I Return Victorious! (And Some Cool Reads of 2011)

Hello Blog-O-Sphere, fancy meeting you here!  I’m so sorry that I have been away for such a long while. Since I last blogged life has been a series of ups and downs, of joys and pain.

For starters: That 91,000 word manuscript for Gestalt evolved into a 107,000 word novel which has been published by Twisted Library Press’ Sci-fi & Fantasy department. Shameless self promotion: Buy it here!

I won’t go into detail about the craptasticness (yes, it’s a word now) that has been my personal life, but suffice to say that this year hasn’t been the best personally.  At least I set out to accomplish my goal of completing GESTALT and beginning work on NOSTRUM while in the new apartment. That said; we are getting ready for yet another move to a new location. It’s a larger apartment which will be beneficial for the new addition to our family:

 

Meet Kieva! He’s a daddy’s boy.

Onward!

I’d like to wrap up 2011 and bring in 2012 with the following:

Hoshi’s Top Reads of 2011

These are not necessarily books which have been published this year, but instead books that I have read this year which I enjoyed tremendously.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Everyone has at least heard of this book by now. But if you haven’t read this book series yet then drop what you are doing immediately, head to your local book store and get it. 

Now. 

I mean it. 

I’ll wait.

Back? Good.

This dystopian series is gritty, vibrant and soul twisting all at the same time. Very few novels allow characters to just sort of pop off the page. This was one of those series. When I heard that it was being filmed I was super excited and cannot wait until the cast (Which seems to be pretty much on the nose) can finally bring these characters to life for real. Please, for the love of everything holy, read the books before you go see the film. Have your own vision of this world in your mind before you allow a random director do it for you.

The Lost Gate by Orson Scott Card

Orson Scott Card has always been a favorite of mine, and in the vein of Ender’s game, he doesn’t disappoint with this promising new series which revolves around the incarnations and families of the gods of old. This is such a unique take on the system of magick and different abilities. It jumps from Danny’s story to the world of the gods and does a great job of intertwining the two. Without getting the reader too terribly lost or distracted. I was glad to hear that it was indeed going to be a series and not just a standalone piece because there is so much more characterization that can be explored which a single novel just couldn’t do.  Danny’s adventures are just beginning and it is clear at the end of this book that Orson Scott Card knows this all too well.

Dragon Soul by Jaida Jones & Danielle Bennett

This is the third book in the Havemercy series. Like its predecessors, it is told in first person from the perspective of four different characters. This style is very difficult to write with quality, but somehow Jones and Bennett have made this their own style and it works out so well. It is set in a semi-steampunk fantasy realm and revolves around the Volstov and Ke-Han empires attempt to recover a downed dragon from the recent war. Spoilers could be abound if I say anything further, but this is another great addition to the Havemercy series and I highly recommend it. I adore this series and can’t wait until I have the time to dive into the next book.

Boneshaker by Cherie Priest

Completely steampunk, completely fantasy and completely awesome. It was hard to pull myself away from it. I wish that the world was more developed in this one because she’s got a great concept but it just doesn’t seem like it’s as fleshed out as it could have been. At the same time, it’s only the first of what is currently four novels so she may be able to get into the nitty gritty of the world more with the follow-ups. All in all I dug the hell out of this book.

Oh, speaking of flesh: There are also zombies. You can’t ever go wrong with zombies.

I just realized that all of the above listed were in a series. How the hell did I find time to write this year?

Until next time,

Cheers!

~Hoshi

. . .

*walks up and blows the dust off of this blog. Grins. Walks away . . . . for now.*

I Win

There are a couple of different ways I was thinking about opening this entry, not the least of which consisted of a lot of “oh my god oh my god oh my gods” and “Holy crap. Holy crap holycrap holycrapholycrapholycrap!” .  . . and since my brain is currently jello I will leave it at that for now.
I did it. A month ahead of my self-imposed deadline, I freaking did it. Gestalt is now officially the second full manuscript that I have ever completed.

One second . . . .

OH MY GOD! YES!!! *does a victory lap around the house* I DID IT!! YES!

*ahem* . . . . *catches breath*

I’m good now.

The past year has been a learning experience, to say the very least. While, with Ethereal Heart, I had the assistance of a very talented friend, I am more proud of myself with the completion of the first draft of Gestalt because it’s mine. All mine. I did it by myself, at all hours of the day and night, with nothing but caffeine, cigarettes and the encouragement of the people who love me pushing me ever forward. I fought with the muse, tortured the muse, the muse tortured me—let’s just say the Geneva Convention was thrown out the window around chapter five—and I came out on top. I won the battle, and now my muse gets a brief (and much needed) break while I run edits before I dive into book two.
This was my first real step to fulfilling my dream of being published. The easy stuff is over, and the hard stuff is just beginning. All I can say is: Bring it on. There’s nothing I can’t do. I just proved that to myself.
355 pages, 91,491 words. And I’m ready for more.

Cheers!
~Hoshi

P.S. Also, a very happy birthday to my brother, Ben! Love you, Aniki!

New Starts? Yes, Please!

Have you ever been so tired that . . . *five minutes later* . . . I can’t think of a single logical or riveting simile or metaphor. That’s how far gone I am.

We’ve been at it since I got off work Thursday morning and haven’t stopped. We are officially moved with the exception of a few minor details and I have never been happier. I will say, however that roughly eight hours of sleep in three days does not make for a productive atmosphere. Not to mention my EVERYTHING hurts. Three flights of stairs to the new place may have been a bad idea for the move itself, but we just couldn’t resist the vaulted ceilings (and hey, at least we weren’t making our friends lug a pool table up those stairs)!

I am so excited for the move not only to be getting away from the shithole of a location that we had but also because it will be quieter. And I have my own writing space. We may have moved from a three bedroom to a one bedroom, but because of our previous situation I feel that I will have more privacy in the long run. We’re putting up a partition in the dining room so I can have my space for writing. My new little desk is set up in the corner beside the back door which leads to the substantial porch and I even have space enough for my printer and bookshelf. It won’t be grandiose, but it doesn’t have to be. Once it gets cooler outside and I have the patio furniture I’m hoping to be able to sit out there and smoke hooka and write, as well.

This is it. This is where Gestalt and Nostrum (book 2) will be finished. I can feel it. This is where I will finally finish edits on Ethereal Heart, and hopefully not hate it as much as I do right now. This is where I will host my Round Tables with my friends with copious amounts of coffee and all-nighters with the hopes of landing an agent and hopefully later publication.

And this is where I slink off to decide if I should catch up on sleep, soak my tattered muscles in my new garden tub with a good book, or pull out the old manuscripts and get to work on the future.

Right now . . . that Garden Tub is looking pretty inviting.

Cheers!
~Hoshi

The Reason

No, not the Hoobastank song. This is my reason.

A few nights ago, while at my ‘normal’ job, a co-worker watched me as I lugged my industrial Laser Jet printer into the office and set up the fifteen pound machine in my little corner of the call center. There were only three of us in the building so late at night, and thus I honestly didn’t give a shit if one of the other two took issue with my plans. To be fair, I warned him ahead of time, and he took my insanity with a smile and a chuckle, like he always does. This co-worker, by the way, is the epitome of awesome. I could not ask for a better person to sit diagonally from on those long, annoying, painful, terrible nights where all I would like to do is reach through the phone and strangle the people on the other end of the line. This co-worker is also not a stranger to my eccentricities. He knows I’m a writer. We’ve talked about it. He supports me every night that we work together and is always asking how the ‘scripts are coming. He always asks me in a genuine manner, too. Never forced conversation or out of politeness. To put it bluntly: this man rocks.

By the time I was finished with my set up, my little niche of a desk looked like the worst example of your father’s idea of his best idea ever of hanging Christmas lights and jamming the plugs into one outlet. Cables were re-arranged, slung across my three-foot wide steely gray desk, down behind the translucent black plastic that served as a sound buffer between what I can only think to call the cubicles. My laptop and its seventeen inch screen shared the desk with the sleek twenty two inches of the flat-screen monitors provided by my employer, and, of course, the phone.  The headset attached to said phone, which I use for my actual job to talk to actual customers with somewhat actual problems, stretched from its jack in the back that I then twisted from a hole in the partition of the metal between the cubicles and laced through my belt loop before fitting it comfortably on my head. This I did to give me enough slack to move around.

Now, at 1 o’clock in the morning there’s a lot of idle time where I work. It was because of that I decided to drag my monster of a printer into work. I could kill two birds with one stone. My goal was to begin edits on a different (and complete) manuscript to get my mind off of Gestalt for a little while and refresh my brain with something slightly different. In order to facilitate not fucking this process up I want a physical copy to edit. After all was said and done there was barely enough room for my chair. I decided to kick it out into the aisle. Standing was a better option at that point.

My co-worker listened to the whirring the printer made as I proceeded to dish out chapter after chapter of the current draft of the manuscript. Section by section the pages slowly built up, were hole-punched roughly twenty at a time and filed into the two and a half inch red three ring binder. Three hundred and eighty pages, five remote desktop sessions with customers, two hours and three paper jams later I clicked off the power to the printer, pulled my chair back over, and slumped down into as if I’d just run the March of Dimes 5k on Auditorium Shores and won.

Upon hearing my exasperated sigh, my co-worker looked up from his computer screen and asked me, “Why do you write?”

My answer was immediate. Unrehearsed. Raw. Ask any writer, published or not, why they write and the answer will always be the same.

“Because I have to,” they will tell you. And tell him that I did.

Then I thought on it for a moment. The reasons for this knee-jerk reaction vary from writer to writer. Some think they have the next Great American Novel on their hands. They are egotistical enough to throw themselves into the same ranks as Mark Twain, Steinbeck, Faulkner. They are Hell-bent on being published for such a credit and a footnote in history as one of “The Greats”. Others feel they have something they have to say. They have honed and crafted their skills for their writing careers to make a commentary on life, on politics, on religion or society or some fault in the system. Some just do it for the money, thinking that there is a grandiose paycheck waiting for them around the corner if someone would just take the hint that they are the next J.K Rowling or Dan Brown.

I actually laughed at my own absurdity as I mustered all of the sanity within me to add, “Because my characters won’t shut up until I tell their story. It doesn’t matter if anyone else ever reads these things that I have spent years of my life developing, molding, twisting; the stories simply must exist or my characters will drive me to lunacy.”

Only after I said that did it, ironically, fortify my own understanding of myself. I know the odds of being a successful author are stacked against me. Would the money be nice? Fuck yes, but I don’t realistically anticipate living like Stephen King anytime soon, if ever. Would I like to get published? Of course. That’s the secondary reason I write. I don’t care about the money so much as I do about telling a good story. I want to be able to have my novels plucked off of a Half Price Books store bookshelf by someone, the same way I do now, to take home and curl up next to by the window with a rum and coke on a stormy evening, or prop open on the porch to enjoy with a tall glass of lemonade on a summer day. I want my stories to be companions that won’t judge you, but will draw the audience in, make them forget what time it is and say “Sit a while and listen to my story.”

Maybe, if I’m lucky, that one action will pull someone through a dark spot in their life. Maybe, if I’m really lucky, that person will see a piece of themselves in my characters and recommend the book to their best friend.

My stories are not laced with layers upon layers of meaning and secret codes and commentary on the world around us. I’m not looking to change the world with my stories. I know I won’t bring about revolution. I know I won’t stem the tide between good and evil. I’m not so naive to think that I single-handedly have that influence. But perhaps, if the powers-that-be decree it, I can make a modest living off of my passion while simultaneously allowing you to forget about real life. Of lost jobs, road rage, strained relationships and broken hearts for a little while by diving into another world.

Cheers,
~Hoshi