Alour-Tan II Third Draft Complete

 Posted by at 11:14  No Responses »
Mar 072016
 

I don’t know what happened yesterday, but I got up, went down to make coffee, started working on the book…and didn’t stop until I reached the end of the book.

The third draft is done!

What does that mean? The third draft is the final story- and character-revision pass. The next pass, generating the final draft, comes from an aloud read-through with Cody for phrasing, grammar gaffes, and general technical consistency. This will fill a few evenings and will also be Cody’s first actual exposure to the full text of the story, as opposed to just hearing me talk about it. Meanwhile, I’ll also be doing peripheral work: figuring out the cover, deciding what appendices to add, etc.

Most importantly, though, it means that the book is coming. Soon. Very soon.

As with Ashes, I’ll be releasing a few sample chapters here on the blog once they’re finalized. That could even be imminent, so stay tuned!

This is what happens when I forget what I was going to say

 Posted by at 10:58  1 Response »
Oct 082010
 

I had this whole plan for what to write about today that congealed as I drove to work. It vanished when I actually sat down to write it.

Yesterday marked Cody’s and my second month as a married couple. So far, so good! It seems a little silly to celebrate these milestones, given the four-closing-on-five years we’ve been together. The relationship is solid, we love each other just as much (if not more) now than we did when everything was exciting and new, we live together well, etc. It still feels like an achievement anyway. Marriage! It’s this big, important word that, for us, represented no functional change in our relationship toward one another that nevertheless bestowed a reaffirming, reinforcing strength that I didn’t even know could exist. I heartily approve.

I decided to bite the bullet and forgo worrying about writing a tailor-made web app for play-by-post Firefly-inspired Star Wars game I’ve been planning for a few months now. Instead, I went with MyBB and will adapt it as the need arises. I’ve used phpBB in the past, but it’s always felt a little clunkier than it ought to. MyBB is very smooth by comparison. This doesn’t obviate the need for a character creation web app, but it’s one less technical hurdle to starting the game than I had before. It’s been a long-standing desire of mine to play/run a Star Wars game that used an adapted version of the 7th Sea rule-set, so I’m looking forward to seeing how it pans out. Play-by-post is an odd fit for such a dynamic and fluid system, but one never knows until one actually tries.

November is bearing down on us, which poses two annoying problems. The first is that Cody and I are still at a loss about a concept for Halloween costumes this year. There isn’t enough time to do anything complex1 in the time we have—next year, for sure—but even within that constraint, it’s rough. The second problem is one of time management: NaNoWriMo is going to eat my time in November, which presents something of a blockage on both the aforementioned Star Wars game as well as the heavy WoW-playing fronts. Oh, to have just six more hours each day.

Hell, I’d settle for two.

  1. Like the various costumes I’d make with a vacuform table [↩]

Moving Forward

 Posted by at 12:45  No Responses »
Sep 282009
 

This weekend, Cody and I finally finished the last milestone in making the house “livable:” painting the kitchen. The kitchen’s modification has been a long, arduous process that started in mid-June.  The first hurtle was getting rid of its hideous pineapple wallpaper. This took an army of people to do (who have my everlasting thanks) over a period of several weekends. Once finished, we still had to patch some substantial holes and cracks, sand down spackle, prim, and finally paint.

To celebrate, we threw our first proper house party.

It’s a little odd to walk through the kitchen, dining room, and sunroom now. They’re so open. Before, they were cluttered with boxes, tools, and debris. Now, the floors are clean, the walls are brightly painted, and the boxes have been tucked away. It feels like a home.

With the major house construction projects out of the way–the pantry still needs the same treatment the kitchen got, but it’s a small space and low priority; the upstairs bathroom just needs to be repainted–I can start focusing on writing. NaNoWriMo is still a month away, but I’m going to try to amp up my daily wordcount and plow through a novel by the end of November.

The trouble is, I have yet to decide which story is the most promising. I’ll probably end up writing both at the same time, depending on which strikes my fancy at any given moment.