#atlastracking

WIP Intro - The Greyhound Club, a novel

Hi, hello, welcome to another wip. I haven’t done one of these in ages but I finally have some new ideas thanks to uni.

The Greyhound Club is a science fiction, literary novel that follows lab tech Gwen as she uncovers the perhaps unsavoury and sinister goings on within the company she works for. Her role within the company is to help engineer and develop the science behind robotic, ai carers for the elderly or injured. However, is there something more to her job that she isn’t being told? And will the new hire she is charged with training help lead her to uncovering the truth behind it all? Who is the elusive and elitist Greyhound Club that consists of the ‘best’ employees from each department, and what do they really do to deserve all of those benefits? Does it have anything to do with Gwen’s experiments? What is the price for finding out the truth?

Genre: science fiction, literary, horror

Setting: undetermined city in England, 2026/a few years in the future

POV: first person, present tense

Status: initial drafting/planning

Vibes/Aesthetics: smog covered motorways, the sizzle of stubbing out a cigarette, a half-filled car park, drawing frowny faces on frosted windows, clicking of a mouse, Uncle Sam posters ripped in half, dead rose bushes, choking on a plastic bag, twisting an ankle, spit on concrete, the smell after rain, dew lined skin, stainless steel, half-fogged glasses.

Unfortunately I can’t post an extract here yet since the assignment is still ongoing but after the hand-in in May I will update with some extracts. But I’m really happy with this idea overall and I think the vibes are super different to things I’ve written before. I tend to go really bloody and gory with horror and the vibes usually have more colour and pigmentation, however with this one I really wanted to mute everything down to the minimum and see what I could extract from those small moments and what will arise from the nothingness. I have also never specifically set a story in England, where I’m from, and I found that so unusual since I have never been to America or any other place I seem to gravitate to when coming up with settings. So rainy England seemed a perfect change of pace. I’ve also been listening to a new album in order to help visualise and get in the headspace of the story more so if you want an even more explicit depiction of the vibes then listen to Kesha’s album, Gag Order.

I’m hoping to be doing small updates on this as I get further through the drafting process as part of my assignment (which is only 3000-3500 words) and try and be a bit more consistent on this one because I really see this going all the way. Idk, I might be delusional but a little doesn’t hurt.

If you have questions then please ask cos I love talking about my work and my characters and my vibes. Also if anyone has any comp titles that would be really appreciated cos I don’t read much sci-fi. And of course if you want to added to the taglist then please let me know.

Taglist:

[image id: an image of a sky filled with long, thin blue and white clouds. “ZIYIN” is written in the middle in a tall, white, partially transparent font, while “a writeblr intro” is written in a smaller blue cursive font in its middle. /end id]

ZIYIN — a writeblr introduction

i’ve had this writeblr for nearly a year now and i still haven’t re-introduced myself yet, smh. welp, for the new year here’s me doing just that! 

ABOUT ME

hey, hi, hello, everyone! some of y’all may remember me by my old url @/writerlywonders, but for those who don’t: my name is judith, i’m a chinese-canadian recent university graduate in my 20′s with a full-time job (derogatory), and i go by she/her pronouns.  

ABOUT MY WRITING

i mainly write character-driven stories about extremely complicated people trying to survive life, their equally as complicated relationships with each other, more dysfunctional families than you can count, and almost no plot. if you dig those, you might like my works. 

(wips under the cut.)

D U O D E C I M A L ↳ a novella by max franciscovich

(image credit to tamanna rumee on unsplash)

Sixteen-year-old Marshall Gardner is 1) straight-laced, 2) exacting, 3) judgemental, and 4) perfectionistic. And below the surface, kept hidden from the rest of the world, he’s 5) controlled by his obsessions and compulsions, 6) fixated on the number twelve, 7) hopelessly in love with his best (only) friend, and 8) horrendously imperfect.

He’s also 9) universally disliked, 10) the self-made enemy of the former GSA president, 11) just a little too easy to trick, and 12) in trouble.

a story in twelve parts, ft. color symbolism, neurodivergent feelings, trans people, the “locked in a room with the person you hate” trope except it’s not enemies-to-lovers they just hate each other, & at least one ray bradbury reference.

AKA “the short story that got away from me and became 23k words,” AKA boy howdy have YOU ever wanted a twelfth night retelling that fully ignores the gayass love triangle that is the main appeal of twelfth night and focuses instead on the irrelevant background characters and their silly little subplot??? have i got the novella for you!

duodecimal is entirely free & being released in full!

all 23k words of it. links & content warnings under the cut.

A Whisper in the Clockwork: A WIP Introduction

Fritz hated the pitying tone, the way the archivist looked at him so worriedly. It was as if they were worried simply talking about missing people would break him. And maybe what he hated more was that they were right, that he’d been sick the first time he’d gone back there and seen Florence’s name added to the records: a paper-thin file that boiled his sister down to her barest essentials.

genre ↠ high fantasy (steampunk)  

content warnings ↠ missing persons (found dead)

summary ↠ 

The Institute is not an easy place to live, and it is an even harder one to leave. Its shifting hallways bury and reveal secrets in turn, and no one is permitted on or off the island without written permission. It is a place for secrets; a place where discoveries are made and buried, and someone is always watching.

When Fritz Everhart invents a machine that amplifies the voices of the dead, he is looking only for one ghost: his sister Florence, who went missing shortly before she was found dead. Instead, he finds secret after secret, and the deeper he ventures into the Institute, the harder it becomes to find his way back out. 

characters ↠

Fritz Everhart: inventor; brilliant and not afraid to own it; arthritic; used to be optimistic, but he seems to have lost the rose-tinted glasses since Florence turned up dead; seeking a purpose, and hoping desperately that if he can talk to Florence just one more time, she’ll be able to tell him what comes next 

Edith Fowler: medic; the last person to see Fritz’s sister and her girlfriend; steady hands but a shaking heart underneath; loves what she does but doesn’t know if what she wants to do aligns with what the Institute wants from her anymore 

Léo Esperanza: archivist; remembers far more than he should; responsible for keeping the Institute’s records but what he really wants is its secrets; the only person who knew Fritz and Florence before the Institute

taglist under the cut (ask to be +/-)

[start id / a photo of a bronze-coloured statue on a brown background facing a golden globe of yellow-white light. over the image, in serif font, is the text “a million homes and none of them is yours” / end id]

A MILLION HOMES AND NONE OF THEM IS YOURS: WIP INTRO

[this is my original work, do not use / repurpose / plagiarise in any form]

GENRE: literary fiction with speculative elements / fabulism [aka a Vibe]

SETTING: south india / a weird other dimension.

FORM: second-person pov, present tense. told in vignettes that are sometimes poems, sometimes recipes, sometimes full scenes and sometimes a single chunk of fancy description.

STAGE: drafting. expected wc: 30k.

TONE: harsh, quiet, seething.

THEMES + AESTHETICS: girlhood vs motherhood, freedom, fear of change, the feeling of missing something you’ve never experienced. red lights, nights with no moon, dimly lit motel rooms, reaching for something and finding only air, dust hanging in abandoned rooms, endless roads, dark forests, silence.

CONTENT WARNING: toxic relationships, intense discussions of motherhood and pregnancy, violent thoughts and mentions of death.

SYNOPSIS:

When a young college student returns to her hometown on her mother’s request, she doesn’t expect to stay long, doesn’t expect to be wanted back permanently, doesn’t expect her mother to be freshly pregnant and doesn't expect to learn that her father has been dead for days—her mother selfishly keeping the news from her. Mid-confrontation, the earth below their feet splits open and the two find themselves in a strange, red-tinted world with eerie sounds and skies with no suns. With a mere two weeks left until the mother’s child is due, the two must work together to navigate their way out and back home, whether it knits them closer or cleaves them apart.

aka what i refer to as “mommy issues: the novella”

CHARACTERS:

[start id / a collage of three pictures placed horizontally next to each other. first image is a shot of two hands reaching for each other against a grey backdrop; second image is plain white with black serif text that reads “the daughter”; third image is a shot of a city at night with silhouette of buildings, the central building illuminated in golden lights / end id]

THE DAUGHTER

our second person narrator!

tfw when you think you’re the shit but also you hate yourself

moral compass is messed up oops [understatement]

all she wants is stability in life but life said fuck you babe

don’t think she sleeps for more than three hours a day actually

is a med student! decided she’d be working to be an obstetrician because it ties in with motherhood and i’m pretentious like that

mitski album of her life is be the cowboy

[start id / a collage of three pictures placed horizontally next to each other. first image is a shot of someone’s hands on a windowsill looking at a sparse garden; second image is plain white with black serif text that reads “the mother”; third image is a shot of a road at night with parked cars and yellow lamposts / end id]

THE MOTHER

that one judgemental aunt in your family

why?? does she keep lying??? for what joy??? i’d love to know

no chill whatsoever but this def runs in the family

does she actually know she’s a person whose actions have consequences? idk, she makes good food though

accidentally started associating her with crabs after drafting this one scene and it is such an image to live with actually

aggressively atheist [we stan]

mitski album of her life is lush

[start id / a photo of a woman standing in a dark room facing a beam of light that illuminates the top half of her face. over the image, in serif font, is the text “You’re both so similar that it prickles. You know she thought you an anchor. You know she needs to touch skin to believe she’s real. You know she’s just as lonely as you. You hope.” / end id]

AN EXCERPT: She almost smiles at you. You almost smile back. You don’t remember when you stopped making jokes out of everything or when she stopped laughing at them, don’t remember when you started pushing limits to see how far you’re truly allowed to reach, to snap, to be, and when she started letting you, started seeing you as another body in her house, started thinking of you in portions rather than person, started touching her neck and face and heart on Sunday mornings with the curtains still up and the windows still whispering from the night draft to convince herself that at least she’s a real. You’re both so similar that it prickles. You know she thought you an anchor. You know she needs to touch skin to believe she’s real. You know she’s just as lonely as you. You hope.

BURNISH, BURN ; a short story by Ari B. 

IMAGES: Masaan, dir. Neeraj Ghaywan (2015) / Cero Umano, Gorche (2013)

length: 2.5k words / 10 minute read

warnings: period typical racism, colonial violence, alcohol mention 

themes: colonization of the mind, identity and belonging, language 

further notes: she’s back!! i have a real soft spot for this short story, what with it being one of the only completed works i have in my roster fjalkfjd. it’s a loose retelling of wuthering heights featuring a south asian heathcliff (since the original text heavily implies that he’s a man of colour). i hope that you all enjoy reading (or re-reading) this, and i’d love to know what you think of it! 

↳ ☆ CHARACTER INTRODUCTIONS.

FUNKE. 25. SHE/HER. One of the most prolific scavengers on this side of universe, Funke is more often known as the illusive ‘Crow’ as a result of the level of goods she manages to unearth out of the most unlikely places. The deal between her and Imaan has the possibility to change the trajectory of everything she deems normal.

IMAAN. 25. SHE/HER. Exceedingly furtive, the meeting between her and Funke goes off with many a hitch. Unfortunately, the scavenger/ship captain is her only hope of escaping her past, that of which only her and Rafe know—so they’ll have to figure out how to get along.

HANI. 26. SHE/HER. Lady Hani is many things. Kingpin of the criminal underworld, and socialite supreme in a plethora of circles... and Funke’s ex. Hani opens up doors that even Funke’s connections can’t reach, and that makes her an integral part of the chessboard, despite lingering ties.

HERON. 26. HE/HIM. Lady Hani’s right hand man, Heron errs on whatever side of the law benefits the both of them, and their outfit. Disney Prince-esque in charm alone, despite the glorified bodyguard and ex-merc traits. Kind, despite himself. 

RAFE. 26. HE/HIM. Mercenary for hire, currently on long-term payroll under Imaan’s banner, Rafe’s mouth is sealed shut—both due to the many credits paid in advance and secrets not yet told. Insufferable, but great to have on deck for a fight.

YAYA. 25. SHE/HER. Yes, THEE Yaya Starburst, the galaxy’s #1 Princess of Pop. Yaya’s universal bounds of love knows no bounds—fans found within their crew-mates, too. As per her current hiatus and pull away from all things musical, she’s making her moves in some (misguided?) journalism... and this could be the break the Larissa crew need. 

SOURCES:

poika picrew 

wanted poster PSD

previous vague intro that has been completely changed and will probably be redone but references this project (i will make a new post soon!!!)