Yearly Archives: 2014

A Brief Look Back

Last year about this time I looked back over the year and seemed to think I had my deadline issues under control and that I was in more balance, but it turns out I was deceiving myself. Honestly, I still haven’t figured out a non-stressful way to deal with deadlines, and I’m still not in balance, although I try.

On the plus side, I continue to have a wonderful, supportive family.

This year has had its challenges, only some of which I’ve alluded to. My mother continues her long slow fade into Alzheimer’s, which is very sad to watch. My sleep apnea issues have returned in the last couple of months, so I guess it’s time for another appointment to see if the med team can figure out what’s wrong again. Sleep apnea sure beats diabetes or cancer or any number of other terrible diseases, but I’d be lying if I’d say it doesn’t suck to wake up feeling tired every single day.

December Update

I hope all of you have been having a pleasant December.

As usual, silence here means that I’ve been busier than usual. First it was with writing, or, rather, revision, up until the day before Christmas Eve. Then it’s been with traditional and pleasant holiday things like picking out gifts and wrapping them and meeting old friends and gathering with family.

I’ve taken some time off for reading some different books and to play Battle Academy 2, my chief present this year.

Lord Dunsany Re-read: Time and the Gods Part 2

Bill Ward and I are continuing our Lord Dunsany re-read with the next two stories published in the original Time and the Gods (not the omnibus). You can find a free copy of the book here and join in the discussion. Our rating system is pretty simple. One star is a standout, and two stars is truly notable. Most of Lord Dunsany’s fantasy work is already fairly remarkable, so even a “no star” story on this scale may be worth a look.

Lord Dunsany Re-Read: Time and the Gods Part 1

Bill Ward and I are continuing our Lord Dunsany re-read, starting with the first two stories published in the original Time and the Gods (not the omnibus). You can find a free copy of the book here and join in the discussion. Our rating system is pretty simple. One star is a standout, and two stars is truly notable. Most of Lord Dunsany’s fantasy work is already fairly remarkable, so even a “no star” story on this scale may be worth a look.

Hardboiled Monday: Mike Dime and Stickman

As with preceding Hardboiled Mondays, Chris Hocking and I are working our way down the master list in alphabetical order. Details and the list are here. And earlier discussions are here.

Today Chris and I are looking at two excellent, little-known, and hard-to-find private eye novels by Barry Fantoni, Mike Dime and Stickman.

Lord Dunsany Re-Read: “The Avenger of Perdóndaris”

 

Bill Ward and I are continuing with our Lord Dunsany re-read with a follow-up to one of Dunsany’s greatest, “Idle Days on the Yann.”  Here’s a link to the Gutenberg edition of Tales of Three Hemispheres, one of Lord Dunsany’s later (and to my mind weaker) collections. Towards the very end of the collection are  “The Avenger Of Perdóndaris,” which we discussed this week. As always, our rating system is simple. Any Dunsany story tends to be fabulous, so one star is a standout and two is something remarkable.

Writing Well

I’m starting to think that writing is easy and that it’s writing well that’s the hard part.

My new outlining method has worked wonderfully for me all year. I remain excited by it. It is not, however, the complete solution to all my writing problems.

It ensures that all the bones are in place and that everything makes sense plot wise so that I don’t write dead-end scenes that end up having to be cut. But, because I start with a very rough framework, it can take longer than I might like to whip the prose itself into shape. On the plus side, it means that my writing process HAS gotten much faster. But it’s still not as fast as I would like. I can complete a rough draft in three months, but it might take another month or two to punch it into proper shape. Now that’s not a bad thing, certainly, especially when some of my first books took more than a year to write. But in an industry that doesn’t pay particularly well 4-5 months isn’t a useful tempo. I’m not sure what to do about that except keep fingers crossed that the next books sell even better so that 4-5 months profits me more.

Process wise, though, I keep coming back to some essential truths.

Icky Monday

It’s been a miserable few days here at the Jones household. First my eldest came down with something that knocked him out of commission on Tuesday and Wednesday. Then it hit my wife and me. Head cold, general aches, that kind of thing. I managed to work through it on Thursday after resting a little extra, fully expecting to bounce back by Friday. I have a pretty high constitution, despite the fact that I’m not a particularly robust looking guy, and I almost never get sick.

This time, though, my wife and I got worse and worse, bad enough that she called in Friday (by Thursday she had mostly lost her voice). Bad enough that Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, I wasn’t good for anything except lying on the couch. Usually I’m the first one in the family to bounce back from anything, but this time it hit me the hardest. I did some reading, but I was in enough discomfort that writing or revising weren’t real options. Today I finally feel about as good as I felt last Thursday, which is pretty icky, but which is the picture of health compared to the last three days.

Lord Dunsany Re-read: A House on Go-by Street

Bill Ward and I are continuing with our Lord Dunsany re-read with a follow-up to one of Dunsany’s greatest, “Idle Days on the Yann.”  Here’s a link to the Gutenberg edition of Tales of Three Hemispheres, one of Lord Dunsany’s later (and to my mind weaker) collections. Towards the very end of the collection are  “A Shop in Go-By Street,” and “The Avenger Of Perdóndaris.” Next week we’ll be discussing “Avenger.” This week we read “Go-By Street.”

Howard: This was the first Lord Dunsany story I’ve read where I felt tension. I thought I’d read it before, but it seemed new to me, because I honestly was waiting, breathless, to see whether the narrator could get back to the Yann. There was less distance between the reader and the events this time than I’ve felt before in a Dunsany story, perhaps because I could relate so well to the narrator’s desperate search for a way back to the land of dreams and the magic he found there. And I exulted with him when he found the way, and I enjoyed with him the delights along his path and all the marvelous little Dusnany-esque asides, like the dreams of dead poets and the sleeping gods and how forlorn Time will be when the Gods are finally dead, and the fate of those who prophesy the word of dead gods.

Hardboiled Monday: The Mouse in the Mountain

As with preceding Hardboiled Mondays, Chris Hocking and I are working our way down the master list in alphabetical order. Details and the list are here. And earlier discussions are here.

Today we’re looking at Norbert Davis’ The Mouse in the Mountain.