Posts Tagged ‘reflections’

Conversations With CC Finlay

Posted: February 4, 2014 in Author Interciew, Review, Writing
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Today I finally get the chance to post my interview with science fiction author Charles Coleman Finlay, or CC Finlay for short. A graduate of Ohio State, his first story Footnotes was published in 2001 in Fantasy and Science Fiction, where several of his short stories have been published since. He’s also published four novels, including the Traitor to the Crown series (which one of my favorite shows, Sleepy Hollow, strangely resembles) and a collection of short stories, The Wild Things.

I sat down with him to talk about writing, fiction, and how delicious the food from the Wexner Café was (comments about that last subject are not in this interview). It was a great way to have lunch on a Friday afternoon.

RU: I guess the first question I want to ask you is, how did you get into science fiction?

CCF: I’m not sure there’s a short answer. When I was a kid, I felt overwhelmed by the world just because of personal events in my life. So I was looking, unconsciously,  for larger than life characters, people who faced world-sized problems and overcame them. So I started with cartoons and comic books. I loved superheroes–Superman, Batman, Green Arrow, the Flash, the X-Men. When I started reading a lot of books, science fiction and fantasy fulfilled the same needs but in a more complex way. Take Lord of the Rings, for example. Here’s Frodo with this burden he didn’t want, and he’s not a wizard or a superhero, and still he finds some way to triumph. That really resonated with me. Edgar Rice Burroughs was also a really important writer for me. All of his characters face big overwhelming problems, whether it’s Tarzan orphaned in the jungle or John Carter transported to another planet. Science fiction and fantasy are  full of those kinds of stories, and I loved them. I still do.

RU: I like comic books too, though they’re usually the Japanese kind, and I still read them a lot. When you write, what is your process?

CCF: Every writer is different. For me, it’s an iterative process. I have to have the whole story in my head, the shape of it like a picture, and then write it down. My first drafts can be pretty rough, but then I revise it and rewrite it many times. My wife’s also a writer, but she’s the exact opposite of me. She needs the scene perfect each time. So she writes more slowly, but she does less editing than I do. But if you ask this question of a hundred different writers, you’re going to get a hundred different answers. Everyone is different.

RU: A lot of the readers on my blog are a strange grouping of traditionally-published and self-published authors. How do you feel about the changing dynamics of the publishing industry these days?

CCF: There’s not a period of time where you can point to traditional publishing–however you define traditional publishing–as stable. It’s always changing, always evolving. If you’re thinking of it from a professional point of view, the most important question is this: how do authors get paid. A lot of technologies are allowing authors to get paid and published in new ways. That can be good for authors. But there are also a lot of authors who publish their books too soon, before they’re ready. I know one writer who, when he was young, self-published his first novel and was so discouraged by the reaction to it that he gave up writing for a decade. That was a shame, because he was incredibly talented. Had he stuck with traditional publishing there would have been more people around him to keep him going and to help make his books better, so that when they did come out, people would have loved them. On the other hand, I have friends who, after being traditionally published, have started to self-publish. T.A. Pratt and Henry Connolly, for example, both had series that got cancelled by their publishers, but they had a hardcore group of dedicated readers. They self-published more books in the series and had huge success with it. So it’s a lot like the question about the writing process. There’s no single right answer, and every writer has to find the right path for them. Everyone will make mistakes along the way. So it’s up to authors to educate themselves about potential opportunities, but also potential problems.

RU: What advice would you have for an author who isn’t having much success right now?

CCF: Keep working at it. I was writing seriously and submitting fiction for over six years before I sold my first story professionally. That’s pretty common. I’ve heard it described as the Million Words of Crap theory–that every writer has to write a million words of crap before they start producing something good. Other people I know quote Malcolm Gladwell and point out that you need to put in 10,000 hours of practice to get good at any skill.

Also, surround yourself with other writers who are as serious about it as you are. Pick them up when they get discouraged, and let them do the same for you. Learn from them and share your own mistakes to shorten the learning curve for everyone. Writing can be lonely enough, but don’t let it isolate you.

RU: Do you think as less people are reading, the novel will die out?

CCF: More people are reading than ever before, not just in the US but throughout the world and ebooks are making that easier. So I don’t see the novel dying out soon. The problem is there are more writers, more novels, than ever before. So it’s harder to find a big readership for any single book.

(Editor’s note: Mr. Finlay recommends going to this website for more information on the subject.)

RU: What do you look for in the stories you read?

CCF: That is a great question. I am a guest editor for the July/August issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction. In the month of January, over 750 stories were submitted to me to read for this issue. From that I had to narrow it down to about 12 stories that I will get to publish. So I’ve been thinking about this a lot.

I like to be surprised, which is hard when you’re a writer. The surprise can be plot, language, format, character, knowledge. But it has to be something. The more I read, the more it’s something else besides plot–you see every plot twist, every angle in a story before it happens. So when a plot surprises me, I really value it. And then I look for stories that make me feel. It’s not just putting characters through terrible things, there has to be some emotional resonance as well. Fear, excitement, sadness are all good emotions, but I really look for and enjoy stories that can make me feel delight, wonder, joy. Those are a lot harder to write, and I appreciate stories that can evoke those emotions. And then I love to laugh. Not every story is funny, or should try to be funny, but when a writer can make me laugh consistently, I really appreciate that.

RU: So much science fiction has become reality: communicators become cell phones, all-matter materialization devices are 3D printers, and we have information literally at the tips of our fingers. Where do you think science fiction will go from here now that a lot of it is becoming science reality?

CCF: I don’t think it’s something new. Thomas Disch wrote a great nonfiction book called The Stuff Our Dreams Are Made Of about this phenomenon. But I also don’t think that science fiction is a laboratory for new technology. Science fiction is about the present, not the future. If people envision something and make it a reality, then that’s something different from science fiction.

RU: Final question: If you were stuck on a desert island and could only bring three books with you, what would you bring?

CCF: I think you have to take Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe with you for all the obvious reasons. Defoe invented the novel and Robinson was one of the first he invented. I would also take a collection of Lois McMaster Bujold. I think she’s an amazing writer, and I reread her Vorkosigan series in particular every year or so. And then I’m a writer. So the last one would be a book full of blank pages, so I could write the book I wanted to read. That’s what we do as writers, right?

 

If you’re interested in learning more about CC Finlay, you can check out his website at www.ccfinlay.com.

Plans for February 2014

Posted: February 2, 2014 in Living and Life, Writing
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January was a great month for me. I got a lot of writing done, I did very well in most, if not all, of my schoolwork, I applied for several scholarships for my study abroad trip, That, and Angela and I are very close to finishing the final draft of Snake (thanks for all the help, Angela, by the way. Couldn’t have done it without you). Since January was so good, I’ve got similar feelings for February, and I thought I’d share what I hope to accomplish this month:

Write and edit like a madman. I’ve still got several short stories I want to write, so I hope to get those done before I return to my WIP Laura Horn. I also hope to edit those same short stories and maybe send them to some magazines. That, and I plan to finish Snake and get it ready for publication (already thinking about a book trailer), as well as to write an article for a magazine a friend of mine runs. And finally, I hope to write some really great blog posts that examine various aspects of writing and ask some deep questions on fiction writing. Not sure what those will be yet, but I have some ideas. We’ll see what I can come up with.

I’m going to enter a few contests. There’s a short story award given out every spring semester by Ohio State’s English Department, and I’ve submitted my entry already. I decided to go with Ohm, the short story I wrote last month about a man who starts a cult around himself using meditation. It’s not horror, but with OSU’s English Department that might be a good thing (they’re more literary-oriented, sadly). I think they’ll like it, but we’ll see. I also plan to submit Reborn City for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award in the middle of the month. I don’t think I’ll get very far with my first novel, but I hope to get to a certain round where you can get a possibly favorable review. If that happens, I’m hoping that more people will discover RC and maybe like it. Fingers crossed!

I’m going to work hard in school. Five classes, most of them between the 3000-5000 level makes for some heavy assignments to get through. As soon as I’m done with one, I have another to look forward to! But I’m not going to let it get in my way. I’m going to get all A’s this semester and I’m going to keep my place on that study-abroad trip! And speaking of which…

I’m going to get a lot of scholarship! Okay, that’s kind of out of my hands, but I applied for a lot of scholarships. At least one of them might come through! It’ll save me from applying for a loan to finance this trip, anyway!

And finally, I’m doing Buckeyethon again! Last year I had so much fun raising money for cancer research and then celebrating with a 12-hour dance marathon, I’m doing it all over again this Valentine’s Day! Oh, and if anyone wants to make a last minute donation, here’s the link. It’s all for a good cause!

Well, that’s all I got for now. I hope to have more good news later this week and this month. Until then, Goodnight Followers of Fear!

Sales In Self-Publishing

Posted: January 20, 2014 in Reflections, Writing
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Some people think that anyone who’s published a book must be very talented  and rolling in money. I’m going to leave the question of talent to the side for another post, and focus on sales, particularly sales in the world of self-publishing.

I published my first book in July last year and my first novel in November. As a self-published author, a college student, and a guy working at Ohio State’s Student Financial Aid office part-time for nine bucks an hour, I couldn’t exactly afford an advertising team to help me spread the word about my books. I’m completely reliant on my blog, every social media platform I can get my hands on and learn to use, and the spoken word, along with any contacts I can make in the writing industry.

Truth is, most writers don’t make that much money out of their craft, especially if they’re self-published and doing a lot of the work on their own. Most writers usually have teaching jobs or something else to help pay the bills. Stephen King didn’t stop teaching until Carrie went paperback. Anne Rice and JK Rowling had small sales until their careers started taking off, and then they began writing full time. There are numerous other examples I could mention, but the point is that writing and publishing books is not guaranteed income. In fact, several authors I know, most of them self-published but a few of them having gone the traditional route, have described their book sales as getting a big boost whenever a book is published, followed by a steady decline to the usual amount of sales after a month or so. I’m still working to get to that level of popularity!

But then again, most authors don’t care about the amount of sales, at least not like an executive in a toy company might worry about how a toy is not selling as it should among kids 8-12. Most of the time, we’re more worried about how people are liking our books, if they enjoy what they’re reading and if they’re connecting with the characters. In short, every writer wants to know is if people are appreciating the stories they create. And the authors that are more concerned with sales in the other sense? Well, I don’t think that they got into writing for the right reasons.

So most authors don’t make big sales like some people tend to think. We certainly wouldn’t mind having more sales but it’s not as big a factor for us as one might think. In fact, I’m very happy with my current fanbase, though it’s pretty small at this point. The people who read my work tend to enjoy it very much, and they let me know in reviews and emails and in conversations. And for now, that’s all I can ask for. When I get the big sales and the larger fanbase, it’ll be because I’ve earned it.

All for now. I’ve got a short story to work on. Wish me luck!

The 3 Types of Terror

Posted: January 18, 2014 in Reflections, Scary Stuff, Writing
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I came across this post by Stephen King on Facebook the other day and I thought it’d be interesting to write about. The post goes like this:

The 3 types of terror: The Gross-out: the sight of a severed head tumbling down a flight of stairs, it’s when the lights go out and something green and slimy splatters against your arm. The Horror: the unnatural, spiders the size of bears, the dead waking up and walking around, it’s when the lights go out and something with claws grabs you by the arm. And the last and worse one: Terror, when you come home and notice everything you own had been taken away and replaced by an exact substitute. It’s when the lights go out and you feel something behind you, you hear it, you feel its breath against your ear, but when you turn around, there’s nothing there…

Words of wisdom from the King himself.

When I read this, it struck a certain chord with me. I realized that a lot of horror writers and filmmakers can easily gain an understanding of the first two, but it takes a long time to get into the third type, and an even longer time to gain a mastery of it. For example, there are a lot of films out there (of varying quality) that utilize Gross-out and Horror. They have serial killers, they have vampires and demons, but they’re kind of low on terror. The Evil Dead films and many bad slasher flicks are prime examples of this (I’m talking to you, Friday the 13th remake). Even I had trouble with this early on in my writing career. I could easily write a story about vampires or demons that had plenty of blood  and fight sequences, but I was lacking in the terror department. Even worse, I rarely thought about including the terror factor, and when I did I didn’t really do it as best as I could.

But at that age though, and in that point of my development as a writer, all I thought I needed was a monster, someone’s life in danger, and the rest would take care of itself. I learned later on that adding terror to the story is a process, something that has to be consciously done before you can go about actually adding it in unconsciously. This is something I’ve had to comprehend with lately and which I’ve been working on with some of my latest stories. With The Loneliest Roads, I tried to put in a sense of unreality and strangeness even before my protagonist entered the limo, and slowly heightened it once she got into the limo. with some of the short stories I’m planning on writing now, I’m looking for ways to increase that terror without seeming silly or absurd. And in future novels, I hope to add that factor in with more skill and precision than I have in the past.

Perhaps adding terror in is the most difficult part of horror writing because, as King said, it’s the worst. It’s what really makes a horror story memorable to those who read or see it, and the thing about it is that it’s often an underlying element in the story, something that’s a factor in the scary elements of the story but rarely the main element. That goes to the Horror, which usually causes in one way or another the Gross-out. But the Terror? It’s what hails the coming of the horror, what prepares you for the jumps and scream the Horror will cause. And getting someone prepared for that can be really difficult, all told.

Although I’m still trying to get mastery of all 3 elements, I’m hoping that in the future I’ll be able to get a better handle on them, and to do that I just have to keep writing, to keep practicing and see where it takes me. As I write, I learn, and hopefully I learn how to tell scary stories much better than I have in the past. It’s an ongoing process, but I feel it’s one I must take part in. Wish me luck.

And for those horror writers out there, how do you deal with the 3 elements listed above? Do you have any advice on utilizing any of them? What?

(Don’t say “limit Gross-out” though, because I’ve already figured that one out. Too many horror films rely on Gross-out as it is, and it’s annoying after a while.)

Hypnosis vs. Meditation

Posted: January 12, 2014 in Living and Life, Reflections
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Some of you know I go to a weekly meditation class on Sundays. Today at the class we had an interesting discussion about the differences between meditation and hypnosis. The discussion started while going over some of the aspects of a particular chakra. One suggestion for clearing this chakra of impurities or of other problems is to abstain from activities such as hypnosis. Because I use hypnosis a lot in my life as well as meditation and because I know how to perform hypnosis, I had to ask why one should avoid it, especially since hypnosis and meditation are very similar and have similar aims when performed (unless you’re a stage hypnotist, in which case your goal may just be to do some interesting trick).

Ultimately, the problem comes down to relying on yourself vs. relying on others. The form of meditation I do, called Sahaja Yoga, has a great emphasis on practitioners being able to do Sahaja Yoga on their own and become their own guru in order to find the answers they are looking for or to resolve the problems they are experiencing. Hypnosis, on the other hand, relies heavily on the hypnotist to help a subject, and because hypnosis is largely dependent on the hypnotist’s suggestions, there is an opportunity for abuse on the part of the hypnotist to hurt the subject or cause them to do harm onto others. For this reason, some Sahaja Yogis are very against hypnosis.

As someone who has positive associations for both practices, I saw it as almost like the science vs. religion debate: while they may seem at odds, that doesn’t necessarily mean that they can’t work together. For example, many people are able to believe in both the Genesis story and the theory of evolution, and that’s just one example of how people have learned to reconcile religion to scientific beliefs or theories that seem to contradict each other. Also, both disciplines can be abused by those who are trained in them: a preacher could abuse his followers’ trust in him to scam them or hurt them, while some scientists used to use pseudo-science to justify racist, sexist, anti-Semitic, or homophobic beliefs (a few still do, sadly).

Hypnosis and meditation can also be like this. While some may see the two as distinctly different and that they can’t work together, others see them as very similar and that they can work together. Many researchers have found that the hypnotic state is very similar to the state of consciousness achieved during meditation, and that they can both have positive effects on the physical, mental, and emotional self. For a personal example, last semester there were a couple of weeks where I was under intense stress and was constantly worried about finishing projects and homework, my finances, and other problems. It took a very powerful combination of meditation and hypnosis to be able to get back to my normal self and handle my schoolwork without having a breakdown of any sort.

Not only that, but both hypnosis and meditation can potentially be abused by those who practice it. A hypnotist may use a client’s suggestibility to cause harm to the client or to themselves, but someone who knows some meditation can easily create their own brand of meditation and charge through the roof for lessons or even start a cult based around them and their meditation brand (when I pointed this out to my class, my first thought was, “Hey, that could make a great short story”. Believe me, I will make it into one).

Whatever you feel about hypnosis and/or meditation, it’s important to keep in mind that both aim to help people, that they are very similar in several ways, and that there are people who will swear by one, the other, or both that they are helpful disciplines. I feel that my life is enhanced by both, and I’m glad to be able to know how to do both.

If you are interested in trying either in order to better understand the issue, I’ve embedded two videos below. The first features Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi, the founder of Sahaja Yoga, giving an introductory session in Sahaja Yoga to an audience in Sydney, Australia. The second video is a basic hypnotic relaxation video that gives you an idea of what a hypnotic state is like and what one can accomplish in it. All you have to do for either video is follow the instructions given (preferably while wearing headphones for best quality), and you’ll get a sense of what each is like.


What do you think of hypnosis and/or meditation? Do you think they’re incompatible or compatible? Or do you just think the whole discussion is silly?

A Confession and Some Updates On My 666th Post

Posted: January 8, 2014 in Living and Life, Progress Report, Reflections, Writing
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Yes, this is my 666th post. The fact that I’ve been counting up to this post must tell you a lot about me. I just wish I had something scarier to mark the occasion. I guess the picture to the left of this paragraph will have to do.

I want to make a confession to you on this post, and that confession starts with a little story. Today I met with one of my counselors at Ohio State and she told me she’d read Reborn City over winter break, and that she’d enjoyed it very much. In fact, she told me at times she had trouble putting it down because she wanted to keep reading and see what happened, which explained why she read it so quickly. I’d heard this from someone else who’d recently read RC, so it made me feel pretty good. But at the same time, I also felt pretty incredulous. After all, I wrote this book in high school. It took me about four years to get it ready for publication, and I needed a lot of help along the way from friends and family.

The truth is (and this is the confession part from the title of this post), I’m still trying to figure out what the hell I’m supposed to be doing. I may act sometimes like I’m all experienced in the matters of fiction writing and all that’s terrifying, especially when I’m writing a post for Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors, but I don’t know it all. I have no idea how to get more people to read my blog, or how to get more people to purchase or download copies of my books. I tried with the Weekly Exercises to get people interested in buying my fiction writing and just interested in my writing in general, but it didn’t work out so much (this is part of the reason why I haven’t been writing any Exercises recently, in case any of you were wondering. That, and I didn’t have the time or the inexhaustible well of ideas for so many flash fiction pieces). And I’m certainly not the authority on terrifying people. I’m pretty far from it. I’m still trying to learn how to do a better job of scaring than jumping out to yell BOO! or use a big, scary monster with claws or a serial killer with a knife. There are subtleties to scaring people and doing it well. I’m still learning how to do it.

So I ask that you still support me and help me. I’m working hard to fulfill my dreams and to become a better writer. If you want to read my writing, then I’m happy about that and I thank you for it. And if you never want to read my books because it’s just not what you’re into, then that’s fine. Everyone’s tastes are different.

And now for those updates:

–I’ve written a blurb for Video Rage. For those of you who’ve read Reborn City and enjoyed it, I wrote a short blurb for RC‘s sequel that gives a few hints as to what we can expect for the next book. Unfortunately VR is only listed as Coming Soon, as it’s still in the first draft at this point. Still, if you’re interested in the second book, you can read the blurb here.

–I’ve published a few stories on WattPad. Well, one story, to be exact. Revenge for a Succubus’s Beloved was published about a year ago, and it’s still one of my favorites, so I published it again on the site for others to read if they so desired. The other two publications are previews of The Quiet Game and Reborn City. I hope to publish some original fiction in the coming months on the site, and when I do I’ll let everybody know. If you would like to read The Quiet Game‘s preview, click here. If you want to read RC‘s preview, click here. And if you want to read Revenge for a Succubus’s Beloved (and it’s one of my favorites, so I hope you do), click here.

–My Facebook page has reached 100 likes! Growing and maintaining a Facebook page is not easy, ask any author who has one. Ask any person who has one. And I finally managed to get 100 likes on my own page. Took several months, but I did it. I’d like to thank everyone who’s liked my page and stayed with me through the months. Just like everything else, it couldn’t happen without you. And if you’re interested in checking out my Facebook, follow the link here.

Well, that’s all for now. Have a good night, Followers of Fear. Thanks for reading my 666th post, confession and all. I hope nothing demonic results from you reading it.

100 Ideas!!!

Posted: January 6, 2014 in ideas, Living and Life, Novel, Progress Report, Reflections, short story, Writing
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I’ve mentioned this before on my blog, but I keep a list of ideas for novels/comic books/films/TV shows/etc. on my flash drive. And over the past semester, that list grew pretty damn lengthy. In fact, I had more ideas than I did in any other semester. And tonight, I got my one-hundredth idea for the list! And having just typed that, I wonder how I will ever find the time to write all of those stories. I probably won’t, but it’ll be fun to try.

Anyway, the idea for number one-hundred came to me quite by accident (apparently that’s how all the best ideas come). I’ve previously announced that before I get back to working on Laura Horn, I wanted to do some short stories. And before I decided to do those short stories, I decided to take one last look at one short story, maybe see if I could spruce it up a little and possibly publish it on WattPad (I’ve published one or two things on there since I got an account on that website. More on that to follow in a future post). The story in question, Resurrection, is about a man who is brought back to life through advances in science, but something goes terribly wrong and his resurrection isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. That story has gone through several different drafts and incarnations, and I thought I’d give the latest incarnation a look over to see if I could make it better. When I looked over it though, something occurred to me midway through the short story. There’s this one scene when my main character encounters a religious leader who is more than a little upset about this resurrection. I was going to have my protagonist call him an old fart, but with the years he’s been dead, the protagonist is over ninety years old. He should be calling the preacher a stupid kid.

And that’s when it hit me. A short story was too short to tell this story. It had to be expanded, to go into a novella or even a full novel! Resurrection had to be resurrected in a new form.

God, that was a bad play on words.

But that’s beside the point. Here is the point: the last time I trotted out Resurrection and sent it to a friend, he told me that it was an interesting concept and that it could be expanded into a novel or into a film. Oh, that sounded nice. The thing is, I couldn’t figure out how to expand it into a novel, and I didn’t have the time to write a screenplay. And even if I did have the time, I wouldn’t know how to go about getting a screenplay sold (though I might try in the future, when I have the time). But at that single thought on how the main character should think about the preacher, I had an idea on how to expand the story into a novel. I stopped looking through the short story, went to my Ideas list, and recorded Idea #100.

My idea is alive! ALIVE!

I don’t know when I’ll be able to write the novel version of Resurrection, mostly because I have a few other projects that take priorities that take place before it. However, I’m sure it won’t be too long before I get around to it. I like the idea, and I don’t want to be working on this story on and off for several years. I don’t want to do that at all. I really want to write this story eventually and do it sooner rather than later. For now though working on it just won’t be possible, so instead I’ll just leave a few hints as to what we can expect from this future novel:

–some of the themes will include aging, adjusting to a changed and changing world, and death and dying.

–the technology aspect will make Reborn City jealous (then again, the point of RC was never the technology, but whatever).

–the resurrection, though scientific in nature, won’t be plagued by problems of the scientific realm.

–and finally, I may release each finished chapter of this novel, once the book has been heavily edited, on WattPad or on my blog. One of them.

I also hope someday to get to many of the ideas I’ve written on that list. A lot of them I feel are really great ideas, and I would love to write and share them with the world. So the hope is that I can get a good number of them written over the coming years, and that as each novel (or in the future, if God is willing, each film or manga or TV series) is released, there will be someone willing to check it out and read it, maybe even a lot of someones. I think that’s why I keep writing, even if I haven’t exactly been super-successful yet. It’s because I know that each story could potentially make someone happy, and I’m still writing fot hose people. Hopefully we’ll find each other someday and they’ll enjoy what I’ve written for them.

That’s all for now. I’m going to take a break and then get started on an original short story. I’ve got close to seventy ideas for short stories as well, so I need to get some of them out of the way. Good night, Followers of Fear.

Spring Semester 2014: Pre-Semester Countdown

Posted: January 4, 2014 in Living and Life, Progress Report, Writing
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I’ve done the last of my pre-semester shopping, so it’s time to write a post about what’s going to be happening to me this semester at Ohio State University. My college life and my writing have often been intertwined since I got to school here. When my grades are good and life’s going my way, my writing has done well. When life’s tough and I’m not doing so well grade-wise, my writing has suffered (or worse, my writing hasn’t even happened because I just don’t have the time or energy to write! That happened last semester). Which is probably why I write these posts at the beginning, middle, and end of each semester, because both are so essential to each other as I try to become the writer I’ve always dreamed of being.

In terms of classes, all but one of them are devoted to the study abroad trip I’m going on this summer. The study abroad trip visits England, France, and Germany, and we’ll be intensively studying World War II. With that in mind, many of my classes are focused exclusively preparing for the trip. I already took a general World War II class and a History of the Holocaust class in past semesters, so the number of classes I have to take have been pared down. Still, there are a few I still need to take: one is a special History research seminar, in which we’ll be covering various WWII-related topics and then do research projects around that (I’m assuming). Another History class is devoted to the rise of America as a world superpower from 1921 to 1963 and hinging around the US’s involvement in WWII (I guess a semester of prep for studying World War II abroad just wouldn’t be complete without one course that’s America-centric in nature). The other two classes are French classes: one is a course on French-American relations throughout the years. I’m pretty sure this’ll involve everything from the various wars the US and France have both been involved in since the French and Indian War as well as such silly topics as “freedom fries” (the latter is actually in the title of the class, if I remember right). The second course is a course in learning everyday French and learning how to say “Thank you for your help”, “Where is the bathroom?”, and “I would like a Belgian waffle. Oh your wife is Belgian? Cool! Tell her I love the waffles and chocolates!”

 

The beach of Normandy. We’ll be studying D-Day this semester and visiting the beach during the trip. Can’t wait!

 

In addition to the French class, I ordered some software off Amazon last night that’ll teach me to speak German. Not only will this be relevant to the trip, but it might be relevant for a future story and it doesn’t hurt to be able to speak Hebrew, French and German when I apply for jobs in the future. I’m actually looking forward to learning the language, and the software I got received some very good reviews on Amazon, so I hope I’ll really be able to utilize it. I also plan to apply for several scholarships and get the funds I need to travel abroad. I hope I can get a ton of scholarship money! Otherwise it might be difficult to go on the trip!

The only class I’m taking this semester that isn’t related to my study abroad trip is an English course for my English major. Specifically, it’s an English 4597 course, which is one of those courses all English majors are required to take at some point late in their college careers. Fortunately they offer several different varieties of this class, so I ways able to choose one that worked with my other classes and sounded interesting: Deaf Literature and Deaf Culture (when I tell people I’m taking this course, they ask me if I mean “deaf” or “death”. Considering that it’s me they’re asking, it’s a relevant question). It looks pretty interesting, and we have some very interesting books, including a children’s book that intertwines illustrations with prose into two different narratives. Not your average children’s story, to say the least.

I’m also working about ten to twelve hours a week at the Financial Aid office this semester, just like I did last semester. With busy season over, the office should quiet down a little. Still, there’s a literal mountain of work to get done, and I’ll be working through some of that mountain every time I step into the office. I don’t mind though: the work usually isn’t too bad, the people are great, and I’ve come up with some great ideas for short stories and novels while restocking the copy paper or sifting through some recently-scanned documents (so if you think a job will sap you of your creativity as you try to create the ultimate story/painting/poem/etc., here’s an example to the contrary).

And finally, I just want to fill everyone in on my social plans and my writing goals for this semester. I hope to be able to hang out with my friends a bit this semester, just like I did last semester, but I also want to socialize more and do new things. Last semester I joined the science fiction club on campus, but I was so busy I was only able to come to two meetings. I hope to attend more often this semester. I also would like to go to events in and around campus and meet new people. And who knows? I may even try to start a relationship of the romantic nature this semester. Don’t know if that’s possible or if I’ll have time for that, but I can try.

So looking forward to finally getting Snake done and published. I hope plenty of people read it.

And as for my writing, I plan to finish Video Rage‘s first draft either this weekend or in the coming week. I’m almost done with one of the chapters and after that there’s only two more to go. I already have the ending planned out, I just need to get there. And after I finish VR, I’ll take a short break from writing before getting to work on several short stories. Over the past semester I’ve come up with over sixty ideas for short stories, but I’ve been so busy with school, work and VR I haven’t had the time to write any of them, so I want to get some of them out of the way this semester. And after I’ve written enough short stories that I’m satisfied and submitted a few of them to magazines and other publications, I’ll take another break before I get back to work on my other WIP Laura Horn, which I hope to finish up before the fall when I start a new novel for my senior thesis.

I also have plans to edit VR when the time comes, start the basis of a new collection of short stories, write several articles to Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors, and of course to finish the final draft of Snake and get it ready for publication. My friend Angela Misri is almost done giving me feedback on the book, and after she’s done I’ll interview her about her work, including the publication of her novel Jewel of the Thames, which is coming out sometime this spring. It’s going to be a great semester!

Now though, I have to go on a short shopping trip and then make dinner for myself. Afterwards I plan to do some last-minute preparations for the new semester before retiring for the evening. So with this, I wish you a good night and I’ll see you tomorrow, my Followers of Fear. Wish me luck in the new semester as I take on the world, prepare for my trip, and try to fulfill all my dreams. It’s going to be hard work, but I’m so ready to take up the challenge.

See you in eight weeks when I let you know how I’m doing.

Writing In The Dark

Posted: January 3, 2014 in Living and Life, Writing
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I’ve been meaning to write this post all day, but it’s been kind of a crazy day, so I haven’t rally had the chance until now. I better take advantage of this opportunity while I still have the chance.

Last night I sat down to work on Chapter Thirty-Five of Video Rage, the sequel to Reborn City. I’d started the chapter earlier in the week, but because I’d been sick and because of the new year I’d only gotten a little over a page written. I’d planned to sit down and write before Elementary came on, and then do some more writing during the commercial breaks, but at around nine-thirty the power went out all around my neighborhood. In the space of a second the only light in my apartment was my laptop computer.

Now for those not too familiar with Ohio, we get some crazy weather year round (last year during a power outage a friend’s grandmother actually got snow on her roof. It was in July, and she has the photo to prove it). And this week we’ve been seeing below-freezing temperatures and several inches of snow. So when the power went off, my apartment started getting pretty cold. After confirming that the rest of the neighborhood was out of power and placing a phone call to the power company (where I learned that the outage would most likely be repaired by half-past midnight), I shut myself off in the apartment, got out some flashlights, and booted up the computer to continue writing VR Ch. 35.

Normally when I write, I’m beset by a number of distractions, the Internet being the chief one. However the lack of power took out the Internet, took out the TV, took out the lights, and took out most of the distractions. So besides answering the phone or getting up for the bathroom or to blow my nose and get a cough drop (still a little sick even now), I was basically distraction-free.

And boy did I write! With nothing really to keep me from writing, I just wrote the scene down! There were some tear-jerking moments when the characters questioned why they were even fighting for their lives, followed by a moment when my leading lady really hit them with a pep talk. There was a final battle, and it resolved with a deus ex machina that perhaps wasn’t the best deus ex machina ever written, but I think for this story it worked out very well.

At around ten to midnight the power in my apartment came back on, and I was able to take a hot shower and go to bed feeling warm. However I also ended the evening with a lot of work out of the way and the goal to finishing Video Rage that much closer to attaining. I’m really glad I was able to have that opportunity to write uninterrupted, even if I had to wear an extra sweatshirt and my snuggie to do it. And when I finish Video Rage (hopefully sometime this weekend), I’ll be able to look back on that night and see it as a bit of a turning point in the process to finishing up the novel.

However, there’s a bit of a sad note to this story: last night while I was working, I dropped my USB drive and its casing broke. Luckily I was able to fix it quickly with some tape and none of the files saved on the drive went missing or were damaged, but I knew then that the drive was near the end of its life. The drive was already several years old: I’d gotten it in high school, and back then it had a silver casing around it to protect it, as well as fabric and another metal ring so that you could hang it from a key ring. The fabric broke eventually, and then after nearly four and a half years of surviving everything and anything, the silver casing fell off, and not too long after the last one, the casing broke.

My old flash drive in its last moments. In lieu of flowers, please send money to a charity of your choice (though I wouldn't mind if you supported my Buckeyethon fundraising efforts).

My old flash drive in its last moments. In lieu of flowers, please send money to a charity of your choice (though I wouldn’t mind if you supported my Buckeyethon fundraising efforts).

So while I’m kind of sad to have to give up the drive, I know it’s time to let it go. I already bought a replacement and I’ve transferred the files, so I can let it go knowing all the hard work and all the years of use weren’t in vain. So good-bye, old USB drive that lasted through so many years and even a trip through the washing machine (not kidding, it went through the washer and after some time in rice worked like a charm). You shall be fondly remembered.

I’m going to end this post here, Followers of Fear. I just want to say that wherever you are right now, you’re warm and your power’s working. I’ll let you know if I finish Video Rage by the time I go back to classes on Monday. Wish me luck!

2013 In Review

Posted: January 1, 2014 in Living and Life, Progress Report, Reflections, Writing
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Happy New Year!

As always, WordPress sent me an email letting me know how my blog did this past year. This year, my blog was viewed enough times to fill the Sydney Opera House about four times. That’s great…but I wish I was good enough to fill the Sydney Opera House just once! Honestly, where do they get these statistics?

But I digress. The point is, another year has come and gone. And to quote Dickens, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” That sums up just about every year I know, but it’s pretty accurate. A lot happened this year to me, including two of my books getting published; I moved into an apartment with a friend and learned some more of the tribulations of the adult world; I was accepted into the study abroad trip I’ve been aiming for; I started my third year of college; I began writing and then administrating for Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors; and a whole lot more that I won’t put on my blog but were important nonetheless.

All in all, a crazy year. Sometimes all that was going on threatened to bury me, while at other times I felt like I could do anything. I had my highs and my lows, like anyone else. But I managed to get through them and I came out stronger for it.

Reborn City

And now for my new year’s resolutions: I resolve to be a better writer. I resolve to get more people interested in my work and even in reading it. I resolve to finish Video Rage (probably happen in the next week or so), get back to Laura Horn and finish that up (shouldn’t be too hard, considering how quickly I tended to write the chapters), finish the final draft of Snake (hopefully sometime in the next couple of months) and publish it by the end of the year (I hope), write a whole ton of original short stories and publish some of them (fingers crossed on that one), start whatever novel will end up being my senior thesis in the fall and maybe a few other projects. I resolve to improve my craft and to help others improve their craft in my own small way. I resolve to grow this blog and Self-Published Authors Helping Others Authors. I resolve to fulfill my dreams of being a successful novelist.

I resolve to be a better person. I resolve to work on my personal flaws and try to improve. I resolve to be a good student, a good scholar of English and History, a good roommate, and a good worker. I resolve to be good to my friends and family and love them as much as they love me. I resolve to go to Europe for my study abroad trip this summer and learn as much as I can on World War II and the Holocaust. I resolve to keep my grades up. I resolve that my conduct in life is exemplary.

With any luck, you’ll be reading about a guy called the Snake soon.

I resolve to read a lot of books, see a lot of movies, and binge on too much TV. I resolve to keep my bank account in order. I resolve to eat healthy and stay healthy. I resolve to…are you still reading this list? If you are, you have the patience of a monk.

All in all, I plan to make 2014 better than 2013. So this year, my Followers of Fear, I wish you luck and I hope we get to share a ton of great experiences together. Happy New Year!

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