The Builder VS Hunger

I've been thinking about The Builder since I watched it today, and now that some time has passed, I think it is a good film. Having some preconceptions about its subject matter negatively influenced me at first, but it really is a good film.

And any fears that it would cover the same ground as Hunger have been put to rest. It doesn't.

The story of The Builder is essentially one half of Hunger -- the path where you know what you are meant to do, but go along with what everyone else expects from you. It's pretty tragic, and one aspect of the concept that I hadn't thought about before is the utter indifference of everyone else to your goal. That is an insightful observation, and one that should be incorporated into Hunger.

Of course, what Hunger has that The Builder does not have is the Choice, and because of that we get to explore the other path -- the path where you follow what you are meant to do, and experience things both bad and good which proceed from that. Things like being ostracized from the village and, on the positive side, the understanding that what you are doing is ultimately for the common good.

So it makes me hopeful, and in a way validates the power of the subject matter Hunger will soon explore.

Novel: Mutiny on the Frozen Sea (working title)

Now that I'm basically finished with Trinidad, I've started thinking about what other books I could write. The horror story is one, but I have problems with writing it. I'm not sure I want to write something so blatantly fantastic. I am more interested in taking realistic stories and revealing what is mysterious about the world through them. I think I'd like to take on the sea again.

The origin of Trinidad was like this: take a classic sea story and place it within a modern setting. The story I chose was The Stowaway.

I think I would like to do the same thing again for another type of story, this time The Mutiny. I have only a vague idea for the story, but I think I have a setting.

In Arctic waters, they have vessels called icebreakers whose job is to clear frozen waterways in rivers and the sea. I would love to set a story there, a story about mutiny in a sea of ice. Unfortunately I don't have any first hand experience with working on an icebreaker. But I like the atmosphere it conjures in my mind very much.

Story about a captain who abuses the crew, but is considered a great, feared leader. In the story a deck hand is killed in a work accident, and the captain changes. He becomes kind-hearted, but this leads to the crew rising up in mutiny and taking the command from him. The head mutineer is the brother of the deck hand who was killed. He blames the captain for it, and for this reason leads the uprising. They throw the captain overboard onto the ice plains. During the mutiny the vessel catches on fire. As they try to put it out, the captain watches the boat sail away. He says a prayer for the burning vessel, and that's how the story ends.

Things you don't come back from

to come...