writer life

Dino Mall | Behind the Scenes

JoeRover behind the scenes , , , , , , ,

I had a silly and crazy dream. It starred this couple who were close to divorce. They accidently uncovered that their local mall has cloned extinct animals, such as dinosaurs, so they can operate the mall. The extinct animals make the food and maintain the building, among other chores.

Over time the couple learns that the owners, also a husband and wife duo, have cloned some cavemen/cavewomen to run things like the stores and food court thus kicking out the ones who used to work at the mall. They also replaced the mall cops with their own tougher security guards.

The dream ended with an epic battle between modern animals, like tigers and elephants, versus the extinct animals, like saber-tooth tigers and wooly mammoths. There are also teens in food vendor and department store uniforms battling the cave-workers. The mall cops were also there battling the security guards. The hero husband and wife took on the mall owners.

I woke up about the time the two forces collided.

“What on Earth did I eat before bed to get that dream?” I thought. I think it came from a mixture of watching the “The Golden Years” episode of The Commish on IMBd TV and the Jurassic Park dub video by How It Should Have Ended.

However, that being said, I am working on refining the dream into an upcoming story.

Who do you think would win in a fight between a tiger and a saber-tooth tiger? Let me know in the comments section.

Until the next wormhole…thanks for reading.

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What genre do you write? | Author Q&A

JoeRover Author Q&A, behind the scenes , , , , , , , , ,

If you have any questions for me, please leave them in the comments section.

What genre do you write?
I focus mainly on science fiction and fantasy. My books have a lot of alien invasions, time travel, magic/superpowers, advanced technology, and more.
I enjoy sci-fi because it is as close to magic in the real world as we’ll get to (at least at this time). I enjoy how you can let your mind run wild. There are restrictions but not many. It is hard to have characters go on magical journeys if the story is set in the real world.

I also focus a lot on superhero type stories because I like how 99 percent of the time the story ends happily. Horror stories, for example, rarely have a happy ending or closure; they usually have some kind of ending twist.

Until the next wormhole…thanks for reading.

YouTube CliffsNotes | Living the Write Life

JoeRover Living the Write Life , , , ,

After seeing the latest “couch-side chat” by MatPat (host/owner of The Game Theorists channel–among others) where he discusses how the good that YouTubers do is largely overlooked by the news media, my first reaction was “duh.” (Click here for the video.)

He mentions how a public relations person told him that no one is interested in good news about YouTubers. As a once-upon-a-time reporter (and for a short period a PR person), I was not surprised by this statement. The first thing they tell you when you walk through the Journalism 101 door is “if it bleeds it leads.”

It’s not just YouTubers that are targeted by this “no one interested in the good news they do” belief, it’s everyone. I can’t tell you how many times I pitched a “good” news story only to have it rejected or published on page 25.

The reason for the “no good news” is partly because “bad news” is what sells. News media operates by lowest common dominator, which sadly is drugs, sex, and violence. People are more interested in reading about a scandal or accident or disaster–probably because these things end up affecting people. The story about the 100-year-old woman is cute but how does it affect the average person. The story about the tornado ripping through a town impacts more, especially if you have friends or family there.

The “bad news” is also easier to write from a reporting perspective. It’s a lot easier to find an angle for a story where YouTuber X is found to be a child predator versus YouTuber X donated $2,000 to charity. In the later, pretty much all your questions are answered within a few words; the former creates questions and creates more stories (i.e. coverage of a trial, controversy over if YouTube should run background checks, etc). In the charity example, you get one, maybe two, stories. In the child predator story, you get hundreds.

But, I’m not here to talk about business theory or sociology or psychology. I’m here to talk about the second thing I thought of after watching the video. How do people find out about all these news/debate topics and still spend hours upon hours on their videos? Is there a YouTube CliffsNotes I don’t know about?

So, naturally I began thinking about how funny that would be if there were CliffsNotes on YouTube Creators/Channels (there might be; I just said I’m not “in the loop”). Wouldn’t that be weird/cool to walk into a bookstore and there is CliffsNotes: MatPat? It’d be full of all the stuff about his channels you’d need to know, like “clap and a half,” and “#BlameJason,” and “Pro Tips.” It would also have brief summaries of the more popular videos.

Or how about a “For Dummies” spin-off/series. Grian for Dummies or Domics for Dummies.

I’m sorry, these are the weird rabbit holes that writers/artists find themselves in sometimes. But, you can’t tell me that you would rather have a post discussing news media theory or dissecting an Internet video than hearing about Let Me Explain Studios for Dummies.

Two hours later…

Two hundred dislikes?!

OK, so maybe you would rather have a post dissecting a video…

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The latest Side Quest short story Carl Rogers Is Missing is out now for FREE.