A Writer Meme and Some Other Stuff
I thought it would be interesting to:a) Continue a meme I found on another blogb) Put some updates of stuff on here since I am not quite done with Shadowfall by James Clemens to be able to review it. The first meme was one I found at Kristine Smith’s blog here:“Turn to page 123 in your work-in-progress. (If you haven’t gotten to page 123 yet, then turn to page 23. If you haven’t gotten there yet, then get busy and write page 23.) Count down four sentences and then instead of just the fifth sentence, give us the whole paragraph (that it comes from).” Obviously I’m going to take the sentences from WISB. So here they are:He agreed. He had never been to a slaughterhouse as there wasn’t one in Woodton, and he had never actually left the valley where his home sat. Somehow he knew he didn’t want to go. Something about knowing how an animal was killed and prepared so he could eat made him think he might lose interest in meat altogether. He saw that as a loss, for he truly enjoyed the flavor of meat. Technically they come from Chapter Nine on page four, but I decided to count my pages as published pages, rather than regular typed pages. Sort of like double spaced basically. So really those lines fall right on page 123.Next, just wanted to let everyone know that all that stuff I was selling on Amazon, well I’ve updated it with a lot of other stuff from fiction novels to non-fiction, etc. There’s almost everything in there now that I think about it. So, feel free to look, pretty please! Check it out here. I was coming up with my own meme to start, but I stupidly forgot to write down the idea for it and basically forgot what it was. So, alas, no meme from me.Good news is I will be done with Chapter Thirteen (B) this weekend, will have read Shadowfall, and will have read half of Neuromancer by William Gibson for my lit class. Hopefully I’ll get really far into Ninja too so I can review that on Friday of next week.In any case, check out the post before this one as it deals with critique groups. I’ve also got in the works a post on stuff for writers–such as tools, software, etc. I’m not sure when I’ll finish it as I keep finding new stuff.
Reading List Updates and Such
First things first. I’m only posting a little extra this week because I want to make some announcements that are somewhat important and less than important. Announcement One: I’ve decided to get rid of all my text books and the like through Amazon. Now, not ALL of these are actual text books (meaning things like chemistry books, psych books, etc.). Some are literature books from my various writing classes–creative writing, etc. So, maybe something will catch your fancy, maybe not. I don’t know your tastes obviously. Still the link to my Amazon Marketplace or whatever you want to call it is here. If that link doesn’t work, tell me please. Announcement two: Books I bought this week! Woot! Here’s the list and where I got them from.Thrift StoreThe Kin of Ata Are Waiting For You by Dorothy BryantThe Time Master Trilogy by Louise CooperA Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor VingeThe Gunslinger by Stephen King (might never read it, but hear it is good)Return to Mars by Ben BovaThe Flying Sorcerers by David Gerrold and Larry NivenThe Best Science Fiction of Isaac Asimov (another one!)Footfall by Larry Niven and Jerry PournelleSkull Gate by Robin W. BaileyFanduilh by Daniel HoodThe Devil and Deep Space by Susan R. MatthewsFantastic Voyage 2: Destination Brain by Isaac AsimovDollar Store (very rare to find anything worth while there)A Draught For a Dead Man by Caroline RoeMechwarrior: Fortress of Lies by J. Steven York (it was a buck…)Mechwarrior: A Call to Arms by Loren L. Coleman (same excuse…)Local Custom by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (part of the Liaden Universe…)The Goddess Worldweaver by Douglas Niles (I’ll get the rest of the series later…)So that’s the books I got this week. I bought more, BUT, because they are on my awards reading list updated below I won’t mention them since you will all assume I will be acquiring them anyway. So yeah. Chapter 13 goes up tomorrow. And on to the reading list stuff! Alright, just to clarify on my reading lists here. I’ve moved Seeker from my current reading list to the new list of Philip K. Dick / Nebula / Andre Norton award nominees as it is a nominated work, obviously. I will be finishing up the current list first, and not hitting anything whatsoever on the other list until awards have been announced for one of the three awards, in which case I will start from non-winners to winners on each award and review. That’s how it will go. So here are the lists: Current List (in no particular order):1. XXShadowfall by James Clemens (reading…lot longer than I expected…)XX2. XXNinja by Racy Li (e-book, won it!)XX3. XXNeuromancer by William GibsonXX4. XXThe Elder Gods Book One by David and Leigh EddingsXX5. XXDo Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. DickXX6. XXCell by Stephen KingXX7. Two Wizards by Darren Reid (e-book)8. Nebula Awards Showcase 2004: Edited by Vonda N. McIntyre9. Jupiter by Ben Bova10. Mad Ship by Robin Hobb11. The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger12. The Locus Awards: Edited by Charles N. Brown and Jonathan Strahan Awards List:1. From the Files of the Time Rangers by Richard Bowes2. The Girl in the Glass by Jeffrey Ford3. The Privilege of the Sword by Ellen Kushner4. To Crush the Moon by Wil McCarthy5. XXFarthing by Jo WaltonXX6. XXDevilish by Maureen JohnsonXX7. Magic or Madness by Justine Larbalesteir8. XXLife As We Know It by Susan Beth PfefferXX9. XXThe King of Attolia by Megan Whalen TurnerXX10. Midnighters Book #2 by Scott Westerfeld (I will read book #1 first of course)11. XXPeeps by Scott Westerfeld (he got two nominations for the same award…)XX12. XXRecursion by Tony BallantyneXX13. XXLiving Next Door to the God of Love by Justina RobsonXX14. Mindscape by Andrea Hairston15. XXCarnival by Elizabeth BearXX16. Spin Control by Chris Moriarty17. XXCatalyst by Nina Kiriki HoffmanXX18. XXIdolon by Mark BudzXX19. Seeker by Jack McDevitt So there we go! I’ve got some interesting blog posts in the woodworks as we speak too. One on stuff for writers (websites, software, etc. that we can all make use of, or some of us anyway), and I’ve also got to finish the second part in the Critique Groups post. That will be an interesting one I’m sure. Then hopefully I can finish Shadowfall this coming week. It turned out a lot longer than I had expected. I love the book though. It’s very good. I’m going to use it as an example of how multiple POV’s can actually work superbly. It might also become the face of my new argument on how Tower of Shadows still sucks and how Shadowfall is a perfectly valid substitute. But that’s for later!
Our World Changing–Writer’s Be Aware
Well, it looks like things are making some interesting changes that I was completely unaware of. 1) Firstly, apparently scientists have developed a way to levitate things via sound. You can find the link here at Tales From the Raven. They levitated an ant, a fish, and a tadpole. I’m rather disturbed by it because, well, that’s just creepy. Can you imagine walking around and suddenly get picked up? And who knows where this technology might go in the future. Perhaps we could use it for targeted attacks of some sort. Perhaps police officers will use it for something. Who knows. 2) Some things on writing of interest to anyone who writes. Over at Quantum Storytelling there is an interesting checklist of scene necessities, especially on the different conflicts necessary. I think it greatly applies to fantasy, but that’s my opinion.3) New Links: You’ll notice several new links over there ——–>Well, figured I’d explain what some of them are :). First there’s Blogels, a nifty site that links to a bunch of other blog novels such as mine–although not in the same genres. They deserve as much attention as mine I gather. There’s Blogging Poet, a lovely place with poetry, interesting news about poetry and things going on in the world, and it apparently has a poetry search engine that I have yet to use as of yet. Sword & Sorcery/Weird Fiction Terminus is a nice blog that has book reviews and the like–mostly related to fantasy of course. SF Bookworm is a bit misleading at first as the title suggests it is related only to SF, when in fact it is just a big blog about all sorts of speculative fiction writing. This post was about who won the grand master award at the latest World Horror Convention. Of Making Many Books is yet another writing advice blog and recently had some great info on “Show, Don’t Tell”. An Urban Fantasy is a blog by debut author Alan Campbell which is more or less related to writing, whether directly or not, and is rather entertaining to read. From the Cradle to the Slave is a fantastic beginning to a potentially thrilling scifi novel. Hopefully the author will get some more chapters up soon as I have quite enjoyed reading it. Pocket Full of Words is a lovely blog by a fellow writer of what looks to be fantasy. She’s got three novels in progress, so best of luck to finishing all of them. After all, I’m doing one…Heather Harper I managed to find by accident. She’s also writing a YA fantasy and I look forward to reading more on her blog as she progresses in this endeavor. Lowe Brow is doing the same as the previously mentioned site, posted in installments and also podcasted. All the Billion Other Moments is another writers blog with some helpful insights into the writing life, progress, and the like. Scribblings of a Madman is a journal by a fellow amateur novelist about his writing life. Write, Pam, Write! is a blog by a three time NaNoWriMo winner. She’s currently working on a novel called Eagle’s Heart. And finally there is S. William Shaw, Writer!–a blog about the progress of his novel endeavors in the younger adult field than my own, but still worth a lovely read. So, this is my midweek post for no real reason other than the fact that I am home and available to do it. Don’t expect midweek posts often, but yeah, here it is.