Last week’s story

I have not yet finished “The Demon of Ypres”, last week’s story. I expect I will do so either today or tomorrow. It’s a simple story, my WWI horror story, as most of the stories originating in this project have been, but one never knows. I’ve been working on these stories during my breaks and lunch hours while working at home, but now that remote work has come to an end for my employer, I will have to go into the office, without my personal computer, so working on these stories might be a little bit more difficult. I can do it, though! I know I can!

But I’m also near to the halfway mark of this project (next week will be Prompt No. 26!), and I will have to decide whether I’m going to proceed on to number 52, or start revising stories for submission. If anyone has input to offer on this important question, please let me know in the comments.

This week’s prompt

This week I rolled a 1 on my D4, and a 5 on my D6, which means I drew from the Story Engine’s main deck, and that the sub-genre I’ll be writing is Mystery. I’ve also considered adding a third die roll to determine which aspect of storytelling I’d be working on each week, whether that be character, setting, sensory details, and so on. I’ll have to make that decision as well.

Anyway, here’s the prompt:

MYSTERY: A doppelganger wants to unravel the mystery of a wish-granting paradise, but they must leave the familiar behind and face the unknown.

I’ve always been fascinated by doppelganger stories, especially those that are supposedly true. Did a nun at a Christian school really double herself, teaching a class while simultaneously supervising kids on the playground? Did a man really encounter his double who portended doom? These are both “true” stories that I’ve found in my wanderings around the internet. And, of course, there’s The Double by Fyodr Dostoevsky, a haunting and unusual tale that I read probably twenty-five years ago, sometime in the mid-90s.

As to the notion of a wish-granting paradise, well, I have no idea — yet — as to how to bring about that one. And it’s going to be a MYSTERY too! Well, I can only wait to see what I come up with.

This week’s recommendation

I have been thinking a lot about curiosity recently. My mom tells me I had a litany of questions I would ask her whenever I encountered something new: “What’s that?” “What does it do?” “How come?” I don’t remember much from that stage of my childhood, but I try to stay curious to this day. I admit my curiosity has dulled over the years, but that’s likely to be due to depression and anxiety. So I’ve been looking for ways to become more curious so I can learn more about myself, other people, and the world around us.

This book, Seek, by Scott Shigeoka, helped. It begins with an anecdote about how Shigeoka, a queer Hawaiian man, went to several Trump and Republican rallies, in order to more fully understand their point of view and their thought processes. He learned quite a bit, including some very surprising observations, which you should read about in the book.

Ultimately, Shigeoka shows how we can harness our own curiosity to come to a better understanding of other people, and break down the silos and echo chambers that divide us.

In conclusion

Thanks for reading this far. I have a lot more to say, but I will probably say it in my newsletter and a separate blog post.

As always: stay safe, stay kind, and have fun.