Meet Faye Masters, she’s a chip off the old block.

The search for a new computer continues. Meanwhile, I’ve not been idle.

I told you a while ago about a new character, Faye Masters. She’s the great-granddaughter of Andorra Pett and as such, has a bit of a reputation to live up to.

I’d already written one story about her life, as a planetary engineer a long way from Earth. Called Faye finds the Answer, it has yet to be released on the world.

You can read an early version of it HERE

Then in a strange case of serendipity, I was led to write another Faye Masters tale.

I got tagged, as they say, by one of the editors of a publication on Medium to write a story based on a set of prompts.

One of the story suggestions was,

“There’s a murder in the rainforest!”

A classic “whodunnit” with a location restriction twist! Is it a traditional film noir or a more modern take?

As I walked along the cliffs and thought about it, I realised that the premise would be perfect to introduce Faye to a new career, taking over the sleuthing from her illustrious ancestor.

There were suggested constraints to the tale, worth extra bragging rights for their incorporation into the story.

Constraints:  (Choose 4)

• A snake (“I hate snakes!”)
• Mist or fog
• An old wreck
• A rickety bridge
• A homing beacon (or a homing pigeon)
• Lost supplies

Hardcore Constraint: (choose either one) 

• A duel to the death!
• A dangerous duo!

Literary Device  

Give your protagonist an epiphany that ties your story together!

I mashed that all together and started typing. Within two days, I had written a 4,000-word Sci-fi story, containing all the required elements.  

It’s a tale of murder, set on a newly discovered planet half a Galaxy away from ours, yet similar in many ways. As you know, I love a bit of world-building and the place I called Blodwyn was great fun to develop. I can certainly see it as a setting for more stories in the future because it has everything. There are ancient forests, wild animals, relatable weather and interesting people.

The crime itself was more proof of something that I believe will happen when we travel to the furthest reaches of space. That is the simple truth that we will take all our earthly traits, all the goodness as well as the vices, with us. Our lives and dramas will be basically the same, just played out on a different stage. The trick is to use the new location to amplify them and give them an edge.

Hopefully, I manage to do that in Murder on Blodwyn.

Here are the first few paragraphs,

I opened the door of my house, a grand name for the converted shipping container that held all my possessions, and peered out at the new day. I had chosen to live separated from everyone else. I guess I just preferred the solitude.

From my vantage point, on a hill above the settlement I was helping to build, the mist was rising as the heat of the morning sun raised the temperature. The whole scene was bathed in deep red sunlight from the giant star in my pink sky. There was a little blue light on Blodwyn, everything was red-shifted from what we were used to on Earth.

Surrounded by the palm-like trees that gave my metal home shade from the afternoon heat, if I looked away from the skeleton structures in the valley, it almost felt like I was the only person alive on Blodwyn.

Not that it was far from the truth. There were just over a hundred people on the planet, the advance party of builders and engineers, creating a working base for the colonists that were arriving as soon as they had somewhere to live.

Let me introduce myself. I’m Faye Masters and I’m a planetary engineer. Blodwyn is the ninth planet I’ve had a hand in preparing for colonisation.

I turned to go back inside; it was time to get the first coffee of the morning, before I had to go down to the settlement to start the day’s work.

A sound stopped me, a raised voice ringing out. It startled a huge flock of dark yellow, parrot-like birds that filled the sky as they took off.

“Help,” someone shouted. It sounded like Malich. “Lucas is dead,” it added. Now that sounded like a good reason to skip coffee and head down to find out what was going on.

You can read the rest, on Medium, by clicking on this link.

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