January was a busy month, dominated by processing the first Beta responses to Champion Bold, working on the Kickstarter campaign, and closing in on a readable draft of the Colonel Lieutenant.

Writing

I’ve started getting Beta reader responses to Champion Bold, which has been positive. A few good points they’ve brought up for me to clarify, which is the point of Beta readers. I’m putting together the Kickstarter campaign, and I’m hoping to have that up this month or in March.

Continuing to work towards a completed draft of The Colonel Lieutenant. I’ve got the arcs worked out, now it’s just a point of writing the scenes, and then ironing out the story so it’s coherent.

I’ve been working on other projects. Writing a scene here, some world building there. Just some little bits to break up the routine when I need to mix it up. I did get the first post up about my writing process, which I’m glad I finally got out.

February Goals

• Champion Bold: Finish incorporating Beta responses
• Champion Bold: Get Kickstarter Up
• The Colonel Lieutenant: Complete Draft
• Blog: Get one non-update and non-book report post up
• Other: Knock 10 things off my minor writing list

Reading

I finished the paranormal espionage thriller Declare by Tim Powers. This book was phenomenal. It was a good mix of ancient mythology, modern spycraft, and with a story that was told simultaneously in the 1940’s and the 1960’s. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys stories adjacent to the Cthulhu mythos.

With that done, I shifted over to try to finish A Fire Upon the Deep, which I had an eBook from Libby but couldn’t finish in time. I picked up a cheap paperback copy to finish. Now, if you want to know anything about this book, it is one where you have to infer a lot of the rules of the story from how the characters respond to things. There’s not a lot of exposition. It can make it frustrating to not understand the rules as well as the characters do. But we’ll see how it ends.

Still working through The Count of Monte Cristo as my audiobook. I know so little about this story I have no idea how it’s going to end, and I’m almost halfway through. I have so many questions about who he’s going to get revenge on and how. Even though the main character’s a bit of a Mary Sue, I don’t care. It works.

February Goals

• Finish Fire Upon the Deep
• Start new fictional book
• Start new non-fiction book

Movies and Shows

I didn’t watch too many new episodes this month. Added a few episodes of the Expanse, which continues to be a good show I just can’t really get into. The last episode I watched was so intense (and upsetting) I had to take a long break. There are still a lot of elements to the show I like, and I appreciate its quality. I just can’t binge it.

I started watching The Halo TV show on the advice of a friend. I’m only a few episodes in. I’ve got mixed feelings so far. The opening sequence – a Covenant attack on a human settlement – was brutal to watch, which really set the tone well. That was great. And Halsey is a fun character. The parts that haven’t worked for me are the uber-fascist feel of the government and the chosen-one trope they’ve given the Master Chief. We’ll see how it ends.

I also started Masters of the Air, the new show about the USAAF in World War 2. Only three episodes in, but I appreciate that the view is from squadron and group leaders, meaning I’m getting a good view of how these raids were organized and led in the air. Most other stories I’ve read have been about individual aircraft and their crews (looking at you, Memphis Belle).

February Goals

• Finish Halo Season One
• Finish Expanse Season Two and Three
• Finish One Marvel TV Show
• Watch Two new movies

Games

I finished the campaign to Anno 1800 this month. It was a good campaign that teaches the players most of the base mechanics of the game. I want to try playing it past the end date to see how far I can take it, but it does take a lot of time.

Advanced a few missions through Gears Tactics. I feel like if I can set aside a night to just play this game, I could probably knock it out and then be done with it.

I started Red Dead Redemption II. This game follows an outlaw in the end of the wild west. So far I’m liking it, particularly that there is a mechanic where I can choose how honorable or despicable I can be. We’ll see how it comes out.

RPG wise, most of the campaigns are continuing along nicely. But the exciting news is that I get to take out the every-other Monday night game with a campaign idea I’ve been working on for a while I’m really excited to get this one to the table, and nervous to see if I can get the game to run the way I hope. Right now everyone is in character development, which is a lot of fun to partake in. I’ll let you know how it all goes.

February Goals

• Finish Gears Tactics
• 20 Hours of Red Dead Redemption 2
• Start another PC Story Game

What’s Next?

I’ve got two events coming up.

Minicon 57, the weekend of March 29th to 31st. There I will have a table selling my books and likely have something up about upcoming publications.

On April 13th, I’ll be running a Pop-Up Bookstore at Number Twelve Cider. It’ll be a four-hour event, but it should be a lot of fun.

So that’s it. Two events to plan for, a game to process, two books to bring to publication, and a lot of work to do. Should be fun.

Cheers!

Michael