Alright!
I have my sketch outline for the Short Story Competition!
The competition theme is poisonous intent – and it’s taken me a while to engage with the idea and really understand what I want from it.
– IT WILL BE SET IN THE WORLD OF ERIS
– IT WILL BE CONNECTED TO BOOK 2 OF THE AEGIS SAGA!
but. . . spoilers ; )
wish me luck everyone
– this is going to be tough. And I hope some of you will be so good as to beta-test it later this month. 
That’s it, the full ten chapters is out for proofing and editing : )
In the meantime I’m joining LordIrish’s 4th Annual short story competition to kick start writing the sequel and maybe get a little exposure with other aspiring and published interactive fiction authors!
http://www.choiceofbox.com/cscomp16.html
I don’t know about you guys, but I’m excited about finding and exploring all the different interactive fiction sites out there. Some are pretty new, easy to follow and well designed, like Choice of Games, and some of them have been around since the good old days of Zork (you should not be worried if you do not get this reference!)
Anyway I’ve linked a load of them here at the bottom of the sidebar as I try to get ‘The Aegis Saga – Blood’s demo out to fellow minded interactive fiction fans.
Have fun! A lot of Choice of Games and Hosted Games authors have stories and profiles on these forums : )
. . .okay. . . may have slightly underestimated the length of my story ‘The Aegis Saga – Blood’.
Context! Harry Potter – The Order of the Phoenix was 257,000 words. Conclusion – I need an editor ; )
You can create interactive fiction using a number of tools. One of the best is ‘choicescript’.
You can make interactive fiction easily too. If you want to try it out go to:
https://www.choiceofgames.com/make-your-own-games/choicescript-intro/
It’s easy to pick up and there’s plenty of help to be had on the wiki and the forum.
I should have a good run at proofing the 8th chapter today. If only I could run it through a training montage. I’d be done by now!
I’m getting excited about the upcoming 4th Annual CS Comp run by Lordirish beginning on the 1st of May.
They’ll be releasing a theme and I’ve got one month to create a brand new short story – hence the self-imposed deadline to get ‘The Aegis Saga – Blood’ out by the 30th of April.
Headspace. . . !
COG forum link = https://forum.choiceofgames.com/t/lordirish-presents-4th-annual-cscomp-please-register-to-enter/15804/161
The fantasy world of Eris (the greek word for Strife) is named after our own greek goddess of discord. She’s described by the poet Hesiod as taking two ‘wholly different’ forms – the first Strife is ‘evil’, while the second – ‘harsh Strife’ – makes us competitive. Heriod says of this second form of Eris, “a man would praise her when he came to understand her”:
“So, after all, there was not one kind of Strife alone, but all over the earth there are two”. . . “one fosters evil war and battle, being cruel: her no man loves; but perforce, through the will of the deathless gods, men pay harsh Strife her honour due.”
“This Strife is wholesome for men”, “neighbor vies with neighbor”. “She stirs up even the shiftless to toil”
(and Hesiod says the goddess Eris is to blame for choicescript authors getting angry or competitive with other choicescript minstrels too 
)
But to return to my fantasy world.
Interactive stories allow you to change things about the story that you’re reading. It’s a great way to feel more involved in a narrative.
In the ‘Aegis Saga – Blood’ you can choose your path through the story, effecting the character’s relationships with your avatar, changing the things that happen, and enjoying a more immersive experience of the world of Eris than you might have done if you’d stuck to linear reading.
And if you enjoyed it, you can read again, and find out how different choices shape the world around you.
The full ten chapters of my interactive fantasy novel ‘The Aegis Saga – Blood’ are being proofed now, prior to going to a publisher.
(click here to find the four chapter demo and here to find a brief description of the story)
Charles Parkes 