Then And Now: Why I'm so jealous of my children

Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future -Corrie Ten Boom

As some of you may have known or suspected, I'm old. Or rather, in terms of technology, I'm old. One hundred years ago... no, even fifty years ago, a seasoned man like me in his 40s wasn't considered old. In today's world of 11-year old podcasters and 20-somethings who made their millions writing software for smartphones or the web, it's safe to say anyone around my age may feel as relevant as a Trump speech at a NOW rally. I'm actually okay with this. The future is marching forward faster than ever before, and even us "old folk" can make use of the technology the younglings provide. It is perhaps because of this technology that I am so, well, jealous of the youth of today.

Why? Simple: Today's technology advancements have helped foster a life of constant learning and creativity unseen by anyone since the Renaissance. Here's my short list of things I wish I had available to me in my youth:

The Internet.

To say the Internet has been the most important invention since, well, ever is an understatement. At no time in world history has so much information been made available so easily to all the world. Thirty years ago, getting information on any subject required a visit to the library in the vain hope that the book you need to learn a specific subject would available. Even if the book was there, that was only a small step in the learning process. One can read about how to replace the fuel pump on a 1969 Chevelle Super Sport all day long and still not have enough information to do so reliably. I can read a book on photography cover to cover and not know a tenth of what I need to know to take professional quality photos. As a child, I relied on my teachers to help me figure out Geometry. I read about World War II in World History until, about two pages in, I fell asleep.

With the Internet, I am no longer limited or restrained from learning something new by such arbitrary issues like access. Virtually everything you might want to learn about is available to you, practically free! You no longer need to attend college or a trade school to learn how to do something. Want to learn software development, maybe perhaps how to write an app for the iPhone? Open up a Google search page and type in 'iPhone developer tutorial' and voila! You have literally hundreds of links to sites that teach you everything you need to know, usually without paying a penny. My writing career would be so much farther along if I had the knowledge base from which to draw when I was a budding writer who had nothing but time and dreams.

Amazing.

If I were a kid these days, going to school, there would be nothing I couldn't learn. If my teacher doesn't know something it's no longer a limitation I'd have to deal with. If I couldn't figure out the Pythagorean Theorem, I'd have tons of people on the web helping me figure it out. My only limitation would be... myself.

Smart Phones.

One of my favorite book series is The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. For non-geeks who don't know, the books revolve around a man forced to travel the galaxy with his friends while getting into no end of strange and wonderful situations. The central focus of the series is a wonderful electronic book which contained all the knowledge of the universe, available at the press of a button. With Smart Phones, we have this same ability (although it is limited to only our knowledge here on earth. Bummer, that). With these wonderful devices we can find our way to any address using Google Maps. Having a dispute with your friends on the exact wording of Roy Batty at the end of Blade Runner? Whip out your smart phone, do a quick search and see for yourself. Add in the phone camera and you have instant memories available to you. The smart phone has been the first viable replacement for the home PC ever. Almost everything you can do on a standard PC, you can do on a cell phone - and more.
If I had one of these babies as a kid, I would have a TON more pictures of that wonderful time. I would have constant contact ability with my family. And, again, I would have instant access to an unlimited knowledge base. I can only think, "How much farther along in my career would I be if I had this available to me as I was growing up?"

GoPro

This one is more for my own personal stuff, but I'm really jealous of the ability for kids to be able to record their daily activities. What I wouldn't give to be able to rely on more than my fading memories when it comes to my past. This alone makes me wish I could somehow become a 10 year old again. If you have kids this age, do them a favor and buy them a GoPro, or some other means of recording for them. They'll love you for it now, and cherish the results of what you gave them later.


These are only a few things, but you get the idea. The future for our children is bright, to be certain, but never before has the present been so exciting as it is today for our kids... And for us. Let's make good use of it.

When writing becomes more than a private love affair

"The freelance writer is a man who is paid per piece or per word or perhaps."- Robert Benchley

There's an old adage that goes, "Get a job doing something you love, and you'll never work a day in your life." For the longest time I agreed with this. As a software developer by trade, my love of computers knew no bounds. I'd been programming since the tender age of twelve, when I would turn on my Commodore VIC-20 and spend hours writing programs (usually games of some sort), only to have all my work destroyed when I turned the computer off. I didn't have any means of storing data, you see, and no way of keeping the computer on since I also used the family TV as my monitor. As I grew older, so did my love coding. It seemed only natural to make this my chosen profession. That was a long, long time ago, and I never regretted my decision... or so I told myself.

There was another child inside of me who longed for a different path. That child enjoyed the written word. From my first story in fourth grade, about a giant heart that ate New York City, to my last short story in college about the joys of owning a pet turtle, I constantly wrote about anything and everything. It was a talent I had and enjoyed sharing immensely, but never took seriously because I didn't think I could get a job writing, and computers were, and still are, the hottest thing one could do.

The child remained hidden throughout early adulthood, until finally he decided he'd had enough. I started writing again. The more I wrote, the more I began to realize that, perhaps, I wasn't as in love with computers as I once thought. Like someone who finds themselves no longer enamored with a lover of many years, I found myself wondering if perhaps I hadn't made a mistake in choosing my professional wife. Call it mid-life crisis. Call it irrational behavior pushed along by the allure of something new. Call it what you will, I couldn't deny that my heart was forever changed. My new mistress had a siren song I couldn't resist and I found myself spending my days with my computer wife, and my passionate nights naked with my thoughts and my text editor.

And now, it seems, perhaps the mistress will be demanding more of my time. I've recently started writing professionally for a podcasting company, Blazing Caribou Studios. It's not a paying gig so I guess it's not a 'professional' gig in that sense, but I'm writing for something that matters, and most importantly it's something that people will be reading and listening to voluntarily. The thrill of this is indescribable, except to say it compares to the first time I wrote a computer program that someone else liked and used. In other words, my writing work has become validated.

Granted, it's not much, but it's a start. A good start. I'm still sticking with my computer wife, but the mistress has become less of a passing interest, and more something that may convince me that perhaps I could divorce my wife after all.

It's an idea at least worth persuing!

The voice of the masses, those glorious bastards

“Being an author of a book is like being a mother of a debutante in the Middle Ages. You have to present your baby to society and provide her with dowry, and in your heart, you hope that some royalty spends a night with her and ensures her way to success.” ― Elvira Baryakina

I suppose one of the scariest things a writer can experience is that space in time between having a book published (be it one of the "Big 7" or Indie publishing) and waiting for someone to read and review your book. I suspect it really is as Ms. Baryakina mentions in her quote in that it is your baby - no, it's more than that. A baby is something you're proud of, but not because of any work you did to create the baby. Please note that I'm not belittling the effort and pain women go through to give birth; I recognize how difficult and rewarding it is.

The writing of a novel, while not nearly as physically painful, involves its own set of trials and ordeals. A typical 80,000 word novel takes an average of 12-18 months to complete. This is particularly difficult for us part-time writers who spend their days at regular jobs, then spend their nights in front of a keyboard. There's the first draft, raw and unrefined, and that is a great accomplishment (one that I have yet to experience). Then there is the 2nd run through it, where we cut and trim and "Kill Your Darlings." After that, you're working with your editor (assuming you have one, please tell me you do!) to trim your novel up even more.

Finally, you get the thing published. You're proud of what you've completed. You're officially an author! It's time to show off your work. Your publisher sets it out to be printed and hopefully sets you up for advertising, book and blog tours and the like. Amazon has your book on their shelves, and you sit there all day hitting reload on your browser, waiting for the reviews to come in. For me, I think that bit of time right there, as I'm nursing both my carpal tunnel pain and a nice strong drink, that I would experience real fear. It really boils down to finding out if anyone else loves your work as much as you do.

Still, even if that first novel isn't as well liked as we'd like it to be, it will still be our baby. The people may think it homely, but it's beautiful to us. The great news is, we don't have to rely on genetics to make the next baby more beautiful. We can use what we learned from the first baby to make the next one something everyone will love.

We Hope.

Extra Post : An encouraging word

I don't usually have a post this early in the week, but my wife and I spent the evening watching Walt Before Mickey. It was quite by accident; we were at Downtown Disney for an evening of shopping and people watching when we noticed the movie poster for this movie at the AMC 24 theater located there. We are both avid Disney fans, but we had never heard of this movie. It intrigued us enough to venture inside.

It was the better use of two hours that I'd spent this year.

There's little doubt that I am prone to the use of hyperbole, and certainly I am biased when it comes to movies about Walt Disney. That aside, I was entranced enough by the movie that I felt I had to write about it here. To explain why, let me give some background on the movie, and the man the man the movie portrays. If you know nothing else about Walt Disney, you know that he created Mickey Mouse, an iconic character not only in the Disney universe, but truly an American tradition. You would be hard pressed to find anyone in the United States who doesn't know who (or what) Mickey Mouse is. There aren't many in the modern world who doesn't know about the character. Walt Disney World is the number one vacation spot World Wide. The company is simply huge, in size, in reach, and its name is synonymous with Quality.

The movie covers Walt Disney's life and career before Mickey Mouse was created. To suggest Walt was an instant success would be laughable. As the movie portrays, Walt had several hiccups in his rise to be the best. He was penniless more than once. He nearly lost his entire company (and DID lose several characters he created to Universal). One blow after another came at him during his struggle to succeed. But also as the movie shows, Walt Disney never gave up on his ideas, nor his ambition to not only succeed but to be the best.

I'll leave the details of the story for you to research. You won't be able to see the movie for a while since it currently is only showing at Downtown Disney's AMC Theater (due to open nationwide at select theaters some time in September). I'm not really wanting to talk about the movie right now... Rather, I want to discuss Walt's view on life, and how we as aspiring writers should take his view as our own.

If we are to become successful at our craft, there is not doubt we must keep working at it. We can't let setbacks, self-doubt or the criticisms of others keep us from our lofty goals. We know what we want, and we know the path to getting it. It is a simple two-step rule.

1. Write
2. Never give up

That's the gist of it. As writers, we must strive to keep at our craft, even when the entire world tells us we are wasting our time. We know what we know, and that is the stories we have in our minds. Those stories will not be brought to life unless we provide the breath. How can we let our characters down by giving up because we are discouraged or because others don't see how what we love could possibly be worth pursuing? The answer is simple - we can't. I write this blog post to give what little bit of encouragement I can to you, fellow writers. Let's follow Walt's pattern of self-determination and drive and get ourselves better. Let's get those characters written, scenes developed, books finished. Let's get published, ladies and gentlemen. Let's show the world that Walt Disney's success wasn't a fluke. It is repeatable, even by the likes of us wannabes.

Our Mickey is waiting to be born.

How To Drown Even Though You Know How To Swim.

“Just write every day of your life. Read intensely. Then see what happens. Most of my friends who are put on that diet have very pleasant careers.” —Ray Bradbury

I was going to use this post to write about something really cool, the Magic Spreadsheet. It's a great tool that writers can use to help them keep up consistency in their writing routine. If you have a Google+ account, check out this Community. Otherwise, there are other sources all over the Internet that covers it, so click here.

What I'd like to talk about instead is how important it is to get that consistency in your writing routine. I mentioned it before in an earlier post, but lack of consistency kept me from writing for quite a while. I think back on it now and if I had kept writing during that time, it is quite likely my book would be complete! I mean, seriously, think about that. Writing just 250 words a day is all it would take. When I'm in writing mode, 250 words is nothing... it's a paragraph, a descriptive text. It's much more likely that I'd write 1,000 words or more in any given day. The average book is between 40,000-100,000 words. 100,000 / 1,000 = 100... 100 days.

Now that's rough draft to be sure and the end result would take much more time. Even so, that's much closer to finishing a book than I've ever been! It's with this realization that I regained my drive, my focus. This is what I'd like to suggest to you, fellow writers. Write, and continue to write. If you get stuck in a story, fine. Start another story. Write a short story, write a paragraph or three describing your surroundings. Keep writing to keep getting better. As you get better, you'll enjoy your writing even more.

When you get to a point where you can't write, read. Not reading when you're trying to become a published author is like trying to learn how to swim without taking a dip in a pool. Sure, you can learn the techniques but when you finally do end up in the water you'll find yourself flailing your arms and gulping water, wondering why you're drowning when you've studied technique for so long. Pro Tip: Don't just read stuff that interests you. Make an attempt at reading other genre fiction. It's likely you'll find authors using writing techniques that you've not seen in your particular fave genre. I love Speculative Fiction, but learned more how to write romantic scenes after reading a romance novel or two.

Side note: NaNoWriMo is coming up - are you ready? What better time to get into that habit than writing a 40,000 novel in a month? I think this is the year I'm going to actually finish it. Yeah Yeah, I say that every year. But with the help of Mur Lafferty and the Magic Spreadsheet, I'm more confident than ever!

Eating words through the Audio Canal

Everything comes to us that belongs to us if we create the capacity to receive it.
Rabindranath Tagore


You know, I'm not the first one to say this but the Internet is an amazing thing. Since the creation and acceptance of the World Wide Web in 1994 (or thereabouts), this wasteland has provided an abundance of all things weird, insightful, scary, disgusting, beautiful... really, anything you could possibly imagine, you can find on some website, just waiting for you to discover.

Since I've begun my writing journey, I've found several sites that offer help for the newbie writers. They are many and varied and easy to find. Search, peruse, consume and discard to your liking. I'd like to instead focus on a more specific genre: Podcasts. I won't insult your intelligence by trying to describe what a podcast is. The vast majority of you know and have listened to them. If you are one of the few cave-dwellers who have never heard of them, look here.

I'd like to highlight a few here, as they are ones the blossoming writer will find useful as they hone their craft. There are many more than I will name here; these are just ones that I personally have found to be quite insightful, enlightening, and even fun to listen to. In order of preference, I bring you:

Writing Podcasts Worth Listening To

• Writing Excuses
  Ok, this one is at the top of my list, and for good reason. This is a weekly podcast that is hosted by four accomplished authors, one of them being among my favorites: Brandon Sanderson. The podcast takes a specific subject and spends about fifteen minutes (Their tagline is "Fifteen minutes long because you're in a hurry, and we're not that smart") discussing it among themselves. They talk about how they might tackle a certain problem, how they go about their writing lives, and how YOU might use what they've learned to great effect. In the current season (Season 10) they've been going through the complete writing process of a book. Insightful and fun to listen to, I highly recommend any aspiring author to pick it up.
• I Should Be Writing
  I really like this one simply because I can relate to the host. ISBW is a podcast that started back when the host, Mur Lafferty, was trying to break into the writing scene. She has since finished and published a book and several short stories, but she keeps the lights on at ISBW and for good reason. The podcast helps budding writers with a lot of the pitfalls of the writing process. Mur goes about it from the viewpoint of a struggling writer which proves useful in relating to the rest of us. She has interviews with authors, agents and any other milleiu-specific personality and picks their brains to ask the questions we'd all like to know. As well, Mur accepts questions from her audience via e-mail and attempts to answer them on the show. Highly recommended, although her casts are irregular in their frequency.
• Odyssey Writing Workshop
  I found this one at some point and found it quite interesting. The Odyssey Writing Workshop is a workshop people from around the world apply for when their work is approaching publication quality. You can get the entire spiel from their website, but the gist of the podcast is that they provide excerpts from their classes for us wannabees to listen to. They can be quite interesting and there is an extensive backlog that you can catch up on. I haven't had a new one from it in a while, but I believe it's kind of seasonal so that's to be expected.
• The Secrets
  This one is a real treat. Michael A. Stackpole headed it up... you may know him from his Star Wars books as well as his other Sci-Fi tomes that are, to me, fantastic. He used this podcast as an advertising platform for his 'Secrets' newsletter, but the podcast itself provided a LOT of very good information. You can still listen to the podcasts he made and find quite a bit of stuff to store into your brain. The podcast is now defunct, but still applicable!

Well, there you go. Those are my top four. There are a plethora of others, and many of them are likely very good as well. Still, I highly recommend my four here. At the very least, it can help get you into writing mode... and that's always a good thing. Do you have a favorite writing podcast you'd like to share? Maybe you have a podcast of your own? Let us know!

Indie Book Review!

"Twice and thrice over, as they say, good is it to repeat and review what is good" - Plato

Today gentle readers I'd like to introduce a new thing for our little blog, and that is for me to do a book review. I'm going to focus on Indie books - that is, per the definition, books that have either been self-published or published by "Small Press."

The reasons for this are many. First and foremost, I'd like to spotlight efforts by fellow authors who have gone thru the gamut of writing, editing (or submitting) and publishing a book either on their own or through a small publisher. This is a growing medium that many are using to circumvent the traditional avenues to getting a book published by the major publishers (The "New York 7," as they are sometimes called). While the quality and enjoyability of such books may in some eyes be circumspect, I have found many of these books to be quite readable, if not altogether enjoyable.
Another reason is so that we may have the opportunity to discuss writing-focused issues with the book - That is, use the book perhaps as a kind of learning tool on how and how not to do certain things. In keeping with the spirit of this blog my reviews will focus mainly on this. Hopefully you, dear reader, will be able to take this review and parse it, dissect it so that the good bits may be used by you to help hone your writing craft.
Finally, I'd like to use these reviews as a means to give any Indie authors out there a chance to have their writing put into a spotlight, little though my spotlight may be (for now). If you have a book you'd like me to review, please let me know and I'll do so!

And now, without any further lilly-guilding, let's review!

Indie Book Review - Reap (The Harvest Saga Book 1), by Casey L. Bond

Overall Rating: 7/10

Story Flow: 8/10

Plot Development: 8/10

Writing Quality: 7/10

Re-Readability: 6/10

Ms. Bond's novel, Reap (The Harvest Saga, Book 1) surprised me. I wasn't sure what to expect when I first picked it up. When fishing at Indie Lake one always has to be sure to be careful where you place your cane pole - your quarry can be pretty gamey, especially when the price is cheap (or free). I came into it with reservation, but I came out surprisingly satisfied.

The story revolves around Abigail "Abby Blue" Kelley, a late-teens woman who lives in a world where the classes have been divided by necessity into two different kinds of people: "Greaters" and "Lessers." As a Lesser, Abigail has a rough life, living in a town where, even among the lower class, there are winners and losers. The people in the town in which she lives is responsible for harvesting Apples for the Greaters. Other towns grow and gather other primary resources, and each have their own community that isn't allowed to mix with the others, except by necessity. Abigail's lot in life is similar to those around her, except for the secret that no one (including Abby) knows - she was actually born a Greater.

Her meager life becomes more complicated by higher members of her community when their sadistic and self-loving son begins to focus his attention on her. The focus helps to spark a chain of events that shakes Abby's world to the core, and perhaps gives her a chance to change things for her and her friends for the better.

When I began reading the story, I found it a little difficult to get into the book. The writing starts out a bit choppy and wordy. Some descriptions provided aren't really needed, and indeed sometimes tended to draw me out of the story with their awkwardness. However, it didn't take long for me to disregard this and actually enjoy the story. Abigail's plight is such that you KNOW she's going to have things get better, and you can't wait to find out how that might happen. As is typical with a YA Urban Fiction novel, there is a significant romance aspect involved - not usually my kind of reading. I found the story line entertaining despite myself. The world she creates is an interesting one. I would have liked a bit more history of the world dynamic, but that's just personal preference I think. The lack of backstory doesn't detract from the story.

The thing that DID bother me, however, was the protagonist herself. While she is a likable character, she seemed to have no control over her life whatsoever. Every problem that happens to her seems to require an outside entity - usually a male protagonist - to come in and fix it. It felt like she was a pinball, bouncing from situation to situation while those around her constantly used flippers to keep her in play, so to speak. I kept waiting for her to grow and become a stronger character; unfortunately, that just never happened. This is book one of a series, however. It's possible that the later books show that growth. I would have just liked to have seen a bit of that growth in this one.

The writing style itself is very nice. Written in First Person, Bond has no problem staying with her character and not describing things in such a way that makes you feel like we're not hearing from the person herself. No lengthy or flowery prose, no head-hopping, and at no time did I wonder, "How does she know what that character is feeling?" The flow of the story is smooth, the pacing nearly perfect. Most importantly, Ms. Bond really made me feel for this character. Her plight became my plight and I couldn't wait to see how she came out in the end. Perhaps this is the reason I noticed her weak responses to her issues.

All in all, I enjoyed the book. It's a good beginning into the series, and I'm looking to continue to book 2 to see how it turns out. If she fulfills her promises she's made in the first book, I would find it to be a series I'd want to read again.

Thus concludes my first book review. If you have an Indie book you've written or you've read that you'd like to have reviewed here, be sure to let me know. In the meantime we'll pick up next post on the Indie thing, and have another review in a few weeks or so.