King Spot: CC-licensed fairy tale well told

By Cory Doctorow at 12:23 am Sunday, Apr 17

Mike sez, "I've written a 48-chapter all-ages novella while looking for work, and I have begun posting it reserving rights under the creative commons license. It's 20,000 words and some change, but should be about 230 pages when illustrated (comic-panel storytelling has been sketched for most pages)."

I read the first couple short chapters this morning. It's a snappy, witty fairy-tale kind of thing, like Geek Love without the squick, and if I didn't have to run, I'd be reading it still. It concerns itself with the adventures of King Spot, a runaway circus dog who is the king of the world.

"Hey, look over there," said Roger. "Check out the peg-legged guy with the funny-looking dog." Roger was talking about a very large man in an overcoat, whose face was hidden by a scarf. To his left was a tiny, spotted dog.

"Are you trying to trick me?" said Brian. "I have to be careful, because, unlike lying for fun, using deception to win a game is not considered immoral. It's called bluffing."

"Brian, you talk like you're going to read shampoo instructions for a living when you grow up," said Roger. "You'll find a job where you can talk like this: 'After you lather the shampoo in your hair, rinse it out. Then lather and rinse it from your hair again.' You'll do this in the supermarkets where they sell the shampoo. They'll pay you to go away."

Link (Thanks, Mike!)