Real Life

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Why do I write? Because writing makes me happy and gives me something I desperately crave – an outlet for all of the people and worlds living in my head.

Writers aren’t exactly people…they’re a whole lot of people trying to be one person.
-F. Scott Fitzgerald

To be honest, I don’t ever expect to become rich off of my writings. I don’t exactly see myself as being the next J.K. Rowling or Laurell K. Hamilton or Stephen King.

I just like to write.

I do hope to reach the point – soonish rather than later – where I will be able to pay off all of my debts and make a fairly comfortable living. I would like to be able to give the Kid a good education and a nice place to live. Most of all, I never want to worry about him going hungry again.

But even if I was living in a gutter somewhere, I would still write, because it is my passion and my joy.

Even if there was no one to read the words, I would still write them down. On a computer, in a notebook, in the dirt on the floor… the words would still flow out of me and always will.

That being said, I really do appreciate it when someone reads something I’ve written. Whenever I sell a book, I feel a jolt of pleasure at the idea that someone out there is meeting the people I created and traveling the world they live in. And I hope they experience the same richness of feeling that I did as I wrote every word and imagined every action or scene.

Feedback is always appreciated, but to just know that someone is reading something I’ve created… that’s enough.

~Peace, love, joy

 

Faizel 02 at Amazon
0 comments on "“What are you doing?” he ejaculated vigorously. – “Obviously not what you’re thinking of,” she answered calmly. “Here’s some tissues.”"

So my grandpa was a self-publishing fool. He signed his books up with two companies and refused to believe they might be shady or anything. Now I have to get his books off their lists, re-edit and reformat everything, and republish them.

He died several years ago and it’s just one of those things – I really don’t want to see his stuff being maintained by a group of people that really don’t care about him or his writings, just the money he paid them (thousands and thousands of dollars. Enough money to just make you sick.) At the time he published his stuff, there wasn’t a whole lot of self-publishing options, so he went with the old-fashioned pay some company to do nothing approach. They got thousands of dollars from him, but he was happy as long as he had a couple copies of his books.

I told the family that I would take over his stuff though. I mean, he put so much of himself into his books, and the sad thing is that they would have been pretty good if he would just have listened to anyone about a few changes. He simply got bogged down by the details – like 1000 words right in the middle of the action about shoeing a horse or loading a wagon,

He tried so hard to be Louis L’Amour, and he simply would not listen about just writing his own stuff. He was such a stubborn, frustrating old man. It’s no wonder he lived to be 97 – he was just too ornery to quit.

And I’ll always remember the time he used “he ejaculated” instead of “he yelled,” then refused to change it even though I kept telling him he should. Then, when I went and changed it for him… he waited until I was gone and put it back. He finally changed it for real when the self-publishing company told him he should. Right up until then, he kept insisting I didn’t know what I was talking about.

Crazy old man.

Fortress in the Eye of Time at Amazon
0 comments on "Info Dumpers Anonymous"

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So I’ve been writing, which is good. It’s about the only thing I have been doing because I don’t have much energy or interest in anything else. I even let my farm on Farmville get all withered, and you would have thought my OCD would have forced me to care for my crops at least.

My current priority projects:
THE BRAND — [Harper Kingsley] mm fantasy. This story has grown from “that harem thing” to something with a lot more court intrigue and assassination attempts. I’m very enthusiastic about it and I’ve been building a world that I hope other people will enjoy reading about as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it. [words: 100,000+]
FIENDS — [Sol Crafter] mm supernatural. Teablossom is a jerk, but I think he’s becoming a creature with a little more depth than he started with. I’m still trying to see what kind of guy Henry is–though like a lot of my other characters he’s somehow managed to become completely neurotic. [words: 30,000+]
VEDRAN’S HAND — [Harper Kingsley] mm fantasy. My weekly opus. The world of Dragon Knight has become a lot richer and fuller than I started with and the characters have gained more depth. Dragon Knight has also become a bit of a sociopath that only cares about Vedran and would kill anyone else that got in his way, but he’s a hot sociopath, so that’s something. [words: 100,000+]

What else is in my stew pot:
ALLIES & ENEMIES — [Harper Kingsley] The sequel to “Heroes & Villains.” This should already be done, but it’s been very painful for me to go back through and add to. I’ve killed so many people in this story that I have to worry it might be a bit too much. [words: 120,000+]
NYXTI — [Harper Kingsley] mm fantasy. So I promised Sam Argent a story, and that’s pretty much this one. Set in the same world as “Vedran’s Hand” and “Black Hood,” but in a different decade. [words: 100,000+]
TUESDAY NIGHT — [Sol Crafter] mm superhero. AU of “Pulse of the City.” Kind of a kid!fic, but really just two guys trying to make a life together. [words: 50,000+]
DOGGY STYLE –[Sol Crafter] mm supernatural. Zack gets turned into a dog, then has to figure out how to get back to being human. [words: 30,000]
ACROSS TWO DIVIDES — [Sol Crafter] So I’m this awful person that killed off this poor guy’s brother, and now I’ve gotta get him past his grief to the point where he’s not just a pile of misery.

Anyways, I’ve got a lot on my plate and I’m moving through it all at a steady pace.

If you’re curious, this is how I write:

  1. I come up with the initial idea. Which can basically be “two guys meet and fall into a relationship that has an HEA” or “a guy really wants to be a superhero, but it doesn’t work out, so he becomes a pretty serious supervillain.”
  2. I expand on the idea in note form. Pages of description, things I think I might want to have take place, even background info that I might not use for that particular story but might use later.
  3. I write a synopsis. A generalized sketch of what I want to have take place in the story. Beginning, middle, and end, though it’s pretty sparse.
  4. I write a serious outline that goes through the scenes one-by-one and includes all the dialogue. My outline could basically be seen as the entire story in compacted form.
  5. Using my outline, I write out the scenes, filling in all the details and richer descriptions of people and scenery.

Sometimes I don’t bother with steps 3, 4 and 5. If I feel like I know the story and the characters well-enough, I just come up with the world they live in and let them go about their business.

My daily quota: 12,000 words.

Faizel 02 at Amazon
1 comment on "Downward Spiral"

I would never think to lie to anyone and say that I am a happy-go-lucky person… no, I fully admit that I am a terribly moody bitch. But I’m pretty cyclical, so if I time things right I can *fake* it that I’m cheerful most of the time.

Anyways, I’ve noticed the last few days that my taste for life has been degrading rapidly, which is kind of a warning sign that I’m about to go down, down the rabbit hole once again. When I reach my lowest point, about the only thing I have any enthusiasm for is writing–everything else is all just shades of gray. It’s kind of like being a real life zombie. Sure, there’s no craving for brains, but I do shuffle through my days in a mindless stupor.

So there will probably be writing updates here and there, and I am for sure going to make sure I hold to my weekly schedule for “Dragon Knight,” but there’s a good chance that for everything else my contact with the outside world will go dark.

Please do not be offended if I don’t immediately respond to emails or messages. I will try to get back to anyone that messages me, though it might take a little while.

~Pax