So I started working on my fifth story, then I realized I had nothing.

My idea for stories five through eight was to follow the exploits of one character at a time through a war and interrelate all four … somehow. So I started thinking of interesting scenes and ways to correlate and show both sides of the battle, such as a character that betrays his own side because he thinks the opposition’s god is superior, but is then killed for treason against his own people, because, after all, he could turn around and do it again.

I thought about a person on a warship (tentatively called the Omega) that gets destroyed and he has to swim for shore and fight for his life. Perhaps a native is bleeding to death and hands over their baby to a soldier, begging them to take care of it. Perhaps one of the characters sacrifices themselves to give civilians from the other side a chance to escape.

Tons of ideas and ways to relate them, but overall they are nothing more than your typical meditation on war. A chronicle. It’s probably good practice for me to write such things, but I wanted it to be something more. I wanted some underlying reason, some theme to tie it all together, really give it a pulse, and make it special. So far, nothing’s come to mind. And it’s been two weeks.

So, because I still haven’t come up with the lifeblood for these stories, I haven’t had the will or interest to write them.

Instead, I’ve found myself editing my novel again. I guess I just couldn’t stay away for so long, and how much ground I’d lost while doing this project became painfully apparent.

I put off posting any updates, just in case I came up with the x-factor angle I needed to continue my second batch of short stories, but I didn’t. So, I kept working on the drafts of the short stories I’d already written and pressed on with my novel.

And then my wife picked up one of the two books I’d been reading: Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game. She would read it while I was at work, and sometimes while I was at home, too, which gave me more time to edit when we’d usually be watching a movie.

She devoured the book and said it blew her mind.

I was like, really?

She said it could be her new Favorite Book of All-Time.

Does something so amazing happen later on? I mean, there’s no doubt that it’s a highly enjoyable book; I was a third of the way through at the time and enjoying it quite a bit, but I was skeptical it could pull off something so amazing that could become worthy of such a coveted title.

Still, I picked it up again and read the rest post-haste, if only because G was really excited and wanted to discuss aspects of the story with me.

Well, I’m happy to say it blew my mind, too! And … while I wouldn’t quite say it’s my new favorite book of all time, it’s frighteningly close.

Anyway, I’m out of the short story workshop and back to the ol’ grind (editing), but it was a good journey and I’ll be following along with the workshop in my own little way. There’s no doubt I learned a lot, and I have more stories and ideas than ever to work with. Most importantly, I’ve proved to myself that I can come up with new ideas, and quickly. So, thank you, Merillee, but I’m afraid I sometimes just can’t control my monkey-brain as well as you can.