I think I’ve mentioned it before, but I don’t really suffer “writer’s block.” I mean, I understand it on an intuitive level, but I don’t really “get” it in the traditional sense.
But right now, gosh oh gee, but I’m gettin’ close.
The scene I’m working on is a pivotal moment in the heist. I know that, the audience knows that, heck, my characters know that. And it’s just not coming.
I’m going to do my standard thing of writing the words GOAT CHEESE in big brackets and come back to the scene later, because it’s been four days now and I can’t not keep writing like this. Hopefully by the time I finish the rest of the novel I can come back and replace that with a scene that makes sense.
Because this writer’s block stuff? No time for that nonsense.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Sad Reading
One of the downsides to reading Indigenous and Caribbean literature (two different courses, for the record) is that a lot of the reading is super depressing.
And don’t get me wrong. I understand the need for honest, no-holds-barred writing about this stuff. Too many people still wallow in the belief that ye olde tymes were somehow “better” for everyone and that intergenerational trauma is a recent thing.
I don’t even know where to start with that one, but some people seem to think it.
Anyway, the result is that the 4 readings I had this week are soul-crushingly sad. And as one of my classmates pointed out today, very few people seem to enjoy sad works.
I definitely do not. As stated, I get the necessity, but I don’t enjoy them. They are necessary but not fun! And I like fun writing.
Ah well. I guess a little rain has to fall into every life.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Caribbean Literature
One of my courses this semester is on Caribbean Literature (it’s technically my 4th Year Seminar course, of which I am allowed to only take 2 in my entire undergraduate degree… my previous one was on Healing through Reading). It’s interesting to lump together so many diverse cultures and diaspora into a single umbrella term… “Caribbean.”
I’ve never been, of course. I mean, I would’ve loved to have gone when I was younger, but my parents were not big on “fun” or “travel” and so I didn’t. And now I know too much… the tourism industry in the Caribbean is a brutality in so many ways that I can’t bring myself to make a trip, even if I could afford it.
Which, of course, I can’t.
But at least I can read some of their works! I read A Small Place last week, as I think I mentioned, and I’m going to start Caryl Phillips’ Cambridge later today. I’m looking forward to it! The poetry we’ve had to read thus far hasn’t really been “my thing,” but no fault of the poetry. I just don’t really like or “get” poetry as a matter of course.
So I’ll let y’all know how this story works out in a few days when I finish it up! Our professor has spent a lot of time discussing how the geography and geopolitical landscape of the Antilles works its way into the works we will be reading… I wonder if Canada does that with my own writing?
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Small Angry Books
I just finished reading A Small Place by Jamaica Kincaid, a little book about Antigua (a tiny island in the West Indies). The book itself is a joy to read, but also fueled entirely by rage.
It’s great. Somebody wrote that it’s “Swiftian” in its wit, which I think is a little unfair, but not entirely inaccurate. Definitely worth a read.
The next book I’m working on is about the Canadian Residential School system, and as somebody born and raised in Canada, it’s a tough read. But an important one, I think… sadly, more important for the people who won’t read it than it is for the people who will read it. But still. I’m glad it exists… I' don’t have it immediately at hand, otherwise I would quote the title, but I suspect I’ll finish it later today so I’ll put the title here on Tuesday.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
One More Time, With Feeling!
Well, the year has officially started. I mean, it had officially started on Tuesday when I last posted, sure, but now I have started working again. The cycle has continued.
I finished reading Motorcycles & Sweetgrass, which was nice. Not great, but good, and very clever at points. A few actual laugh-out-loud moments, which is always a pleasure to encounter in a book. I’m about a third of the way through The Golden Compass, which is proving to be as good as I expected it to be, and I’ll be diving into some Caribbean literature later today (I have some chores and tasks to accomplish first, but right after those). A friend on the internet read 164 books last year, a jaw-dropping number until I realized that I probably read close to 100 without really trying. Work related and schoolwork, almost exclusively, but a few that I really wanted to read tossed in there as well. And a stack of at least 50 more than I will absolutely read the moment I have time. My current course list is only 10 books long for this semester, but I still have 2 more semesters to go this calendar year (one over the summer, and another in the fall of 2023).
Anyway, this isn’t meant as a brag (humble or otherwise), but it made me really think about how much I read, and how much I enjoy reading. I’m so glad there are so many incredibly talented storytellers out there, and I hope that in some small way there are people out there who are glad that they read my humble offerings as well. And I look forward to being able to provide more to them!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Motorcycles and Magical Realism
The first novel I have to read for one of my English courses this semester is Motorcycles & Sweetgrass by Drew Hayden Taylor. It’s Canadian Magical Realism, heavy with Indigenous themes and content. Usually that means super-massively-depressing (not without justification!), but so far this one is… neat. Interesting. Not without elements of depression, certainly, but not just depressing.
But it’s got me thinking about Magical Realism as a genre. I’m curious to hear what my professor will say about it (eventually… classes don’t start for another week), since it’s a genre I’ve always found fascinating. Neil Gaiman wrote a bunch of it when I was younger, and the man is a genius, so they were a tonne of fun to read. Douglas Adams wrote the sublime and bizarre Dirk Gently Holistic Detective novels, and those were weird and fun in equal measure. But this one… I don’t know if “Fun” is going to be the correct descriptor. Just a hunch.
Anyway, I’m enjoying the reading, and am hopeful I can crush through at least 2 or 3 of my 8 course books. This one is very easy reading, and I’m enjoying it… not a requirement, of course, but it does tend to make the reading easier.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Happy Arbitrary Calendar Rotation Day!
Well, the planet has once again completed a full circumnavigation of our local star. I suppose it’s as good a reason to celebrate as any!
2022 was a weird year. Not releasing a book feels wrong, somehow… I’ve released at least one every year since I started this crazy adventure in 2016. Statistically I’m still okay: there are 7 novels out there with my name on it, and it’s been 6 years. But I want to average more than one novel a year, so this year I’m hoping to publish two.
The first one is the one I’ve been working on all year, and it is getting much closer to completion. I think another month, maybe two, and then it will be into my editor’s queue for a good coat of polish before heading out into the world.
The second one will be aiming for the fall, and that one I’m not positive about. I might do a sequel to Caitlyn Morcos… I really liked that universe. But I might try another new and different setting again, just to keep casting the net out as wide as possible. We will see, we will see…
Anyway, I’m off of vacation again, so you all can expect 2-3 posts a week from me. Mostly rambling, some updates, some advice… the usual mix of stuff that comes pouring out of my brain on any given day.
With that, I wish each and every one of you a very happy New Year, and all the best wishes for the days and months to come!
Hope everyone is staying safe and healthy!
Happy Whatever-You-Celebrate Day!
As an atheist, I’m not particularly attached to one holiday (literally “holy day,” after all) than another. They’re all equally silly in my generous estimation.
But, hey, I get a day off today and tomorrow, and I am very grateful for that. Exhaustion is never fun, and a few days to recover with no expectations and no insane work schedule is desperately needed.
So from all of me, to all of you: here’s hoping you too can have a few well-deserved days of rest and respite before diving into the new year.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Technically, Issues
I can’t speak for everyone (obviously), but there are days I almost forget how reliant I am on technology. Everything I do these days… well, almost everything… is touched by tech. I write my books on a computer, I upload my drafts to Dropbox, I post updates on my website, I enjoy recreational video games (ha, what a formal way of describing my current journey through Assassin’s Creed: Origins!)… even the music I listen to is entirely digital these days.
None of this is a complaint… except when it doesn’t work. And it happens… the router stops working, the internet hiccups and boots me off, one of the many services I need and use to write and advertise decides to just not work… and then I am suddenly faced with the web of interlaced tech that keeps my usual day-to-day… well, “usual.”
I order my books for my friendly local bookstore over the internet. I sell my own books through the behemoth that is Amazon. I used to use social media to talk about my work… these days I don’t do that any more (and, I’ll be honest, I kinda miss it).
Speaking of missing social media: I’m currently reading The Wrong Stars by Tim Pratt, and I’m really enjoying it! I like Pratt’s writing style, and I thoroughly enjoyed 2 out of 3 of his Twilight Imperium books (one was fine, but it was weaker and too Deus Ex Machina for my personal tastes). In this book the protagonists awaken a woman who has been in cryosleep for about 500 years, and she worries that she can’t hug people any more because “What if a plague or disease made hugging a faux pas?”
He wrote the book in 2017. What did he know that we didn’t…?
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Final Sprint
I mean, not “final” final, but it’s certainly the busiest, most frantic time of year, and I am wading my way through it as best I can.
However, that apparently means forgetting to post! Twice! Bad writer.
Ah well, I don’t really have anything interesting to put here. I did well in my two courses this semester (85-88%), and I’m okay with that. Doesn’t help me in anyway, and grades are a pretty meaningless construct at the best of times, but I suppose it’s nice to be told you’re good at something. I’d like to claim I don’t really try, but that’s not at all true. I try very hard. I am very trying.
That’s a joke.
Regardless, I have to head into work again in a little bit. Oh, I’ve watched the first few episodes of Andor, and if you are a sci-fi fan… not just a Star Wars fan, but a sci-fi fan… do yourself the favour of giving it a view. Is real good.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Positive Journals
One of my major assignments for my 4th-year English course that I just finished was to keep a weekly journal. The idea was that each week we’d be covering a new topic, and the journal would give the professor a chance to read our thoughts, let her know where we were mentally and emotionally as we went along.
Apparently my journals were very good. She mentioned, and I’m going to quote her here: “If sci-fi doesn’t work out for you, you might consider publishing some of your musings, maybe?” Which is amusing for me for a few reasons, but the main one probably being that I don’t understand the point of autobiographies at the best of times or for the most interesting of people, and I’m definitely neither the best nor most interesting of people. My views, such as they are, are pretty pedestrian.
And anger-and-sadness fueled. A lot of anger and sadness these days. Everything is getting harder, and colder, and worse. Well, almost everything. The trajectory of history is still curving towards justice, but gosh is it ever a battle sometimes.
A quick aside: I remember reading once that my favourite author of all time, Terry Pratchett, wrote the way he did because he was incredibly angry. Anger is what fueled his work, and gods did it ever fuel brilliant work. It was funny, but it was funny because it was angry. At the time I read that I thought “Huh, that’s too bad… I’m not really all that angry so I’ll probably never write anything as good as him.”
Which, for the record, I’m okay with. He is the greatest English writer of the last hundred years. Not being as good as him still leaves lots of room for very, very good writing.
But these days… I still don’t think I’ll ever write anything as good as Pratchett, but I think I may have the anger at least. Lots of it to spare.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Looking Like Winter
I will be the first to admit that I’m not a big fan of winter. I don’t think I’ve ever really been one. As a kid I did a lot of winter activities… skiing, ice hockey, sledding, winter camping… but I can’t say I really loved any of them except perhaps hockey, and I wasn’t a great hockey player. Since leaving for university (and having to pay my own bills), I’ve never gone back to hockey, and the only other winter activity I ever really enjoyed was snowboarding, and that lasted up until somebody stole my board almost twenty years ago.
But I love the “feel” of winter. I love waking up to a world covered in a thin layer of snow. I love hot chocolate, and warm fireplaces, and the sense of slow, ponderous weight that everything takes on when it’s winter. Yes, you can go somewhere, but you’d better be wearing good socks. Or two pairs of good socks. And thick pants. And several layers of shirt. The process of just leaving my house is almost half an hour of prep, and I strangely really enjoy that. I love not having to go anywhere more than even that, though. The world telling me “Hey, it’s dangerous outside. Maybe just don’t?” and me saying back “Huh, you’re right. Hot chocolate and blankets, here I come!”
I suppose the snowfall we’re getting today is making me think of this. Sadly, no slow, enjoyable snow day for me. I have to head out into the cold in a few hours to work the other job. But the thought of being warm and cozy is nice, at least.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Generous to a Fault
You, dear reader and/or visitor, may recall that on Tuesday I mentioned that I needed to find my copy of John Scalzi’s Lock In in order to write an essay on it… a considerable essay, worth approximately 30% of my entire grade for this one course.
I did not find it. Well, that’s unfair… I did eventually find it: I had lent it to a friend a few months back and they still have it. But before I realized that, there was a significant amount of panic. It, and its sequel Head On, are both very good, but more importantly there is no way I could write an academic paper on it without the book.
So what to do? I knew if I bought a copy then I would find my original copy immediately afterwards. I don’t have any friends locally who are big sci-fi fans (a good friend in Toronto, but I doubt even he has a copy). So what could I do…
I went to the library. They had a copy! Huzzah!
They also had copies of a few other sci-fi books I nabbed (most notably Mary Robinette Kowal’s next “Lady Astronaut” series), which I gleefully look forward to reading when I have “time” again.
Yes, the quotation marks are needed in that previous sentence.
So, source material secured, now I undertake the actual writing of said essay!… or I could just read a few pages of The Golden Compass…
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Last Essay for the Year!
It’s not exciting news to anyone but me, but I’m currently working on my last essay for the year.
I think I’ve mentioned it before (in fact, I am positive I’ve mentioned it at least once before), but I’m not a big fan of essays. I get them, I understand and accept them, but I don’t like them. And this essay is going to be slightly better than average by virtue of the topic allowing me to discuss John Scalzi’s Lock In.
Huh. That makes me realize I had better find my copy… I may have lent it to somebody, and that would make writing an essay on it very tricky! I’ll check after I finish writing this here post.
But regardless, I feel a deep sense of relief knowing that this is the last essay I will have to write for about a month. That’s a nice feeling… a sort of general feeling of accomplishment that I can take some pride in, assuming I do okay.
I suspect I will do okay.
Added bonus: with my obligatory writing done, I can again focus on my own writing! Huzzah!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Small-Time Holidays
I know this is sorta redundant, but if you folks out there reading this have the means please consider supporting a small artist, business, or writer this season. It’s tough out there for all of us, money is tight for everyone, but I guarantee you that the big businesses that are raking in money need your cash way less than small businesses, or individual artists, do.
Sure, buy one of my books for yourself or a friend. But even if you don’t want to buy any more of my stuff, go out and buy something from a small business. Get something for your pets from the local pet store. Buy a game or toy from your friendly local gaming shop! Or support an artist you like by giving them a few bucks on Patreon or whatever. It means the world to us.
This will be my only commercial post for the season: I have a few assignments to wrap up my semester at school, and then I’m working 7 days a week to pay them bills (my bill for next semester just showed up and it is literally 3 times what I thought it would be… you’d think I’d know better by now, but here we are). But I have other work to help pay for my bills: many artists, including countless numbers of the ones you love, don’t, or are struggling under the weight of everything.
Toss a coin to your bards, oh valley of plenty.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
So Far So Good?
It’s weird. I mean, many things are weird, but the specific thing I am talking about today is the lack of the Little Blue Bird in my life any more.
I had an account on there for… gosh, years and years at least. But I realized today that I hadn’t even thought about it since I cancelled my account a few weeks back. The blog is receiving slightly fewer visitors, but slightly, which is unfortunate but also not surprising.
So I guess that’s good news? I’m still on Facebook for now, but not nearly as much as I used to be. So I guess social media for now is just a long blip in my life. Which is interesting, I suppose, but I’m as surprised as the next guy that I don’t miss it more.
Ah well. Less time on the apps means more time writing!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
All the Plans, None of the Time
This is a common refrain here on my little corner of the internet, but gosh do I wish I had more time.
There are so many plans I have! So many stories that are banging around between my ears, straining to be released. So many shorts and novels and scripts… even the novel I am currently working on is pushing on my time like a juggernaut, always stretching every moment I have to sit and write, to push words out of my fingers and onto the pages as quickly as I can. Every word rushes out, worried that I’ll have to close the spigot, that I will have to reinforce the dam, before it can be birthed onto the page.
That makes it sound more glamorous than it probably deserves, but it’s true. I never have enough time to get even a fraction of what I want done, done. And this time of year, as time constraints and expectations pile up and push in from all directions, I feel it far more acutely.
Ah well. I shall lament this state of affairs for some time, I suspect, but for now I need to focus on what I can do, rather than what I can’t. And maybe sacrifice more sleep…
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Essay Writing Made Easy
I don’t like writing essays. This is perhaps a sad statement for somebody halfway through an honours English degree, and yet it is true.
Essays, at their finest, are overly proscribed. Very particular in their approach to information and how to distill it, I understand the need and purpose of the structure while simultaneously chaffing against its confines. I don’t want to think of a thesis in the way that my professors (and academia at large) needs me to think of a thesis: I just want to tell you what I know, what I think I know, and what I definitely do not know but would really like to know. But you can’t do that in academia, at least not directly. You have to prove and counter-prove every sentence: make a statement, quote the source, provide context, make a conclusion, repeat for however many pages the prof has requested. And again, I get it… but that doesn’t mean I like it.
I should get to it. With any luck it won’t take all day (spoilers: it will) and I can get a few thousand words on the novel done as well!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
And Just Like That...
Well, I deleted my little-blue-bird accounts. I’ll miss it, honestly… not what it is now, of course, but what it represented.
Again, hats off to the idiot who bought it and drove it directly into the closest iceberg, bounced off that and straight into several hand-selected rocks before setting the ship on fire. I don’t think I’ve ever witnessed such concentrated incompetence on such a massive scale before.
What’s done is done. Going to be a lot lonelier around this here blog for some time at least, but hopefully people will trickle over through my other efforts. And for those of you still checking in… thanks!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
The Long Slow Death of a Little Blue Bird
Well, I don’t think it’s official yet, but it looks like I’m down one more social media platform. I haven’t hit “uninstall” yet, but I’m almost certainly going to later today.
Which is a pity in many ways. I’m pretty sure a bunch of the traffic I saw here on this website was directed by that other one. Which was never that much traffic, sure, but it was still nice to know that there were people who might not otherwise know who I am finding my work.
Ah well. All good things. I suppose I can just let people find my work through the publication of my books… that’s fine too.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!