1. Why do you want to become a staff writer on BeastKeeper?
I have always adored the concept of worldbuilding and expansion of fantasy universes. More or less, the idea of creating a new facet of the world, or expanding and deepening the history of an existing one, adding logical depth and detail is truly inspiring and exciting in my opinion. Becoming a staff writer would be an absolutely wonderful experience, would allow for more experience in writing for an already created world and hopefully expand the limits of my skill.
2. How long have you been writing?
I've been writing for quite a few years. I began quite early so the total is more like seven to eight years, although, it was in the last three or so years that I began to write seriously and with far more concentrated effort.
3. To your mind, what are your strengths and weaknesses as a writer?
Personally, I believe that I have a wide ranging ability to write in detail and with complex plot and progression. My strength in writing lies in the description, the entire 'flavour of the story' creation, atmosphere and envisioning of the setting and the events that occur within it. Writing fantasy is relatively simple in this manner.
I do find myself with convolutions in the writing process occasionally. It more or less occurs when I work out the beginning, end and results of the story but then find it difficult to work out exactly what occurs in the middle. The middle portion then can become overly complex, twisted and lengthy.
4. Do you have any writing experience for other browser games?
Unfortunately not. This would be the initial venture into such.
5. Please provide one recent writing sample.
(Everything has its own meaning. Symbolism runs rampant, especially through the first paragraph.)
- - -
The house is quiet, rustling with the small steps of small creatures, creaking softly with the accumulated dust of years.
Nests adorn its uppermost eaves, bearing owls and rooks, ever watchful for the multitudes of lizards and spiders hidden in the cracks of wood. Lairs of foxes and badgers lie shadowed in corners and the occasional flicker of bat wings are visible in the dusty reaches of the ceiling.
The encroaching wood has partly taken over the house, enfolding it within its embrace. Aspen, fir and white poplar stretch their branches over the roof, entwining their leafy fingers overhead. Sweet William and basil turn their head to the sun, luxuriating in its gaze as nightshade and foxglove slowly emerge from the shadows.
Blackthorn, elder and yew compose the rest of the wood’s reaches with abundant flourishes of cattail and nettle. A few ash and rowan trees are interspersed among the other trees loosely draped with mistletoe and hemlock leaves.
----------------------
The house is quiet, rustling with the wind-blown leaves, creaking silently with old memories still brooding and restless.
The doors open in the creaking manner she has known so well. The familiar groan and squeal of the hinges heralds the first human step the house has known for many years. That step, she places in the very centre of the first floorboard, the board that splintered when she was a child.
Her father replaced the board with a solid plank of oak. “Don’t worry. It’ll never break again. Trust me.” She believed his words with all her heart.
The worn ceiling of the old house is covered by a blanket of climbing vines and crumbled brick. It groans alarmingly ever so often, although she does not look up. There is no fear here, deep within her own home. Her light steps take her past the old door that led to her room.
“Father, I’m scared! The monsters will come and get me!”
“Don’t worry my dear. I will always be here for you. At any time you need me.”
She shakes her head, smiles and continues walking on. She had trusted her father intimately, even when he had left her in the house for a day and a night, with no-one’s company but herself. Even then, the night after, she had hugged him closely when he returned, smelling strange and not of himself. The usual warm and comforting scent of leather, lather and the wood itself had been replaced with an odd metallic scent, the scent of rusting iron.
She turns a corner, the last corner of the great corridor and there he is, standing in his usual relaxed way, seeming not to have a care in the world. He is there, as if she had left only yesterday and this was her homecoming after a day playing in the fields.
“So, my little princess. How are you?”
“I’m well father, and you?”
“You know me. I’ll always be healthy, never a sick day in my life.”
She walks over to the desk in the study, watching him carefully, not wanting to miss a moment of his presence.
“Father. How have you been?”
“Oh, all the time, busy, busy. I’ll be seeing a good warm bed soon though. I should -"“
She blinks. Is he evaporating?
“Father? Where are your legs?”
“Oh, all the time, busy, busy. I’ll be seeing a good warm bed soon thoug-“
“Father! Why are you leaving? Where are you going? Your body!”
“Oh, all the time, busy, bu-“
She screams then, and runs to him, runs to him as like she has never had the opportunity to run to him before, to smell that familiar, heart achingly familiar, scent again, to hold him close and to never, never, let go. But he drifts between her clutching fingers like smoke on a blustery day and vanishes.
She realises then, she is alone.
----------------------
The house is quiet, rustling with mute sound, creaking still with the weight of long gone years that lie still and silent in opaque tears.
