Category: writing

How to raise a Death Flag

“Barring any unforeseen RealLife consequences – as such happened last November– I’m feeling very good about this project.”  He said in hubris, in the post just below this one.

Our oldest dog had a nasty nosebleed last Tuesday.  Our local vet said to give him some diphenhydramine.  That worked for a week.  It was back on Monday; bad enough I’d to take him into Columbus to MedVet.  They did a CT and rhinoscopy; he has a tumor in his right nasal cavity.  We’ll find out by Monday if it’s malignant or not.*

Note to all writers out there:  never, EVER, say nor write what I did in that sentence on top of this post.  Don’t.

*It would almost be better if malignant, as it would be easier to treat with radiation than with surgery.

Updates

Only fourteen days left until NaNoWriMo begins.  About a week ago I finally dug out the script I’d written for what would have  been the webcomic, Poisoned Hearts, thinking I recalled it well enough to serve as a first chapter.

Oops.

While I did recall most of it, the characters were already reforming in my mind for the new story; so, personalities are different, huge timing changes . . . at least the locations….    Nope:  I’d reimagined what the lab at Neuroi looks like, based upon my horror short.

So as it is, what was a first chapter of material is now a stack of notes for Cursed Hearts.  That still puts me miles ahead of where I started two years ago with The Fourth Law:  one mental image and a 20-second sound bite.  Barring any unforeseen RealLife consequences – as such happened last November – I’m feeling very good about this project.  Of course it’s tempting to actively make notes now, but I think that violates the spirit of the month-long challenge.  Dreaming, okay; notes, not so much.

My other October project:  converting my father-in-law’s oral history into written history, has also not gone as well as I’d hoped.  Once I sat down to write all that I recalled as a framework for him to add onto, I realized just how much I’ve forgotten over the past ten years.  Sure, I can ‘see’ the images:  him and his cavalry detachment caught in the second floor of a Polish cheese factory when a Red Army platoon motors up.  Him in a AVO prison, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs to his right and a 2-star general to his left.  I think I shall reallocate this to January, when it’s dark and cold and we’re all inside (December will be given over to editing then publishing Cursed Hearts by Christmas).

Not much meat in this post, but that’s what happens when a writer is between project.  Expect things to get very interesting quite soon.  Cheers!

 

First Pass

Got the interior completed and uploaded last night.  More clumps of hair out this morning trying to get the front/back covers done.  At only 24 pages, there’s no ‘spine’ per se, so had to work around that.  Then, the primitive graphics program I was using decided it was done for the day.

The nice thing about flat-panel screens is they go much further once they’ve cleared the glass of the window.

*ahem*  After applying the typical IT solution (“Did you restart your computer?”), things were less bad.  Images formatted, converted, uploaded.  I’ve gone ahead and submitted them for review by CreateSpace, even though I’ve no blurb on the back cover, yet.  I want one of their proof copies in my hand:  until you’re holding a physical copy, you’ve no idea what stupid things you’ve screwed up (such as leaving page numbers out of my first novel; my then 11 year-old caught that one).

As always, I cannot thank Claudia Gadotti enough for her amazing illustrations.  Please go to her place and lavish her with commissions!

“HBD!” Adding text

Last night was crashing and burning:  came home hopped up on coffee (recall:  I’ve high blood pressure) to get things done on HBD!, only to be confronted with hysterical wife:  “my J-drama torrents won’t work!!”  An hour lost there, then another making dinner, I finally sit down to format some jpg’s to pdf’s . . . forgetting that twice 2700 pixels is not 1350, but, in fact, 5400.  Re-re-formatting everything, I do a trial upload at 2215.  All clear.  Time for bed.

Tonight, adding text.  As this is a book aimed at 2nd graders, I think there’s about 120 words, total.  This issue – ONCE AGAIN – is formatting:  my pages are set to ‘bleed-out’ on the edges, so when making text boxes, I have to guess where my perimeter is.  That’s been three tries so far.  I’d also some issues about ISBN’s, but would rather toss my desktop out my window than even think about discussing it.

Below the fold, a snapshot of page 17.  God bless Claudia Gadotti, my illustrator.  How she could reach into my mind from my poor, bare-bones description of my characters to make what she did . . . well, just wait until I’ve wrapped this all up in a couple of weeks.

Continue reading ““HBD!” Adding text” →

HBD! Update

With only seventeen days left to go in my self-imposed deadline, I just now figured out how to format the pages from jpeg to pdf and upload them properly to CreateSpace.  I’ve been spoiled:  for my traditional novels, I’ve used “Bookwrite” by Blurbb; a fantastic program, so long as you stay within its boundaries.  As this is an illustrated children’s book, I needed those boundaries to be elastic, so after a few days, out that went.

Then it was a matter of re-scaling Claudia’s wonderful drawings.  That took a couple of days to figure out… glad my wife told me to drink less:  I was about ready to throw my computer out the window.  I finally got a test of the cropped, resized, and split, pages successfully uploaded to CreateSpace.  I’ll – hopefully – reformat the remaining images tomorrow, then add the little bit of text (this is a kids book, after all) the day after.  Looks like the wife and daughters will be foraging for dinner the rest of this week!

Provisional cover is below the fold.

In other news, I’ve seen some huge character changes for my NaNoWriMo project this year; I’m quite pleased!  Set in a part of MachCiv I’ve not really been to, yet, and something of a horror novel, this should be fun!

Continue reading “HBD! Update” →

A Look Back

For the first time in just over two years, I’m on vacation.  Even that’s qualified, as we’re in Houston/Galveston, but the reason we’re here is my wife’s 6 month post cancer-treatment checkup.  Still, better than central Ohio.

Had I been home, I’d be working on “Henge’s Big Day;” I’m not, so I’m not.  I did, however, see a vignette that I alluded to while writing “Defiant.”  Some skinny-dipping at the PSU pool with my main characters.  Was finally able to type it out, today.

This takes place halfway between Act II and Act III.

Continue reading “A Look Back” →

‘Defiant’ – End; One.

An experiment, just to keep me writing.  People I’ve never met, places I’ve not seen – and that I don’t recall – for over thirty years.  And here I am, about 60k words later.

Creativity is occasionally creepy:  where does all this come from?

Anyhoo.  There are still flaws in what’s below.  Someday, after I’ve written Part 2, I’ll get this all cleaned up and ‘novel-ized.’

Played with different ‘voices’ in this one; too much gin to get it all right.  Actually excised a couple of paragraphs:  I was lecturing again.  Thanks, Will!

Let’s do this again.  Soon!

Continue reading “‘Defiant’ – End; One.” →

Fork

As in, stick it in; it’s done.

3100+ words for the wrap up Act III.  However, I’ve been drinking on and off since noon, what with the family getting back late this PM, so I’ll edit this before letting it go.  There are a couple of parts that might need to be smartened up.

I’d planned to shoot Nike.  Didn’t work out that way.  Maybe next time.  Tomorrow night, post work, is an HDoO, and taking Daughter #2 school stuff to school.   Worst case:  posting Tuesday.

“When will you make an end?!”

“When it is finished!”

My right brain is no Michelangelo, and my left brain is no Pope Julius II, but that’s how I feel about Act III of ‘Defiant.’  At the expense of my blood pressure, I loaded up on caffiene at the end of my Day Job to hit the ground running once I got home.  A quick, small dinner, then more coffee, with bourbon.  Wrote what’s below.  Next time; next time:  the party at Multnomah Falls.

God help me if it’s in more than one part.  I just type what I see, tanjit!

Continue reading ““When will you make an end?!”” →