A progress bar moved!

Started walking/jogging again today. Made it 1.86 miles in 30 minutes.

Yesterday I wrote two sentences for the ‘compassion’ story for Winston Crutchfield’s benefit book for Compassion 365. Last night I decided I had the wrong viewpoint character and changed him to a her and wrote the rest of the opening scene, or most of it at least. It is a horror story, and I am working compassion into it, just hopefully in  a way that people wont expect.

I’m in the process of editing a story I finished that was for a winner of last year’s Podcasting For Water winner (who won a story by me about them, or his son in this case.) I had planned on about 1000 words, and it’s over 2k at the moment. I don’t expect it getting any shorter, since I think I need to add to the story to make it any good. I’m fine with the plot, but the main character needs developed so the conflict is dangerous and personal to the viewpoint character. I set up a situation that hinders the main character, but not very well, so when I tried to tap into it at the end, it made some sense, but I couldn’t put the emotion I wanted into it, plus the fix at the end felt anti-climactic to me.

I don’t know if I’ll catch up on the 12 stories finished this year, but I know I can catch up on the miles ran. Getting my time organized and using Remember the Milk and Google Calendar and putting those on my desktop with SMS reminders is really helping my get things done (as opposed to forgetting to do them.) Like the Mad Poet says, 2010 is not the year to step back, it’s the year to step up. I think I’m making that happen.

(Thanks to my Star Wars Game Master Jason for the tip of Remember the Milk)

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My First PDF eBook is now for sale!

I’ve created a widget in my page on the top right where you can now purchase a downloadable, DRM free pdf of my latest story “Send In”.

I plan to make this available on the Kindle also.

For promotion I may give away review copies and run some other giveaways. Keep an eye out here for details.

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First story of the year almost completed

I went through one of my short story called Send In today and changed a bit of the prose. I wrote it originally in Google Docs, but moved it over to yWriter. Once there I ran some of the ‘problem words’ searches and found I had a lot of works that ended with ‘ly’. I wasn’t sure what this meant so I asked Matt Selznick on gTalk about it and he said I was probably taking shortcuts of descriptions. To clarify I asked if ‘The car quickly sped up’ versus ‘The engine revved as the car sped up’ is what he meant. That was exactly what he meant so I went through and changed most of the ‘ly’ instances to have more detail.

I did a few other changes, the program suggested and aside from just better description, one part of the story near the end has a much stronger narrative now, plus a hilarious joke.

All that is left is correcting typos and making sure I stayed in the proper tense, then I think it will be good to go. It will be over 3300 words.

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A Weekend of Steampunk Things (11-14-09)

As I am writing some steampunk stories, and as I enjoy steampunk things, I thought I’d write about a few steampunky things I’ve found out about this week.

While listening to the Clockwork Cabaret I heard about the Phono Vault. They sell the kinds of music steampunk music you might hear on the Clockwork Cabaret (even some on vinyl!). If you sign up for their newsletter, you get a free song a week. This week I got The World Turned Upside Down by Charlie Kahn. It’s quite an enjoyable listen.

While perusing the wares of a dusty bookshop I discovered a curious thing. On a pane of glass flickered the words Steampunk Magazine! I ran my fingers over the glowing glass and perused the magazine. Inside I saw many wonders on lifestyle, mad science, theory, and fiction. The layout and style of the magazine have the feel of the Victorian era. I browsed the latest issue, #6, and found stories about Lizard towns and madness engines, an interview with a steampunk rock band from London, an article on alchemy, and much more. All the issues are available for free online. There is also available A Steampunk’s Guide to the Apocalypse, which will be very useful in a catastrophic event.

I took a stroll in the Steampunk Workshop and took a gander at a fine looking Wimhurst Machine.

A telegram arrived and I learned that at the Oxford Museum of the History of Science, an Art of Steampunk exhibit had opened.

As I walked down a country road, a house passed me by and they invited me in for a cup of tea. I was able to rest while still moving in my intended direction!

That’s about all I had this week, come back again to see more of the wonders I discover!

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About That Hint Fiction …

I wrote three hint fiction stories for an anthology, but none were accepted. So, I’ll be posting them here throughout the week!

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Burst of creativity

I took my wife and daughter to the park today and they hung out with some friends. I then took my wife’s laptop to the library and wrote. I didn’t know what to write so I opened up my Moleskin and paged through it until I found an idea that seemed like something I’d like to write at the moment. I found one and in about an hour I pounded out 1198 words. I had no internet active, typed in wordpad, and just wrote. With little distraction aside from the faint smell of body odor when a dude sat near me and nothing to do but just write, I got a lot done. I didn’t finish the story, but I have a good idea where I’m going. I based it all on the single sentence I wrote down who knows how long ago.

This would be an awesome thing to do more often. Wife gets to go out with friends, daughter gets to run around and get tired out, and I get to write a lot all at once.

Of course with NaNoWriMo coming up, this can’t be done every day, so I’ll have to work in the normal home environment for the most part. It’s good to know that sometimes the words can just flow out though. Been a while since I managed that.

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New Project Began: The Emperor

I’ve started working on a new writing project for the Emperor’s Flame podcast. I’m writing the comical adventures of The Emperor and his Knights as they seek an obligatory item of great power. Standard quest fare. It is also Christian themed. I hope to keep the comedy fun and the morals of the stories true, but not overbearing.

I find myself spreading out my writing over the web. Hopefully this means when I start my own podcast for free, and my planned story subscription service (something like Jeremy C Shipp does), I’ll have ready audience with open ears.

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Open Mic a Smashing Success.

The first official Open Mic Night at Turtle Beach was a total success. Two people from the writing came out and sang and told some jokes. We also had some horror stories and some beautiful guitar playing.

Ge3x telling some jokes

Ge3x telling some jokes.

Pam Sargent Singing 1

Pam singing

Will Reading

Will Reading

Malfunctioning Lowbeams playing guitar

Malfuctioning Lowbeams playing guitar.

I had to actual leave before it was over because we had to get dinner. I didn’t expect it to last as long as it did.

Speaking of dinner, had another blessing, got two Burrito’s from Moe’s for less than $4 with some coupons. It’s nice to have a decent meal that cheap.

I heard back from P.G. Holyfield on my Stories of the Children submission today. He asked for a rewrite! This is very good.

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Stan Prolongo Season 2 launches

Episode one of Stan Prolongo Season 2 is live! Catch up on season 1 if you haven’t, then start in on season 2. Dave Avila wrote season 1. I wrote season 2. Dave reads them both.

Listen and subscribe here.

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Back to JL Script

It’s Labour Day. I stayed up late last night trying plugins on the site and came across the one I already mentioned. Slept a good 8 hours though, and have gotten some work done on the script for Jump Leads. It’s been slow going, but I’m going to get it finished someday. I like the way it is going.

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