So_Clever

[Sgt_G]

Well, shucks. It's been ten days now with over 600 hits, and only one comment back. And thanks, @jespah

When I started writing the story, I crafted an ensemble cast and planned to write in my typical third-person omniscient mode, aka the God View. After I had the first few pages down, I changed my mind and decided to write it in the limited point of view to follow just one character, that being Miss Smith. However, I already had one part written where I followed Miller and Price, so I amended my rule to say I would follow either Smith or Miller (it was going to be Price, but Miller became a more important character). When I write about what Luke and the others are doing, it's when Smith and/or Miller can see it happen.

It made for an interesting challenge for me as an author. I never tried to restrict my point of view like that before. Most of my favorite book-authors write in God View, and I like to use ensemble cast, so that's my default mode of writing.

As to why I wrote this particular story:

Spoiler

A while back, there was a thread in which we were each contributing a character to build a full crew of a starship. My character, which I never posted, was going to be a small, furry, non-human electronics technician. He's cute and cuddly, and speaks in very broken English as his vocal cords aren't built to make human sounds. People underestimate him. He's actually highly intelligent, with an IQ above 150. So, now that I had a character, I wanted to create his home planet. And that's where So Clever got its start.

 

[Sgt_G]

I originally thought Christina was the married woman,

For the life of me, I could not figure out how you made this mistake. Still, I did edit the scene at the dining table where I introduced the human cast from this:

members of Christina’s extended family were her older sister Valerie Smith-Jones and her husband William Jones....​

to now read as this:

members of Christina’s extended family were her older sister Valerie Smith-Jones and Val's husband William Jones....​

Changing one word should, hopefully, eliminate the problem for future readers. As to keeping track of who's who in the story, well, that's always a problem with an ensemble cast, no? That's why I put the dining table scene in the story. It might feel clunky, but I felt that was the best way to list everybody in one fell swoop.

Nineteen people is actually a light crew for this type of ship; it really should have 30-35 people for 24/7 operations. I have story ideas set on a ship (police cutter) with a crew of about a hundred. I do plan to make a list of names for every single crew member on the ship, but I do believe I won't put more than about a dozen or so in any given story.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

Apologies for not getting a chance to finish this sooner.

This is a wonderful character piece, exploring space and life away from Starfleet, with hard-working civvies and family squabbles all going on whilst the ship is in crisis, but taking time out to play amateur anthropologists. Whilst it may be a little tricky keeping track of 19 different people and the connections between them, it's not an insurmountable hurdle to get over and enjoy the story.

 

[Sgt_G]

Glad you enjoyed it, Bry.

If you think it's hard for a reader to keep track of everyone in an ensemble cast, try being the author keeping track of not only who's who but also who's where while writing the story.

 

[Sgt_G]

Someone at work asked when I'm going to post the "next part" of this story. Dude, it took me six months to write the above (albeit taking a couple months off in the middle to deal with Real Life stuff). No, I haven't even begun to write anything because, honestly, I'm not sure where I want to go with it.

My original plan was the next story would skip ahead three weeks and place many of the human characters back on Earth, facing a hearing in front of a board of high-ranking officials who will decide what to do with the planet. And also, what criminal charges, if any, the crew may face. But that was before I added the extension to the end.

If I pick the story up with them still on the planet, there's a host of issues to be resolved (SPOILER ALERT):
-- They can't leave until the Star Fleet team gets there. Figure at least four or five days, possible as many as ten days, before the team arrives. A lot can happen in that time. A whole lot.
-- They have cargo with a deadline for delivery. How do they get it there?
-- She has another ship to deal with. What should she do with it?
-- I've hinted at some mysteries behind the planet's history .. what are those (I'm not even sure yet) and how much should I reveal?
-- And of course, the biggest issue of them all: what will Sarah & family do next?? What should the humans do about them??

 

[Robert Bruce Scott]

You weren't kidding when you characterized this as a novella. At the risk of necroposting, I'll have a look and leave a comment after reading.

...If you think it's hard for a reader to keep track of everyone in an ensemble cast, try being the author keeping track of not only who's who but also who's where while writing the story.

I created a resource book when working on Star Trek Hunter, with comprehensive backgrounds for each character, org charts for Star Fleet admiralty and for the U.S.S. Hunter, political structures for various cultures (including Earth Gov, the Andorian Empire, Vulcan High Command and two separate romulan governments as well as the klingons), plot lines, ship names (and crew members mentioned), and canon variance notes.

I also included the entire crew roster for the U.S.S. Hunter at the beginning of each episode, which became really useful as crew tended to rotate out and I needed to make sure I wasn't mentioning someone who shouldn't be there...

Thanks!! rbs

 

[Sgt_G]

I'm glad you like it thus far, @Robert Bruce Scott, and look forward to seeing your comments when you get to the end.

It was supposed to be a "short story" to lay the background for a character to be used in later writings. Alas, I appear to be incapable to writing a "short". I kind of let the story go where it wanted to, even with the end goal in mind. I actually did trim it back a bit, such as I started a funny scene where the female "clever monkeys" became interested when one of the women hung her under-things out on a line to dry. The transition to that scene wasn't working for me, so I dropped it. Maybe I'll sneak that into the sequel.....

I, too, have a spreadsheet listing the name, rank, and duty title of the entire 120-man crew for the Police Cutter stories that I've been working on. Obviously, I don't plan on writing about everyone on the ship, but you never know when you might need to mention the crewman on night shift back in engineering who plays a mean banjo.

 

[Robert Bruce Scott]

I'm thinking you can remove all the Star Trek franchise-owned references from this story and retail it as original science fiction. I'm a big fan of the engineering detail that avoids too much technobabble. And the complicated family relationships - especially the rapprochement between the sisters.

There are a few questions left over - but only from a Star Trek perspective. Particularly why the planet was listed as pristine but not first contact by the previous explorers.

I have to echo the comment about having trouble telling the characters apart. Once you got halfway through the story, you started re-introducing them by explaining their positions and developing their characters, which helped clear that up. A more thorough introduction of the characters early on - physical description, clothing - can help quell that confusion. It's easier to remember characters that you can visualize. Such introductions kind of have to be spaced out or they'll just kill the narrative.

Kudos on the .007 jump start to the story - with the pirate encounter both creating the story and drawing the reader immediately into an action sequence in the same move. A valuable counter-weight to the more leisurely pace of the story once it gets planetside - a pace necessary for the development of the monkeys. Nice to see a story in this venue with that kind of pace.

Thanks!! rbs

 

[Sgt_G]

There are a few questions left over - but only from a Star Trek perspective.

There are many questions left over. Yes, so many questions.

Particularly why the planet was listed as pristine but not first contact by the previous explorers.

Presumably the survey team never realized the Senji are sentient let alone sapient. Or did they? Why was their report so heavily redacted? Maybe Part Two will answer these questions, and more. But only if I figure those answers out and actually sit down to type it out!

I'm glad you liked the story.

 

[Sgt_G]

Well, now, isn't this interesting:

Marmosets use specific ‘names’ for one another, study finds

Marmosets use specific ‘names’ for one another, study finds

Researchers say behaviour, identified for first time in non-human primates, aids social cohesion

www.theguardian.com

https://scitechdaily.com/breaking-cognitive-boundaries-groundbreaking-study-finds-monkeys-use-names-to-communicate/

Maybe, just maybe, my story is not so far-fetched after all.

 

[Robert Bruce Scott]

A big hello to all intelligent life out there and for the rest of you, just keep banging the rocks together, guys. You'll get there. Eventually.