I was thinking of a plot involving the Sun Shade which was discussed in Five Ways to Save the World. The Sun Shade is millions of tiny 1 gram lenses that would be scatter in space 1 million miles from earth and would deflect 2% of solar output which would be enough to stop global warming. The cost of the project was estimated at 4 trillion dollars and would take 30 years to finish. A less slow and expensive sci-fi version of this might be interesting. However I know its a bit too similar to Icarus in DAD. I would imagine the Sun Shade technology being hijacked by the villain so he could blackmail the world's governments into making him world leader or face having the sun completely blottted out. Mr Burns did a mini-version of this in an episode of the Simpsons.
I was thinking that it was time for a more "lesser-scale" villain as opposed to the WD types that Bond tends to confront all too often.
I totally agree with that. It is certainly my preference when it comes to villains.
What I was thinking for novel 6, is that it would be nice if Bond has to do some serious spying just to find out who the villain is. As opposed to something like Casino Royale, where Bond is told about the villain and is sent to stop him. I would like to have a plot where Bond has to do a bit of detective work, piecing together bits of information to find out who the villain is, and have the villain be a nobody (i.e not the type of person who is on 10 most wanted list or something like that) just to make life harder for Bond. Another thing that I think would be nice to work into the story would be something to do with signals intelligence and cryptography. We could have Bond working with someone from GCHQ trying to work out how the villain communicates with his network of evil.
As for the villain's plot, I don't have any bright ideas at the moment, but I just thought I'd share these ideas at this point.
Some thoughts:
Are you taking about possibly having a mole in a nation's government that Bond must somehow expose (ie, he could have to infiltrate the CIA or risk his own status by infiltrating MI-6), or someone completely unuspecting like you and me?
And as for working with signals, cryptography and and coded communications... Will that be handled by Q's gadgets, some university professor, or some govt. hired comms and intel expert?
Are you taking about possibly having a mole in a nation's government that Bond must somehow expose (ie, he could have to infiltrate the CIA or risk his own status by infiltrating MI-6), or someone completely unuspecting like you and me?
And as for working with signals, cryptography and and coded communications... Will that be handled by Q's gadgets, some university professor, or some govt. hired comms and intel expert?
I hadn't really been thinking in terms of a mole, but that is certainly something that could be considered.
Basically, my idea for the villain is somebody who has kept a low profile his entire life - a name that means nothing to Mi6. Basically his scheme (whatever it may be!) has been his life's work. The anonymity will make it harder for Bond, and also the fact that his scheme has had his undivided attention for a long time means that he has thought it out really well, and has just about every base covered.
As far as the cryptography side, I was just thinking it would be interested to have this incredible code which he uses to send clandestine information to his cohorts. And Bond would be working with a govt. hired Signals Intelligence expert from GCHQ.
Of course this short of idea should be secondary to the actual plot of the story. We should probably get on with constructing the plot before we worry too much with details like this.
I like the idea of a project which is supposedly a philanthropic endevour, but which is actually designed to do serious harm to Britain. Although after Moonraker (novel) and other stories (like DAD) this idea seems a bit tired and passe. Something linked to the July 7 2005 bombings in the UK might be interesting, but again, it seems that nearly every Bond tale at the moment has terrorism at its centre. I guess this is the product of the current world situation. I guess that is one reason I like the idea of setting the novel in a different time period, to give us a chance to write about a time when the world had different things to worry about.
Are you taking about possibly having a mole in a nation's government that Bond must somehow expose (ie, he could have to infiltrate the CIA or risk his own status by infiltrating MI-6), or someone completely unuspecting like you and me?
And as for working with signals, cryptography and and coded communications... Will that be handled by Q's gadgets, some university professor, or some govt. hired comms and intel expert?
I hadn't really been thinking in terms of a mole, but that is certainly something that could be considered.
Basically, my idea for the villain is somebody who has kept a low profile his entire life - a name that means nothing to Mi6. Basically his scheme (whatever it may be!) has been his life's work. The anonymity will make it harder for Bond, and also the fact that his scheme has had his undivided attention for a long time means that he has thought it out really well, and has just about every base covered.
OK, that clarifies that thought... Kinda reminds me of that section in SC: Chaos Theory when they run a background check on that one guy to find out there's nothing on him (maybe Bond can fix another "bureaucratic error" ) )
As far as the cryptography side, I was just thinking it would be interested to have this incredible code which he uses to send clandestine information to his cohorts. And Bond would be working with a govt. hired Signals Intelligence expert from GCHQ.
Gotcha.
Of course this short of idea should be secondary to the actual plot of the story. We should probably get on with constructing the plot before we worry too much with details like this.
I like the idea of a project which is supposedly a philanthropic endevour, but which is actually designed to do serious harm to Britain. Although after Moonraker (novel) and other stories (like DAD) this idea seems a bit tired and passe. Something linked to the July 7 2005 bombings in the UK might be interesting, but again, it seems that nearly every Bond tale at the moment has terrorism at its centre. I guess this is the product of the current world situation. I guess that is one reason I like the idea of setting the novel in a different time period, to give us a chance to write about a time when the world had different things to worry about.
My idea (as mentioned before) was to have Bond take down a weapons dealer (or a drug lord could do), and here terrorism isn't necessarily the main course but something off to the side, receiving a small mention here or there but that would be about it. I'm one who prefers having things set in the present day as (IMO) 1) Bond's a character of the present day and 2) there's more material to use in the present day (ie, technological and medical advances, flexibility of events [not being bound by history], and things like that). Of course, a flashback is something totally different.
My other idea was for a villain who is a conspicuous consumer and voluptuary who is anti-environmentalist. The opening scene would be a whaling ship killing a whale, docking, and a courier taking some fresh whale meat to a restaurant just so it can be served to the villain. The story could have scenes in French geese farms where they make the finest pates but where the geese suffer by being forcefed etc.
My only ideas are for a PTS. In short, they involve Bond, a British Naval ship, and a stunning female Lieutenant Colonel (which then just gave me some idea about Bond "practicing his salute" with something other than his arms ) :007) )
My only ideas are for a PTS. In short, they involve Bond, a British Naval ship, and a stunning female Lieutenant Colonel (which then just gave me some idea about Bond "practicing his salute" with something other than his arms ) :007) )
Please, tell us more! I like anything involving Bond and his naval roots. (And a bit of sexual innuendo never goes amiss in a Bond novel!)
scaramanga1The English RivieraPosts: 845Chief of Staff
just to let you all know that the finishing touches to my new short story/novella are being sorted now and that in the coming few weeks we can really get the planning on novel 6 sorted -along with who the contributers are. I have a busy month in May (I'm going on vacation) so the actual writing process will not actually start until June 1st. Can anyone who is interested in being part of this project PM me so I can create a list of who wants to take part -and then we can look at plot ideas in a bit more depth soon.
Cheers,
SC1
scaramanga1The English RivieraPosts: 845Chief of Staff
Ok -those of you who really want to be part of novel 6 please pm me as soon as possible so I can compile the list of contributers.
I will be starting a suggestions and criticism thread today also where ideas will be bounced around in a more focused fashion - first I wish to look at locations - then we will start writing almost "organically" referring to the suggestions and criticism thread as we write as our plot ideas develop. Remember posts can always be edited if things don't fit -plus the final draft will be edited properly so that the tale reads fluently.
I will start the prologue with a basic opening that will allow us to write a PTS as it were so we can get into the hang of the writing -this can be polished later or even ditched if we decide it doesn't work.
Remember this will be quite free flowing and spontaneous initially -it is the first draft after all -so when it is your turn to write read what has gone on before and then take it the direction you feel it should go -if the direction clashes with other peoples ideas we will then take a majority decision and take the tale in that direction -but remember if there are any disagreements -they have to be debated in the S&C thread properly.
I hope those of you who come on board enjoy this project -so happy writing and let the mayhem begin!
Comments
Title: "The Man Who Stole the Sun"
Some thoughts:
Are you taking about possibly having a mole in a nation's government that Bond must somehow expose (ie, he could have to infiltrate the CIA or risk his own status by infiltrating MI-6), or someone completely unuspecting like you and me?
And as for working with signals, cryptography and and coded communications... Will that be handled by Q's gadgets, some university professor, or some govt. hired comms and intel expert?
I hadn't really been thinking in terms of a mole, but that is certainly something that could be considered.
Basically, my idea for the villain is somebody who has kept a low profile his entire life - a name that means nothing to Mi6. Basically his scheme (whatever it may be!) has been his life's work. The anonymity will make it harder for Bond, and also the fact that his scheme has had his undivided attention for a long time means that he has thought it out really well, and has just about every base covered.
As far as the cryptography side, I was just thinking it would be interested to have this incredible code which he uses to send clandestine information to his cohorts. And Bond would be working with a govt. hired Signals Intelligence expert from GCHQ.
Of course this short of idea should be secondary to the actual plot of the story. We should probably get on with constructing the plot before we worry too much with details like this.
I like the idea of a project which is supposedly a philanthropic endevour, but which is actually designed to do serious harm to Britain. Although after Moonraker (novel) and other stories (like DAD) this idea seems a bit tired and passe. Something linked to the July 7 2005 bombings in the UK might be interesting, but again, it seems that nearly every Bond tale at the moment has terrorism at its centre. I guess this is the product of the current world situation. I guess that is one reason I like the idea of setting the novel in a different time period, to give us a chance to write about a time when the world had different things to worry about.
Please, tell us more! I like anything involving Bond and his naval roots. (And a bit of sexual innuendo never goes amiss in a Bond novel!)
Cheers,
SC1
I will be starting a suggestions and criticism thread today also where ideas will be bounced around in a more focused fashion - first I wish to look at locations - then we will start writing almost "organically" referring to the suggestions and criticism thread as we write as our plot ideas develop. Remember posts can always be edited if things don't fit -plus the final draft will be edited properly so that the tale reads fluently.
I will start the prologue with a basic opening that will allow us to write a PTS as it were so we can get into the hang of the writing -this can be polished later or even ditched if we decide it doesn't work.
Remember this will be quite free flowing and spontaneous initially -it is the first draft after all -so when it is your turn to write read what has gone on before and then take it the direction you feel it should go -if the direction clashes with other peoples ideas we will then take a majority decision and take the tale in that direction -but remember if there are any disagreements -they have to be debated in the S&C thread properly.
I hope those of you who come on board enjoy this project -so happy writing and let the mayhem begin!