I was honestly looking forward to NaNoWriMo this year… and at the same time, not. The reason I wasn’t looking forward to it was because I knew I had a number of projects already on the go. Did I really need to add one more work-in-progress? But, I thought seriously about it and realized that I STILL owed my Scout troop the entire, finished version of “Boy Scouts of the Apocalypse”. That was why I WAS looking forward to NaNo. I would finally write the entire story, get the zombies out of my fevered brain and be able to face the troop when we went to camp. And then, World Fantasy Convention happened and NaNo got chucked out the window. […]
Read moreCategory: Irreverent Muse
Farewell to Anne McCaffrey
I haven’t had a lot of time for Twitter the past while, but last night I flipped over to see what everyone was talking about. To say I was stunned by the conversation would be a major understatement. Anne McCaffrey had passed away at the age of 85 on November 21, 2011. I was never fortunate enough to meet Anne in person but she still had a major impact on my life. I was a big reader when I was young. I still am, to be honest, but hers was some of the first writing I can truly say I fell in love with. Those formative, lonely years of junior high school were made brighter by her DragonRider and Crystal […]
Read moreI’m No Expert
I’m not a big fan of people who claim to be “experts” or “gurus”. I mean, the word “expert” to me mean someone who knows everything about a certain subject. I have no doubt that such people do exist, but the vast majority of the so-called “Experts” only know a very small subset of the equation, and usually use the title as a marketing tool or to shill something. That’s why you will never hear me say I am an “expert” on anything, not even myself (there are days I wake up wondering just what the hell I was thinking the night before when I drank that pitcher of beer, for example). No, if you hear me talk about something […]
Read moreEditing Update – Foreshadowing is Easier than you Might Think
I’m almost finished this round of edits for “Mik Murdoch, Boy Superhero” and I am about to do a major new scene/rewrite of an existing one. One of the comments I received was, make sure you foreshadow this scene so it doesn’t seem like you’re just pulling stuff out of the air. Foreshadow a new scene? How the heck do I do that? Well, I am surprised to say it is easier than I expected. I won’t go into the exact scene (cause that would be spoiling it for later) but let me give you an example of how it can be done. Say you need to add a scene where the character solves a problem by overhearing some people […]
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