Posts Tagged ‘novel’

The Lull Between Projects

Posted: April 4, 2016 in Living and Life, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , ,
5

If you’re not on my Facebook page or Twitter feed, then allow me to let you know that on Saturday night, I finished the final draft of Video Rage! And a friend of mine is designing the art for the cover, with the promise that she’ll get it done by Sunday. So all that’s left is to get the copyright (I wonder if I’m the one who gets the copyright for the cover image?), set up everything on the various websites I’m selling VR through, and set a release date! Oh, and see bout doing a blog tour.

In short, there’s only a few months until Video Rage is released!

I know! Exciting, right? Fourth book is finally on the way. Woo-hoo!

In the meantime though, I’m…not really doing anything. Seriously. I’m just kind of this in this funk where I don’t feel like writing or editing. I plan to. At least, I plan to do plenty of editing on Rose. God knows I need to. But not just yet. I’ll have a lot of work to do once I get that cover. And I just don’t want to do anything big, like write or edit or even blog, during that time. Yeah, even writing this post is something of a chore. Which is weird, considering that I normally love blogging.

I think we all go through this sort of thing every once in a while. After a very big project, we don’t really feel like diving deep into the next big project if we can help it. After all, we’ve poured all this energy into getting the previous project done. Who wants to go straight into a new thing? We’d rather just relax for a little while. Which is what I’ve been doing. I’ve watched a couple of movies, caught up on some reading (I’ve got a book on Jack the Ripper I’ve been trying to get through for a while), and just chilled. And unless I’m doing something to prep for the new job (more on that in a later post), I’m just taking it easy.

However, it’s just a lull. Lulls are just that, quiet periods between great periods of activity. And as soon as I get that cover back, I’m going to get right back into work. And I plan to get a whole lot done.

Until next time, my Followers of Fear!

Review: “No Matter How Improbable” by Angela Misri

Posted: April 2, 2016 in Novel, Review, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
2
"No Matter How Improbable" by Angela Misri

“No Matter How Improbable” by Angela Misri

I’m of the opinion that the third book in a series can be really hard to pull off, especially when the first two books were just that awesome. I’m glad to say that while the third book in the Portia Adams Adventure series by friend and fellow writer Angela Misri is a bit darker than the previous two books, it’s still a great read and I enjoyed reading it from start to finish.

So if you’re unfamiliar with the book series, it follows Portia Constance Adams, a young woman who finds out she’s the granddaughter of John Watson (as in Holmes and Watson), and moves into 221B Baker Street and begins solving mysteries in 1930s London. The third book starts with Portia now known to the great wide world as the new consulting detective at 221B, and, in addition to a bit of annoying notoriety, she’s dealing with some rather upsetting aspects of being human. Namely, you sometimes argue with, and sometimes you even lose some friends.

These themes of struggle with your friends and loss are present throughout the book, and they can be either a plus or a minus, depending on the reader. In my case, I think I’ll go with a plus. Seeing Portia’s struggles with her friends, which often are somehow wrapped up with the cases she’s taking on, makes for great character development, and makes you want to read more to see how she resolves these problems. You also feel a lot of what Portia’s feeling as you read on, which shows how good Angela is at making you feel what the character feels.

I also found the cases in the story very compelling. Again, I struggled trying to figure out who the culprit or culprits were in each case, and each time I was pleasantly surprised (I’m better at figuring out culprits on crime shows than I am in the books, it seems). My favorite was the mystery “Principessa”, which follows the actual Princess Francesca Maria of the Italian royal family. It was pretty cool, seeing an actual figure from history in a historical mystery novel.

If there were things I thought could’ve been improved upon, I did think that the final casebook was a little crowded. So much was going on in that book–a strange death, a couple of odd men following a friend of Portia’s, and a suspicious psychologist–that it’s hard to keep track of what is part of which case when. That, and in the beginning of the last chapter, there’s a scene where Portia shows some really deep emotion, but it’s only glanced over. I really would’ve enjoyed seeing more attention paid to that scene, as I think it would’ve been a very memorable scene if that had been the case.

Other than that, I really enjoyed No Matter How Improbable. It was a great read, and I really can’t wait for the fourth book. On a scale of 1 to 5, I’m giving it a 4.3 out of 5. Definitely check it out (and the first two books, too) if you have the chance.

Video Rage: Begin the Final Draft!

Posted: March 31, 2016 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
0

I came home from the grocery story just a little while ago, and logged into my email after I put the groceries away. I was surprised and pleased to see an email from my fabulous editor, Britney Thompson Mills, with her marks and remarks on the third draft of Video Rage. You know what that means! One more draft and we begin the publication process!

Now if you don’t know what Video Rage is, it’s the sequel to my first novel, Reborn City.  And if you don’t know what Reborn City is, it’s the story of street gangs in a dystopian city-state in Earth’s near future, and a conspiracy involving the leaders of a rising gang known as the Hydras and the leaders of the city. The novel features themes of Islamaphobia, racism, drug addiction, gang violence, and overcoming other people’s expectations. It’s also a bit more realistic than other dystopian stories, with problems that mirror problems of today’s world, and a society that you can actually imagine forming.

Reborn City, my very first published novel.

Reborn City, my very first published novel.

The sequel to Reborn City, Video Rage, follows the Hydras soon after the end of the first novel, as they face the same problems made that much worse, and deal with new threats that are intent on taking their lives. I’ve been working on VR since my third year of college, and I’m glad to see that we’re finally just one step away from publication. So I’ll take a break from working on Rose–I’ve only gotten a tiny bit of that edited, anyway, so no big deal–and get through VR as fast as my little fingers can type.

In fact, I think I’ll start tonight! Look forward to seeing a post with a release date some time in the next couple of weeks. In the meantime, why not check out Reborn City? A lot of people have told me that they really enjoyed reading the book, and that they cannot wait to read VR. So if you think it sounds interesting and want to check the novel out, you can find copies in paperback and e-book from Amazon, Createspace, and Smashwords. And whatever your thoughts, please let me know what you think. Review, comment, I love some good feedback, and I would love to hear yours.

And if you’re an author looking for someone to edit your book, why not check out Britney’s website? She’s got great skills and she’ll give your book the touch-up it needs. I speak from personal experience, and I highly recommend her.

That’s all for now. See you in a few hours, when it’s Friday (you know what that means). I’m off to edit!

Ignore the Naysayers

Posted: March 30, 2016 in Living and Life, Reflections, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
10

Yesterday someone in one of my writers’ groups on Facebook posted about a recent upsetting experience. She’d told her family that her book was coming out later this year in July, and that she had other books on the way too. Apparently her family’s response was entirely negative, telling her that only rich and famous people actually called themselves authors, and that she should keep her head out of the clouds and on the ground because she obviously wasn’t one.

Not only was this reaction just plain horrible (we should be getting tons of love and support from our families for our writing dreams, not criticism and put-downs), but it’s also ignorant. While not all authors become rich and famous, they don’t need to be to be called authors. And even the rich and famous ones, which are rare to begin with, started out as dreamers with a manuscript they wanted to get published. Seriously, every one. JK Rowling was a single mother living on state benefits while writing Harry Potter. Stephen King was a teacher with three kids and not a lot of cash before the paperback rights to Carrie allowed him to move up the economic ladder a little. HP Lovecraft never saw true success in his lifetime, but he’s considered one of the most influential authors in modern-day horror. We all have to start somewhere.

But that’s beside the point. What I’m actually trying to say is that fame or finances are horrible ways to measure whether or not someone should be called an author. Someone could have millions in the bank or have a reality show and a famous spouse and write terrible fiction. No, if you’re going to measure by what right someone has to be called an author, then do it by how passionate someone is about writing, and by how their work resonates with others. If someone is very passionate about writing, about telling stories and sharing them with others, and that person’s work resonates with readers, I really think they deserve to be called an author. And in the case of this particular author, she’s clearly passionate about her writing, and it resonated enough with her publisher that they want to publish it and believe it’ll do well in sales. In my eyes, she definitely deserves to be called an author.

Of course, there are always people who feel they know better, whether or not they’re inside the industry, and there will always be people who just want to put others down just so they can put others down. I run across those people from time to time. I can’t say which kind the family of the author I’ve been talking about it, but I know what response I would give them: Screw you. Those people don’t hold any power unless you allow them to, and your own opinion of yourself and your work is more important than what they have to say. And if they’re only going to say hurtful or denigrating things, then maybe it’s best to put them aside and find people who will give you the support you need. Let them stew in their own negativity.

Or to put things more simply (and humorously):

So let them naysay. It won’t get them anything if we don’t let them have anything from it. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t intend to let any of my detractors (few that I have) say anything bad about me and bring me down. No, I’ll keep on writing, editing, publishing, and marketing, and listen to the voices who will help me along in that.

And in its way, having those supporters is way better than any riches or fame (though those would be nice).

Self-Pub Authors: How to Deal with Idea Fragments

Posted: March 28, 2016 in ideas, Journalism, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
4

I just published the other article I wanted to write before I started working on Rose. How to Deal with Idea Fragments is exactly how it sounds: tips on working with characters, concepts, or images that could be great stories but you don’t have enough material yet to really call it an idea. I took a lot of the material for this article from personal experience, and I’m hoping that it proves very helpful to writers everywhere who may struggle with these fragments on occasion.

Go check out the article when you have a moment. And if you get a moment, why not check out the rest of the website? Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors is a fantastic blog from independent writers, by independent writers, and for independent writers. There, you can find articles on writing, editing, publishing and marketing, all without having to use a big publishing company. I’ve found it extremely helpful in the past, and I’m sure you will too.

That’s all for now. I’m going to try to get some work done on Rose today. I actually started work on the third draft late last night, and while I didn’t make a lot of progress, I at least started the process. Hopefully I can get it a little further along today, right my Followers of Fear?

#FirstLineFriday

Posted: March 25, 2016 in ideas, Novel, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , ,
6

It’s Friday again, so you know what that means. It’s #FirstLineFriday!

Now if you’re unfamiliar with what #FirstLineFriday is, here are the rules. On Fridays, you:

  1. Create a post on your blog entitled #FirstLineFriday, hashtag and all.
  2. Explain the rules like I’m doing now.
  3. Post the first one or two lines of a potential story, a story-in-progress, or a completed or published story.
  4. Ask your readers for feedback and encourage them to try #FirstLineFriday as well (tagging them if necessary).

This week’s entry comes from a story I’ve had sitting in the back of my head for a while. Without going into details, it involves issues of faith and belief, as well as devotion and power. It’ll be a very dark and probably bleak book when it’s finally written. Anyway, enjoy:

I remember the day I lost faith almost as clearly as if it had happened yesterday. Probably a good thing too, because my lack of faith is what allowed me to survive.

Thoughts? Errors? Let’s discuss.

And while we’re here, I think I’ll tag someone again. This week I’m tagging…Angela Misri of A Portia Adams Adventure! Angela, in honor of your new book, No Matter How Improbable, being released, I hereby tag you for #FirstLineFriday. Hope you enjoy doing it almost as much as I do every week. Or as much as I’m enjoying the new book. I’m about nine or ten chapters in at the time I’m writing this, and I have to say, I find it very intriguing. Especially including real historical figures in the story. That’s a pretty cool touch.

That’s all for now. If there’s anything else to post about this weekend, you’ll hear about it. In the meantime, have a good day and I’ll see you all later. Have a good one, my Followers of Fear!

Prepping to Work on “Rose” Again

Posted: March 21, 2016 in Novel, Reflections, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
4

So I finished that outline for that new novel I plan to write for NaNoWriMo later this year. First draft of the outline, anyway. I probably will revisit it again before November, make some more tweaks and possibly add a scene or two. It’s a ghost story, and since ghost stories tend to involve the protagonist or protagonists being affected on a very personal level by the spirits involved, often by exacerbating personal problems as well as actually haunting the people involved (ghosts and ghost stories are very intimate that way, I’ve noticed), I’ll want to make sure that that’s done right in this story before I write it.

Now that that’s taken care of, I’m finally getting around to working on Rose, the novel I wrote as a thesis for my senior year of college. If you’re unfamiliar with that novel, it’s about a woman with amnesia who finds herself trapped in the home of a man who says he’s her boyfriend, her body going through astounding changes which this man says was to save her life. I started writing it in September 2014, went back a couple weeks later to rework the entire story because the direction I was going in at first just wasn’t right for the story I wanted to tell, and finished the first draft in January 2015. Not too long afterwards I did a second draft that I finished around April, and I haven’t touched it since.

So yeah, it’s been nearly a year since I worked on that novel. But between working and living in Germany, writing some original short stories and editing Video Rage twice and giving Laura Horn a much-needed second draft, can you blame me?

Okay, I might have also been a bit hesitant to approach Rose again. During my thesis defense at the end of my senior year, my advisor told me that if I were to get Rose up to the level worthy of getting it published, I would have to do quite a lot of work on it. And not just grammar and spelling, though that was mostly okay. I had to work in new scenes, space out some others, rework a couple of characters, and change a bunch of stuff in the beginning of the book. Add to that the normal work of editing, and I’ve got one hell of a third draft ahead of me. It’s a bit intimidating, almost like starting a new novel and facing a blank page asking for sixty-thousand plus words.

Yeah, the horror writer’s scared of his own creation. Make fun of him and the irony. Go ahead, get it out of your system.

But you know what? I think I’m up for the task. I took Laura Horn, which I was sure would need an entire rewrite, and the worst that it came to was a few tossed chapters and one major plot point subtly changed to better reflect actual circumstances. If I can tackle that (and LH was a much longer book, by the way), I think I can tackle Rose.

And not only that, but with this being the third draft, I think once this is one I can send it to n editor for a final look-over before I get ready to publish the book. So if we’re lucky, I could have Rose ready for publication by the end of the year. Wouldn’t that be great?

So I’m going to get two articles out of the way, and then I’m going to get straight onto Rose (unless I get the notes back on VR, in which case editing that takes precedence). Wish me luck, my Followers of Fear. I’m going to be very busy these next couple of months (though that is kind of my life in general).

Personal Problems for the Characters

Posted: March 13, 2016 in Reflections, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
0

So I’ve been working on the outline for a new novel that I plan to write for National Novel Writing Month in November (I know, it’s early for that, but I need to work on something original because I’ve been doing nonstop editing since last NaNoWriMo, and if I don’t work on something new before I work on Rose I’m going to scream). And while I’ve been working on it, building the story chapter by chapter, I had the feeling that there was something missing from the story.

About two nights ago, I hit across what was missing. It was personal problems! Good horror stories often deal with issues that the characters are dealing with both internally and in their own lives! In great horror stories like Cujo and the novel I read and reviewed the other day, the main characters are trying to keep their families alive in some state and not lose their livelihoods in addition to trying to survive rabid dogs or a haunted house. In the TV series Supernatural (which I’ve been binging on lately, it’s so good!), in addition to dealing with evil entities and the oncoming Apocalypse, the protagonists Sam and Dean Winchester have to deal with the fact that they’re brothers, with all the issues that family can have when living and working in proximity, and then some.

And I don’t do enough of that exploring–or indicate that I will be doing that sort of exploring–in the outline for this new project. Which is actually a very big issue if I think about it.

There are several reasons why this is. One is having these personal issues helps the audience identify with the characters. Everybody has problems, and seeing people with relatable issues in their life–recent loss, money troubles, relationship issues, addiction, etc.–even if they’re just characters in a story, make people feel for them. In American Horror Story: Asylum, the character of Lana Winters is thrown into Briarcliff as a patient because she’s a lesbian. We of the present day know she was born that way and there’s nothing wrong with her, but back then, the LGBT community was seen by many as immoral or insane, and faced all sorts of discrimination. This immediately makes her a lot more sympathetic to us than if she was just a regular ambitious reporter, and helps draw us into the story as well as makes us identify with the characters.

Another reason creators explore these deep, personal issues in horror fiction, even when you’ve got everything from ghosts to serial killers to aliens to vampires and everything in-between, is that it keeps the characters interesting and the audience interested. Going back to Supernatural, what would the show be like if each episode was about the Winchester brothers facing a new monster and defeating it, plus a few quips? Well sure, it’d be entertaining for a while, but with no change in that formula things would’ve gotten stale probably ten seasons ago. Part of the draw is seeing these two very-different brothers go through ups and downs in their relationships, figuring out right and wrong in a world full of grey areas and just trying to be good people and good to each other at the end of the day, in addition to stopping the end of the world and all the things that go bump in the night.

And third, we writers like to explore these characters, their problems and traumas, and how the characters deal with them over the course of the story. Some good examples of this come from my own work. If you’ve read Reborn City, you know that protgonist Zahara Bakur doesn’t really start out as heroine material. She’s as far from a Wonder Woman as you cn get. But through the story, I explore both the problems she deals with as a Muslim gangster in an environment that isn’t very nice to Muslims and Zahara’s doubts and fears. And I love doing that, I love watching characters like Zahara grow from someone whom you’d never expect to be a hero to someone whom you’d willingly follow into a tricky situation.

So yeah, exploring personal problems with our characters, whatever those problems are, is definitely something we authors do a lot of. And I need to do it more with this new project I’m working on, even if I’m not picking it up again until September or October. Actually,I’m a little surprised I’m not doing more exploration. There’s a whole big problem with the protagonist’s relationship with another character–let’s just say they shouldn’t be an item for a very good reason–and I’m so not exploiting that enough. I really have to explore how this relationship could mess with the characters while at the same time something evil is attacking the town.

In fact, I’m going to get on that right now. Wish me luck, my Followers of Fear. Hopefully by the time I’m done going over this outline, it’ll be as good as it needs to be for November.

Review: “Within These Walls” by Ania Ahlborn

Posted: March 7, 2016 in Novel, Review, Scary Stuff
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
0

“Within These Walls” by Ania Ahlborn

I’m honestly surprised I haven’t heard of Ania Ahlborn before. I got a recommendation from Audible a couple of months ago to try one of her books, and I ended up getting the paperback version after I finished A Storm of Swords. I’m glad I did, because Within These Walls is one of the scariest books I’ve ever read, on par with the likes of Stephen King.

Within These Walls follows Lucas Graham, a true-crime writer whose career has reached its peak and has since spiraled down into the dust. He gets a letter in the mail from Jeffrey Halcomb, an incarcerated cult leader whose followers killed themselves back in the 1980’s, offering to give Graham his previously-unheard story if Graham promises to live in the house that Halcomb’s followers killed themselves in. With his marriage on the rocks and no other options, Graham and his teenage daughter pack up and head out to the house in Washington, where they find that Halcomb’s promises to his followers of eternal life might be more than just talk.

It’s going to be hard to summarize all that I loved about this book, but I will try. First, it’s hard to put down. The story twists and turns, making you guess where Ahlborn is taking her book every moment. I also liked how she could capture the voices of each of her different POV characters. Lucas comes across as both desperate and obsessed, consumed by the promise of Halcomb’s story and what it could do for his life. Flashbacks told through the eyes of Audra Snow, one of Halcomb’s followrs, really break your heart as you see her fall under Halcomb’s spell. But best of all are the chapters told through the eyes of Jeanie, Graham’s teenage daughter. Teenage logic and thought processes are contradictory, ruled by emotional swings, and not always bound by the rules of the real world, and Ahlborn captures that so well with Jeanie. It actually taught me a couple of things about writing for that age group, something I’ll hopefully keep with me in future stories.

But really, the best part is the scares. Every scare is perfectly done, like something out of a horror movie. In fact, this would be a great movie. Why isn’t this a movie yet? From the initial move-in to the house, to the powerful, climactic end, every spooky scare will chill you and make you worry for the characters and for your sleep. It’s just wonderful.

The one problem I had was that I would’ve liked Graham to maybe investigate some of the house’s history as well as Jeffrey Halcomb and his followers. There’s documents in between a few chapters that go over the house’s history, among other things, but I think it would’ve been interesting if Graham had read some of those and had been affected by them. But it’s a small point, so whatever. I still enjoyed the book.

All in all, Within These Walls a 4.8 out of 5. It’s scary, it’s exciting right till the end, and I will definitely be checking out Ahlborn’s work in the future. If you like a good horror novel, this might be the one for you.

Oh by the way, after I finished this book, I watched a movie over dinner called The Veil about a cult with strange, supernatural happenings, which I only found out after I started watching it. And both the book and the movie were probably inspired by Jim Jones and the Jonestown Massacre, which I read up on this afternoon after I heard the new Outlast horror game was inspired by the happenings at Jonestown. That’s like four Jonestown-related things in one day. I seriously hope that’s a coincidence and not God giving me a sign for what I should do with the rest of my life.

#FirstLineFriday

Posted: March 4, 2016 in ideas, Novel, Writing
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
4

It’s Friday again, so you know what that means. It’s #FirstLineFriday!

If you’re new here and don’t know what #FirstLineFriday is, let me start by telling you that it’s a fun weekly ritual to take up (and it’s a lot less costly than animal or human sacrifice. Also requires less clean up). So here’s how it works. On Fridays, you:

  1. Create a blog post with the title #FirstLineFriday, hashtag and all.
  2. Explain the rules like I’m doing.
  3. Post the first one or two lines of a potential work, work-in-progress, or completed or published story.
  4. Finally, ask your readers for feedback and encourage them to try it on their own blogs.

This week’s entry comes from an idea I had a few weeks back for a novel that might be classified as science-horror. I’m not sure, it’s got some elements that could be classified as horror, but at the same time part of the conflict of the story involves a science-fiction plot device, so it kind of straddles the two. I’m not making any sense, am I? Well, whatever. Here are the lines that would start this story. Enjoy:

Catherine had been working at the Warner-Marigold Motel for three years, and she was on track for a promotion in the next year or so. Of course, that might only be because she was the only one on the cleaning staff who was willing to clean Room A16, known among the staff as the Suicide Room.

Thoughts? Errors? Let me know in the comments below.

And while you’re at it, why not do #FirstLineFriday on your blog? It’s great fun, and for writers it’s not only good practice, but it’s a great way to test different openings for various stories. I’ve certainly enjoyed doing it, and I started doing this on my blog nearly a year ago.

That’s all for now. If I have somethig to blog about, I’ll let you know. In the meantime, I’ll see you guys around. Have a great weekend, my Followers of Fear. I know I will.

Older Entries
Newer Entries