WorldEmber 2023 Homework

Week 1 Homework

I decided to work on Vnou, with a focus on creating more of the character's stories in specific, since it's a world that I both love and find easy to write in. After NaNo I want something that is easier for me. And while I have spent a lot of time on the various families, or at least working on defining some of them, I want to get into more details with the families. Giving myself a higher word count, I'm hoping to actually write with this challenge too, not just craft the characters and their information. I'm not intending on trying to write out a full novel but I do like writing little snippets and small shorts with the various characters I make and I think it helps flesh out the world and the characters in specific. If I can thread some of the things together in some sort of cohesive timeline for any character in particular, all the better.

Relationship Impression by SanctifiedSavage via Midjourney

Week 3

The vnou homepage needs a lot of love. I've never been the sort to advertise or summarize things very well, so I never really know what to say beyond "look at this thing I have done". And I'm self conscious enough to think that it's only for me anyway, so what should it matter? At base, vnou is for me. I could likely spiffy up the homepage because it deserves something that is as pretty as the vnou are in general I'll just need to figure out how to structure it in a way that makes sense.

Week 2 Homework

Scope

While tackling the characters of an entire world might seem like a rather large scope, characters in and of themselves is actually one of the easier things for me so it doesn't feel like a daunting task at all. Fleshing them out and adding to their histories, their lives, etc is going to be time consuming and a creative endeavor, but I don't foresee it being difficult, thus the perceived broad scope is more a tiny portion of the vnou world as a whole.

Themes / Mood

Vnou is built on the back of a theme that strings through a lot of my writings - that of a relationship and power dynamic between something that is supremely powerful and something that is ultimately submissive. What that means for each character and each relationship, how that affects the world around them, and how that might change depending on the setting with a bit of magic and manipulation involved is the real fun for me. While there have been a lot of my settings that grant characters a lot more freedom and agency, vnou does not. People are born into the roles they have and there is very little mobility - but the rigidity of the world makes it all the more fun to see how someone might supplant expectations.
I also toy heavily with the idea of a secretive or shadow world beyond the one that is perceived or known. The vast majority of the vnou world seems to function similar to our own, in which I usually refer to it as earth au. That gives the vnou world a generally bright shine until you start looking behind the scenes or catch glimpses of things that don't seem right. Because they really aren't. It's the idea of how messed up the world really could be when the vast majority of things are manipulated and manufactured to be that way.

Goals / Inspiration

Though the noble vnou are a small portion of the over all vnou world, they have always been my primary focus. Fleshing out this shadow-ruling class has been my goal and eventually crafting enough of a timeline to write out their stories would be the ultimate goal. At base, my inspiration for the vnou was the Calluvia's Royalty series by Alessandra Hazard. The first book is a rough introduction to the actual meat of the Royalty and what sparked my love, and thus creation of, the vnou. As well as a hefty adaptation of a scifi race I had attempted to make some years ago that happened to be quite ruthless. Dabbling through the Vnou's history, they've maintained that merciless behavior.