So I'm Trying to Write

[SinbadEV]

So, I have just written the first 1600+ words of a novel... I might never finish it. It's just that I've always wanted to do and I have pile of time off with the baby so I can clear my head and get creative again. As it turns out taking care of a baby is about a 18 hour a day job and when 2 people are doing it it only takes about 9 hours from each, then you factor in about 6 hours of sleep and you get a lot of free time... especially if you can't feed the thing yourself... anyways...

I have a bunch of ideas for stories and I playing around with one that's in a low magic (but big on alchemical and steam-punk) setting and I've got this city... it's basically NYC, port town/landing spot for immigrants turns manufacturing center then turned cosmopolitain metropolis... might be comparable to Ankh Morpork in Discworld or the Ptolus setting.

Anyways... I'm working on a descriptiong of the city itself and I'm not very nautically minded so I was wondering if someone good at math and nautical shipping history could give me some pointers.

Mason Ridge.PNG (17.69 KiB) Viewed 1974 times

My inicial idea was you've basically got this HUGE sheer cliff that tapers off to mountains and it's so freaking huge that it made more sense to build a series of locks to get up it instead of going around it.

There is a very large lake or inland sea on top of this plateau and there was presiouse metals and gems and stuff on top of this plateau surrounding this sea so people got up there in the first place...

A river runs from the sea to the cliffs and fell as waterfalls down into the ocean and over the years a flood-plain-delta thing forms at the base of the falls and the falls move back (like Niagara is doing) so you've got this large patch of fertile land with easy access from the ocean at the base of this huge cliff and it's the only ocean side land reachable by boat.

In order to get the stuff being mined on top of the plateau they build a terraced lock system to get ships up to the top and back down... now because it's dwarves and gnomes and humans all working together on an incredibly huge project they go hog wild and make the thing multiple steps (I was thinking at least 10) and have 2 series of locks, one up and one down so that ships can go both directions at the same time... then they went really crazy and expanded the basins on some of the levels and build channels to bring fresh water to the city and run water wheels and even set up drydocks within the lock system... no because this project was so huge when they were cutting it out they build up terraces bridging the steps and the workers and then the people serving the workers and then the merchants and ship builders, and then industry folks all moved in and build a complex city on these steps... so that's the basic idea...

Anyways... when I describe it in the novel it's going to be dolled out in short "Encyclopedia Galactica" bites throughout but I've got some technical questions...

is "It has preciouse metals, good stone and gems and this was the best way to get them out" a plausible explaination.

the fertile floodplane delta at the base of a waterfall... how realistic is that?

How big would the upper body of water have to be to be worth acctually taking ships up there instead of just setting up an elevator system...

How big would the flood plane have to be to be inhabitable and still have room for a massive river.

how high can the cliffs be and still have the TOP of the Plateau be fertile... I was thinking 1000 feet at first... but 200 seems more resonable... also how big do you think ships in a pre-steam age industrial setting would need to be, and therefore how big would each of my basins for the locks need to be...

I know that real locks they usually just have ships go both ways in the same lock set... would there be any signifigant advantage to haveing two sets.


Does my city sound cool... it's basically a backdrop to hopefully a series of stories... is it cool enough to have lot's of different things happen within it's walls?

[tombom]

Novels are hard to write, try short stories instead.

[SinbadEV]

Novels are hard to write, try short stories instead.

thats usually 10,000 words right?

edit: I'll aim for that for now

[Guessmyname]

Remember: Show, don't Tell. Zoombie will probably tell you the same if he ever visits this thread

[Argh]

"The distant, cyclopean locks traveled from the edge of the cliffs to the top of the plateau, like a stairwell of the gods. He/She could see ships trapped in their embraces, like toys in a children's pool.".

Short, to the point, etc. Unless the locks are actually germane to the entire heart of the story, in which case you'd better explain what they do... in the context of a conversation, or through a character's active observations, etc. (active, not passive) they're just a piece of scenery. Don't derail the work trying to describe such objects in detail.

[SinbadEV]

Don't really want to describe them so much as have them clear in my mind so I know what's going on... meanwhile "cyclopean" is one of my favorite words for "Big and Made of Rough Stone" ever.

[Erom]

How are they gonna make pumps pre-steam? You don't have very tight machining tolerances back then. Or are the locks going to be man/beast emptied? Might take a day, at least, to traverse the entire lock staircase, not that that would make them infeasible.

I would suspect that the big galleons and such wouldn't go up and down the locks, and low-draught boats like river barges would go up and down instead, moving goods to the coast where they would be loaded onto ocean ships. This would drastically reduce the depth each lock needs to be at empty, meaning you can bridge the same hight without needing as many steps.

As for the altitude of the plateau and crops on it - it depends on the climate. As a rule of thumb, one mile of elevation is the same, climate wise, as 1000 miles of latitude.

For example, colorado is a mile up, and while it's too arid to grow much natively, a little irrigation and careful planning, and there are plenty of farms in the state.

Your system sounds a lot like the old canal system on the Great Lakes. You can look at that to get flavor from.

[Argh]

Well, basically, all locks do is move stuff up and down, using water... it's pretty easy to describe them in the simplest terms. One should only get into the details (the pumps, the gates, etc.) if they're really important to the story.

If you're really just lacking in mechanical knowledge of locks... here ya go.

[Zoombie]

Remember: Show, don't Tell. Zoombie will probably tell you the same if he ever visits this thread

<grunt> What that guy said.

I don't know much about the time period you're working in, so my only advice is read what other people have written, read history books, read science books...read a lot, write a lot...you'll be fine.

[SwiftSpear]

How are they gonna make pumps pre-steam? You don't have very tight machining tolerances back then. Or are the locks going to be man/beast emptied? Might take a day, at least, to traverse the entire lock staircase, not that that would make them infeasible.

I would suspect that the big galleons and such wouldn't go up and down the locks, and low-draught boats like river barges would go up and down instead, moving goods to the coast where they would be loaded onto ocean ships. This would drastically reduce the depth each lock needs to be at empty, meaning you can bridge the same hight without needing as many steps.

As for the altitude of the plateau and crops on it - it depends on the climate. As a rule of thumb, one mile of elevation is the same, climate wise, as 1000 miles of latitude.

For example, colorado is a mile up, and while it's too arid to grow much natively, a little irrigation and careful planning, and there are plenty of farms in the state.

Your system sounds a lot like the old canal system on the Great Lakes. You can look at that to get flavor from.

They are using waterscrews powered by waterwheels.

[SinbadEV]

They are using waterscrews powered by waterwheels.

I know that's probably a reference to Dwarf Fortress but that was the basic Idea... water power...

also apparently based on that article you can twin your locks and that saves time getting boats going oposite directions and saves energy potencial because you can switch use water from a higher adjacent chamber and inprove efficient use of water...

my best writing happens when I'm up late... and I think I sidetracked myself with the science here... I'll just pretend everyone knows how the locks in the city work for now and just use it as a setting.

[Neddie]

Well, some explanation of most uncommon mechanisms in the environment is required for an engaging setting. I too am a writer, though at this point I'm working on a very different sort of book, and another tip I may as well give; Don't reveal any part of the text you haven't edited yourself to anybody else.

[Caydr]

Don't reveal any part of the text you haven't edited yourself to anybody else.

As I'm also writing... ^^

Why's that? I'd think you could get constructive criticism from someone you trust, who shares the same passion as you for the topic at hand.


(at hand. cos it's written. by your hand. hahahahha)

[Neddie]

You can get constructive criticism, but if you haven't realized your original desires in refining your own writing, the criticism will be preemptive and may not help with the purification process.

[Lumpy]

you need something to grab the attention of the readers.

the huge awesome island sounds compelling enough.

but maby as they are digging and all this stuff they uncover some sort of power / horrible secret or something deeo within the mountain.

Ie make some sort of a page turner to compel people to keep reading

http://pixs.media.mit.edu/picture/image ... h_2500.jpg

[Imperium]

Just make it nice and depressing and after you're dead it'll be hailed as a classic.