Other works

THE FOOL ON THE MOUNTAIN

The unlikeliest pair in the post-tech world of the Fifth Millennium

HE is a paladin: a brilliant young champion of war, impeccable in character. But he has lost the duel of his life, is forsaken as a loser and a traitor by his home empire, and is separated from the man he loves… the man who defeated him, and might well go on to destroy that empire. Torn and despairing, he is considering ending it all.

SHE is an iconoclast: an elderly, eccentric sage living in a cave on a barren mountain slope, kept in food by local people and pilgrims alike who appreciate her uttered jewels of wisdom—or is it madness? Either way, she seems to have learned the secret of absolutely unshakable happiness, and all who speak with her come away somehow changed.

He needs living space. She needs a guy to do chores.

Maybe he’ll learn something.

Maybe they both will.

A collaborative weblit novel of love and enlightenment
by Shirley Meier and Karen Wehrstein

Our plan is to write this over the course of three days at the Muskoka Novel Marathon, July 16-19, 2010, using Google Wave. We might make it a livewriting event.

KEF & SER

Okay, this pair is pretty unlikely too

THE SUBORDINATE: Kefas Runasas, solas, veteran law enforcement officer for the Ministry of Internal Serenity of the Empire of Arko. Grizzled. Jaded. He’s seen it all. Well, maybe not all, since he’s still just in his late twenties. But a lot. You never know what you’re going to see on the roads of Arko, in the world of the Fifth Millennium.

THE COMMANDING OFFICER: Serao Shae-Ityirya. Yeoli. One of the occupiers of the Empire, transplanted into its authority structure. A true believer in the sacredness of law and order. Honest. Upright. Totally anal-retentive. But not sexually repressed, because she is Yeoli, after all. Five years younger than Kefas and able to kick his ass in combat.

As partners, they are required to work together, watch each other’s backs, show a united front, help each other resist the inevitable temptations of the job, maintain the dignity of the Sereniteerhood, and Further the Cause of Peace, Order, Universal Siblinghood and General Wellbeing in the Pacified Empire. And above all, always, everywhere, even in the slightest little incidents where, on the surface, it doesn’t seem to matter:

Uphold. The. Law.

A weblit series by Shirley Meier and Karen Wehrstein, to be created at least in part by live-writing and audience participation methods. Please contribute plot ideas here. (Warning: don’t expect us to use all ideas given us. Or if we use your idea, don’t expect us necessarily to use it as intended, without distortion or perversion. We will use the ones we like and modify them as we please. You’ll never know. Until it’s too late.) More on the series origin here.

You will be kept informed of all developments through proper official Ministry of Internal Serenity bulletins.

THE GAMES

There’s only one way to get into the greatest school of generalship in the Fifth Millennium world…

TASERA KRIL
Her blood-mother died by her own hand. At heart, she feels she has a brilliant strategic mind, but her shadow-mother and her two shadow-sibs laugh at her ambitions and say she’s only good for farm-work.

If she goes back home a loser, it’ll be the final proof that she has no talent, only pretensions.

ELERA SHAE-TYEBA
He was working his way up the ranks of the Yeoli army quickly, until he got busted down as a result of his own obsessive envy. “A fine commander,” his military record reads, “as long as he doesn’t have Fourth Chevenga Shae-Arano-e under his command.” As if that could ever happen.

Guess who decides, on a whim, to show up.

TORAS MENEKEN
Forbidden by Arkan law to command more than a hundred fellow solas for most of his career due to his caste, he is capable of much more. Now he’s free to pursue his dream of becoming a general… but he’s also alone among foreigners who hate his people for what they did as conquerors.

For political reasons, this year will be his only chance.

What do they have in common?

They all have to win…

THE GAMES

A collaborative weblit novel of strategy, rivalry and loyalty by Karen Wehrstein and Shirley Meier. Forthcoming we know not precisely when.