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Archive for Time travel

Timebound

Aug26

18061791Title: Timebound (The Chronos Files)

Author: Rysa Walker

Genre: Science Fiction

Length: 374 pages

Read: April 14-18, 2015

Summary: Highly recommended

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I found Timebound while searching for best sellers to use as advertising targets for my own time travel novel Untimed (I’ve been experimenting with Amazon’s new do-it-yourself ads).

I’m glad I found the Chronos Files.

At a certain level Timebound shares common DNA with Untimed. They both feature teen protagonists who discover they are time travelers and get dragged into a complex temporal war. There are other time traveling relatives and both mythologies even have “books” that to some extent chronicle/reveal/inform. But most of these similarities fall naturally out of the basic “teen discovers they’re a time traveler” idea. I will note that Untimed was published a year earlier, but even if Rysa Walker happened to read it, she has her own tale to tell.

I should note that I half read half listened this this book, utilizing Amazon’s awesome Whispersync. The narrator is phenomenal too.

Kate’s first person narrative is extremely compelling. She speaks in typical past tense in this first outing, but switches into a lightweight present tense in the second book. The voice is light on description, sticking mostly to people, clothing, time travel equipment, and necessary details. It’s longer on Kate’s internal processing, but uses this to deftly bring our plucky protagonist to life. While she superficially resembles many modern YA heroines, being smart, pretty, courageous, resourceful, and the like, Kate manages to maintain a unique personal feel. Namely, she feels real and essentially human. She acts consistently, and has her own constantly evolving opinion and a strong moral compass.

The balance in this first book favors characterization and “world building” over action and even historical exploration. The opening stresses the family dynamics almost more than the time travel revelations. The inciting event (act 1/2 break) is a 1-2 punch as much about meeting her Grandmother and discovering she’s dying as the temporal shift that deletes Kate’s reality and parents (shades of Untimed as well!). There is a well handled but highly deliberate love triangle involving present day boyfriend and a time traveling past boyfriend who remembers her from another timeline. This is actually one of the better love triangles I’ve seen, because it feels both natural and has a natural pathos that flows out of the timeline shift. Book 1 concentrates on present boyfriend — and on the present itself as well as time travel mythos and mechanics. We don’t actually travel anywhere substantial until about the 75% mark. The romantic elements feel slightly injected at times, but are natural enough and not in the least melodramatic.

This is not really an action book, although it is fast paced and tense. There is a lot of talking and planning and perhaps 75% of the novel occurs inside Kate’s house! The narrative and characters are compelling enough to overcome that locational limitation.

Both boyfriends are well developed, although past boyfriend is mostly a child in this first book (sounds more twisted than it is). The parents, aunt, etc are well characterized. The villains are not as strong as the positive supporting characters. We have the time wrecking mastermind grandfather (barely seen but much heard), medium-bad prophetess aunt, the smirking thug Simon, bitchy Eve, and the creepy and effective 1893 serial killer Holmes (my favorite, as I love a good creep).

The past, when Kate gets around to visiting it, is confined to Chicago’s 1893 World’s Columbia Exposition. The overall focus is more personal, involving the survival of Kate’s grandmother and the interaction of the time travelers, than largely historical. Untimed explores the role of the individual in big historical techno-socio-political currents, Timebound focuses on the relationships and cat and mouse between the travelers. Walker did a good job with her period research. Her 1893 feels like late 19th century America. It’s not highly descriptive, but the behavior of the people and general attitudes seem appropriate. It even smacks slightly of Bioshock Infinite, without all the steampunk and weirdness (although I loved that too). I’ll contrast this with a book like Clockwork Angel (gag me with a spoon) where everyone acts like a 21st century snarky teen in Victorian clothes (except the outfit on the cover is more Edwardian — sorry Cliff). As I mentioned before, I like the addition of the authentically creepy real-history serial killer. But part of my point here is that the “scope” of historical interaction isn’t huge in this first book, but it is a decently different era. This is no Tempest where all the time travel is within 15 years. It’s clear Walker loves history, but she concentrates her efforts more on the characters, time travel mechanics, and meta plots.

Which brings us to bad grandpapy Saul and his evil Cyrist church takeover. Liked it. This was both a sensible take on world domination, a clever way to utilize the abilities of a time traveler for “gain,” and a felt creepy and realistic. Somehow, the Cyrists seem very American and perhaps makes me wonder if Walker is an apostate member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Or maybe she just really enjoyed The Book of Mormon (the musical).

What follows now is a fairly technical discussion of time travel mechanics:

Walker’s time travel mechanic is very different than in Untimed, and simultaneously easier to write and more complicated. It would never work, and doesn’t really make total sense (more on this in a second), but it serves up compelling time travel fiction. It falls into the un-predetermined category like Untimed (Time Traveler’s Wife featuring the predetermined type with a single complex timeline). She does support an endless changing “leading edge” or five dimensional meta-timeline like Untimed, but it’s probably closer in spirit to Back to the Future’s system. Causality loops back endlessly in a way that would be very difficult for the Universe to actually compute. Essentially, changes are percolated forward, recomputing everything that is not protected by a technological field (maintained by the Chronos Medallions). This recompilation is apparently instantaneous and continuous as things leaving the field will “correct” (disappearing photos or people and the like) and that new computation will percolate forward. Where it breaks down is that there is no clear elucidation of the relationship between 5th dimensional time in normal 4th dimensional advancement. Let me (partially) explain.

If Kate were to change something in the past, then hop forward to her home time. Another traveler uptime of the change, say Pru, protected by her Chronos field, would notice. Kate and Pru are both free to react to this change and proceed with their next meta-temporal move. But who gets to go first? Well in this case, whoever the author feels like it. Say this attempted change is far back in the past. All (or many) uptime versions of the effected individual would have the opportunity to notice the changed timeline and decide to take action. But which one does? Is it 1:28pm Kate or 2:05pm Kate who takes action? Clearly they all can’t. In practice, while writing the book, there is a “current” narrative version who reacts. But the time travel mechanic doesn’t appear to actually narrow this down. This is why Untimed‘s system allows only one actual version of a time traveler in the timeline at any given 5th dimensional meta-moment.

Timebound also allows loopbacks, self changes, dual memory headaches and the like which don’t make total computational sense. How does the Universe even keep track of all that? Does it have unique IDs for every molecule? Some kind of object tracking system? Computing the loops is a form of the Halting Problem and has been proven (by genius Alan Turing) to be unsolvable in the general case. But none of these technical problem really matter in a work of fiction. From a storytelling point of view Timebound offers a very compelling time travel system with lots of interesting characteristics, limitations, and powers. Book 2 explores it more fully too.

There is also a fairly consistent but loosey goosey treatment of the “butterfly effect.” In this book, things tend to mostly play out the same way if the people basically do the same thing. There doesn’t seem to be a huge sensitivity to minute changes. I.e. slightly altering the timing and whereabouts of the young Katherine in 1893 doesn’t seem to drastically alter her later life and its relationship to the time modifications. People also tend to mostly be preserved, with their circumstances changing around them. This is people centric and I did basically the same thing in Untimed when repurposing the same people in Philadelphia 1.0 and 2.0 (British America 2012). It makes for better storytelling.

All in all, a great novel, and a fabulous addition to the time travel genre (which clearly I have a positive bias toward). I jumped right into book 2, read that, and am sad I have to wait six months for book 3.

Check out my own time travel novel or

Find more fantasy reviews here.

Related posts:

  1. Tempest
  2. Untimed nearly here!
  3. Untimed – Out on Submission!
  4. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  5. From Sketch to Final
By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Books
Tagged as: 2013 Winner — Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, Book Review, Rysa Walker, Time travel, Timebound

Time for Everything

Mar31

mza_6650942485853558696Title: About Time

Director/Stars: Domhnall Gleeson (Actor), Rachel McAdams (Actor), Richard Curtis (Director)

Genre: Family Drama?

Watched: March 21-22 15, 2014

Summary: Confused, and def not SciFi!

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About Time represents one of those all to frequent films where the expectations of the studio and the filmmaker have about zero overlap. What the studio seemed to have wanted, and attempted to market (despite the reality of the actual film) was a romantic comedy. What they got, was something a bit confused. Basically, a wish fulfillment fantasy (not Fantasy, but a fantasy) about family and quirky characters. Oh, and it has a time travel gimmick and is from Richard Curtis, of Four Weddings and a Funeral fame.

As a film, About Time is populated by some good acting (particularly by the ever-excellent Bill Nighy), some humor, and some nice sentiments, coupled with a stunning absence of conflict or jeopardy and plot holes the size of the Titanic. Still, it’s not awful to watch or anything.

As Science Fiction, or a time travel movie, well that’s another matter. And it’s this last I feel the need to comment on, or if not need, obligation, given my relationship to the genre (see my own time travel novel). Time travel in this film really is a gimmick, and not one that is particularly well thought out. Sure, at times it’s amusing enough, as when Tim, our protagonist, patches together his relationship with his soul mate out of at least 3 distinct tries. Slightly Groundhog Day, the rules are never really worked or explained. When Tim loses his perfect first date because he needs to fix his landlord’s broken play on the same night, he has to try again with the girl differently — but the audience is left guessing as to why. The rules themselves seems to change at a whim. He (and his dad) spend oodles of time in the past, but never seem to age doing so. We are told he can never go to the future — but clearly he comes back from the past. He travels alone — except exactly twice. Once, with his also time traveling dad (fine) and then truly mysteriously, once bringing along (and returning) his sister?!? This trip in particular makes no sense. Not only does he bring another person (how?), but it allows for a sideways reality of several years, but when he learns (from dad) that this loses him his kid (in the present), he  goes and fixes it back with no explanation or film time. If there is so much jeopardy (losing one’s kid because of the butterfly effect of random sperm) then how can he fix it so easily? And if fixed, where’s the jeopardy?

The gimmick does manage to briefly capture about 5% of the pathos factor of visiting someone dead and lost with his father (during and after) said father’s demise (mostly on the strength of Nighy’s acting) — but again, the pathos is drawn out by the lack of any consistent attention to the rules. Supposedly, Tim can’t visit his dead father in the past anymore because he can’t cross the barrier of his third child’s birth, yet on his last visit, the two of them hop off twenty years into the past (crossing numerous birth barriers) with nary a thought. Plus, he already (as mentioned above) fixed one such barrier goof.

Oh, yeah, then the big kicker is, that despite the fact that his time manipulations have only been used to fix things, and have never previously messed anything up (that hasn’t been then fixed), our protagonist decides at the end of the film to just stop using the powers, because now he “appreciates everyday so much he doesn’t need them.”

I call B.S.

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Related posts:

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By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Movies
Tagged as: About Time, Bill Nighy, Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel McAdams, Richard Curtis, Time travel

Continuum – Corporate Future

Oct14

continuum-season-one-blu-ray-400pxTitle: Continuum

Genre: SciFi Thriller

Cast: Rachel Nichols (Actor), Erik Knudsen (Actor)

Watched: October 5-11, 2013

Summary: Solid sci-fi

ANY CHARACTER HERE

Continuum is the second excellent Canadian SciFi television show I’ve found this year (the other being Orphan Black). The regular American networks just wouldn’t make something like this. In fact, they all passed on it. Their loss, because while it has a couple of flaws,  as television goes, Continuum is first rate science fiction and imminently watchable.

Plot wise, we have a 2077 cop who while supervising the execution of the world’s worst terrorists, is propelled back in time to 2012 as part of their cunning escape plan — maybe.

The pilot does a first rate job of setting up the future and getting us quickly back in time . The details are hinted at rather than beaten over your head, which is good because the events leading to the time travel will be revisited numerous times in future episodes  as we learn more and more about the  players. The first few episodes seem almost procedural, with our heroine rapidly shifting herself into a cop role in 2012 — but this begins to shift right from the beginning to a more extended style of plotting. True, the always amusing fish out of water dynamic is underutilized (Kiera picks up 2012 like a pro), but the show really keeps the high level plot moving forward.

The show’s two biggest strengths are its big but tightly integrated cast and its complex mythology. The characters are interesting, and for the most part, not entirely formulaic. Alliances are always forming and shifting, without feeling forced. The terrorists are a varied bunch, with differing agendas, and the writers have deftly complemented their reprehensible methods with highly sympathetic political goals. In fact, this is a show with a substantial dose of moral ambiguity. The apparent behavior of the character is often at odds with their political agenda. The terrorists might be evil killers, but we agree with their points. Kiera might be our heroine, but at some level, her defense of the status quo can be called into question. Overall, the characters are interesting and not totally predictable.

The future city looks great (for TV)

The future city looks great (for TV)

At a political level, the take on 2077 is intriguing. This is a world where government has gone by the wayside and the corporations have risen to dominate the political and social landscape. Profit über alles. And given how things are now, this isn’t such an unreasonable trajectory. The future tech is for the most part pretty well done. We have a lot of slick touch screens, on nearly every kind of surface. For low budget television it looks pretty darn good, if a bit like modern buildings in Vancouver playing high tech dress up. I have a few specific tech nit picks, but they don’t detract from the watchability of the show.

  1. Alec is way too good about coming to grips with technology he is supposed to invent decades from now and has way too easy a time interfacing his 2012 prototypes with models from 2077. I know why the writers did it, but it’s unrealistic.
  2. Why the hell does Kiera have to use touch screens on her suit sleeve when she can control her CMR (internal cyber hud) just by thinking?
  3. The batteries on her stuff sure last a long time.

The mythology is quite excellent. Each episode is studded with flash forwards (usually from Kiera’s perspective) into 2077 and each time we get a bit more of the picture as to who all the players are and how they intertwine across both timelines. It’s, for the most part, sharply written and quite intriguing. Many of the 2012 folks are a bit at odds with who they become, not in the sense of character believability (which is pretty good) but with where we might expect them to go. This all makes it pretty fun.

Not the execution they were looking for

Not the execution they were looking for

The time travel is well handled. Two seasons in (and a third has been ordered) we’re not totally sure which end of the time travel  spectrum we’re operating on, but the characters are asking the right questions, which makes it interesting. In one episode they try to  eliminate each other by killing their grandparents — only to find it doesn’t work that way. So we know causality doesn’t loop (a.k.a. Back to the Future), but is this a fated timeline? Did original older Alec remember younger Kiera and engineer her return? I don’t think so, meaning we are dealing with two possibly disconnected timelines. As a time travel fan and author thinking about these questions made my day.

All in all, I watched it in a 3-4 episode a night binge and I was depressed when it was over. Good thing another season is on the way!

Check out more TV reviews or

my own Time Travel novel, Untimed.

continuum01

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By: agavin
Comments (12)
Posted in: Television
Tagged as: Continuum, Erik Knudsen, Rachel Nichols, Science Fiction, Science Fiction and Fantasy, Television, Time travel

Untimed on the Cheap

Sep02

The E-Book versions of Untimed will be only $0.99 cents from Monday, September 2 through Friday the 13th! Take the plunge, it’s certainly a great deal.

Buy it on Amazon!

Tweet, share, like, follow, blog and grab a copy of my book. The trailer can be found here.

About Untimed

Charlie’s the kind of boy that no one notices. Hell, his own mother can’t remember his name. So when a mysterious clockwork man tries to kill him in modern day Philadelphia, and they tumble through a hole into 1725 London, Charlie realizes even the laws of time don’t take him seriously. Still, this isn’t all bad. Who needs school when you can learn about history first hand, like from Ben Franklin himself. And there’s this girl… Yvaine… another time traveler. All good. Except for the rules: boys only travel into the past and girls only into the future. And the baggage: Yvaine’s got a baby boy and more than her share of ex-boyfriends. Still, even if they screw up history — like accidentally let the founding father be killed — they can just time travel and fix it, right? But the future they return to is nothing like Charlie remembers. To set things right, he and his scrappy new girlfriend will have to race across the centuries, battling murderous machines from the future, jealous lovers, reluctant parents, and time itself.

“A masterful storyteller, Gavin builds a solid plot with believable characters.” — Kirkus
_
“Adventure, chemistry… and roller coaster plot are sure to appeal.” — Publishers Weekly
_
“Like science class in Las Vegas!” — FantasyLiterature.com

Buy Sample Characters Reviews Reviewer Info

20-Tyburn

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By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, E-book, sale, Time travel, Untimed

Untimed – $1.99 this week!

Jan20

To help kick off the launch, the E-Book versions of Untimed will be only $1.99 cents from Sunday, January 20 until Friday the 25th! Take the plunge, it’s certainly a great deal.

Buy it on Amazon!

Tweet, share, like, follow, blog and grab a copy of my book.

About Untimed

Charlie’s the kind of boy that no one notices. Hell, his own mother can’t remember his name. So when a mysterious clockwork man tries to kill him in modern day Philadelphia, and they tumble through a hole into 1725 London, Charlie realizes even the laws of time don’t take him seriously. Still, this isn’t all bad. Who needs school when you can learn about history first hand, like from Ben Franklin himself. And there’s this girl… Yvaine… another time traveler. All good. Except for the rules: boys only travel into the past and girls only into the future. And the baggage: Yvaine’s got a baby boy and more than her share of ex-boyfriends. Still, even if they screw up history — like accidentally let the founding father be killed — they can just time travel and fix it, right? But the future they return to is nothing like Charlie remembers. To set things right, he and his scrappy new girlfriend will have to race across the centuries, battling murderous machines from the future, jealous lovers, reluctant parents, and time itself.

“A masterful storyteller, Gavin builds a solid plot with believable characters.” — Kirkus
_
“Like science class in Las Vegas!” — FantasyLiterature.com

Buy Sample Characters Reviews Reviewer Info

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By: agavin
Comments (0)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, sale, Time travel, Untimed

Whelping Characters

Dec24

My novel Untimed was conceived as a fusion of ideas. Lingering in my mind for over twenty years was a time travel story about people from the future who fell “downtime” to relive exciting moments in history (until things go wrong). I’d worked out a time travel system but had no plot or characters. Separately, in 2010, as a break from editing The Darkening Dream, I experimented with new voice techniques, especially first person present. I also read various “competition.” One of these was The Lightning Thief (the first Percy Jackson novel), which has an amazing series concept (if a slightly limp execution). I love mythology and history, and liked the notion of something with a rich body of material to mine. I wanted an open ended high concept that drew on my strengths, which brought me back to time travel.
Some of the mechanics from my earlier concept merged well with a younger protagonist, voiced in a visceral first person present style. I started thinking about it, and his voice popped into my head. I pounded out a chapter not too dissimilar from the first chapter of the final novel. Then the most awesome villain teleported into the situation. I can’t remember how or why, but it happened quickly and spontaneously. Tick-Tocks were born (or forged).

Rapier: So bad he's cool

Rapier: So bad he’s cool

The Tick-Tocks are supposed to be mysterious, and I really wanted to reveal their secrets layer by layer. It was even important that by the end of the book, while you understand a lot more about them, you don’t really know exactly where they come from or what their up to. A great nemesis needs this. Think Darth Vader or Professor Moriarty. Their secrets aren’t all on the table to begin with. Additionally, one of my favorite emotions to play with is “creep.” My first novel, The Darkening Dream, is all about creepiness, and I think it’s much more effective and scary than plain horror. So the Tocks are supposed to be creepy. Not exactly horrific, but just mysterious and creepy. That’s one of the reasons they don’t talk. Creepy.

Charlie: Not even his mother remembers his name

Charlie: Not even his mother remembers his name

Charlie’s character derived automatically from his voice, which I tried to make authentically 15. And while he’s sweet, and fundamentally optimistic and good natured, realism demanded a bit of an edge. Teen boys think about shit and sex. Sorry, but it’s true. I rub up on issues that make some squirm, even if I deal with the lightly: teen pregnancy, drinking, slavery, etc. But to sweep these under the carpet wouldn’t do justice to the 18th century – or our own.

Yvaine: Comes with serious baggage

Yvaine: Comes with serious baggage

As to Yvaine. Well, she’s based in part on the kind of girl I wanted to meet when I was a teenager. This seems odd, considering how messed up she is, but like Charlie, I didn’t have much luck with girls in High School. In the 80s, being a “computer guy” and even worse, into video games, was pretty much the kiss of death (see 16 Candles for reference). Yvaine is smart, capable, and in charge, but she’s also damaged and emotionally needy. I thought the combination worked.

Donnie: If you think the wig is impressive, wait until you see his sword

Donnie: If you think the wig is impressive, wait until you see his sword

Lastly, I’ll talk about Donnie. I’ve noticed that the most effective jerks tend to have some real charisma. Because of Yvaine, Charlie never really likes Donnie, but he maybe could have briefly. Donnie holds his little band together throw a mixture of intimidation, generosity, camaraderie and loyalty. He may be mostly out for himself, but he really sees himself as the protector and leader of his gang, and he acts this way to hold up his own self image. Even in the end, his loyalty to Stump is his own undoing, which is kinda sad – but that’s life. Real villains are heroes in their own stories.

Buy Sample Characters Reviews Reviewer Info

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  1. Untimed Art Finished!
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  4. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
  5. Untimed Characters
By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Characters, Charlie, Creepy, Lightning Thief, Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, Sixteen Candles, Time travel, Untimed, Yvaine

Untimed officially for Sale!

Dec20

Both the paperback and Kindle versions are available. If your stocking is stuffed with a brand new Kindle, or you already have one, or you read on the Kindle app anywhere (iPad, Android, etc.)…

Buy it now!

The e-book launches at the low, low price of $5.99, certainly a bargain given that it took me a year to write. Plus the book is lavishly produced with a cover by award winning fantasy artist Cliff Nielsen and there are twenty-one gorgeous interior illustrations by Dave Phillips.

For those of you that aren’t Kindle people, in the next couple of weeks I’ll try to get all the other E-Book variants up (B&N, iTunes, etc.). Also, I’m also working on a stunning hardcover edition — just because I can.

About the book:

Charlie’s the kind of boy that no one notices. Hell, his own mother can’t remember his name. So when a mysterious clockwork man tries to kill him in modern day Philadelphia, and they tumble through a hole into 1725 London, Charlie realizes even the laws of time don’t take him seriously. Still, this isn’t all bad. Who needs school when you can learn about history first hand, like from Ben Franklin himself. And there’s this girl… Yvaine… another time traveler. All good. Except for the rules: boys only travel into the past and girls only into the future. And the baggage: Yvaine’s got a baby boy and more than her share of ex-boyfriends. Still, even if they screw up history — like accidentally let the founding father be killed — they can just time travel and fix it, right? But the future they return to is nothing like Charlie remembers. To set things right, he and his scrappy new girlfriend will have to race across the centuries, battling murderous machines from the future, jealous lovers, reluctant parents, and time itself.

So try it out and see what you think. Afterward, please review the book on Amazon. Reviews matter!

Buy Sample Characters Reviews Reviewer Info

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EndGame2_cropped

Related posts:

  1. Untimed – Out on Submission!
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By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Amazon Kindle, Amazon.com, Andy Gavin, Cliff Nielsen, E-book, Fantasy art, iTunes, Time travel, Untimed

Untimed nearly here!

Dec10

Prepared yourself to launch yourself back (and forward) into history! My new time travel novel, Untimed, is launching on December 19!

Charlie’s the kind of boy that no one notices. Hell, even his own mother can’t remember his name. And girls? The invisible man gets more dates.

As if that weren’t enough, when a mysterious clockwork man tries to kill him in modern day Philadelphia, and they tumble through a hole into 1725 London, Charlie realizes even the laws of time don’t take him seriously.

Still, this isn’t all bad. In fact, there’s this girl, another time traveler, who not only remembers his name, but might even like him! Unfortunately, Yvaine carries more than her share of baggage: like a baby boy and at least two ex-boyfriends! One’s famous, the other’s murderous, and Charlie doesn’t know who is the bigger problem.

When one kills the other — and the other is nineteen year-old Ben Franklin — things get really crazy. Can their relationship survive? Can the future? Charlie and Yvaine are time travelers, they can fix this — theoretically — but the rules are complicated and the stakes are history as we know it.

And there’s one more wrinkle: he can only travel into the past, and she can only travel into the future!

The paperback and Kindle versions will be available at launch, with hardcover and other ebook adaptions to follow. The cover is by award winning fantasy artist Cliff Nielsen and there are twenty-one gorgeous interior illustrations by Dave Phillips.

Meanwhile, read the first two chapters here, free!

Related posts:

  1. Untimed Art Finished!
  2. Untimed – Out on Submission!
  3. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  4. Untimed Cover Reveal!
  5. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
By: agavin
Comments (7)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, London, Philadelphia, Time travel, Untimed

Untimed Goodies

Nov12

My latest Advanced Reader Copy of Untimed. NOTE: the white balance leans overly orange in this photo

This was a busy week for Untimed swag. The proof came for the latest ARC (Advanced Reader Copy) and it looks fantastic. Not only the outside, but the interior has a new properly done layout  that includes all the illustrations and near print ready formatting.

Swag bookmarks

I also received a run of bookmarks. These look pretty cool but I wish there was an easy way to get proofs before printing a big run. The way they price these things on the online printshops (I used overnightprints.com for these) it only makes sense to order 1000-2000+, but there are no (physical) proofs. The text on the back is a little close to the trim for my taste, even though it was well inside the safety zone. They also have a 2-3mm variance in the cutting, which is typical but annoying. They aren’t all centered perfectly an I’m a perfectionist. Still, they look cool. For those of you curious about the process, below are the print ready versions.

Related posts:

  1. Untimed Cover Reveal!
  2. Untimed – The Second Cover
  3. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
  4. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  5. Untimed – Meet the Tocks
By: agavin
Comments (6)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, books, Novel, online printing, Paperback, swag, Time travel, Untimed, Writing

Untimed Cover Reveal!

Sep05

I just received the final version of the Untimed cover painting by Cliff Nielsen. I’d thought Cliff knocked The Darkening Dream cover out of the park (it’s even won a number of awards) but this one is on fire.

The art above, cool as it is, isn’t intended to be a complete composition. This is a book cover painting, and so there is extra space to work with around the central figure as well as fairly monochromatic areas for the titles and to the left for the back cover (paper edition). I crop different sections out of it as needed for different uses, such as the banner above or the current front cover composition to the left. The logo and text composition aren’t set in stone yet, either, I’m still noodling on them.

You’re probably wondering who the hell the clockwork man is. Meet Rapier. He’s nearly indestructible, dresses in time appropriate blue uniforms, carries a sword, and kills time travelers on sight. History is his playground. He can be anywhere or anywhen. And no one has a clue what he or the other Tick-Tocks want. Which is all a bit of a bummer for our time traveling protagonist, Charlie.

The scene above is inside the church of St. Bartholomew the Great, London, in the year 1725. At the time, a young Ben Franklin worked there (oddly enough, the building was used as a print shop). When Rapier gets in on the action, the paper is literally hot off the presses!

Be sure to leave your thoughts on the new cover in the comments!

Vote on logo options here, check out some interior illustrations, or

read more about the story of Untimed.

End Game: Tick-Tock TLC

Interior illustrator Dave Phillip’s version of the same scene about two minutes later – when things go from bad to worse!

The old stock photography cover I did myself

Related posts:

  1. Untimed – The Second Cover
  2. Untimed – Logo Faceoff
  3. Untimed – Out on Submission!
  4. Untimed – Meet the Tocks
  5. Cover Commission
By: agavin
Comments (11)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Art, Cliff Nielsen, Cover, Cover art, layout, London, Stock photography, Time travel, Untimed

Untimed – Logo Faceoff

Aug29

A while back, Cliff Nielsen, the amazing artist who created the cover for The Darkening Dream, finished the amazing new cover painting for my second novel, Untimed. This is going to replace the stock photography clock cover to the left, but I’m not ready to reveal it (I will in a week or three) but I’ve been experimenting with logos and wanted to collect your opinions. As a side note, I’ve been doing my mechanicals myself. Not only is it cheaper, but my photoshop skillz have gotten moderately elite — at least for a programmer/author.

Below are three takes on the logo. You can even see just a hint of the cover illustration here, but I cut it tight to be a tease (and content aware filled out a bit of someone’s head!).

A fairly heavily “styled” version where the text is inspired by antique clock parts (this is after all a time travel novel with clockwork killer machines). Thanks to longtime friend Jason Rubin for help on an earlier variant of this logo.

A similar brass treatment, but using a more strait forward lowercase type treatment. The font is modeled after an 18th century typeface.

Same deal as above, but all uppercase.

Similar to the top-most one, but with arabesque tooling in the metal instead of brushing. This new variant was added 9/12/12, after most of the comments. Since people liked #1, I wanted to work in that direction.

So, dear readers, which version do you like? Let me know in the comments. None of the above is a viable opinion, but please give reasons.

The back of a Breguet watch, I was going for a similar sort of vibe with the arabesque tooling.

Related posts:

  1. Untimed – The Second Cover
  2. Untimed – Meet the Tocks
  3. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
  4. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  5. Untimed – Out on Submission!
By: agavin
Comments (26)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Art Design, Book, Cliff Nielsen, Cover art, Fiction, Logos, Time travel, Untimed

Untimed Art Finished!

Aug13

All twenty-one interior illustrations for my time travel novel, Untimed, are now finished! These are painted by Dave Phillips, an awesome artist I commissioned earlier this year. I thought I’d use the occasion to show two new images. And because I love process, I’m posting both the rough and final versions. To get a close up look at this, click one of the images and it will bring up a Smugmug lightbox. You can use the arrow keys to flip back and forth between the rough and the final to see the differences.

Donnie: Two's company, three's a crowdDonnie: Two's company, three's a crowd

Above is is “Two’s Company, Three’s a Crowd.” Our protagonist Charlie has to go all the way from contemporary Philadelphia to 1725 London to meet a girl, but she has more than her share of baggage!

For those of you who are curious, Donnie, the guy in the middle with the crazy wig, is actually nineteen and dressed as a “Macaroni.” Remember the line from Yankee Doodle Dandy: “He stuck a feather in his hat, and called it macaroni”? In the early 18th century it was in vogue for trendy young men to dress in outlandish colors (Italian Style) and they were called Macaronis. Tim Roth also plays a fantastic and similar dandy in the excellent 1995 film Rob Roy.

Sideways: This is Philadelphia?Sideways: This is Philadelphia?

Time travel isn’t just about competing for girls, sometimes tiny changes can have big consequences. Well, maybe letting Ben Franklin get killed and leaving the clockwork men to run amuck doesn’t qualify as “tiny.” When Charlie gets back home to modern day Philadelphia (above), things look a bit different then he expects!

Previously released images can be found here and here and stay tuned for more.

Find out more about Untimed here.

Related posts:

  1. Untimed Fourth Draft Finished
  2. Untimed – Out on Submission!
  3. From Sketch to Final
  4. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  5. Untimed – The Second Cover
By: agavin
Comments (10)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Dandy, London, Macaroni, Philadelphia, Rob Roy, Tavern, Tim Roth, Time travel, Untimed, Yankee Doodle Dandy

Primer – Thinking Time Travel

May19

Title: Primer

Director/Stars: Shane Carruth (Director)

Genre: Time Travel

Watched:  May 7, 2012

Summary: Brilliant and confusing

_

This is very much a thinking man’s thriller. It’s a slightly Momento-esque time travel film supposedly filmed for a mere $7,000! I’m skeptical that it was actually that cheap, but it certainly was cheap. Even so, it rarely suffers for it.

The film is very short at 77 minutes and the first half elapses before we see any actual time travel. We follow a group of engineers speaking a nearly incomprehensible technobabble. Even as an ultimate techie (M.I.T. grad degree in EECS) I could not follow most of it — the writers did not intend us to — but it’s actually fairly reasonable. I had more problem with all the engineers wearing shirt and tie even during leisure hours. In any case, they accidentally invent a peculiar kind of time machine. It allows very limited (and fairly awkward) backward travel.

If you want to try and understand it, which isn’t easy, read this page.

The second half is a dizzying series of overlapping events as the two main protagonists loop and reloop across a few sleepless days. Understanding the exact sequence would undoubtedly require numerous viewings. The creator spares little effort to make such complex matters easily digestible.

As someone who has recently (last year) created his own time travel scheme, for my novel Untimed, I appreciate this complete, well thought out, and fully coherent scheme. This is old school hard sci-fi of sorts, and it’s refreshing in this era of marketing driven watered down drivel to have to puzzle something out.

For more Film reviews, click here.

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By: agavin
Comments (6)
Posted in: Movies
Tagged as: Movie, Physics, primer, Relativity, Shane Carruth, Technobabble, Time travel

From Sketch to Final

May15

Dave Phillips, the awesome artist I commissioned to illustrate my time travel novel, Untimed, has been quietly cranking away. A couple of weeks ago he finished the rough versions of all twenty-one images. I thought I’d use this post as an opportunity not only to show off his brilliant work, but to shed some light on the process. The images on the left are the roughs, and on the right the finals.

End Game: Tick-Tock TLCEnd Game: Tick-Tock TLC

We use the roughs to establish composition and for me to check that all the details are consistent with the novel. I give him feedback and he then spends the time to polish the image up. Neither of these images required any major changes, but it’s fun to see both how well the rough makes an impression, and how much more detailed the final is.

To get a close up look at this, click one of the images and it will bring up a Smugmug lightbox. You can then use the arrow keys to flip back and forth between the images, including between the rough and the final to see the differences.

This particular image, released previously, shows the mysterious Tick-Tock gloating over a dying Ben Franklin — oops!

Looped: Meeting Mr. and Mrs. FakeLooped: Meeting Mr. and Mrs. Fake

And this new one occurs 80 years later across the English channel. Ever wonder if you’d like yourself? Time travelers can find out first hand. Or, perhaps, meeting yourself will destroy the very fabric of the spacetime continuum!

Find out more about Untimed here.

Related posts:

  1. Untimed – Out on Submission!
  2. Untimed – Meet the Tocks
  3. The Final Cover
  4. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
By: agavin
Comments (8)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Arts and Entertainment, Ben Franklin, Dave Phillips, Design, Fiction, Illustration, SmugMug, Tick-Tock, Time travel, Untimed

Untimed – Out on Submission!

Apr13

Young Ben Franklin at the printing press

Exciting times! My brand spanking new literary agent is already out there earning his keep. Eddie (the aforementioned agent of awesome) sent out  Untimed Thursday on submission to New York and worldwide. It’s not only great to have such enthusiasm — we only signed two weeks ago — but an appropriate juncture given that the historical changes in Untimed (a time travel novel) pivot around Ben Franklin, who was one of America’s earliest important printers. People tend to remember him for the whole “founding father” bit but he was first and foremost a printer, political essayist, and satirist (not to be confused with my favorite mythological beings, satyrs).

But rest assured, Untimed is anything but old fashioned. Below and left is another awesome illustration by Dave Phillips to underscore the prose (one of approximately 21 that will be in the book). And that’s just a rough draft! Dave, like many artists, does two passes. The first (like this one) is to establish the composition, mood, and layout. Then, once we get that out of the way, he does a final with more detail. Truth is, this is little different than writing. The initial illustration is like a scene outline. Or video games, where we would rough out a level without all the visual details to see if the game play worked as intended.

The mysterious Tick-Tock gloats over a dying Ben Franklin - in 1725! — rough draft illustration by Dave Phillips

Who are the Tick-Tocks? And what do they want?

Nothing good, as far as protagonist Charlie is concerned. Their policy on time travelers is to stab, shoot, or crush first — ask questions later.

But it’s more complicated than that, as I’m working out now while making detailed outlines for book 2 and 3. Ah, plotting. I have a love/hate relationship with this phase of novel writing. Scratch that, more hate. I love the actual writing best.

This time around I’m trying to plot the entire book in detail before digging into the text, which being a pantser is against my nature. But it needs doing as time travel is complicated and I must research the periods I intend to visit. I’ve already pounded through four or five history books in the last two weeks. Hint: Buckle on your sandals, this time I’m headed way back!

Related posts:

  1. Untimed – Meet the Tocks
  2. Untimed – The Second Cover
  3. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  4. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
  5. Untimed – The Last Draft?
By: agavin
Comments (8)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Business, Dave Phillips, Eddie, EDDIE SCHNEIDER, Jabberwocky, Literary agent, New York, Publishing, Publishing and Printing, Tick-Tock, Time travel, Untimed

Untimed – Meet the Tocks

Mar13

I finished the line editing on my second novel, Untimed, last December, but that doesn’t mean the work is really over. On one front, it’s out to various agents and editors, but on the other I’m working on spit and polish.

I had it professionally proofread and just finished going over all those little fixes. This is just an extra step to make sure it’s as free of errors as possible and that the comma, hyphen, and spelling niceties are as consistent as possible. And apparently I don’t like commas half as well as I should.

But far more exciting is that I’m having the book illustrated! I know it’s relatively rare to illustrate novels, but I love art and believe — well done — that it really adds to the overall experience. Working with the agent who represented the awesome cover artist for The Darkening Dream, I found a talented illustrator named Dave Phillips (his website is here and some portfolio samples here). He has a real knack for character (see this for example) and knows how to capture lifelike personality in his figures. Over the last few weeks we’ve been developing character designs and now the first (more or less) finished image.

To the right, our hero Charlie (in front), confronts the mysterious Tick-Tock, a rapier-wielding clockwork man who serves as the only link to Charlie’s missing father.

But Tick-Tocks are full of surprises, including the ability to punch holes in time!

Two free Naughty Dark tickets to the first reader who guesses the exact physical location of the scene (reply in comments here). You must not be one of my beta readers or one of their relatives. Hint: “Ghost H…”

Related posts:

  1. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
  2. Untimed – The Second Cover
  3. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  4. Untimed Fourth Draft Finished
  5. Untimed – Off for Line Editing
By: agavin
Comments (4)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Arts, books, Cover art, Dave Phillips, Fiction, Illustration, Tick-Tock, Tick-Tocks, Time travel, Untimed, Writing and Editing

Tempest

Jan27

Title: Tempest

Author: Julie Cross

Genre: YA time travel

Length: 352 pages

Read: January 23, 2012

Summary: Great fast paced debut

_

This new YA time travel novel has a bit of buzz (I see it on many of the book blogs I troll looking for candidates to review The Darkening Dream), but I read it — and quickly — because of the superficial similarities to my second novel, Untimed. Both are YA time travel, both have a male protagonist (although he’s a 19 year old in this book, and 15 in mine).

But that’s about where the similarity ends. Although don’t get me wrong, Tempest is a great book (even if Untimed is better!). It’s one of the best YA’s I’ve read in the last year or so, on par with Before I Fall. The beginning is slightly awkward although the 1st person past voice is good. The author’s “I’m a time traveling teen intro” felt slightly forced, but as soon as he’s attacked by mysterious secret agent dudes and forced back from 2009 to 2007 (maybe 10% in) the book rocks along and I read the whole thing in a single sitting. Overall it nicely balances an interesting new scenario, likable characters, a compelling romance, a good mystery, and a touch of pathos. Good stuff.

Tempest borrows lightly from the brilliant The Time Traveler’s Wife too, and while it has a novel take on time travel it’s really more of an action mystery, and most importantly a romance. Untimed on the other hand, which is even heavier on the action, and has a romance (less emphasized), really focuses on the history part of time travel. I visit four centuries, all heavily researched, and explore the big impact individual people can have on the broad sweep of history. Tempest sticks mostly to the personal. The things that change in this novel are all of an intimate nature, having to do with the protagonist and his family. Namely the author is a woman and its all about the relationships: Jackson and his girlfriend, his father, his best friend, and his sister. Not that this is bad, as these relationships are really well done, its just different. The time travel action is confined mostly to a couple years back and is rarely intricate, avoiding most overlap and paradox. All the material stuff occurs between 2007 and 2009 with only a few touristic visits to the decade prior. It’s mostly all in New York city.

This leaves a lot of time to focus on the Jackson / Holly romance. We see it in three modes: as it existed before the novel opens, as he recreates it two years earlier from scratch in alternate 2007, and as he upgrades it on his return. As I said, this is a nicely done romance and really the core of the novel. Both characters felt natural to me, their passion genuine, young, and hopeful. Two major elements interjected a top fight bittersweet note: the problematic nature of a time traveler / normal romance and Jackson’s relationship with his dead twin sister (which because of time travel, lingers on, just a bit).

The mystery element was also good. The book succeeds in NOT revealing exactly what is really going on with the time travelers and even which of two (or even possibly three) factions is actually in the right. This is something I also tried to do in Untimed, and works pretty well here, even if the whole “secret agent” thing and nomenclature of “Enemies of Time” is a bit cheesy. Essentially Cross pulls it off. But the villains are nowhere near as cool as my Tick-Tocks 🙂

And I totally wanted to keep reading. But because of the lame pacing of the traditional publishing system we have to wait a year for the sequel!

Listen to a sample of the audiobook by Macmillan Audio here.

Or for more book reviews, click here.

Related posts:

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By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Books
Tagged as: Book Review, Holly, Jackson, Julie Cross, romance, Tempest, Time travel

Untimed – Off for Line Editing

Nov03

Yesterday, I finished my fourth (more like 3 1/2) major draft of my new novel, Untimed, bundled it up, and shipped it out to my editor for line editing. This was a relatively quick and easy draft (about ten days), although it still took the usual three passes/reads. I concentrated on beefing up conflict. Every book has its trouble spots. In Untimed, these are the couple chapters following the Act 1-2 break and likewise those surrounding the Act 2-3 break (plus in earlier drafts, the ending — but that’s been resolved since the second draft).

The early Second Act has the problem of needing to up the stakes without being too flaccid or redundant. In the first and second drafts it had problems with being divergent to the main storyline, of basically doubling down on the action that occurs at the end of the first act. 1+1 does not equal 2. With the third draft I rewrote it completely, but here in the fourth, my editors had suggested a superficially minor reordering of the action. While textually small, pulling a couple reveals earlier had some great effects on the dynamic between the two leads, basically, giving them more divergent agendas for several chapters. Conflict is good in fiction. In real life we go to a lot of effort to minimize it. When writing, you want to squeeze every ounce of fight out of the story.

The Third Act break just plain needed more fighting (the personal, not the physical kind). I ramped it up again. Still, I wonder if I couldn’t use a bit more of “the whiff of death” but I Untimed is fairly light and I didn’t want to somber it up. Anyway, it read pretty well in my read through.

I’ve also been banging my head a bit with the issue of character arc, but I’ll have more to say on that in a day or so.

Now off to work on other things while I wait for the line edit to come back.

For more posts on writing, click here.

Related posts:

  1. On Writing: Line Editing
  2. Untimed – Two Novels, Two Drafts!
  3. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
  4. Untimed – The Second Cover
  5. Untimed – The Last Draft?
By: agavin
Comments (2)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Fiction, Proofreading, revision, Story Structure, Time travel, Writing, Writing & Editing

Middle Madness

Sep08

I think I’m over the hump with the third major draft of my new novel, Untimed (for a quick blurb see here).

Story structure is hard. And while this book is much better structured than early drafts of my previous novel, it had two major problems: the ending and the first part of Act II. Late (very late) in the second draft I cracked the ending. So that just left the middle.

Therefore, I wasn’t surprised when the biggest comment from my awesome freelance editors’ (I use three: Renni Browne, Shannon Roberts, and R.J. Cavender) involved problems in this middle section. It’s not that the scenes wen’t good or exciting, but mostly that I fell prey to a personal need to sneak Napoleon into the story (time travel seems to call out for the most pivotal personality of the modern era) and this resulted in a bad case of “Double Mumbo Jumbo” (or a variant thereof).

So what is the dreaded Double Mumbo Jumbo? Most specifically it’s the phase coined in Blake Snyder‘s Save the Cat book (which I discuss here). DMJ is invoked by throwing two unrelated implausible things into the same story. However, my specific problem is really a cousin, what my editor Renni calls “1+1=1/2”. This is, the idea that doing the same improbable thing twice in the same book isn’t twice as good as doing it once, but actually half as good. Even if the thing is cool. So a kind of DMJ.

And I was doing it in my middle.

Still, this section of my story accomplished a lot of other things too. And I had to figure out how to rework it to keep as much of the good as I could, avoid a DMJ — and not make TOO much work for myself in terms of repercussions later in the book. Thinking about various ways to restructure, particularly given the constraints of my story, my elaborate time travel scheme, and history itself, was quite the brain buster. I thought on it all day for at least a week. So hard one Friday that I literally gave myself a migraine headache! I found myself pondering time travel so aggressively that I became confused as to what year it was — and then my vision began to shimmer (migraine).

I probably outlined 15 different scenarios and talked about countless more. This part of the writing process is very peculiar. I often end up with a half-baked scenario that satisfies some goals, but just doesn’t really work. One quickly reaches a point where no new ideas surface internally and you need to shake it up. I then find it extremely useful to talk with a limited pool of friends who have read the book in it’s latest incarnation. This allows me to efficiently go over the possible elements. Then we talk out the problems. By vetting numerous failed scenarios it’s often possible to collect enough different disconnected ideas that a single coherent new plot can be jig-sawed together. Or at least coherent enough to polish out in the writing.

This last week, I even twice resorted to writing out (as prose) incomplete outlines to see if they worked. The first revealed itself as a miserable failure. The second made it to the finish.

Now it’s off to friends and editors to see how it passes muster.

For more posts on writing, click here.

Related posts:

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  2. Untimed – Two Novels, Check!
  3. Beginnings and Endings
  4. Peace in the Middle East? – Mezze
  5. Margarita Madness – The Mix
By: agavin
Comments (1)
Posted in: Untimed
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Blake Snyder, books, Creative Writing, Fiction, Headache, Migraine, Napoleon, Napoleon I, Novel in Progress, Novel Writing, novels, Structure, Time travel, Untimed

Crash Bandicoot – Interviews “R” us

Aug13

These are answers (of mine) to a series of interview questions from Russian game site  www.crash–bandicoot.ru. They’re a major Russian Crash fan site, hence the bad pun in my title. If you happen to speak Russian, they’ve it here.

The questions are in bold, and my answers in normal.

Crash Bandicoot (series)

Image via Wikipedia

_

There was the soundtrack of Komodo Bros. boss on the CB1 CD. Does it mean you planned to bring this boss to the first game? What the fight was like and why have you dropped this idea?

Time. We ran out of time, plus we already had six bosses. They ended up in Crash 2. The Crash 1 battle plan was about 30% larger than the game we shipped – which was plenty big enough – as we planned too much. Everything extra ended up in Crash 2. But we didn’t actually make it during the Crash 1 development, we realized before then that there was too much in the plan and shelved it for later. It takes much less time to write on paper, “cool snow level where crash can slide around on the ice” than it does to design, model, and program said level.

Why the cut levels from CB1 beta like Cavern, Cliff and Waterfall haven’t reached its finish point in the final version of the game? According to the video they were well developed.

These were two early levels. The Cliff and Waterfall are the same level (jungle1). The cave was (cave2). These were the first two levels we built in Spring 1995, and they just didn’t work. The designs were too open, showing too many polygons and not channeling the player well enough for proper gameplay. If the space was so big that Crash could just walk around the enemies it wasn’t very fun.

There is the screenshot on crashmania where you can see the fruit similiar to pineapple instead of wumpa. Is it right and was it planned to add different fruits to the game?

Originally (for over a year in development) we had an elaborate fruit currency for pickups. Different fruit were worth different “points.” The only problem with this was that we only had so much texture memory and so each fruit got very little, and didn’t look that great. We eventually decided to spent all that memory on one fruit (the Wumpa fruit) and make it look really good. We rendered it out rotating and stored all the angles. Doing the fruit in actual 3D wasn’t feasible because fruit are round (hence lots of polygons) and we wanted to have many of them on screen.

What the bosses’ heads of Pinstripe, Koala Kong and Papu were for in the bonus rounds in the early version of the game?

We experimented with different “bonus head” currencies. I can’t remember which. In the end Tawna, Cortex, and Brio won out.

What the famous platform with plants from the level Air Crash (CB2) was for? Lots of players used to think it could take you to some secret place however there was the published video where Crash stayed on the platform and nothing happened.

That is just a video of some uncompleted area in some unfinished version of the game (say for a tradeshow). It was under construction and was never intended to be seen. Under construction levels can display any kind of whacky behavior.

The returning characters of Crash Tag Team Rac...

Image via Wikipedia

Why Nitros Oxide wasn’t brought to playable characters in CTR?

We only had room for so many, and the consensus (particularly of the Japanese) was that the cute characters were better choices (like the polar bear cub).

Is it true that there was a secret character called Hippo in the beta of CTR? Why weren’t all the characters from original trilogy included? It’d been nice to see Koala Kong and Nitrus Brio there.

Time and space. Each character was a lot of work and took up a lot of memory. I don’t remember the hippo though.

Why did you choose Mutato Muzika as the music composer to the all games of Crash Bandicoot?

We auditioned a number of composers to give us sample music for the game. Theirs was the coolest. And we were in a hurry J. But it worked out great!

Why CB1 takes all space on CD while CB takes only 1/3 of disk space? It’d be nice to see CB2 on mini-CD.

There is a huge fake file on the CB1 CD (the data.wad) which the game doesn’t care about. The file is full of random numbers and it was there to fill out the disk. The reason for this was twofold. First of all, the outside of the CD is faster, so by putting the useless file on the inside the game would be pushed to the outside. Second, we thought that pirates would be irritated by and less likely to download a 650meg game than a 150meg game. Less pirate copies is a good thing when you make games for a living.

Why have you deleted your official site of Crash Bandicoot on www.naughtydog.com? I’d like to read 20 questions and answers for Crash Bandicoot one more time.

I don’t control or influence www.naughtydog.com in any way, and haven’t since 2004.

What do you think about the bug which allows player to take the red gem in CB2 in an alternative way, not through the secret warproom?

I don’t 🙂 But it’s just a bug. In 1996 it would have pissed me off (mildly), now I shrug and smile.

Why do Brio and Cortex quarrel so that Brio looks for the way of destroying Cortex Spaceship in CB2?

Brio turned out to be surprisingly sympathetic (because Cortex picks on him) so we thought it would be amusing to develop that a bit. The Crash series, however, is not exactly The English Patient in terms of character depth.

It is very interesting what was planned to develop and what plans of that came true in CB2 and CB3?

For Crash 1 we had this huge three-part Island and all sorts of ideas for different areas and levels. Crash 2 was to a large extent those that didn’t make it in the first game plus lots of extra cool ideas we had. There was more time for new mechanics like the surf board, zero-G, sliding on the ice, etc. For Crash 3 we needed something a bit different and came up with the time travel idea (mine!). But truth is that we all loved that idea, and both Jason and I adore time travel. My second novel is about time travel! So the idea naturally led to putting in favorite times and places as levels for Crash 3.

Have you ever regretted of selling the rights of Crash Bandicoot franchise to another company? If there was a chance would you like to return on developing this franchise?

It made sense at the time, but I love Crash. Of all my creations it’s still my favorite and it’s sad to see him drop to his current lows. As Jason puts it, like discovering that your sweet High School girlfriend is now a street walker in Atlantic City.

_

Why did you call your company just “Naughty Dog”?

We liked dogs. Plus Jason was always drawing these cool cartoon characters (in the mid 80s) and one of them was “The Naughty Dog” a studly 80s shades wearing dog who always got the chicks. So he became the mascot and source of the name.

Why Crash Bandicoot and Jak franchises are so similiar? I mean it includes the way of games (1, 2, 3 and racing). The first game of Jak is very similiar to CB1, the attack of Jak is like Crash’s one, we are destroying the crates and so more. Dammit, you can also see the Plant from CB1 in the beginning of the game?

The same people made them. Sometimes you like your own ideas 🙂 Certainly there is plenty new stuff in Jak.

Why have you developed Action-Adventure but not the platformer on PS3 as it lacks of them? I have read your Making of Crash Bandicoot series where you have said Naughty Dog was always looking for the opportunity ways, don’t you think the nice platformer could worth it?

I myself didn’t really do much PS3 development. I left Naughty Dog when Uncharted 1 was in its infancy. But market wise there seemed to be less support for pure platforming. It was seen as old fashioned.

_

What are you interested in besides the video games?

Lots of stuff. Look at my blog http:all-things-andy-gavin.com.  Food, history, travel, writing, fiction of all sorts, technology. I’m very much a fantasy geek in the broad sense of the word.

What is your favorite game?

World of Warcraft. Even though I “quit” (again) after six years. Told you I’m a fantasy geek.

According to Facebook you like classic music. What are your favorite compositions?

I like a lot of music. In pure classical everything from Mozart to Stravinsky. But I listen to a wide variety of things, from weird folk music to industrial techno.

Have you ever been to Russia or the countries of post-Soviet Union. If yes did you like them? If no then are you going to visit them some time?

The closest I’ve been is Budapest and Prague. I’d love to visit many places in the former USSR. St. Petersburg is high on my list because I have a palace and museum fetish and I must see the baroque palaces there. Jason’s been to Moscow too – and I’d love to go there myself.

How do you think if Crash Bandicoot is relevant nowadays?

Current (or recent) Crash games are not relevant, but the character is. The response I get from my blog proves this. People still love the character, his world, and the games. I’m sure if they got an opportunity to play good Crash games in an updated format — millions would.

Any wishes to the users of Bandicoot Internet Zone?

I’d like to thank all the fans. It’s always been so gratifying how much people enjoyed visiting and playing our whacky cartoon universe. We brought it to life because it was just this super silly place that we thought would be a fun to inhabit (even if virtually), and it’s so great that millions and millions of players agreed and had a blast there!

_

The index of all Crash posts is here.

The Making Crash series: [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11]

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Latest hot post: War Stories: Crash Bandicoot

Related posts:

  1. Making Crash Bandicoot – part 6
  2. Making Crash Bandicoot – part 1
  3. Making Crash Bandicoot – part 5
  4. Crash Bandicoot – An Outsider’s Perspective (part 8)
  5. Making Crash Bandicoot – part 2
By: agavin
Comments (52)
Posted in: Games
Tagged as: Andy Gavin, Crash Bandicoot, Fan Sites, Games, Mutato Muzika, Playstation, Time travel, Video game
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