HRVST: Finishing A Finale To A Book
30 Days To Finish The Final Part of a Book, "Harvest", Set On The Moon
I am committing to finishing a book, labeled “Book #2”, retitled “Harvest”, over the next 30 days.
This is a “how the sausage is made” post.
That is to say I am finishing a draft of a book.
It’s the second time I’ve written a book this way, in spurts of 30 day bouts. “Book #1”, “Box Of Stars” was done by accident after 6 rounds of monthly madness.
I poured my grief and imagination and excitement into a story set centuries from now. True to my form, the book, “Box of Stars”, was half real history and half story, with moments from the Dutch Golden Age of commerce and art up, through the Cold War, and up to the 90s birth of the Internet (plus a story of a post-war solar system society).
Not long after I began searching for editors for “Book #1”, I had to shelve everything and sell a house, the last of things to settle from Dad’s passing.
I thought I was done with writing but I was consumed by a speech of JFK in 1962 at Rice University in Texas.
“We Choose To Go” kept resounding in my mind, and I had to write something.
Timing was good, the house was sold after a long hot summer of issues, and I got back to work on what would become “Harvest”.
I wanted to begin a story on Mars about a century after JFK’s “Moon” speech in a series called “2062”. I then jumped to Earth and a financial crisis, in the wake of the first series’ disaster, in “Coin”, and then to “The Verse” in “VIBE".
I left a cliffhanger, and now I’m going to tie the pieces together on the Moon, in “HRVST”, as in Harvest Moon, back to the source of my inspiration.
I plan to write extended chapters here, and as a collection on my Typeshare profile, save them also in draft mode in web 3 platform Mirror (Here is a link to a Mirror “table of contents” for “Ledger Domain”, I think it works.).
On Twitter, I’ll post square shaped preview images of chapters (which I began doing with the “VIBE” series).
This is a LOT to push on you, so I will hit publish and NOT hit “email”.
I plan to email a links page every 5 to 7 days of what I write and send, which will connect to about 5 to 15 pages of the story by my estimate.
I will lose followers as I do these, maybe beginning with this one, but that’s okay, I can’t let the algos tell me what I can and can’t do with my life. There are plenty of other people out there who have “Top 10” cat video lists and the wisdom of the nano-ages to take care of their needs. I’ve got stories and some life left in me to tell them.
Below are 2 “chapters”, one from “VIBE” and a prologue to “HRVST”.
Here is the final piece of “VIBE” and the PROLOGUE to “HRVST”.
I begin “media res”, in the middle of things, plus music each time.
VIBE, Ch. 30: Escaping Upward
The VERSE, upward to LUNA, the End of The Beginning
The elevator doors of the L'Atelier opened.
"Top level. Sky Glass." said the elevator.
The red hues of an invisible sunset were just beginning.
"We can see all of city from here. I'll miss this view."
"What happens now?"
"They're coming through the Lobby. They'll get past the 'Desk Clerk', who is legendary for stopping the anyone without a reservation. But these trespassers will be specialists."
"Where can we go from here?" asked the Artist.
"Here." The Ledger pointed at a dome they stood in front of. The crystalline nano lattice of the Sky Glass housed a telescope.
"This is an uplink, one of the few that can't be breached."
"Back to the Verse? They're waiting for you, nowhere to hide."
"I'm not going back, I'm going up, way up. Right to the second world all Carbons took as their own. I'm going up to Luna. To the Moon. You'll be safe here. They're not looking for you, you can even head back home." The Ledger smiled.
"I'm coming with you." the Artist started walking to the dome.
"To Luna? Zephyr, this could be a one way trip. You go with me, you're officially a part of this. There's no going back."
Zephyr looked into Albert's eyes, and smiled.
"I'm not finished working on my masterpiece...
I need inspiration. A change of place."
They walked into the Sky Glass.
"They're here. The Tower will hold them back long enough."
THE DOME SPOKE:
SKY GLASS ONLINE. WELCOME ALBERT L’ORLEANS NECKER. WELCOME ZEPHYR SPRING. UPLINK INITIATED. COMPILING USERS. UPLOAD.
The doors burst open.
"Where are they? Let's ..."
A MOMENT LATER.
BRIGHT WHITE LIGHT fades into focus, of a room with no sharp angles, a dome whose color alternated between off-white matte finish and dull grey steel. Albert’s and Zephyr’s eyes open. They are lying on a raised platform inside the dome. The platform sinks slowly and merges flat with the floor around it.
A door-shaped hole opens in the dome.
A man walks through it.
Albert stares at a face like his own but with wear and years. The man impassive at first, begins to smile and laugh, and extends a hand in greeting.
"Welcome, Albert. This must be Zephyr."
"Hello, Albert. Zephyr, this Albert L'Orleans Necker the First, former Chief Financial Overseer of the Space Cooperative, former senior member of the Board of Directors of the Cooperative. My carbon model. My father."
Albert the First laughed and held Alberto by the sides of his shoulders.
"Welcome to Luna."
HRVST, Prologue: Burning Karma
LUNA, Aitken Basin, Southern Region
We made it into the anteroom, the hatch sealed, the chamber pressurized.
Our suits blinked green. Air.
Then a voice:
“I'm almost flattered you all came, up the well to see me.
I can see it all over you, You're "Langley". And you, you're "Quantico". "You're Special Forces." In the end, you're all "The Cooperative", pawns in its service.
For thousands of years, we bathed in moonlight at night, reached for what was untouchable. Our karma was bondage to one world.
One day, we harnessed new powers. Chariots made for the dark were flown to our object of desire. Our desire made a bonfire of our karma. What did it profit us? The first landing, the first footsteps, the first outpost. The Cooperative began on Luna.
The first and richest province of the Space Cooperative.
They deny it but that's what this place is, in the eyes of an entity that saw the future like a State. Burning karma for an empire.
I've been under exile, house arrest. They don't call it that. I don't have the beach view like the former head of Wellington HQ, for his clever defiance, or avoid being put to pasture like the head of Houston HQ, who, despite his gamesmanship, is a lost boy.
It was always here, answers to all your questions, long before Earth and Mars were lit up by the worst solar storm in eons, before a hurricane washed away Heavyville, Texas, and a sentient ledger disappeared and robbed the world of its financial memory."
We just took it all in, and looked at each other, thinking the same thing,
"Why are you doing this?"
"I'm just a moral man seeking relief."
A portal opened, dim light grew brighter. We walked through it.
Exciting stuff, I love the Moon and stories set there!