Here's the ending in its rawest form.  I didn't intend for it to have any political statements relevant to us, but that's what  appears to have turned up.  I still say that it was unintended.

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 Here is chapter one of Machmen, which is a bit shorter than I had intended:

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I just got the email today that Machmen might get a cover made by one of the designers in 30C30D in November!  This is exciting news for me. 

Eek!  Less than 4 days to go!  I've got a busy month ahead of me, as I've got school, work, and a writing club to juggle on top of writing two novels.  I'm not quite done with outlining either.  I at least have the main characters for both down (for the most part).

Machmen

Ian Monrow - Shown in The Diner and The Cult.  A fire and brimstone preacher in charge of a rural compound far from the city where most of this takes place.
Mona Rowin - Seen in The Diner and Five.  An old woman who remembers some of what life was like before the takeover.  She's desperately searching for her orange tabby cat.
God - An orange tabby cat separated from its owner.  Coincidence?
Dot - Seen in Five.  A little girl left alone after a conversion mishap erased her memory.  Now she's wandering down the streets with a broken teapot and stuffed duck, wondering what's going on.
Norman Iwo - Seen in Five and Little White Lies.  Man left in an empty clinic with a missing leg and two conflicting memories of the past.
Raimo Won - Seen in Five, Little White Lies, and The Diner.  A man who was separated from a traveling circus and may or may not have been insane before his conversion.
Omar Wonin - Seen in The Diner.  A cook who randomly breaks into song.
Naomi Rown - The Diner.  A waitress who can speak only in rhyme.
Ron Minamo - The Diner.  A diner regular and artist who insists on eating everyone's leftovers
Ann W Omir - The Diner.  A regular who thinks she's a pirate on the quest for the perfect pizza.
Mr. Wononai - Seen in Rape and Diary Part Two.  A homeless man who was the first successful convert.  'Successful' is debatable, but he was the first to survive.
Rowan Nimo - Seen in Hunting Parts One and Two.  A competitor in a hunting contest.  Quick and strategic.
Santino Riaz - Seen in Hunting.  Nimo's rival in the competition.  Prefers brute force.
Dr. Dorothea Calvin Parker - Seen in Diary.  Designed and mentored the LB5 series robots from Alpha to Gamma.

Lunacy

Dr. Bethany Powers - Director of Project Oppenheimer, devoted to finding and bringing home a cosmic energy source.
Elizabeth Smith - Pilot and Coordinator of Project Oppenheimer.
Levi and Calvin Baker - Two brothers, work as scouts.
Brandon Steele, Justin Foreman - medics
Erica Cannon, Ryan Sharpe, Cynthia Sharpe, Billy-Bob Utopia* - miners

There isn't much more I can say about the above characters without giving away too much, and I haven't yet developed them as much as I'd like anyway.

*May or may not be his birth name, but I liked it too much.

I wasn't planning on writing two stories at once this November, but these stories have been bugging me for weeks now, and I love them equally.  They don't seem to want to let go, so I'm going to take on the extra responsibility of writing 100K this year.

So here's the other one I'm going to be working on.  It was inspired by a dream I had, which was of what will be the opening scenes of the story.

Lunacy

Mining for unfamiliar extraterrestrial energy sources has its drawbacks.

Centuries from now, space colonization has moved on past our own solar system. In the middle of an energy crisis, a team of men and women from a remote planet colony has been sent to an approaching comet to collect rare minerals with vast stores of energy in their nuclei. Though well enough prepared for the cold and hostile environment, they were not prepared for the minerals to degrade so quickly, or for the effects of the radiation and chemicals given off by these eroding rocks on their own bodies and minds.

Now they are trapped on a celestial body that is on its way to farther corners of the universe with new dangers to face. Can the team survive and make it off of the comet in time for them to be able to make it home? Will they have anything to show for their troubles if they do succeed?

Outline and characters are to come later, and this summary is likely to change by or during November (same for Machmen).

I'm going to be posting some things about the plot and characters before November comes as a way for me to get a better feel for the story.   This is subject to change, depending on what my muse throws at me. I already cut out one story and merged two others before posting.

 If you were directed here from the UBC iGem website, welcome.  If you weren't, welcome anyway.

This probably won't be updated very often, because I'm no longer addicted to blogging sites and will be busy plotting and writing for the next couple of months.  I've got some shorter things on the backburner that are in desperate need of editing, and I have an exciting (to me) NaNoWriMo project that will make its way here in some shape or form by the time November is up.

Machmen will be my first serious attempt at science fiction, inspired by the robot stories of Isaac Asimov and various rock songs, most of all Gary Numan's "Down in the Park."  

This will be my second time winning NaNoWriMo.  My first was last year with a Greek mythology-inspired crime novel titled Poplar and Mint.  It is now in proof copy form and I am very happy with it.