Archive for the ‘Progress Report’ Category

Background Noise Spurs My Writing

Posted: October 22, 2012 in Living and Life, Politics and Leadership, Progress Report, short story, Writing
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I’ve been stuck on a piece of Dodi Li for the past couple of days, a spot that leads into the climax and ultimately resolves the conflict of the story. Earlier I flashed on a scene from a show I’d been watching, where a captain in a police precinct had a talk show on his TV because it made great background noise to help him with his work. I thought, “The debate is on tonight. Why not hear the candidates’ positions on foreign policy while seeing if I can get a few hundred words into a short story?”

Well, I set up shop in the TV lounge of my dorm about twenty minutes before the debates, I turned on the TV to MSNBC, and you know what? I’m learning a lot about the candidates and their beliefs, and I’ve gotten at least 500 words written down on Dodi Li. Talk about effective!

It’s great when you realize a distraction can help you get the results you want for your work, like that one segment from The Big Bang Theory (still can’t embed it, so I’ll leave the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1WpE5ntqbQ). Plenty of people feel that distractions detract from your work, but in actuality, they can really help.

Now if you don’t mind, I have to see if I can wrap up Dodi Li while hearing President Obama’s policy on China. Have a good night.

Oh, and before I forget, I changed the doctor and the detective from Dodi Li into male characters. I think that works better: the two adult males, supposedly smarter and more rational, end up getting shown up by a child and a succubus, aka a spiritual, feeling woman. I think it sends a better message than two or three women in leadership positions getting shown up by a demoness, right?

500 Likes!

Posted: October 22, 2012 in Living and Life, Progress Report
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That title’s pretty self-explanatory. This morning I was informed I have passed the 500 mark on the number of Likes I’ve gotten. Everyone, thanks for liking me so much. It means a lot to me, and I appreciate it so much. To thnak you guys for liking me and sticking with me all this time, here’s a funny video I found online. Enjoy:

Some Thoughts on “Dodi Li”

Posted: October 18, 2012 in Living and Life, Progress Report, Reflections, Scary Stuff, short story, Writing
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For those of you who have no idea what that title means, Dodi Li is a short story that I started this summer and that I’m rewriting before National Novel Writing Month starts in two weeks. It means “my darling” or “my beloved” in Hebrew and should not be confused with a popular Jewish song that is sung sometimes on Friday nights by Jews everywhere.

Dodi Li features a succubus, a demoness who visits men at night as a beautiful woman and steals their sperm in order to create demonic children or steal pieces of their soul through fornication, depending on what myths you believe. However my succubus, who I’ve named Umuruk (sounds like a name a succubus would have, right?) is not the antagonist of the story. Instead, she struggles to protect the other protagonist, a male she’s fallen in love with. Succubi have fallen in love with humans before, according to the folklore and stories I found by people who say they’ve had experiences with succubi (it’s on the Internet, so I can’t be sure if the writers are crazy or not, but I try to keep an open mind), and I decided to tap into that for this story.

The first draft was very plot-oriented, and sucked immensely. I decided to leave it alone until I could think of a way to make it better, and if I couldn’t, then it’d make a great learning experience. But yesterday in creative writing class, my teacher gave me an idea on how I could improve the story. So I went back and started to completely rewrite it, going until half-past ten last night, and then resuming for a little while this morning before class.

As I was heading to class, I realized something about my story: the main character, whose nine years old, and the antagonist, a 40-something with some mental issues, are the only male characters. All the rest are female: the doctor, the head nurse, the head of neurology, a possible detective character, and of course the succubus Umuruk, are all women, and all are women in positions of power that they use to help people.

I started to wonder if that might mean something, if my psyche was trying to tell me something through my writing. If it’s that I respect women in positions of power and that I think there should be more of them, that doesn’t surprise me at all; I grew up in a house full of women, my mom’s a rabbi, my boss is a woman, her boss is a woman, and I took a Women’s Studies course my first year at Ohio State, which I did very well in. So no surprise that powerful women show up in my story.

However, if it has something to do with the fact that Umuruk is able to help the main character more than these women, then I wonder what that might be saying. Perhaps even if women are educated and in positions of power, if they don’t occasionally open their minds to the impossible, then a mentally unbalanced man will hurt an innocent nine-year-old? That’s also a possibility.

In any case, once I finish the story I might understand more, and if I manage to get it published, you might be able to read it and give me some suggestions on what my Muse is trying to tell me.

Anyway, I’ve got some homework to do before I go to work, so I better get that taken care of right now. Have a nice day.

Oh, before I forget, something funny I have to tell you: I was talking to my history teacher after class today, and we had a really great discussion on the way out the building. You see, at the beginning of the semester, my teacher, whose focus is African History, told us that if any of us intentionally failed his class, he’d used magic he learned from tribal priests to enter our dreams and scare the heck out of us. Ever since then I’ve been trying on and off to get him to agree to teach me how to enter people’s dreams (can you blame me?).

At some point during our conversation, my teacher revealed he’d been joking, but I thought he’d been serious because he said it in such a serious way. This led to a discussion on witchcraft in different cultures, which led to a discussion on using magic and summoning stuff. That led to a discussion on spirits and possessions, and in the end, I ended up recommending my teacher to go see The Possession, which I reviewed back in September. Turns out, he agreed to see it. How about that?

Anyway, I think it’s funny, I have no idea what you think.

Edits and Construction

Posted: October 17, 2012 in ideas, Living and Life, Novel, Progress Report, Scary Stuff, short story, Writing
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Well yestereday I edited two short stories. One was Doll’s Game, the short story I’m writing for class, though I might decide to edit it again if I can get this idea I got today for the story to work somehow. I also edited Hunt in the Slaughterhouse, a short story I wrote back in April based on a dream I had. I’ve been trying to get around to editing it for a while, but I’ve had some trouble doing that. But yesterday I had the chance and I have to say, it loooks much better. I’ll have to figure out whether or not I want to send it to a magazine right now or if I want to wait and show it to someone else beforehand.

I also had an idea for Dodi Li, the succubus story I wrote over the summer. Although the plot for that story was really bad and I ended up deciding this story was best left as a learning experience, I decided to rewrite it after my teacher in my creative writing class gave me an idea. You see, she had been discussing the story we were critiquing today, and how the author was able to make it difficult to tell what was reality and what was delusion in his story. Listening to that, I just had a burst of inspiration for Dodi Li, which I plan to get to work on as soon as possible. Got to say, those workshop critiques can do wonders for you.

On, and before I forget, remember how I rewrote the outline for my serial killer novel Snake and that I mentioned I’d set a scene in a construction site? Well today I finally reached the man who could help me get onto the site. We’re going to try and find a time that works for both of us so that I can tour a site and ask some questions. This is a big oppurtunity for me because I want my readers not to have to suspend their disbelief too much and what’s better than actual experience?

Well, hope to have more good news for you later. In the meantime, I’ve editing to do.

The Edits Are Done! Yahoo!

Posted: October 15, 2012 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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To get why I posted this picture, read below.

Ladies and gentlemen, get out of your chairs, and start dancing in front of your computer or while holding whatever portable electronic device you are reading this post on! I’ve finished the edits on Reborn City! I thought the editing would take a couple of months, but instead it took a couple of weeks. I wonder if my idols in the world of writing literature have it this easy with their novels when they do the final edits.

So, RC‘s at 24 chapters, with each chapter averaging about four edits total. The longest chapter is the first one, with thirty-four pages, and well over 10,000 w0rds. The epilogue is definitely the shortest, with less than a page and barely two-hundred words, if even that. All told, the entire novel, in 8 1/2″ x 11″ pages, with a 12-point font and double-spaced, is 313 pages (whistle-whistle!). The word count, which requires no calculating of page sizes or anything, is 90,850. To which I say, holy crap.

Well, now I plan to go take a nap, because it’s close to midnight right now. Tomorrow I’ll send this baby off to a friend (his email address is conveniently in the emails I got when he commented on previous posts; expect an email saying “rami ungar reborn city” in the subject line), then go to class. At some point I’ll work on editing and writing some short stories, and when November rolls around get to work on Snake for National Novel Writing Month, or as we writers like to call it, NaNoWriMo.

And what happens after I get Reborn City back from my friend? Well, I’ll do the edits he suggests, and then I’ll get to work on doing everything else that needs to be done so that you all can read Reborn City.

You know, I’ve seen this process of self-publishing Reborn City sort of like a train, and every time I get to a new milestone in the process, I’ve reached a new station. When do I get to the final stop? I’m not sure; I’m certainly ahead of schedule, but who knows how long that’ll last?

Anyway, I hope for some more good news soon. That way I can share it with you as soon as possible.

To all, a good night (or if you just turned on your computer and you’re reading this with your morning coffee, good morning. Some weather today, huh?). Sweet dreams, and happy blogging to you.

300 Comments!!!

Posted: October 15, 2012 in Living and Life, Progress Report
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Well, it’s a week of milestones. Five-thousand views, and now 300 comments, thanks to my friend Matt Williams of the awesome blog, http://storiesbywilliams.com/. Maybe I’ll get 100 followers on Thursday. Are there twelve people who like horror, thriller, following aspiring writers in college and don’t mind the occasional post on how much I support the Democrats and how I am confused by Republicans and the things they say and do?

You know, when I first started this blog, I found it inconcievable, when I was barely getting five views a week, that I could get a single comment more than once a month. Now, I’ve got 100 more comments after posting about getting 200 less than a month-and-a-half ago. This is just so incredible, I’m geeking out a little while I write this.

Thanks for all the reading and all the commenting, folks. It means a lot and it means you’re sticking with me through all my trials and tribulations. Hope to hear good news soon. Maybe I’ll finish editing Reborn City and hand it off for some edits from a third party this week. Wouldn’t that be awesome!

Talk to you later.

Chapters Rise, Chapters Fall

Posted: October 15, 2012 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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Or to be more precise, the number of chapters fall and the number of chapters fall.

I wrote a couple posts back that I’d decided to change the way the main characters of Reborn City met up with the big bad guys, so that meant tacking on another chapter. I wasn’t sure if the number of chapters would rise again or if it would drop. Wouldn’t you know it? I ended up deleting a chapter that was unnecessary with the new course of the story (which I’m glad I went with; the story’s much better this way). So I’m back to twenty-four chapters, including a nice little epilogue.

And speaking of which, I’m in the middle of editing chapter twenty-one. I’m in the home stretch, and much sooner than I expected. Who knows, if my friend who’s agreed to look over RC after it’s done (you know who you are) gets through it quickly, I might be able to get the e-book out…December or January. Either way it works out wonderfully, because RC takes place in mid-summer. When we’re freezing our butts off in the middle of winter, it’ll be nice to sit back with our e-reader and read about a gang war with a conspiracy behind it in the middle of July, right?

Hope to have more soon. Wish me luck as I do the final edits.

A Nice Change to Reborn City

Posted: October 13, 2012 in ideas, Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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Yesterday before the Sabbath came in and I became cut off from all electronic devices (including anything I use to edit my stories), I had a great idea on how to edit Reborn City‘s final act. I realize that the original scenario was a little unrealistic, a little in need of suspension of belief. Or maybe a lot in need.

So this new scenario will be much better. I’m not sure if it’ll increase or cut the number of chapters I have, but that doesn’t matter, when it comes to producing a quality story, right?

I’m excited to see what this produces, so I’l write you again when I have something to write. In the meantime–on to the editing and rewriting!

Reborn City: Halfway on the Edits

Posted: October 11, 2012 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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I just finished editing chapter twelve of Reborn City, officially putting me halfway through the editing process before I hand it off to someone to look at. Most of the chapters have already had three or four drafts, but as I look over each and every chapter, I see pieces that could be polished a little, where the phrasing is a little awkward or where something doesn’t make sense. It’s been something fixing these over, but I’ve been able to make some improvements and I’m seeing the story I started in high school slowly becoming better and better.

Speaking of which, Reborn City was written from my sophomore year to my senior year of high school (I took long breaks as necessary for school work, short story projects, a summer in Israel, and sometimes when I was just too exhausted to write and just wanted to enjoy someone else’s work for a change). I can still see some of my writing style from when I was in high school in the words I wrote then, and it’s pretty different from my current voice. I guess you can attribute that to the fact that I’ve gotten some life experience, so of course my voice changed a bit.

But anyway, I’m happy with the progress I’ve made. I’m still not sure when Reborn City will be available for download as an e-book yet,  but I hope it’ll be by mid-March by next year, if I can get these edits done quickly and I can get my publishing press set up without too much trouble.

I’ll let you guys know when chapters 13-23 and the epilogue are edited. Stay tuned for more!

The Snake Outline Reborn

Posted: October 4, 2012 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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Creepy, right? It looks like it might come off the drawing.

Did anyone else see the joke in that title? Anyone? Bueller?

Alright, you guys are more concerned about what this latest post is about. I’ll tell you: I finished redoing the outline of Snake, with new scenes and even a few new characters. I may have increased the parts of the story to eight (including the prologue and epilogue), but the chapter count is down to a little over a hundred, and let me tell you, I like this new version!

For one thing, everything’s much more exciting now. For one thing, the climax of the story is much more exciting, bringing the Snake, his allies, the mafia family the Snake is hunting, and the police and FBI together in one big fight! And at the end, the Snake confronts the boss of the mafia family he’s been up against this whole time! It’s like The Dark Knight meets the end of Daredevil in some respects, at least in my opinion, but I still think it’ll be exciting to read and visualize in your head.

I also did some work on the characters, their actions and their motivations, and believe me, it was worth it. In the first outline, some of the things the characters did might’ve made you go, “huh? What the heck just happened? Why’d they do that? I wouldn’t do that if I were in that situation.” So I tried to make things more believable. I realize that I need to place less emphasis on plot and more on what drives the characters, so I’l have to work on that from now on.

So now that the new outline is done, what next? Well as much as it pains me, I will be taking a break from writing Snake to finally get to work on publishing Reborn City. It’s something I’m looking forward to, and when you guys read it, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Just be patient on the sequel, because I’ll have to finish Snake first and I don’t like doing two projects at once that way.

All for now, stick around for updates on both Snake, Reborn City, and anything else I feel like posting about (including a review of Daniel Craig on SNL, which will probably be my last SNL review for a little while). Post on you later!

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