Thursday, June 1, 2017

Research, by Mike Gonzales

Wow, we're about halfway through the year, already! Hard to believe. It seems just like yesterday that I was celebrating the release of my second novel, “The Battle of Broken Moon,” but that was back in March.



So far, I feel as if I’ve already packed a year into five months.

Recently, I have been giving thought, just for the purpose of experimentation, to writing outside my chosen genre. All my ideas and concepts always seem to come about, and morph into Sci-fi, and or, Fantasy.



Having an interest in the genre within which you write is, to my mind, paramount. I can’t imagine sitting down to write something for which I have no interest: stamp collecting, and golf, come to mind.

Now, it is not my intent to belittle either philately or the links, they just aren’t my cup of tea.

Regardless of how enthralled an author may be with the tome they are pouring their emotion into, there is always something that author must become more familiar with in order to give the story gravitas. Be it the right way to saddle a horse, the correct lay out of a long forgotten western town, or thrust to weight ratios.

I have learned a great deal in the researches I’ve done in support of my Sci-fi novels.

I’ve learned about new technologies that promise humanity a much faster ability to sail between the planets.

I’ve discovered the “multiverse”, the theory that points to an endless number of universes all around ours, like billions of soap bubbles crowding a child’s birthday party.
The possibility that there is a countless number of me out there, each making a different decision at every question; answer the phone or no, turn right, left, buy that house… each decision spiraling that other me into an entirely new future. It’s called, “string theory.”



I have come to understand that the universe is far stranger, and more complex than the human mind is capable of comprehending.

On a positive note, this means that no matter how outrageous, outlandish, weird, or bizarre an author paints his world, either in deep space, or on planet Earth…he can’t be wrong.

It’s all possible, in string theory.

          At night, as I gaze up into the heavens, I imagine my eyes as super powered light receptors. From beyond the Moon, beyond the Milky Way, past the stars in Orion’s belt, and the great Bootes Void, outside the realm of the visible universe come superluminal communications in data bursts too fast to be detected by poor terrestrial sensors.



Within these communications come stories of great daring, accomplished by individuals who reside on other planes of existence, some as far away as the Hercules Supercluster. Others from entire universes that exist all around us, in the same space, and others deep within a single fleck of dust now sitting atop a long forgotten book in your own library.

As the Bard speaketh, “There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio — than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

Amen.   
  



Visit my page, Michael Gonzales, fictionist: http://www.mikegonzalesauthor.com/home.html



5 comments:

  1. In the light of my blog, check out this article by Mike Wehner, Published June 01, 2017

    Scientists may have found evidence of a parallel universe!

    The idea that we might be living in just one of an infinite number of universes has been fodder for scientific debate and sci-fi movie plots for a long time, but coming up with evidence to support the theory has been hard to come by. Now, researchers have discovered something in space that they can't quite account for, and one of the possible explanations is that -- are you sitting down? -- our universe actually bumped into a neighboring, parallel one.

    When gazing into the heavens, scientists spotted what they refer to as a "cold" area of space. It was observed some time ago, and explaining it proved difficult, but a 2015 study suggested it was merely an area of the universe in which the number of galaxies is dramatically lower than the rest. Unfortunately, subsequent investigations couldn't support that finding, and a new study by Durham University suggests the slim possibility that it's actually evidence of parallel universes is still on the table.

    The multiverse theory hinges on the idea that all possible outcomes of any given scenario are all playing out at the same time in a layered reality of which we are only experiencing one layer. It's a wild idea that has a foundation in quantum mechanics, but it's also entirely unproven.

    As the study states, the researchers believe the mysterious cold spot, while still totally unexplained, could actually be "the remnant of a collision between our universe and another 'bubble' universe during an early inflationary phase." In short, if the idea is correct, our early universe collided with another young universe early on, causing something of a "bruise" which we are able to observe today.

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  2. Michael,

    This statement is true for me: "Regardless of how enthralled an author may be with the tome they are pouring their emotion into, there is always something that author must become more familiar with in order to give the story gravitas." I spend an inordinate amount of time in this stage of writing a story, and I can't finish a story until I'm comfortable that I've delved to a sufficient depth of understanding what I'm including in the story.

    On your comment explaining the possible collision between our universe and another bubble... Wow! I'm intrigued with this idea.

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    1. Kaye, I have written over twenty novels thus far. Two are published, one is in the que, and two are with the publisher now. I’m here to tell you, there is never an end to research, never!
      And with Google Earth you can now go stand on the ground that might be the land of your story, allowing you to describe it very accurately. One thing you have to be careful of, given how readily available information is these days, don’t overdo it!
      In the 19th century authors had to be very descriptive in describing other lands, the pyramids of Egypt, the Amazon Jungle, Paris, because in those days all people had seen of such places were wood cut pictures, in black and white!
      Today, the mere mention of those places gives rise to vivid mental images. Why? We’ve all seen them in the movies and on TV, no need to spend a chapter describing them.
      Even the phrase “The cratered red surface of Mars,” allows the reader to see that place, perhaps from having seen “The Martian.”

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