Category Archives: General Thoughts

Unofficial Hiatus Ending

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Hello!

So yeah, this place when quiet for a long time. I’m afraid my blogging, writing, and studying all pretty much died a death over the last however many months. There are REASONS of course, but I’m not going to go into detail on them. Suffice it to say the last 12 months in general haven’t been particularly great ones. Around this time last year I was feeling great and ready to conquer the world. Then, well, this happened. It’s been a lot of ups and downs since then. Good news though: my wife’s further cancer screenings so far have been clean and things have continued to seem very positive on that front. Still though, it hasn’t been the easiest of years. On a few occasions I’ve come onto this blog and stated that I was getting back to normal, but that never really happened.

Now though, it’s almost one year out, a new school semester is starting at my job, and I’m realizing that I really need to stop thinking about everything I need/want to do and start doing. I’m hoping to recapture a little of the energy I had last September. Hopefully I will. Look for more things happening here as I decide what exactly I want to do with this blog and get it more organized and looking the way I want it.

Covers and Shared Worlds

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Prepare for my thoughts! And a ridiculous amount of links!

I love covers. Not book covers, though there are plenty of nice examples of those out there, but covers of songs. Just love them. Discovering a new take on a song I like, or even one I hadn’t before, just puts a smile on my face.

I also enjoy living in the future. Thanks to YouTube and streaming music services I can now go on quests to find covers I’d never heard before. Do you have any idea how many versions of Sting’s “Fields of Gold” there are? I have to be careful though, because I can turn such quests into tools of procrastination like no other.

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A Small Site Tweak

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I thought I’d try tweaking the blog a little. I’ve switched to a light color scheme with the more traditional black text on white background approach. If you’ve been here before let me know which you like better, this or the previous “dark” look with white text and black background.

Reading and Writing: A Couple Challenges for 2013

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A few weeks ago I took on two new challenges that will run the span of 2013. The first was a writing challenge and the second was a reading one.

The writing challenge came from the fantastic musician John Anealio. Well, to be specific this isn’t a writing challenge, its a challenge to be creative. He’s calling it “23 in ’13” and, as you might guess, it’s all about doing 23 creative things over the course of the year. His goal is to create 23 new songs this year. My goal is to create 23 new short stories that I consider good enough in quality to submit to editors. I’m a little behind myself but I’ve got one new story out in the slush piles (it’s already gained it’s first rejection) and one new installment of Empire and Animal.

You can join in the fun over at John’s blog. I recommend getting on his mailing list. You can also download the three instrumental pieces he’s made for the challenge so far or pick up his album “Laser Zombie Robot Love” which is really good.

The reading challenge comes from Worlds Without End. They are having a Women of Genre Fiction Reading Challenge. The goal is to read 12 books this year each by a different woman author that you have never read before. If you sign up they’ve got a great tracking page set up for the challenge and a huge list of authors to explore. Full participationi also includes writing at least a small review for each book you read but it gives you a chance to be featured on their blog. If that happens you also get put into a poll for a chance to win Amazon gift cards! I highly recommend joining in this.

I’ve read my first book for the challenge, Lauren Beukes amazing “Zoo City”, and I’ll be posting my review in the next day or two. I’ve started my second book, Kelly Link’s “Stranger Things Happen”. After that it’ll be Octavia E. Butler’s “Wild Seed”. After that? Who knows. Something awesome I’d bet.

Any of you participating in these challenges? Know of another great one? Got your own? Shout it out in the comments!

I’m On a Podcast!

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I talked about how cool The Roundtable Podcast is before. If you don’t know, they are are great show with a unique concept. Every week they put out two episodes. One is an interview with a professional writer or editor. In the second episode the pro returns to join the hosts in work-shopping a story with a guest writer.

The most recent pro (at the time of this post) was the fantastic Tobias Buckell (@tobiasbuckell), and the most recent guest bringing in a story to kick around was me!

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4 Kickstarter Projects Worth Backing

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Over the last year I’ve become a huge fan of Kickstarter. Probably too much of a fan really, but that’s for me and my budget to have a long talk about. What I want to talk to you about are four projects I’m backing that you might be interested in.: Raygun Chronicles, Glitter & Madness, Roberts versus Slime Monsters and Fireside Magazine. All four of these projects revolve around short stories, though each is a slightly different way.

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