Living in a Virtual World

Writers are always thinking. And not always in normal directions. But what fun is normalcy, anyway?

Since I have just finished drafting a major YA paranormal series project (which will consist of three lead novellas followed by an explosive and large, 110,000 words plus, novel launch) I noticed a strange--I guess the only word I can find for it is "break" -- detachment after typing -30- (something writers used to use to mean "The End" from the old telegraph days) and leaving my "girls" behind, at least for a few days before plunging into subsequent drafts and rewrites, edits and all that good stuff.

I was "living" in my head with these characters so intensely for so long I found myself arguing with them, angry with them, happy for them, annoyed at things they said or did, and sad when certain others didn't make it out of the story alive. They became an extended family of sorts.

And doing this every single day for a month, giving myself over to their story, meant feeding it all into the virtual world of the computer, in essence uploading the scenes flashing through my brain into electronic chatter.

We all live more and more in a virtual world. We work on computers, play on computers, date on computers, read on Kindles, Nooks and computers, even discover imagined worlds--in my case horror and paranormal worlds, or the world of the Old West--on computers.

So where does it stop? Is the line of demarcation growing ever thinner? Are the characters peopling our virtual worlds becoming more and more real? Are they part of us, or are we slowly becoming part of them? Does the old phrase "authors give their chracters life" take on a whole new meaning?

Will someday who we are be simply another file executed on our computer, where we can make life function as we want it to? Creating billions of our own little realities, where only what we desire lives?

It's difficult for writers to separate from their creations. Add that to a computer where we can immerse ourselves into the worlds we create...

I guess, then, my only question would be, what happens when the power goes out?

Will you believe?
Order your copy of the paranormal horror series The Chloe Files on Kindle today!
Limited time price $2.99
Welcome to New Salem...The Dead are waiting...
THE CHLOE FILES #1: Ashes to Ashes by Howard Hopkins
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004WLCRYK
(Also in Nook and paperback)