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midnightwwriter

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  1. I          Story Statement

    In the religion of Voodoo, Baron Samedi is an all powerful death god. His function is to keep the dead in cemeteries and prevent the rise of zombies. But even Death has his limits especially when he gets bored.

    II         SECOND ASSIGNMENT: in 200 words or less, sketch the antagonist or antagonistic force in your story. Keep in mind their goals, their background, and the ways they react to the world about them.

     Baron Samedi has finished his nights work, dumping a child murderer’s soul into the bowels of hell. A spirit who enjoys rum, sex, and Cuban cigars, Baron Samedi is just about to call it a night when his Soulkeeper, Zadie, tells him that he has one more soul to escort into the afterworld. The spirit of the young boy who had been killed by the previous criminal. Exactly at that moment, Samedi decides he has had enough of the dead children, homicides suicides, and decrepit old people. His entry into the mortal world is a freshly dug open grave. He jumps in feet first and lands in Newark, New Jersey. Samedi realizes he needs a “blood sack,” a human body in order to truly enjoy living amongst mortals. A voodoo priestess prayed to him for revenge, so Samedi seeks out the body of a Newark lawyer who had cheated her out of money. Now on the road to debauchery and a good time, he ignores his duties as the precious keeper of the dead, leave the Underworld in an imbalance.

     

               

    IIIfile:///C:/Users/Owner/AppData/Local/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image001.jpg THIRD ASSIGNMENT: create a breakout title (list several options, not more than three, and revisit to edit as needed).

    Death Spirits Rising

    The Book of Samedi

    Imbalance

     

    IV. FOURTH ASSIGNMENT: Develop two smart comparables for your novel. This is a good opportunity to immerse yourself in your chosen genre. Who compares to you? And why?

                I love the work of Jim Butcher, particularly his Dresden Files. He was my original inspiration for writing urban fantasy, where the worlds of “normal” people collide with the mystical. Harry Dresden, a wizard in Chicago, my Baron Samedi, a Voodoo God disguised as a corporate lawyer in Newark. I very much enjoy blurring the lines between mortals, spirits and demi-gods.

                I love the work of Preston and Childs. I will not compare my writing to theirs…they are simply brilliant, and I am humbled by their work. But what is remarkably enjoyable and fascinating is the way they develop their characters. Many of Preston and Child’s characters, especially the beloved Agent Pendergast, who have a somewhat mystical bent about them, and find themselves placed into realistic and at times, gritty settings,

     

    V. FIFTH ASSIGNMENT: write your own hook line (logline) with conflict and core wound following the format above. Though you may not have one now, keep in mind this is a great developmental tool. In other words, you best begin focusing on this if you're serious about commercial publication.

                He likes booze, sex and good food. But who keeps the dead in their graves, when a Death God walks out?

     

    VI SIXTH ASSIGNMENT: sketch out the conditions for the inner conflict your protagonist will have. Why will they feel in turmoil? Conflicted? Anxious? Sketch out one hypothetical scenario in the story wherein this would be the case--consider the trigger and the reaction.

                On a lark, Taroen Magus-Stewart agrees to help his best friends sister, who he has a crush on, to enter a desolate cemetery at night and grab some graveyard dirt off from a murderer who died in 1902. In the process,  Taroen sees a spirit, Lady Simba, who traps him into helping her on a mission in the mortal world--- to find Baron Samedi, a Haitian god of the cemetery, who has quit his job as a keeper of the dead. Taroen Magus-Stewart is a young Jamaican high school student whose only concerned is finding a girlfriend, getting good grades, and surviving high school.An unwilling participant, he’s dragged into a scenario of being the “bait” in order to lure a powerful death good back to the Underworld.

                As if things aren’t complicated enough, the Baron’s absence had opened the door for the rise of a witch and a Bokor, a zombie king and death spirits of legend are being killed. The only person who can stop this is Baron Samedi who refuses to return home, having made a new home among mortals.

    file:///C:/Users/Owner/AppData/Local/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image001.jpg Next, likewise sketch a hypothetical scenario for the "secondary conflict" involving the social environment. Will this involve family? Friends? Associates? What is the nature of it?

    VIIfile:///C:/Users/Owner/AppData/Local/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image001.jpg FINAL ASSIGNMENT: sketch out your setting in detail. What makes it interesting enough, scene by scene, to allow for uniqueness and cinema in your narrative and story? Please don't simply repeat what you already have which may well be too quiet. You can change it. That's why you're here! Start now. Imagination is your best friend, and be aggressive with it.

    Death Spirits Rising(working title) has multiple settings.

    As the story opens, Baron samity is in his graveyard with one final open portal he is about to close. the area surrounding the grave is dark and misty. When the evil soul, who has just been executed realises that the portal he will be entering leads to hell, he has to be coerced into leaving. This amounts to Baron samity hitting him on the head with the back of the shovel that has been digging graves. When he is informed that he has a dead child to escort into the underworld, he decides that he's had enough an jumps feetfirst into the town of Newark NJ.

    In order to fully enjoy himself, Baron Samedi assumes the body of a corporate lawyer, Danny Vinho, employed by a law firm in the city of Newark. Upon arriving in Newark, he is not entirely happy about the environment, and complains that the lawyer couldn't have been from Los Angeles, London, New York or Paris. Baron Samedi, who now goes by the name of Danny, lives between Newark and Jersey City New Jersey.

    Danny's journey also takes him to an old mansion set in a beautiful park in Newark. The name of the home/mansion is called “Waterfields”. This mansion once belonged to robber barons in the 1900, but a voodoo priestess who purchased it as a tax sale in the 1960s. When she passed on, she  bequeathed it to her daughter, Izillda Montague, also a voodoo priestess. He spends time there because he loves the opulent setting. Danny also realizes that the priestess owes him a favor and is happy to exchange romantic sunrises and sex as the payback. Initially, he views her as just another mortal in a long line of conquests, but when he starts developing real feelings for her, he becomes confused.

    The final violent conflict between good and evil, occurs in the basement of an old abandoned factory building which has been converted into a place of sacrifice. Baron Samedi and other death spirits storm the build for a final confrontation in what was once an old bomb shelter. Danny realizes he must go back to the Underworld as Baron Samedi because there are consequences.

     

     

     

  2. 1. Story Statement- When a Voodoo God of Death abandons the Underworld to entertain himself, death spirits are being killed and humans can’t die.

     

    2. The Antagonist- After Baron Samedi abandons his duties for a life of debauchery in the human world, death spirits are being randomly slaughtered. As a result, humans cannot pass into the afterlife, having been forced into longer excruciating deaths. A young Jamaican high school student, Taroen Stewart, trying to impress a girl by stealing graveyard dirt, encounters a Congolese spirit, who, along with an assortment of other grim reapers, force him to search for Baron Samedi to compel him his return to the Underworld. Taroen is uniquely unqualified for the task, having no experience in the voodoo or the occult. He resents being pressed into service and hostilities dramatically increase when he finds out that he actually the son of Baron Samedi.

     

    3.  Breakout Titles-Death Spirits Rising: The Books of Samedi

          When Death Walks Out

     The Voodoo Prince

    4.  Stormfront by Jim Butcher, the Netflix Series Lucifer

     

    5.  Hook line: Dead people bore him, sunrises intrigue him, but when death quits his job, the living will suffer.

     

    6.  Inner Turmoil: Taroen Stewart wants to be a normal teenager, but instead he is forcibly dragged into an world he wasn’t aware even existed. With his life on the line, and forced to deliver a wily, wanton voodoo death god to a cemetery, Taroen is terrified when certain powers arise in him. He later learns that an entity he is the son of Baron Samedi.

     

    7. Social Conflict: Baron Samedi has taken over the body of handsome thirty something lawyer.He spends time enjoying human carnal, culinary and intellectual pleasures. He has no desire to the “go back to dead guy land.”

     

    Other death spirits, an Irish banshee, a French grim reaper, and Charon the Greek Ferryman, cannot fulfill their respective duties, escorting the newly dead to heaven, hell or purgatory. The death spirits are as terrified as Taroen because they are being killed by the necromancer who possessed a knife that kills them. A Catholic priest from Taroen’s school who is familiar with all the parties involved attempts to strike a balance between the spirits, Taroen and Baron Samedi.

     

    8. Setting- Dark Spirits Rising enters world of dark, urban fantasy.

     

    The story occurs in urban cities of Newark and Jersey City, New Jersey. The opening scene occurs in the Underworld as the Baron is digging a grave for a newly executed murderer. After he sends the murderer’s soul to hell, he then sees the open grave as an entrance to the living world. Assuming the body of a young handsome lawyer, he seeks out a voodoo priestess to enjoy expensive booze, sex, fine cuisine, and interacting humans in the city streets. One of the Banshees is murdered on the streets of Chelsea by the same necromancer who is responsible for the killing other death spirits.

     

    The final scene in the book takes place in an old, converted gymnasium in Jersey City where the death spirits led by Samedi fight the necromancer to prevent Taroen’s girlfriend from being a human sacrifice for the necromancer.

     

     

  3. 1. Story Statement- When a Voodoo God of Death abandons the Underworld to entertain himself, death spirits are being killed and humans can’t die.

     

    2. The Antagonist- After Baron Samedi abandons his duties for a life of debauchery in the human world, death spirits are being randomly slaughtered. As a result, humans cannot pass into the afterlife, having been forced into longer excruciating deaths. A young Jamaican high school student, Taroen Stewart, trying to impress a girl by stealing graveyard dirt, encounters a Congolese spirit, who, along with an assortment of other grim reapers, force him to search for Baron Samedi to compel him his return to the Underworld. Taroen is uniquely unqualified for the task, having no experience in the voodoo or the occult. He resents being pressed into service and hostilities dramatically increase when he finds out that he actually the son of Baron Samedi.

     

    3.  Breakout Titles-Death Spirits Rising: The Books of Samedi

          When Death Walks Out

     The Voodoo Prince

    4.  Stormfront by Jim Butcher, the Netflix Series Lucifer

     

    5.  Hook line: Dead people bore him, sunrises intrigue him, but when death quits his job, the living will suffer.

     

    6.  Inner Turmoil: Taroen Stewart wants to be a normal teenager, but instead he is forcibly dragged into an world he wasn’t aware even existed. With his life on the line, and forced to deliver a wily, wanton voodoo death god to a cemetery, Taroen is terrified when certain powers arise in him. He later learns that an entity he is the son of Baron Samedi.

     

    7. Social Conflict: Baron Samedi has taken over the body of handsome thirty something lawyer.He spends time enjoying human carnal, culinary and intellectual pleasures. He has no desire to the “go back to dead guy land.”

     

    Other death spirits, an Irish banshee, a French grim reaper, and Charon the Greek Ferryman, cannot fulfill their respective duties, escorting the newly dead to heaven, hell or purgatory. The death spirits are as terrified as Taroen because they are being killed by the necromancer who possessed a knife that kills them. A Catholic priest from Taroen’s school who is familiar with all the parties involved attempts to strike a balance between the spirits, Taroen and Baron Samedi.

     

    8. Setting- Dark Spirits Rising enters world of dark, urban fantasy.

     

    The story occurs in urban cities of Newark and Jersey City, New Jersey. The opening scene occurs in the Underworld as the Baron is digging a grave for a newly executed murderer. After he sends the murderer’s soul to hell, he then sees the open grave as an entrance to the living world. Assuming the body of a young handsome lawyer, he seeks out a voodoo priestess to enjoy expensive booze, sex, fine cuisine, and interacting humans in the city streets. One of the Banshees is murdered on the streets of Chelsea by the same necromancer who is responsible for the killing other death spirits.

     

    The final scene in the book takes place in an old, converted gymnasium in Jersey City where the death spirits led by Samedi fight the necromancer to prevent Taroen’s girlfriend from being a human sacrifice for the necromancer.

     

     

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