The Gathering Darkness (the Connor series) - Dirk B. (Page 20 of 57)

Close. It's Antonio, formerly Davide. I didn't like the latter. I would leave out actual mental dialogue, but I think haunting Romano with whispers and ghostly appearances of Antonio would be good.

Eh. A story set in Italy that Americanizes the culture for me might as well be set in Little Italy, New York. Audrey voice: "You can dooo eeeet"

In related news, Project L which is set in Earth Prime (eg our Earth) I'm really enjoying the writing process because it has terms like "midnight" and "o'clock". You wouldn't believe how awful it is to write around time references.

On the other hand, it's taught me (forced) to learn to downplay time.

A: When are you headed to the masquerade?
B: When the second hour tolls

So awkward! No way for B to answer this without using Earth terminology, so I make sure A doesn't ask with such precision

A: Are you going to the ball?
B: Tonight's? Of course

I have a new, small prologue up, and scene 3.1, the funeral of Romano's former lover. I've been looking forward to writing scene 3.2, where Campagna first meets De Rosa's godson. She's going to spiral as badly as Romano in 3.1. After that, Connor "observes" an exorcism. :-)

Scene 3.1 is back up.

Thanks
Dirk

I wish I had a better understanding of the finer points of the genre

No never watched or read those

After researching poisons, I decided to settle on good old cyanide. It's relatively painless if you take a lethal dose, which doesn't take much. So, basically, the dark being is going to be handing out cyanide (and water bottles?) to his victims. A painless form of suicide, which minimizes the amount of suffering that the dark being, in turn, experiences for killing cardinals. The undigested capsules will be discovered in the stomachs during autopsy, so the big question for the detectives and the Church is why cardinals are taking cyanide. I originally thought to have them wear a 666 ring and position them like an upside-down cross, but part of me wants to keep knowledge of the Antichrist's involvement completely out of the early killings and have the clues be more subtle and slow in coming out. That probably requires more deaths, which I've been trying to avoid. However, now that the deaths are all painless suicides, I may have a little freedom to kill a few more cardinals, if necessary. It would also mean losing all of scene 1.2 (Cardinal Vitale's encounter with the dark being). Regardless, the reader is ahead of the detectives since the book summary already states that the Church concludes it and Connor are being stalked by the Antichrist, so what's the point of delaying when the detectives learn the truth?

I'm going to take a crack at rewriting scenes 1.2 and 1.4 using cyanide rather than burying Vitale alive to see if I like it. Once those are written, I'll decide if I want to keep the Antichrist out of the picture completely until later.

In my case, the cardinals have to die because it's the End Times and the Unholy Trinity are trying to conquer the Church from within. Satan has been working on this for decades (or maybe even centuries), moving his minions into positions of power. I plan to make them responsible for the sexual abuse. I'd make him responsible for the Protestant split from Catholicism, but that would piss off Protestants, so I won't be going there.

After a discussion on my Catholic forum, I decided to revert to the previously planned deaths (buried alive, hanging, ???, and ???). They don't like gruesome deaths, so I'll try to minimize that aspect, but one of the other members of the site reminded me that Revelation is a violent book. Which begs the question: how do I keep a Catholic audience if I do a relatively accurate portrayal of Revelation in my books two and three?

Chapter two now up on the site excludes the cyanide element but adds other changes, including the dark being identifying himself as the Antichrist and a cross-shaped grave. Not much else has changed.

Unless you've been living under a rock, you know Connor is the focus of my story. He displays an increasing number of supernatural powers as the story progresses (comforting the grieving, healing the sick, casting out demons, etc.). However, he has no knowledge that he may be Jesus returned to Earth as a boy, although Church elders increasingly think it's possible.

My latest prologue is a peek ahead to two weeks after the start of the story, when he is travelling in the Holy Land, retracing the footsteps of Jesus. The scene has him surrounded by frightened members of the Holy Land tour as a demonic swarm of locusts bears down on them. Each locust has a stinger like that of a scorpion, as described in the Book of Revelation (locusts don't naturally have stingers). Connor has yet to realize his full potential, so even he's not yet sure what he can and can't do.

When it comes to the locust attack, I mention that everyone is huddled around Connor, hoping he can save them. Everyone except Connor is trembling. It's the trembling I question. Although he's not yet reached his full potential, he has an unswerving faith in God, and prays for a miracle. Shouldn't he be trembling, too? After all, he's not Christ-like yet.

I'm inclined to have him tremble, in spite of his faith in God. This affects more than just this one event. His powers increase from event to event, increasing his confidence with each miracle.

Thoughts.
Dirk

Depending upon the number of such events/attacks (TBD), I think I'll let his confidence evolve with each miracle. So, if the above scene takes place early on, I'll have him tremble because he doesn't know his own powers. Him struggling with his imperfect faith could be a good character arc for him. If the event takes place later, he'll no longer tremble. I've only begun to figure out how many ways he is attacked, especially in the Holy Land, where he's supposed to be safe from the Antichrist who is still killing cardinals in Rome. There's no way the Antichrist can be doing both, so some think Connor is being hunted by the False Prophet. I wish I could get rid of the latter character from Revelation since his potential presence is complicating the story/mystery.

So now that I've punted scene 1.2 (Cardinal Vitale killed by the Antichrist), I have three back-to-back scenes with Father Romano/Connor as follows:

- 0.0 Prologue - Connor saves the tour group in the Holy Land from the locusts
- 1.1 Connor cures Alessandro's epilepsy
- 1.2 Cardinal Vitale is killed by the Antichrist (deleted)
- 1.3 Connor and Alessandro share breakfast and become friends

I've been trying to alternate between Father Romano/Connor scenes and Inspectors Campagna/De Rosa scenes. I wrote Vitale from his own POV, but considered it part of the murder mystery.

Does it matter that I have three opening Romano/Connor scenes (spanning two chapters and 13 pages) in a row? Campagna and De Rosa don't appear until the last scene (1.4, 7 pages) of chapter one when Vitale's body is discovered.

I'm considering adding a one-page scene in place of 1.2 where the Antichrist enters the Church and confronts Vitale, but ending it before the killer reveals who he is. I could re-use that same approach for the other three killings.

I could also end scene 1.2 right after he says "Good evening, Your Eminence."

Thoughts?