Posts Tagged ‘entertainment’

Snake: Starting The Second Draft

Posted: March 3, 2013 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
Tags: , , , ,
2

Well, it’s been a while since I’ve written about my serial killer thriller Snake, which is about a serial killer hunting down the members of a mafia family in New York City. But yes, as you can tell from the title, I’m working on the second draft. I’m happy to say, I’m getting through it rather speedily, clearing through fourteen chapters in a little less than twenty-four hours. Then again, most of the chapters are less than ten pages, so the fact that I’ve only cleared fourteen chapters in a single day may earn me some accusations of laziness.

Moving on.

So, I’ve gone through fourteen chapters, and so far it’s mostly been polishing up phrasing and grammar. Yes, there have been entire sections of the story that have been rewritten so far, but only one or two, and those entire sections have been small. I’ve also noticed some inconsistencies in what I’ve written at certain points and what I’ve written at certain other points, so I’ve been correcting that when I’ve seen it.

But I’m happy with what I have so far. The entire novel is ninety-something chapters, but I think if I work hard and don’t get too distracted, I should be done in a week or two (thank goodness spring break is coming up). Wish me luck, and I’ll keep you posted on my progress.

Stephen King Meets Stephen Colbert

Posted: March 3, 2013 in Living and Life
Tags: , , ,
2

I found this video thanks to Facebook, and I had to share it with you. Basically, His Scary Highness Stephen King met up with Stephen Colbert back in 2009 and they sat down for a rather funny–and at certain points creepy–conversation. Throughout the video there are homages and references to King’s novels and the movies based on his novels (good or bad).

Unfortunately, I can’t embed the video for some reason, but if you follow the link, you should be fine. Make sure to watch King’s expression in the hallway when he’s wearing matching sweaters with Colbert. If you didn’t know who he was, you’d think he’s just a grumpy, silver-haired man. But when you know his reputation…then the true terror sets in. Rawr!

The Quiet Game: The Final Edits Are Done

Posted: March 2, 2013 in Progress Report, short story, Writing
Tags: , , , , ,
2

TQG cover

This evening I looked over the last two short stories in the order I’ll put them in the final book, and I had to smile at myself: In a little over two-and-a-half months, I’ve written five short stories, had them edited and critiqued, created a book trailer, and now I’ve gone over all five of them and done my final edits on them. In addition, I wrote some notes after each short story, explaining some of what I wanted to accomplish when I was writing the short stories and where the inspiration for each of them came from. It was thrilling thinking about the journey I’ve taken since December when winter break started, and seeing myself here and now.

The only thing left to do is to turn all the files into PDF format, and combine them so that I can send them to the US Copyright Office (and the sooner the better for that one; it seems that the US Copyright Office takes a long time to get your submissions processed and issue you a copyright, even when you do it electronically). After I get the copyright, I’ll upload The Quiet Game: Five Tales To Chill Your Bones onto the Internet as an e-book, and share it all with you!

At this point, I’d like to once again thank those who inspired my work–Caitlin Kelly, my friend J, the people who created the film The Possession, and the Ghost Adventures crew–along with the people who critiqued my work–Marc Neiwirth, my creative writing class, Jason Alan, Enjie Hall, and Rabbi Wendy Warren Ungar–and along with all those whose encouragement has helped me to create this collection. You’ve been keeping me going, and you’ll keep me going until I run out of ideas for things to write, which probably won’t be anytime soon.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to take a break to work on a certain serial killer novel that’s been waiting for me. Have a good night, everybody.

The Quiet Game: The Book Trailer

Posted: February 27, 2013 in Living and Life, Progress Report, Scary Stuff, short story, Writing
Tags: , , , , , ,
2

TQG cover

I’m very happy to announce that in only two hours, I managed to complete the trailer for The Quiet Game: Five Tales To Chill Your Bones. I would like to thank the staff of Ohio State’s Digital Union for answering all my questions on iMovie and for helping me gather the photos and clips I needed.

The video was created using iMovie, and featured clips from YouTube videos, Google Images, and my own book cover. It features music I scrounged up on the Internet, and the sound effects were from iMovie’s sound effects database. I’m very proud of this video, particularly because a year ago I could not imagine myself making this sort of video. Thankfully I learned how to use all sorts of programs last semester, so now I feel a little less helpless using such programs.

So without further ado, I would like to introduce the official book trailer to The Quiet Game: Five Tales To Chill Your Bones. Feel free to share it on Facebook or on your own blog or wherever you would like to share it.

The Quiet Game will be coming out soon and will be available for $1.29 when it does. Please wait until then for it. Thanks for watching.

“The Quiet Game”: Last Night’s Reading

Posted: February 23, 2013 in Living and Life, Scary Stuff, short story, Writing
Tags: , , , , , ,
2

Well, I did the reading last night, and I’m very happy with the results. Not a lot of people showed up–about ten at most–but they seemed to like it, and several friends of mine and some lookey-loos who just lived in the building showed up, which made me happy.

I started the show with a friend on the building’s activity board playing some creepy mood music from a Marilyn Manson album before stopping the song. Then I came out from behind the audience wearing make-up to make me look like Heath Ledger’s Joker and laughing like a madman. It freaked several people out, which was the reaction I was going for (I don’t have a photo of it right now, but I’ll be sure to post a photo of it later on The Quiet Game‘s Facebook page, the address of which is below). I proceeded to read from small sections from all but one of the short stories (you might remember that one of them is about a recovering sex addict, so I couldn’t read from that), and some people were a little creeped out by what I read to them.

Afterwards I thanked everyone who helped put the show together, and I thanked everyone who came for attending and sticking around, before telling everyone where they could find out more about The Quiet Game. It was nice, and I really enjoyed myself. It’s part of the song-and-dance that writers, especially self-publishing writers, have to do in order to make their work heard and bought and read and possibly reviewed on Amazon. So hopefully they’ll buy a copy after the book comes out, maybe tell their friends about it. That’s what I hope, anyway.

So for all those who managed to come, thanks for showing. It really meant a lot to me, and I hope that at future readings, you can show up and maybe not be too freaked out by anything that might be on my face besides my glasses.

Good night everybody.

http://www.facebook.com/#!/TheQuietGameFiveTalesToChillYourBones

The Next Big Thing Blog Hop

Posted: February 21, 2013 in Living and Life, Progress Report, Scary Stuff, short story, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
4

I was tagged by Lorna Dounaeva (http://lornadounaeva.wordpress.com/2013/02/21/the-next-big-thing-blog-hop/) for this post, which is similar to the award memes that make the rounds of the Internet. The Next Big Thing Blog Hop is a chance for us to talk about our works-in-progress, or WIP, and we have to follow certain steps to fulfill it. First, I have to tag the person who tagged me (thanks, Lorna!). Then I have to introduce and explain The Next Big Thing Blog Hop to those reading the post (check!). Then I have to answer ten questions about my WIP, and include pictures if possible. After the questions are done, I must tag five other writers with WIPs, and then let them know through emails or comments.

I’ll get to that, but first the questions, which will be focusing on The Quiet Game:

1. What is the title of the book you are working on? The title is The Quiet Game: Five Tales To Chill Your Bones.

TQG cover

2. Where did the idea come from for the book? I think it started when I realized that editing my sci-fi novel RC was taking longer than I thought and that I’d probably finish my thriller novel Snake around the beginning of winter break. I’d played with the idea of working on a collection of short stories after Snake was done, but by the time winter break arrived, I thought it’d be a good thing to do, especially with my plans to self-publish. So as soon as I’d finished Snake, I got to work on it.

3. What genre does your book fall under? Horror, definitely horror. To be more specific, four of the short stories feature supernatural horror, while the fifth features psychological horror.

4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? Well, it’s a collection of short stories, so that’d be five movies if I were extremely lucky. The only actor I can think of though, would be Taissa Farmiga from American Horror Story, who would play Traci from the titular short story, The Quiet Game. Although she doesn’t look very much like my conception of the character, she’d definitely define and bring the role to life, and that’s what I’m looking for.

Taissa Farmiga, everybody.

5. What is a one-sentence synopsis of your book? Be prepared to enter the darkest corners of your mind in…The Quiet Game.

6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? I’m doing the self-publishing thing. It’s the way of the future, and I’ve tried the traditional route to publishing novels and collections. Although it’s still prestigious,the traditional route is still very difficult to do and from the way some of the bigger companies in New York have been merging and acting, they know it won’t last forever. Besides, I want to get my work to my readers sooner rather than later.

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manusript? Probably a month or so, though one of the short stories did need to be rewritten at some point, so that’s another couple of days there. Each story took different lengths of time to work on, so it was an uneven work schedule. Still, it was very much worth it.

8. What other books would you compare this story to in your genre? I don’t know; it’s so hard to compare one collection of short stories to another. In fact, I’d say it’s almost impossible, though my Mom did compare one of my short stories to Stephen King’s It, which I thought was a huge compliment.

9. Who or what inspired you to write this book? I got inspiration from anywhere. The Quiet Game came from a comment-conversation on a friend’s blog; Addict came from the experiences of a friend of mine. If I tried to go back and figure out the origin of each story, I’d have interesting stories to tell right there!

10. What else about yoru book might pique reader’s interest? I think that it’s by a new author and that each story is different, scary, and unique might draw some in. That’s the hope, anyway.

And now, onto the tagged people:

1. Matt Williams (http://storiesbywilliams.com/)

2. Angela (http://aportiaadamsadventure.wordpress.com/?ref=spelling)

3. Cristian Mihai (http://cristianmihai.net/)

4. Pat Bertram (http://ptbertram.wordpress.com/)

5. Jason Alan (http://jasonalanwriter.wordpress.com/)

Congratulations to the tagged winners, and I can’t wait to read what you’re in the process of creating.

“The Quiet Game”: A Reading

Posted: February 20, 2013 in Living and Life, short story, Writing
Tags: , , , , , ,
2

TQG cover

Ah, so many announcements about The Quiet Game, and so few hours in the day! If you haven’t heard already, I created a cover for my upcoming collection of short stories, The Quiet Game: Five Tales To Chill Your Bones, earlier today and posted it all over the blogosphere, Facebook, and my Twitter account.

Now I have a second announcement: this Friday at my dorm, Jones Tower, there will be a huge Purim celebration. Yes Purim, the Jewish holiday that celebrates our deliverance from the hands of the Babylonian Prime Minister’s plot to murder every single Jew. During the celebration, there will be Hamentaschen, the traditional treat eaten during Purim, masks you can make (it’s basically our Halloween, if you didn’t know), and I’ll be doing a reading from some of my short stories at some point during the festivities. It’s going to be great; I plan on doing a whole lot to make sure it’s so spooky, they may not want to have me read again–

On second thought, maybe I should tone it down a bit.

I’ll try and make a video of the reading and post it on YouTube. Keep your eyes peeled for it.

And if you happen to be in Columbus on Friday night and have nothing to do at 10 PM, please show up. I’d appreciate the support.

Unless of course you’re crazy or want to kill me, in which case I’d like to warn you there are members of the audience who will be attending and who are a part of martial arts societies and groups on campus, and they won’t hesitate to hurt you.

Have a good night, everybody.

“The Quiet Game”: The Cover

Posted: February 20, 2013 in Progress Report, Scary Stuff, short story, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , ,
2

I took some time out of my day today to create the cover for my upcoming collection of short stories, The Quiet Game: Five Tales To Chill Your Bones. I used a photo I’d taken over the weekend and used PhotoShop to add the title and the writing in the sky that’s in the titular short story. The result is what you see below:

TQG cover

The photo is of Orton Hall, one of the oldest buildings on campus, with a snowy night background. With the lettering in the back, I feel it makes for a very scary cover that gives me the effect I’m looking for.

The best part though, is that I did it all by myself, with only a little bit of help from the people who run the computer lab at the Science and Engineering Lab at school, and I did it in barely half an hour, if even that much! I feel so proud of myself for being able to use a program that before I had so much trouble using. Now I can add this to the Facebook page and put it on the “Books by Rami Ungar” page to show the world.

Thanks for supporting me so far. I hope to have the book out by mid-April, when the semester ends. I hope you’re looking forward to reading it, almost as much as I am looking forward to publishing it.

Review: A Good Day To Die Hard

Posted: February 18, 2013 in Review
Tags: , , ,
0

You might want to wait till it comes out on DVD.

(The following post contains many spoilers, so consider yourself warned!)

I went to this film expecting to be wowed…and left seeing why the reviewer from Entertainment Weekly gave this film a C. Honestly, doesn’t anyone care about making good sequels? Let alone making a good movie? Apparently not.

In this sequel, Bruce Willis reprises his role as John McClane, who goes to Moscow to meet his son Jack Jr., a CIA agent who’s gotten himself in jail all with the express purpose of liberating a political prisoner with some national security secrets that could jeopardize a corrupt politician’s corrupt career. Along the way, we get the requisite amount of explosions and public destruction, but very little in terms of plot–unless you count a trip to Chernobyl, Ukraine plot!

We do see some interesting bits. There are some betrayals and cool reveals, there’s a death scene that harks back to the first movie with a new twist, and Willis gets to make some of his trademark zingers. However, Jai Courtney is so one-dimensional as Jack Jr, you find yourself wishing for Justin Long as Matt Farrell from the fourth film. Indeed, you could switch Courtney for Long in this film and get a much more interesting film. That, and if you add about forty minutes and a revenge plot involving nuclear missiles after the main villain gets scissored in half! Oh, and the car chase that happens right after Willis arrives in Moscow without any time to prepare us for what’s about to happen? It’s so like the DC car chase from the last film, you feel like you’re watching the fourth film for the third time!

After all this, I left the theater feeling disappointed. I hope they don’t make a sixth film, because I’m not sure I could take it if they made another! For all the reasons listed above, I give Die Hard 5 a 2.8 out of 5, and unofficially rename it A Good Day to See A Different Movie or Go to Redbox.

I’m Writing What I Know For Once

Posted: February 11, 2013 in Living and Life, Reflections, Writing
Tags: , , , , ,
0

Last semester, I wrote how I continue to write about subjects I have no personal experience with, despite my creative writing class’s textbook’s insistence that I do so. It wasn’t that I thought anything from my own life wasn’t good enough for writing about, it’s just that I was more interested in writing about a demon causing a human to become a cannibal or a war between humans and werewolves than I was writing about my anxiety before a test or my sometimes stormy relationships with my sisters. When people like my dad would tell me to at least give it a shot, I would usually reply, “That’s too scary for literature.”

But lately–and I blame the workshops I’ve been taking for this–my writing has taken a more personal tone. Over break, I wrote “Enigma” (later renamed to “In The Lady Ogre’s Den”), which has an autistic child as the main character. I’ve worked with kids with autism before, and I’m even on the spectrum, though I’m very high-functioning. Later I wrote “Old Sid” for class (I’ll be turning that one in a week from Wednesday) and that story takes place on the Ohio State campus, where’ I’ve either been working, learning, or both for the past two years. And recently I’ve been working on a short story called “Three Life Saving Phone Calls”, which is based on some dark experiences in my life that for a time made me very depressed and even contemplated suicide. Sure, I’ve changed so much around that it’s now only very loosely based on my life, but if someone were to look closely, and if that someone knew a lot about me, they could see through the fictional veneer and spot what I’ve taken from my own life and put into the story.

Why the change? Like I said before, I think it might have something to do with the workshops I’ve been taking. The emphasis on literary fiction as opposed to genre fiction requires me to be more personal than I have been, and a lot of what those workshops have been teaching me I’ve assimilated into my writing. I guess finding ways to make my own life and experiences interesting is part of what I’ve taken away from these classes. I’m not exactly sure if it’s the best thing for my writing–after all, I’m still devoted to genre fiction, and I prefer to use imagination rather than confront an actual serial killer–but while I’m stuck with this new appreciation for things in my life and using them in my writing, I might as well take advantage of it to the fullest.

And besides, who knows? “Three Life Saving Phone Calls” seems to be just literary enough that I could submit it to a major literary journal, one that pays its contributors. That’s the hope, at least.

What about you? Do you use your own life in your writing, or is your work so strange that your life couldn’t find a place in your work?

Older Entries
Newer Entries