sci fi fantasy

CrissySnow

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Does this sound like a good idea?

You have this average girl living back home on a dirty deserted earth. The planet has turned to shit but people still live there. She has a very distant family but she doesn't stay in touch at all. She's a street rat living in the red light district part of town with a roommate. This guy is no saint he does drugs and street deals. One night he gets his head blown off. The girl witnesses this. He knows he has a female roommate he will come back for her too since he didn't get his money. The only place to run is to another planet or galaxy. But how? She is a broke street rat living in the slums. She desperately hitch hikes a ride but it's not good from here. She hitches a ride with an escaped inmate wanted. He is the most notorious criminal in the galaxy. And from there the shit goes crazy...
It does have non consensual elements to it in the story. I started working on it today.

I don't write scifi stuff but I wanted to do this one.

I'll leave it at that let me know if it is a good start?
 
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The only problem I see thus far is that you haven't introduced anything sci-fi. If you hadn't included it in the title and mentioned that the only place to run is a different planet/galaxy at the end you could tell the exact same story and take out the sci-fi element. Don't get me wrong that's not always a problem Star Wars would have worked just fine as Pirates of the Caribean or Lord of the Rings. It's literally the story of a chosen one rescuing a princess from the Dark Knight in a castle.

Still nothing you've provided so far give any reason why this should be Sci-Fi instead of modern day.
 
Well, it sounds a little confusing. She is on a deserted earth, but then there are slums and even a red light district which indicates that there is commerce; meaning people who buy and people who sell.

deserted: adj. (of a place) empty of people.
slum: noun. a thickly populated, run-down, squalid part of a city,

To suggest there is an area she lives in that is slums, means there is an inverse living condition as well, or there is no point to saying they are slums.

I think the idea that you are trying to explain is that the entire earth is a slums. That after years of development, the earth has been stripped of all useful resources. Recycling resources has been so exhaustive that such are of little use anymore to build anything. Without materials to build anything new or repair what was built before, everything has long since started to decay. Creating what was once immense cities, but is now, an entire world reduced to squalid conditions for the sparse people too poor to have found a means to leave the planet.

Do you mean average looking? An average girl to me, is someone you see at the local mall, shopping for nonsensical what-nots.

After that, it sounds a little like hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy (Arthur Dent gets a lift from Zaphod Beeblebrox (a notorious criminal who stole... )).

One way to avoid that association is to avoid using the word "hitchhike" or the phrase "catch a lift."

In all likelihood, she would have to negotiate traveling with whoever gave her a lift, so what if you went that route instead?

It sounds like a good concept if you fix one or two elements and clarify in your mind what you are trying to say.

Just trying to help define concepts which might help in writing a better story.
 
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The only problem I see thus far is that you haven't introduced anything sci-fi. If you hadn't included it in the title and mentioned that the only place to run is a different planet/galaxy at the end you could tell the exact same story and take out the sci-fi element. Don't get me wrong that's not always a problem Star Wars would have worked just fine as Pirates of the Caribean or Lord of the Rings. It's literally the story of a chosen one rescuing a princess from the Dark Knight in a castle.

Still nothing you've provided so far give any reason why this should be Sci-Fi instead of modern day.

Ignore Sean above, it sounds SCI FI to me.

You clearly painted a graphic image of a deserted earth in the future, ravaged and desolate. It’s pretty much a huge dessert. I imagine limited water, stripped down vehicular transportation instead of normal cars. The air in thinned out and polluted, & people are trying to escape to other far off earth colonies (where the new middle class live).
 
It’s pretty much a huge dessert (planet).

Captain Sardonic says "I'll get some whipped cream and a couple of spoons." :rolleyes:

It's a misnomer that a desert island (for example) is a desert (island). One means devoid of people, the other means generally devoid of life.

However, I agree. A story about the future is generally scifi-ish enough for me.
 
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Captain Sardonic says "I'll get some whipped cream and a couple of spoons." :rolleyes:

It's a misnomer that a desert island (for example) is a desert (island). One means devoid of people, the other means generally devoid of life.

However, I agree. A story about the future is generally scifi-ish enough for me.


An author is a sovereign in the sphere of their pages.
 
Earth is trashed. Everything is used up. Nothing is the same anymore. The girl is a typical street rat living in a dirty apartment with a street dealer. She's no trouble at all. But when you live with trouble it is bound to follow you wherever you go. With that said the dealer owed that guy money. What did he do? Avoid him until finally he gets his head blown off by the collector. The collector knows he has a roommate and will go across the galaxy to find her. We not talking about a little change owed but alot. Let's say the equivalent of $100,000 in today's money. Before the dealer could bounce from Earth the collector gets him. BAM!!!

The girl doesn't know this. She doesn't know about the money. But the collector assumes she does. She gets outta town to the nearest space hub to hitch a ride out off earth. But nobody trust a filthy street rat like her. She finds one just one ship left to ask for a ride and this dude is anti social anyway. He's a criminal. Well she has no choice. Either way she is FUCKED and so is the criminal they are both trying to escape from something. She is not trying to be found by the collector and he is not trying to get caught by law enforcement. He is wanted for 3 murders, hijacking a ship, and kidnapping.

There's the run down going on in my mind.
 
Ignore Sean above, it sounds SCI FI to me.

You clearly painted a graphic image of a deserted earth in the future, ravaged and desolate. It’s pretty much a huge dessert. I imagine limited water, stripped down vehicular transportation instead of normal cars. The air in thinned out and polluted, & people are trying to escape to other far off earth colonies (where the new middle class live).


Exactly... Who the hell wants to stay in a wasteland shit hole where if you are found you will be killed.
 
Exactly... Who the hell wants to stay in a wasteland shit hole where if you are found you will be killed.

It's your story preserve it

-However remember in the intro you said she witnessed the murder, you missed that in the new description.
-Do you know how the sex will play out yet?
 
Ignore Sean above, it sounds SCI FI to me.

You clearly painted a graphic image of a deserted earth in the future, ravaged and desolate. It’s pretty much a huge dessert. I imagine limited water, stripped down vehicular transportation instead of normal cars. The air in thinned out and polluted, & people are trying to escape to other far off earth colonies (where the new middle class live).

Agree much more with Sean. As described, it's a confusing setting: drugs + $100K debt = commerce + population + cities and corrupt/ineffectual government...that's not desolate. At all. It's a decent modern story, it's a boring Sci-Fi story. Nothing about it REQUIRES it to be set in the future. You could put the girl in any current slum in modern day and get the same result.
 
Agree much more with Sean. As described, it's a confusing setting: drugs + $100K debt = commerce + population + cities and corrupt/ineffectual government...that's not desolate. At all. It's a decent modern story, it's a boring Sci-Fi story. Nothing about it REQUIRES it to be set in the future. You could put the girl in any current slum in modern day and get the same result.


No you can't. It would be too easy to skip to the next town and run away. You have to skip to another planet. Imagine the population count from modern day 7 billion to 2 million people. That's desolate and lonely enough. It's polluted and full of trash people are still leaving. It would be too easy to pack up and head somewhere else on earth. A chase across the galaxy is more fun if you are traveling with a dangerous criminal. Where would they land and be found? It's all imagination.

If it were modern day and they skipped town it would be boring because everything looks the same. You need a good amount of change to skip to another planet. If you don't have it then stay behind on earth and die .

It's just bits and pieces until I actually write this thing all out.
 
It's your story preserve it

-However remember in the intro you said she witnessed the murder, you missed that in the new description.
-Do you know how the sex will play out yet?



No not yet but I I like non consensual stuff so as much as I know of its really rough
 
Honestly, it has potential, but you're working uphill because the story has been done a few thousand times already. Even with the 'leave the planet' angle, there's nothing new.

If you delve into what caused the destruction of earth, please don't go with the 'humans are awful and destroyed their own planet' stuff that's bee covered ten thousand times.

The story could be set on any planet. The destruction of the ecosystem is a bit of a stretch without some large-scale calamity like a meteor strike or alien war machine that can do big things in one fell swoop.

She hitches a ride with one of the biggest criminals left on earth? Why would that criminal give her a ride? They aren't known for trusting strangers, especially if being actively hunted. Sex on the trip wouldn't be a a good enough incentive because said criminal mastermind could easily get a dozen known whores to provide that.

Just my thoughts.
 
I think the 'ruined Earth' aspect is great - it's even more urgent now than it was in BladeRunner.

To add a 'standard Lit twist', perhaps the girl is his niece, and he wants her with him?
 
No you can't. It would be too easy to skip to the next town and run away. You have to skip to another planet. Imagine the population count from modern day 7 billion to 2 million people. That's desolate and lonely enough. It's polluted and full of trash people are still leaving. It would be too easy to pack up and head somewhere else on earth. A chase across the galaxy is more fun if you are traveling with a dangerous criminal. Where would they land and be found? It's all imagination.

If it were modern day and they skipped town it would be boring because everything looks the same. You need a good amount of change to skip to another planet. If you don't have it then stay behind on earth and die .

It's just bits and pieces until I actually write this thing all out.

Except a chase across the galaxy is ultimately the same as a chase around the world. Judging from 99% of all sci-fi there is more difference between real life LA and Singapore than there is between Tantooine and Coruscant.

If it's just for flavor that's fine like I already said but outside of flavor I'm not seeing what makes it important to go world hoping instead of nation hopping.
 
Except a chase across the galaxy is ultimately the same as a chase around the world. Judging from 99% of all sci-fi there is more difference between real life LA and Singapore than there is between Tantooine and Coruscant.

If it's just for flavor that's fine like I already said but outside of flavor I'm not seeing what makes it important to go world hoping instead of nation hopping.

Nations/sovereign states no longer exist.
 
No not yet but I I like non consensual stuff so as much as I know of its really rough


You see I'm not a fan of NC, but that's no issue because it's your story.
Write as you will and don't bend for no man, change only what you want.



The best way to be a writer on LIT is to be under the impression that everyone wants to kill you all the time. TRUST NO 1.
 
Nations/sovereign states no longer exist.

Kinda missing the point. Which is that I don't see what exactly Sci-Fi adds to the scenario as presented. Other than the writer clearly wants to write about Han Solo but that's all the more reason to change the flavor to fantasy and start jumping dimensions. So that it's less obvious that this is about Han Solo. Regardless the idea as a whole is quite solid.
 
Kinda missing the point. Which is that I don't see what exactly Sci-Fi adds to the scenario as presented. Other than the writer clearly wants to write about Han Solo but that's all the more reason to change the flavor to fantasy and start jumping dimensions. So that it's less obvious that this is about Han Solo. Regardless the idea as a whole is quite solid.



-I think the authors single mistake here, was like that of a head of government asking the house of reps for a vote of confidence.

-Skyfall was the most financially successful of the 007 series, because it embraced the past

-If the author wants to write about birds shitting on Nuns, all we should do is help the author describe the texture of the liquid shit.
 
-I think the authors single mistake here, was like that of a head of government asking the house of reps for a vote of confidence.

-Skyfall was the most financially successful of the 007 series, because it embraced the past

-If the author wants to write about birds shitting on Nuns, all we should do is help the author describe the texture of the liquid shit.


Uh that last part I'm not sure what to think about
 
Loquere has a good if messily made point. Though my point in criticizing the sci-fi flavor was that I think if your making the core of your story something it should be important to the story.

Here I would recommend a little bit of world building along the way.
 
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