OYAN

OYAN, which stands for One Year Adventure Novel, has quickly become an acronym I use often, though I have to explain it every time. In essence, OYAN is a writing program for writers to teach them how to write an exciting, meaninful novel. It was designed by the author Daniel Schwabauer, who teaches with clarity and solid ideas, ideas that are building blocks to a story. Seriously, this guy's got it down to a science.

He starts out by having you watch a short lesson on the computer, in which besides explaining and teaching you face to face, he sometimes puts in clips of movies for examples. We're currently going through the movie Cyrano De Borjerac, and whoever wrote that book was a genius, by the way. After that, you read through a lesson in the Compass, which basically recaps what you learned in the movie. Then you answer questions in the other workbook, the Map, which helps you put down ideas for your story according to what you learned. Finally, he assigns you to read a chapter of Anthony Hope's book, The Prisoner of Zenda. And you wonder why I'm always talking as if I'm writing a story? All this literature is rubbing off on my brain, which I suppose is a good thing for an aspiring writer...

Besides the program itself, there is also a website for all the students. There it has character developement lounges, a chat room, places to knock around ideas, get critiques for your story, and just enjoy each other's writing. It's addicting like Facebook, and even more so for people who love to write. The people are incredibly kind, though I am sure a great percentage of them are Christian homeschoolers. So yeah, we all have a lot in common.

At last, for the lessons themselves, Mr. S starts out teaching about the 5 elements of a story: Someone to care about (hero), something to want (story goal), something to dread (villain) something to suffer (price) and something to learn (theme). On this foundation, he goes on to outline the supporting cast: the Mentor, the Villain, the Ally, and the Love. While on this topic, I have to say that the villain, named Grid, is a completely fictional character, and any resemblence to living people is purely coincidental. He discusses the two types of scenes (Disasters and Dilemmas) and the four defining scenes: The Inciting Incident, Embracing Destiny, The Black Moment, and The Showdown.

If nothing in this post interested you, that's okay. I thought I must explain so you would know from now one what in the world I'm ranting about all the time. Thanks!

Dinosaur Clones? On Earth?!

    How cool would it be if on the future earth there were dinosaurs again? This makes sense if you take into account how much more advanced their science and technology would be. I recently read an article to see if it were possible to clone a dinosaur by taking for example, a mammoth's DNA and putting in into say, a female cow. Scientists have already tried that, but so far have had no good results. I've been thinking that it would be pretty awesome to have wild dinosaurs, plus other extinct animals now roaming the earth.
    What does this have to do with the story? Well, not much, except to add extraordinary settings. I do have an idea, though, that one day as the Band wakes up...
   Rhodes: Has anyone seen the food packs? I know I left them right there.
  Gabriel: Hahaha! Judah, did you have a late night snack?
  Judah: Yep, I ate it all. Sorry, guys. It looks like you're on your own for breakfast.
  Adara: Very funny, boys. Really now, where's the food?
  Rhodes: That's what we're trying to find out.
*They look around the campsite, getting hungrier every mintue, until Kari exclaims*
 Kari: Hey, over here! There's some leftover rice cakes from last night. And... over here is-- Oh no.
 Katonna: What did you find?
 *They all come over to her to see a fluffy, rodent-like little creautre. It's sitting on top of their last pack, mouth stuffed with food*
 Gabriel: No! he couldn't have eaten all that... Could he?
 Kari: Now what do we do?
 Adara and Katonna: Kill it.
 Judah: Wait, wait! It's kinda cute, actually.
 Adara: Cute? That thing just ate all our food. What else can we eat?
 Rhodes: Well, I actually agree with Judah because--
 Judah: Ha! See, even Rhodes agrees its cute.
 Rhodes: Umm, no, actually there's something I should tell--
 Adara: He so did not agree! You took the words out of his mouth.
 Rhodes: Judah, stop petting it. It's mother will--
 Katonna: Everybody, go now! There's an Akremian squad coming for us.

*      *      *

To make a long story short, they get chased around, and finally surrounded by soldiers, Judah still holding the little fluffy rat-creature. Just as they're about to be captured. who should show up but the Mama Rat-Creature, which is about fifty feet tall. Or something like that. What do you guys think? Like I said, I'm just tossing around ideas. And as for the fluffy giant rat, I haven't a clue of what species that would be. I was thinking of it as some sort of a rat with wings, but I'm sure I could find a real extinct animal that would work better.

In the Beginning...

Hey, guys, welcome to my new blog, very unoriginally called "The Band of Corwin". I'll probably change that later... First of all, I just want to say that I've never done this before, so I don't know what I'm doing. Please bear with me while I get the hang of it. Secondly, this blog is going to be an outlet for all our ideas and imaginings concerning the world we once planned to create, and which I am going to write myself for the One Year Adventure Novel, or OYAN for short. This writing program, made by a very good author Mr. Schawbouer, is helping me learn all about how to write an exciting adventure novel. So I'll be posting ideas, your character profiles, and possibly chapters someday. Thirdly, don't be afraid to say anything! This story isn't all mine. Part of you is in too, and I need all the feedback I can get. Finally, for the story itself, here is a brief overview:
     The place is Earth, but our modern world is nowhere to be found. Powerful technology in the hands of warring superpowers caused most of the world's population to die. and It seemed like the now black Earth had come to its end.
     Hundreds of years later, nature has taken over again, the continents have slid together on the opposite side of the world, and the Old World has been all but forgotten. Six Tribes live on one side, simply and peacefully. However, from the other continent arose an empire called Akremia, whose leader Grid has resurrected the technology of old, and plans to use it to put all the Tribes under his control. Enter the Band: Kari, Adara, Katonna, Rhodes, Blue Shell, Gabriel, and Judah. Representatives from all the Tribes, they are Corwin's only chance at freedom. Together they must find a way to unite the Tribes to stand against Akremia's might. Yet even that might not be enough to stop Grid...