Within my main story arc, the antagonist replaces parts of himself with machinery, in order to live forever (for more information on this refer to my "Complicity or Simplicity of the plot" thread), but since the story arc starts in medieval times and goes through 600 years to the 1800's, but the way he replaces his body parts is one by one, yet he replaces his innards and his outward body, how could this happen? The technology wouldn't exist. I want to stick wiht some kind of science, but, while a few parts of this rely on improbability and such, I want some of it to follow some science. Any help would be great, Plus I don't know if this belongs in this part of the forums or in character development, so forgive me there. Thanks in advance for any help.
The only way I could see this happening if his vital organs were ongoing transplants of human organs - even then it's dubious, it would take a great stretch of the readers imagination. And how would you get a human brain to last six hundred years? if you transplant a brain you transplant the person. I read your other post - seventeen books for one project. Do you not think that maybe you are aiming a bit high - I would advice that you start with a smaller project and work your way up to the larger ones. I could not tackle such a large undertaking - however that's me. The best of luck and I hope you can pull it off.
It seems to me that you may need to move your timeline up, and condense. Do you really have enough story to fill seventeen books? Think about it again, how many stories are unique, how many are a re-hashed villain-of-the-week? I wrote myself into a corner as well, you know what? I threw it out and started over. If you get into that state, then your story is fundamentally flawed. Frankenstein's Monster is closest to what you have in mind, and even that, well there hasn't been tremendous variety there.
Everyone so far has made some goood replies, I thank you for them, but I may be interpreting part of them wrong, mainly Trilby's post, I'm not really aiming very high anymore, I'm thinking of lowering the amount of books to 8 at the very minimum for me, plus thanks for the luck. Elgaisma, your post was short and to the point, which I like, but placing it on a different planet and havig people live longer would take away the reason for the antagonist, he is a small symbol of hatred overwelming a person, so much so that he only lives to destroy the protagonist. But thanks for the input. And finally, SashaMerideth, I can't move the tieline up anymore than I have, the elements I use in the books require certain time eras, Plus I have enough story to fill 8 book, so I'm condensing it to 8, plus I don't see much of a Frankenstein's monster thing happening with this, I can see the connection, but it's not a really strong connection. Thanks for the input, If I interpretted anything wrong, then correct me. If anymore Information is needed than just ask.
My point remains the same even on this world though. Find a way to change the enviroment so it works. I don't write Sci-Fi I write fantasy mostly and in order to make things work and be believable it needs a context which is what you are trying to do. For example my character needed to be somewhere so I turned him into a bird etc You can make it an Earth-like planet never even mentioning whether or not it is. Have you ever read Tales of the Otori by Lian Hearne ? It is set in a Japanlike place rather than Japan so she could include 'inaccuracies or differences' so the story worked.
I see your point, but, as I'm also writing a fantasy novel, I have the free range of changing the environment of the novel, but I've already, sort of done what you've said, I've taken my world and made it similiar to earth, almost identical yet with slight differences, more like an alternate reality. So, I've kinda used you're idea, so....thanks.
In which case you now need to reread the story and decide how to make it make sense, it may only take a sentence here and there or a whole chapter moving forward or backward etc This is why I find it easier to just write out the story from beginning to end then fix my plot holes later. Once I know the story I know what it needs and I then rewrite the story as many times as I need to get it right.
I don't feel like needing to reread the story, I've made good sense of it so far, I've just got to keep going in this style and fill in certains parts when I get to them. Thanks for the input though.
It may be best to pull an "Orlando", and simply have your character not age. Not possible in real life, but much more believable. -Frank
I have to say this story sounds like it would be interesting. Throughout history there have always been people/societies with technology/techniques that were more advanced/uncommon that what was available to everyday people. The Hashshashin, an group of assassins known in medieval times had methods of assassination and espianage that took their targets by surprise many times. Had doctors during Da Vinci's paid attention to his work with anatomy, it would have advanced medical knowledge by several hundred years. Many of his inventions would have worked, at least in theory (he designed a helicopter, but the propellars were too small for it). Scientists thought Einstein was a bit looney until he was able to prove his theories. He then went on to become one of the greatest scientific minds known to man. I'm just making points to show your idea is feasible. It woudl just be very uncommon in the time period you are talking about (if it is set on Earth). Would your character be able to create a prosthetic limb, for this example I'll use an arm, that would allow him to grab things? With the help of a blacksmith, I believe so. Would you be able to replace his heart with a prosthetic? I seriously doubt that until much later on. The more complicated the body part, the harder it would be to replace, not so much due to the level of technology, but because the MC can't do everything on his own such replace his own heart.
I know its a little cliche but maybe he's a vampire? You could also have something have it so he got the technology from da vinci.
Well, you are writing something that is extremely fictional so what's your reluctance to go large on the fiction? There simply is no way that your situation is remotely possible in the time period you've stated. So: 1. You have to go with the idea that your character is a genius who discovered realish medical techniques that are beyond our current time and explain how that happened. 2. That he created bionics of maybe a steampunk variety. 3. That somekind of hidden technology exists on Earth we don't know about. This is a common attribute to India/Tibet due to the Indian stories that once a super advanced civilization existed there hundreds of thousands of years ago. Perhaps if he met members of some underground version of that society or found a text, etc he would know how to perform medical feats greater than we know.
I think that you're on to something, I'm going to go with your ideas there, the 1st and 2nd ones, so, thank you. It seems that this problem is done and dealt with.
Well, I'm happy about that! I've always been fascinated with 3 since I read about flying machines and nukes described in ancient Indian stories. I don't really believe it, but there's the idea that UFO are part of this ancient technology and coming from some hidden Earth society. Having a character to found that kind of info would be interesting, but it would take a lot of world building.
I'd wonder how necessary a timeline of 600 years is to the books, to be honest. If life can be arbitrarily extended, then it cheapens the sacrifice made by the protagonist somewhat- if he can freely dedicate centuries to the extermination of his opponents, and then go on to live a semblance of a normal life, then he's got a bit of an escape from karma. There's the Arabic proverb that says "If you set out in hope of revenge, first dig two graves" that seems to be the overarching theme of this story. If the mechanisation of the man represents his dehumanisation as he becomes obsessed with murder, then you could replace it with his scheming resulting in disaster and emergency prosthetic surgery for him, creating parts of his body that were solely tools for murder (as he goes and tries again) and which will outlive him. What elements in the books require certain time eras? If it's social mores, you can place it in a different society or in another country- revenge and vendettas still exist in the Mediterranean today, along with the possibility of artificially extended life. Strict social conformity, ethical perversions and the sort of science that may have resulted in mechanical people could be found in developed dictatorships. If your plot relies on certain historical figures, ask yourself what part those figures play in the story and whether or not it couldn't be played by somebody else.
In the film version of the Japanese series, Dororo, the 'demon hunter' character had all of his body but his head stolen by demons (as part of a deal his father, a warlord, made for power). Abandoned, an alchemist and engineer old man builds him a new body out of the dead bodies of other children (it's war time and many have died). This story, although it appears to be Sengoku period Japan, is actually in the far future. There's an idea.
You could just take a look into alchemy and what people used to think was possible etc. I mean Even Newton spent years studying Alchemy, turning basic metals into gold and the like. If you use that as a base for some of the science, albeit fictional, it existed in the minds of many of the greats who studied it. then throw in a nice dose of Sorcery and mysticism, making it how they incorporate the new body parts. maybe throw in some of the great scientists and inventors of the era. It's fiction so make you're own rules.
I think it best that I answer these questions you've got here, so here we go: Well, within the storyline, the antagonist (the man replacing his own body parts) fought the protagonist in the first book and lost, vowing vengenance (for nuemerous reasons), in order for the antagonists vengeance to be complete, he must eradicate the bloodline of the Lumiere family. Since the antagonist is no longer immortal (immortality was taken from him after the first battle with Zeth Lumiere the first) he replaces his body parts to live on, each time he manages to kill a descendant, every 50 or so years, yet there is always another born. More simply put, this idea was inspired by the villain ClockWerk from the Sly Cooper Series. Plus, the choice of the antagonist to replace his body parts with metal and machinary is not particularly a choice, he cannot live forever after the first book, thus the only thing keeping him alive is the mechanised body, but in order for the body itself to run, it requires his hate of the Lumiere family. I don't know if any of this will truly answer your questions or even prove anything but I think the only way to actually explain/understand it is to literally explain the entire character, using parts of each book to do so. If you believe I have mis-interpretted you in any way, please correct me.
Good idea The idea is good because your didn't take the easy option of setting it into the future. One idea is set the story in the 1800's, so you have a more credible starting point. Ironically the person who is trying to be immortal, may by accident, be a pioneer in medical science. Just a thought.
