Amethyst Writeup Done

I finished my writeup of the fairyland of Amethyst and all of my related fairylands.  It's over 11,000 words, and I've been working on it for a week, but I think I finally have everything I've created for any of these fairylands documented in one place.

And that's not an easy thing to do.  For example, I've known for a long time that the sisters Magical Midriff and Magical Manic Pixy Dreamgirl (she just goes by Pixy Dreamgirl these days) were transplants from a fairyland.  But what was it called?  What were their names there?  Why are they on earth now?  It turns out I know all of these things -- but I gave each answer at a different time, in different stories.  Pixy Dreamgirl explains that their father sold the fairyland kingdom to a developer, because he needed money and it was kind of a dump.  That's in a scene early in Oz On The Half Shell when they're talking to Kid Continuity and Wayback Boy.  In another scene, it's mentioned that they're from a place called Kadditha, and in yet a different scene they are introduced by their very embarrassing fairyland names Princess Butterbean and Princess Sugar Beet.

Or, as another example -- in my story Return to Amethyst, the wicked witch has a magic Ruby Bell on a necklace that can summon winged cats.  I've tossed in similar items at least three times now, all based on  the Golden Cap in the Wizard of Oz that controls the Winged Monkeys.  But I didn't have a name for this item other than "The Ruby Bell of the Winged Cats" -- except!  Buried in some dialog in the story Oz On The Half-Shell, a character mentions it as "Barthollo's Ruby Bell of the Winged Cats".  That name doesn't even appear in the story that actually deal with the item!

In similar fashion, I seem very fond of tossing out the names of people and mystic lands as off-handed comments in stories that don't directly deal with those people and places, so I had to read through my stories very carefully to make sure I had everything gathered in one place.  The cook at the Castle of Lialoshi is named Sandola, but I only know that because of an offhand comment the Princess makes when she's on earth and fixing strawberry pancakes, and notes that "Sandola is a fantastic cook, but she can't duplicate the taste of authentic strawberry pancakes".  It's important that I write these little tidbits down because who knows, I might write a story where I need to name that cook, and I'd probably forget that she already has a name.

All of this puts me in the mood to finally finish Oz On The Half-Shell, which is a novella-length story but is mostly done.  That's good timing, because Camp NaNo is about to start and finishing up several of my Grandpa Anarchy novel-length stories has been my basic plan for this April.  However, I was really hoping to finish one or two more short stories this week -- and I'm running out of time to do that.

I think my basic plan is to finish Oz On The Half Shell and, god willing, rewrite and finally finish World of Hero.  I'd also like to get my story X Factor from book 6 finished (I have 2 or 3 stories left to write for that book).   The other novella/novel length stories that I need to work on are Second Class and Serial Anarchy, but for now I'm going to ignore those.