Writing

Feeling Old and a Mission

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Short Story Collection

The other day I came up with the idea of collecting my short stories and maybe self-publishing them. My first instinct was that I’d never have enough and I’d have to write more.

After looking through my writing folders I certainly have enough content but I’m not convinced I have enough quality… Yet.

I get a perverse joy out of reading my old stories and pretending someone else wrote them. It’s easy, seeing as even some things on this blog I don’t remember writing. Some of it is good, some of it is terrible, but boy is there a lot of it.

Feeling Old

I feel old when I look through the folder and find some of my stories that are just shy of 2 decades old. My early stories could vote. That’s frightening. I didn’t consider myself a writer until I finished my first novel “Cerulean Skies” and even then I never considered writing regularly, but looking back I’ve been writing, in one form or another, for over twenty five years. I remember the first novel I tried to write. I had almost finished it and left it in an envelope. I found it when I moved to Ottawa in 2002, but I had made the terrible mistake of using pencil and it had faded beyond recognition.

I found some Dungeons and Dragons writing that I did for my first big campaign. I remember it being massive in scope. When I looked at it today it was barely 9000 words. Or as most of my author friends would call it, a few days’ work.

I think I’ll stick to stories that were written within the past decade for the collection.

I’m Terribly Sorry

There are several serial stories that I have written that I promised to write more and I seem to have completely forgotten.

If you’re interested in reading them here are the links:

Armstrong 3 (Space ship Science Fiction) – 2009

The Professor (Archeological Action Adventure) – 2009

The Cosmic Cuckoos (Adventure Science Fiction) – 2014

I plan on not only continuing these stories but re-writing and editing them into a coherent total. One of them may even become my next serialized story.

I have a Mission

I discovered around Christmas that I’d been collecting Urban-Fantasy/Fantasy series at an alarming rate. At last count, I have over 50 of them and more than 20 that I hadn’t read. No seriously, I have one series where I own the first 8 books and I’ve never read the author before.

In order to pare down my library and make sure I like the books, I’m on a quest to read the first in each series. I’ll be posting short reviews of each of the books unless I really love them or hate them.

Here’s what I’ve read so far this year and my opinions:

Moon Called by Patricia Briggs

A great start and a wonderful read. I look forward to the next one. Rating: 80%

Night Child by Jes Battis

Not a terrible book but very uneven. The author’s metaphors were awkward, the characters were stupid and the style wasn’t consistent. Not planning on reading the rest of the series.

This book had so much potential and angered me so much that it gets the lowest rating I’ve ever given with 40%

Blood Relations by Caroline Fréchette

Check out my full review this Thursday.

 

That’s 3 down and 19 more to go.

 

What’s your favourite fantasy, science fiction, or urban fantasy? Let me know and I may add it to my list.

I Don’t Have a Plan

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Felix Felicis

When I sit down to write a novel I have character outlines, plot points, an ending, and a structure all planed out. When I write a short story, I have them even more plotted.

Yesterday my wife asked me how many more parts there were going to be to The Ridiculous Adventures of Felix Felicis and I answered completely honestly with, “I have no idea.”

I’ve been writing it as a serial novel and I have a general idea of his character arc but have no clue of anything else. I’m writing by the seat of my pants and I’m having fun doing it.

So for anyone wondering, the story of Felix will end April 2nd. How many other silly adventures he’ll have, I have no clue. I just write it when I feel like writing it.

If there’s something you want to see in the story, let me know.

Everdome

I love writing Everdome. Getting to know the characters and seeing how they’ll eventually end up together on the reality show is fun. I’m still in the honeymoon, “Everything is Awesome” phase of writing a new book, where it’s all about discovery and foreshadowing.

Rants

I haven’t done a proper rant in a while, it’s not that I haven’t had the motivation, it’s just that I haven’t felt the need.

Lots of stuff makes me want to rant from serious issues like Gamergate to personal pet peeves like the Hobbit trilogy but I haven’t found anything that I felt I could say something new about. It’s been said by plenty of other people.

 

Do you have an article or topic you’d like me to rant about?

Latter Days,

Éric

Anniversary

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I missed my blogging anniversary. Ok I missed one of my blogging anniversaries. I have four, the latest being the creation of this blog way back in August, then there’s the decision to blog regularly even farther back in December 2013, and the creation of my previous Aspiring Something Blog in May 2008.

I’d say I’ve been blogging seriously since December 2013, sporadically since 2008, but I’ve been blogging since 2004.

Back in 2004

Back then the word blog wasn’t in the dictionary and many people hated it. Some used Web Log, or Electronic Diary, serious news types had Ezines. I used a popular site that still exists called Livejournal.com, the original blog is long dead.

Surprisingly the content I wrote back them wasn’t all that different. Mostly I wrote about my life and trying to find love, but you’d find the occasional rant and pseudo-philosophical stuff I still do today. I had no idea I wanted to be a writer despite the half-finished novels and dozens of Dungeons & Dragons stories that could be found on my giant 256mb USB drive. Instead of talking about writing I’d write bad poetry.

I love poetry but I have the hardest time writing it. My in-laws are amazing Limerick writers but I spent all of dinner trying to write one and couldn’t get it. I know the theory and the words but I can’t put them together.

 

What would you like to see me write more of in the next 10 years?

Eric

Diversity in Writing

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My brother, who is a great guy, has always loved performing and after our mother died he started taking classes and seriously throwing himself into acting. It was roughly the same time I started writing seriously.

Authenticity

When he talks about the craft of acting he often brings up “truth” or “honesty” in reference to a performance. It got on my nerves until I understood that he was talking about authenticity or making a character feel like a real person. (My English teacher would say three dimensional.) It’s a concept that brought his acting from talented but hammy to truly good. He’s been getting better with every project by always keep that idea in his mind.

Writing and Authenticity

In writing it’s just as important to make your characters authentic and relatable. As a writer (I’ve written 5 books, fifty plus short stories, and over 200 blog posts. I’ll call myself that and if this guy has a problem with that I’ll gladly challenge him to a write off.) Sorry… As a writer, I concentrate as much as I can on characters. My favourite scenes are usually domestic ones, how someone eats, cleans etc. tells me more about a character than all the clever quips in the world. (I like those too though)

The problem with being authentic is trying to understand and represent characters that are completely different than me. Let’s face it, I’m a 30 year old white, middle class, male, who rates a 2 on the Kinsey scale. I am what 90% of books, movies, and television portray as the norm.

This makes me worry that I’m not being authentic in my writing. If I’m not the best case is that that characters come off as unbelievable, at worst they come off as sad stereotypes. I don’t want to misrepresent my characters or my (eventual) readers.

Why Does Diversity Matter

I’ve heard the old saying of, “Write What You Know” it is a platitude handed down from the gods of writing years ago. It’s also wrong. It’s an attitude that says only aged, world weary, grizzled writers should write.

So why do I want to write about characters who don’t resemble me? Why is it important? It just is. As a kid I had hundreds and thousands of characters that looked and thought like me, that I could relate too. I want that level of relatability for everyone. I want a world where you can pick up a book and see a character that you fully understand and a whole bunch that teach you that as humans we are all fundamentally the same.

Learning about other sexes, cultures, religions, nationalities, sexualities, sexual preferences, and disabilities helps make them more understandable and breaks the “Us vs Them” mentality.

It’s also more interesting.

Conclusion

I haven’t lived as a Polynesian girl with anorexia, or a transgendered boy raised by a conservative family but I have written about them.

In Parasomnia, (AKA the book that is taking me way too long to edit) I tried my best to be authentic and to make each character feel real. I hope I succeeded but I’ll only know by finding beta readers who can call me out on anything that is wrong or stereotypical.

 

What’s your opinion on diversity in books?

Éric

April Laramey

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SONY DSC

I (Jen) had the great pleasure of meeting the author April Laramey (Facebook, Twitter) this weekend, which reminded me that I had yet to post her picture with the TARDIS, taken at this year’s Can-Con. April also contributes to Capital Geek Girls and Apt 613, great sources of information around Ottawa.