16 July 2018
Working on some sketches for various stories. Below is a work in progress for the Ghost Garden piece I wrote for my youngest daughter. Here is the link to the story if you wish to read it: The Ghost Garden. Both the story and the sign still need a lot of work, but so far so good. It's the sign her brother makes for her.
In other news, I've been working away at editing and adding to a number of short stories. Working on a cover for The Legacy as well, one of the next short stories to be released for sale outside of an anthology. I also re-edited Black Char and the Crystal Caves, though I'll have another go at it before updating the manuscript on Amazon. I received some well-thought out feedback from a reader and I'm taking a look at the points I agree with.
I also watched France win the World Cup and Belgium take third place. I have friends in both Belgium and France so it was a bit of a pickle on who to root for!
13 June 2018
I started working on a new story today. It was supposed to be an adaptation of a time capsule 'story' I wrote and sent in to an editor. The original assignment was for a list of items in a time capsule, with the backstory behind each item. Who put them in there, why did they pick those items, etc...The inspiration was a MASH episode with a time capsule in it. The way the piece was supposed to work was that another writer would take my time capsule items and write a story set around the time capsule being found and what happens as a result.
The second part of the assignment was never done, so I pulled back my submission and decided I would try and write the story of the time capsule being found and what it meant to those who found it. But my brain...uh, my brain did not cooperate.
So, my latest story released has a main character called Black Char. I thought it would be great to have him in this piece as well. He's an explorer, so maybe he finds the time capsule somewhere as he is exploring. Sounds doable, right?
I sat down to write, and the first item in the time capsule threw me off a bit. I don't want to share what that item is, but it is a little extreme. I thought it would be a good thing to exaggerate the intensity and have the time capsule be found by someone young. Not Black Char then. Maybe his child? I could set the story a bit farther in the timeline. And then I thought it could be at the same time as the other story, which means having something to do Black Char or the other characters in the last story. And something clicked...
I started to write a story about Tarver the Magus and Murg. It flowed out, not fast, but well. Then I started to switch the tense and rewrite again. And then I deleted some of what I wrote and switched it to more showing than telling. The writing got better.
I'm still working on it, but I feel good about how it is going so far. I don't know where this story will end up, in fact it hasn't even touched upon anything in the time capsule piece. But I can see the way forward for it to be incorporated smoothly.
We'll see what happens over the next few weeks. Summer is my time to be productive when it comes to writing. Wish me luck.
Picture for today:
Has nothing to do with my story I'm working on. I like it though.
05 JUNE 2018
Yesterday was a very productive day! I released my second short story out into the wild. Black Char & the Crystal Caves is available! The working title was It's a Trap. I decided to change the main title and keep It's a Trap as the subtitle. My thinking was that It's a Trap sounds too Star Wars-y and I might use Black Char in other stories, so let's go ahead and make him the star of the show. He is the protagonist after all.
What are you waiting for? Go get it! It's free if you have Kindle unlimited, less than a buck if you want the ebook version and only 3.99 for a printed copy, which will make my mother happy.
Links to the versions:
eBook version
Paperback version
My mother wants to hold the book in her hands, though in this case I'm not sure how rewarding that will be since the book is only 38 pages or so.
This is my first foray into actually designing a physical book. If you buy the paperback let me know what it looks like! Thirty-eight pages long. lol. I thought about adding in other short stories I've done, but I think the next time I make a physical book will be the short story collection, so that will be long enough. Thirteen stories planned for that. It's sitting at a good book length already.
For those interested, I'm going to share a few lessons learned from designing the paperback soon in another post.
Time for a picture and a Dad joke. Joke first:
Q: If you're American when you go into the bathroom, and you're American when you come out of the bathroom, then what are you in the bathroom?
A: European!
My youngest son groaned at that one. :)
And the picture for today: The Seer by Michael Bohbot. Nothing to do with Black Char & the Crystal Caves [go get it!], though it would work as semi-inspiration for one of the women in the story.
28 OCT 17
So I have decided on my next project. It's a story I wrote a while ago, called "It's a Trap!" I pulled it down from Wattpad, where it's been for a while, and I'm going to rewrite it, with an aim for more imagery and maybe a little more background integration. The story has some grammar issues with it that I've never fixed, and that is the first thing for me to change. I'm also going to throw in a small sketch or two.
If you've already read the story on Wattpad, you'll be able to see the growth and progression of the story from it's first draft to its final version. The story started out as sort of a western, hopefully that feel comes across at the beginning. I may try to return it to that original western feel.
Here's a piece from the story now, no clue on what the final version will look like though, so don't fall in love with it yet!
"You bastard!" Black Char snarled as he got up off the ground. He staggered back from the trio and prepared to fight. Jagged Edge still had that horrid knife in his hand. Black Char could see the rough, serrated edge of the blade, covered with his blood. Well, Jagged Edge indeed, he thought. The blade had an oily sheen to it as well. Must be something magical about it. Char had to be careful with this bunch. They were trickier than he thought. He put his hand to his lower back and felt the tear in his clothes.
Murg smirked. "Bastard. Yeah, I'll give you that one. But mind your tongue and remember who is in charge. Now let's go get a sword or two."***
Besides writing, I've also been practicing some of my photography skills. I am not good at low light photos, so I decided to see what I could about that. I went to a haunted house and was allowed to go through it and take pictures.
Here is one I am happy with for the post picture:
Some techniques I worked with to get around the lack of auto-focus (it doesn't work in low light) were using lit objects (like the exit sign at the end of the hall) to manually adjust focus, also using a monopod to try and maintain a steady image, and trying to use occasional lighting (strobes, flickering lights, a door opening such as with the picture above) when possible to set a dark picture.
Although a bit early, I'd like to wish everyone a Happy Halloween and other 'dark' celebrations. I've read about different traditions from around the world, such as All Saint's Day, Dia de Los Muertos, etc... It's amazing to me the many ways that people have for dealing with the shortening of the days and the lengthening of the nights.
