I'm thinking of writing a Sci-fi novel, which is a welcoming change from General Writing. But I've never written ANY Sci-fi ANYTHING before. I've read a couple of Sci-fi novels like "Ender's Game" and "Fahrenheit 451", and I have the general plot down, but I don't know if I'm going to do a good job or not. The plot is that the world has been taken over by a single dictator, and the effects of that have a big emphasis on the children of the world. In schools, they teach you how to honor the dictator, and outside of school, there is a children's army that you must join... or you will be sentenced to a horrible death. Therefore, there are a certain number of kids that rebel against the school system and the government by going into hiding and doing what ever they feel like doing. Until there is one person who wakes them up to that logic, and says that they must fight back against the dictatorship. They capture a number of mobile robot suits and they fight back against the government. I don't know if this is going to be any good, or if it has been done before. But can you please respond if you read this? Thanks!
Sounds good. Reminds me of "Battle Royale," if you've ever read that. Basically, middle school kids are sent to an island and forced to kill each other. A few eventually rebel against the government that cast them out. But yours does have its notable differences, so I say write it.
It has been done before. 'Arslan' is a sci-fi novel about a world dictator. 'When the tripods came' is about students leading a rebellion against alien overlords. So is 'Red Dawn'. Margret Peterson Haddix's 'Among the Hidden' is about kids going against a government that says they shouldn't exist. The mobile robot suits remind me of various Japanese cartoons, but I'm not a big anime fan so I couldn't name anything specific. That said, there's no reason why it couldn't work. But ask yourself why you have to write this novel. Why write sci-fi now when you never have before? What about this story makes you want to write it? If you start, do you think you can carry through to the end? If you want to do it, go ahead! Especially if you can give a fresh perspective to this kind of story. Make your dictator different. Make the school system honestly terrible. Read up on children's armies (nonfiction, like the ones in Africa; or things like the Hitler Youth). What does the children's army do? Do they acutally fight wars? If so, why aren't adults fighting? Etc.
O.K. step one - do it. Write it out, don't worry if it's good, bad, or somewhere in between. Once you've done that, then look at what works and doesn't and correct it accordingly. I've found that worrying about whether anything will work is the surest way not to actually finish/start a project. Just have fun with it.
Sounds like a cool idea - you should definately write it. I've never read any of the above books, but this is something I would read Don't worry about not having written a certain genre before - I was scared about writing a specific genre but I found it more exciting once I got into it! Reading over your idea I was reminded of nazi Germany - Hitler wanted to get children into the whole nazi ideology young and set up youth groups all over the country - this may be a good opportunity for making your story more humanistic and flex those researching skills. Good luck writing!
i'm with banzai on the red october reference... it had nada to do with a world dictator or overthrowing a planet-controlling government, was just a lone russian admiral defecting with his submarine...
