Tag: friendship

Making sounds

Took a little longer to get around to this than I’d anticipated, but at long last I built a “quiet corner” in my basement (and it’s only quiet when people upstairs are not flushing the toilet!) and got around to practicing recording and editing.  A pic of my corner – one cannot call it a studio – is below the fold.

Attached (and this might take more than one try; please bear with me) is an 8-minute mp3 of me taking a stab at the prologue of “Friend & Ally.”  I am very young at this and welcome constructive criticism.

Hardware:  a Samson C01UPro mic (USB).  Software:  Audacity (2.3.3)

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“Men from the Sky might fall…”

A riff on Lucretius.  You’ll see why when Nichole 5 shows up.

This again slightly longer installment marks the end of Part 3 of the MS for “Empress’ Crusade.”  I want to wrap the whole thing up in no more than 40-60 more pages.  I’ve reams of notes and images in my head but, honestly, am not sure which way to jump right now.  I know Faustina moves due east but not with how many of her four legions in Vicksburg.  I see the huge old Army base of Fort Benning.  I see what’s left of Atlanta and those in it a generation on.  I also understand her operational desire to secure the rest of the Deep South and a land route to Savannah.

This weekend will be spent in note-taking and, very likely, a series of micro-stories to try to muddle my way through this.  I don’t want to inflict that kind of “blue skying” on anyone, so it is likely that my updates will dwindle to nothing for June.

I am still looking forward to playing about with creating audiobooks over the summer.  Once I have the rest of EC in the can, so to speak, I might just post my prototype voice efforts on you, my poor, unsuspecting readers… and listeners.

Below, Faustina once again reaches out to her extended family to make a point to President Dysart of the Gulf Shore States:  the world is a much, much smaller place than he thought it was.

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Another scolding

From her personal mistake of going on recon nearly by herself in unknown territory, it is now pointed out to our genius that she has done the same thing to her entire command, putting thousands of lives at risk.

Her other family, in the form of her god-mother and her sister-in-law’s father, take Faustina to task on this point to make her older.  At least there is some good news at the end.

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Soup and Juice

Faustina has a short meeting with her legates but makes time to be informal with her cousin, Ryland.  For a kid genius, who usually are monomaniacs and burn out early, Ryland is surprisingly perceptive.  I wonder if being a mutt is a factor?  Or her mother’s close relationship with the machines of tribe Tohsaka?  We’ll likely find out later or sooner.

I have written a little past this but have to go make an early dinner for my family.  If not too drunk to write more, maybe I can get another update ready to later.

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Flashback

In the published novel, this will be the start of chapter two of Part III.  It hearkens back to what happened at the very end of Part II, where, as Arpad and Ryland were about to return to the Texas-controlled side of the Mississippi, he received a note of some kind.  We know is was significant, otherwise, why is Faustina’s young cousin travelling with them into another battle zone?

I’ve seen what happens right after this memory and am writing it now.  This is a very productive weekend!

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Iter

This little addition will conclude what will be part two of “Empress’ Crusade.”  As I mentioned last time, I need to collate and overhaul my notes before I write one more word.  That is going to take a few days.  Sorry.

In an interesting tangent to my works, yet another person today told me that “I like you ideas but have no time to read.  Do you have audiobooks?”  Once I finish “EC” I shall take a break from writing and bring myself fully up to speed on creating said audiobooks.  It seems I’m missing out on more than have of my market.  Time to fix that.

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“No” or “hell, no!”

Had a co-worker over for cocktails yesterday afternoon.  Ohio allows personal interaction and we’re both “vital medical personnel” *snort* so we do what we want in the Dark Age of BatAIDS.  He’s one of the folks who encouraged me to think seriously about making audiobooks.  We covered that subject and several others.  While mildly lef of center, we discovered that we’re shoulder-to-shoulder on issues such as private property and firearms.  He’s not particularly religious and was surprised to find out I’m Catholic.  I stared at him over the rim of my Martini and asked, “You’ve read three of my books.  Did you think those elements fell in there by accident?”  All in all, an excellent Saturday afternoon.

Below the fold, anxious for her men and wanting to reunite her army, Faustina thinks of ways to bluff her next opponent rather than fighting a battle.  Which is a polite way of saying I don’t want to throw away another week thinking about it.

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Bloodlines

I swear… I SWEAR that there is shooting in the next installment.  I’ve already written it, so trust me.  It’s just that I think it is so much more interesting to listen to them rather than *pew*pew* and *boom*boom*.  It will be impressive once adapted into a visual series but it just takes up space in my mind and in my pages.

We get to know Ryland, a ‘normie’ but genius human, a little bit better.  She’s not the self-centered shit I thought she was last week.  That is one of the reasons I so love this job:  discovery.  Had I never on a whim written “The Fourth Law” five years ago, I’d not have met Lily.  In the next book, her sister, Callie.  Several books on, writing about Callie’s son and girlfriend, I met Faustina.  And now her cousin.  If this is not a miracle then tell me what is.

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Tough Times Demand Tough Talk

A bit of a long-ish addition.  I wanted to wrap up Part One of Empress’ Crusade, at about 18k words, and get on to the campaign itself.  For the historically minded, it will be loosely based on Caesar’s Gallic Wars, always a good read.  In the meantime, I have some research to do about the populations of former Alabama and Mississippi and how that extrapolates one generation on into the Breakup.

Below the fold is a family who loves one another but find it increasingly hard to like one another.  That is probably an odd concept for my younger readers but is something we in our dotage just nod at.  Thanks for everyone’s support!

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