How I Wrote 100 Short Stories

[@jdtheone]

I'm old now with major issues and spend a lot of time in waiting rooms and twenty year old magazines just don't help this channel and some others have made it just so much better ❤️

[@flyhyland]

Congratulations Nik! :)

[@dereklavington6629]

Great stories Nik

[@markfergerson2145]

Speaking of where writers get ideas, I recently read some stuff about why people in different cultures space themselves at different distances in various situations. A lot of it is cultural, like Arabs not getting close up until they want to have a serious discussion and then they get close enough to share their breath, to literally conspire, in softer voices. New Yorkers, or inhabitants of any densely populated area, on the contrary do not make distance a factor in whether they speak seriously or frivolously with each other, developing the habit of speaking loudly all the time. This obviously makes cross cultural communication difficult, so we humans established formal rules for formal meetings like sitting in chair at tables with the chairs at a compromise spacing that everyone is equally uncomfortable with. That line of thought combined with the trees in the background- what might trees discuss if they were sentient and capable of it? Then you panned over to the artillery bunker. The trees might be discussing the sudden, to them, disappearance of some of their number and the to them simultaneous appearance of the bunker. After that hundred years they have concluded that there is some force, some possibility sentient thing that was responsible. They think slowly you see, and cannot perceive humans or our activities directly unless we or our works hold still long enough. Worse, they can only converse clearly with those nearby, and information from those farther away is harder to hear though with effort they can do it. Hence they know that other trees around the world have similar experiences and collectively try to solve the mystery of the ghostly force changing their world around them. (Yes, I’ve tried writing a little bit. I’ve only ever published a tiny bit of it on Quora not out of lack of confidence but because I don’t want to fool around with Reddit or other online antisocial media. I have noticed that many sci fi story channels on KZbin get their content from Reddit rather than write their own but still I just don’t feel like becoming a redditor.) If you choose to take that as a writing prompt, feel free. The idea has been used before in the story “Green Brain” but it could stand expanding. The trees don’t have to be trees, they could be xenos who experience time differently experiencing their first contact with humans. Whatever. I still wonder who you learned English from originally. Native speakers in any language learn from their parents in their colloquial dialect. Then they learn the “official” dialect in school, then from others they meet in life some of whom have slightly or wildly different dialects, from media persons with their artificial commercial dialect and so forth. To tune your spoken English to your audience, you don’t really need to know who they are and what dialect they are used to listening to. British, American, Australian and so forth all have subtle and stark differences but there is (or used to be) something called Standard Business English which became the lingua Franca of the worldwide business community. It’s kind of bland in that it eschews regionalisms and is rather formal, but nearly everyone in the world who speaks any version of English understands it. The Bradbury story you first read, and most English language science fiction, has traditionally been written in that version. Bradbury somehow managed to adapt it to his very poetic writing style which is something very few authors can do. You’re actually pretty good at it too. I suppose I must agree that your accent and English dialect are better suited to the kind of stories involving Val. I get that AI readers still suck horribly even though they have advanced a lot since the first text to speech engines appeared. However I also still think that we, your audience, have the fortitude to let you polish your spoken English on the grindstones of our ears. You will always have your accent but that’s okay. More English speakers than you might think are sufficiently cosmopolitan, or cultured as the Soviets put it, to hear the meanings under the accent. Well, I am, anyway. But as I’ve said before- your channel, your choice.

[@nikhein]

First of all, thank you once again for the awesome comment! I really appreciate it. Such responses keep me driving even when the channel is not performing well. Thank you! I want to address a few of your remarks. First of all, I'm thinking already about that prompt of yours. It has good potential, and it's probably time for our good old friend Sven Tomberg to make his return to the channel ) Second, about the Reddit. Honestly, I see no point in publishing there. It's heavily infested with AI-generated pulp, and I don't to swim in THAT substance. I would rather publish it here on the channel for the chosen few and quietly prepare my first book for publication. Next, about my English. Truth is, I'm almost 95% percent self-educated. It was taught pretty bad in my school, and I wasn't the best student either. But I always loved sci-fi, and at some point, late in school, I discovered that there were some sci-fi books in my local library in English that had never before been translated into Russian (now they are, but that was 35 years ago). I still remember some of the titles: Tiger! Tiger! by Alfred Bester, Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert Heinlein, and the collected sci-stories by James G. Ballard. I was so fascinated that I even decided to translate the stories of Ballard into Russian (it was insanely hard, as he is a complex and multidimensional writer, but I didn't understand it back then). And so it started... My spoken English is still like 4 levels worse than my writing skills ) As for how the narrations on my channel will develop, I will narrate something myself occasionally. I'm constantly searching and experimenting with AI narration, but honestly, there's not been that much progress in it lately. And if I'll be able to afford to hire a voice actors for some selected stories, I'll definitely do that. The good narration could mean at least 50% of success of the audiobook. By the way, I'm writing this response to your comment right after finishing the edit for new self-narrated story about Val. Tomorrow I'll do the custom subtitles and story will be up on the channel, and the next is already on my schedule. For some reason I love this guy )

[@TowGunner]

Congratulations Nik!

[@dennisthornton4434]

Yes please. 😊 Love the sound of thunder. Ray Bradbury is one of the best. Writing is a good way to relax your mind.

[@OldManGibb]

Nik, you accent is awesome, and you speak english very well. I think it would be awesome to hear you accent in the stories, It would add a unique element to the story.

[@nikhein]

Thank you very much! I actually started narrating myself, and I have plans to redo all the stories that I previously uploaded as AI-narrated. That, of course, would be one hell of a task, but I see no other way out for me. I can't compete with automated AI-generated channels that upload literally 12 videos per day (I have actually seen those), so I need to go the opposite direction. If that will not work, well, then nothing will. But I hope to build a proper audience in time.

[@OldManGibb]

@@nikhein Brother, There will always be a place for Human voiced content, Don't let the AI trash channels get you down, they will fail in the end. I listen to several SCIFI audio book channels, only one is AI. ( the writer had throat cancer and can not speak ) AI is ok in the situation. But AI is not able to give proper inflection or relay emotion, so please don't get frustrated, You got this.

[@escgoogle3865]

Off topic. Have you climbed any 6000m peaks?

[@nikhein]

Nope, I always was more into the sport climbing )

[@VV-nw4cz]

Is there a way to listen to your stories or read them as-is (not translated)?

[@nikhein]

There is ) Here www.youtube.com/@-bibliolab

[@lawrenceburchett7411]

An so it unfolds, that a mind talks so ...Perhaps, , you might even say , that what you wish that day.But due to will and that what happens , better damn well fix the FTL reactor, otherwise we are in a ration of s***t and I wont be able to help you a bit ,be well Niko ....Sorry old Boat builders do ramble .....

[@martinwyke]

I've enjoyed a lot of your stories, but I think you should seek some assistance from a proof reader, or perhaps several to make them great. There is no shame in this, remember even the biggest name professional writers go through several rounds with copy-editors at the publishers. I've notice a few errors or omissions that left me wondering how we got from C to F, were was D. You know, you know your story, but a proof reader can tell you when the leap is two big or complex. Please take this as constructive and keep up with what you are doing.

[@nikhein]

That would be great, but the proof readers and editors don't grow on trees, you now ) At the moment I barely can afford few software tools that I'm using. I decided to go as I can with the channel but put more effort (and money, if I had them by then) into the future publication of my stories in book format.

[@martinwyke]

@@nikhein Perhaps ask for volunteers in the Community feature of KZbin.

[@TheUncannyF]

Thank You! I think Your stories are good, at least I like them. However, I must admit, after the deluge of AI-generated SF stories has hit YT, combined with coming cross one of Yours which was either translated badly, narrated badly, or it just was not for me - I kinda stopped listening to new stuff from You. Which Is a shame. For me, as a non-native English speaker, AI-voice with it's lack of emphasis, odd rhythm, and flat cadence is either annoying or difficult to understand / enjoy. I'd have easier time reading, actually. PS Just listened to first minute of "Cold offer" - better than AI voice, at least for me. IMHO Cadence and emphasis is more important that pronunciation/accent.

[@nikhein]

Thank you! Yeah, the AI narration is my pain, but so far I can't see a clear straight way out of it. Well, actually I see it, but don't have big enough budget for it. But I'm working on getting away from AI, that's for sure. As for the you not listening to my stories - I'm okay with that, no offence. I know that no writer can be good for ALL the readers, and my writing style tends to go somewhat pretty eccentric ) Thank you for the comment!