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Monthly Update

December 2022 Update

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Well, November was a month dominated by NANOWRIMO and Thanksgiving.

Writing

I missed the goal of 50,000 words by about 8K between all three projects. Th main reasons I missed out had to do with slowing down on weekend and spending more time over Thanksgiving with family than writing, which is a good trade off. Still, I’m good with 42,000 words for the month. That’s a good amount of writing.

Movies and TV

Finished off Andor in November. That was a fun show, getting into the dark background of Star Wars without adding Jedi and Darth anything. It was a slow start, sure, but I enjoyed it, especially Mon Mothma’s storyline, and Stellan Skarsgard’s character of Luthen. I look forward to the next season.

Over the holiday I went to see Devotion, about the the first African American Naval Aviator and the Korean War. I liked the movie, and had a fun experience where my knowledge of World War 2 aircraft led me to anticipating some plot points. There was one minor plot that I felt was forced, but overall, I liked it.

Books

I read the next Gregory book, The Other Boleyn Girl, and I’m working on the blog post for that. The book is from the POV of Mary Boleyn, sister of Anne Boleyn, and is the first time we get to see the events of Henry VIII’s life from the Boleyn faction. I’ll leave more for the blog post.

I also read another 30K book, Heralds of the Siege, book 52 of the Horus Heresy series. Like all the other anthologies in the series, some of the short stories were very good, and others were forgettable. And most involved characters we haven’t seen in ten books or so, so I had no idea who they were. But, one more down, twenty to go?

Games

I’m continuing to wrap down the Sunday night game. I’ve only got a few more sessions before it finished up, and I’m hoping I’ve got a good idea how to get a final battle that will be challenging and enjoyable.

The other two games I’m playing in ar moving along. We have an almost TPG (Total Party Kill) on Monday night, so a bunch of us had to replace our characters. It’s a chance to try something new.

What’s Next

On December 10th I’ve got the next Books and Beer Pop-Up Bookstore at the AZ Gallery in St Paul. Other than that I’m working on three book projects and a number of short stories. I want to published at least one book in 2023 if I can get it to work out.

Keep on writing!

Michael

Monthly Update

November Update

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Man, the monthly change really sneaks up on you. No sooner am I planning the update, then BAM, we’re past the first. Well, I’m only a day late to cover what I managed in both September and October.

Writing

I have been making a lot of good writing milestones the last few weeks. I got past the last big issue with Book 3 and I’m writing through that act. Then I’ll have to keep writing into the next act and start ironing out what doesn’t make sense, and iron it into the act before. I’ll have to take a few passes to make it work, but then I’ll finally have my rough draft. The downside is that even though I’m finally over 100,000 words (yay!), a lot of the work ahead is re-writing, so the word count won’t increase as much.

The SciFi and Fantasy novel re-writes are going well. Each is over 20K and progressing daily. Both are a lot stronger than the rough drafts were. It’s nice to be able to jump between them as I need to.

NANOWRIMO Note: My goal for NANOWRIMO is to add 50K words between the three projects. The Book 3 Re-writing will be a bit odd to count, but I’ll make it work.

Movies and TV

I cannot say I watched a lot of new Movies or TV the last two months, in part because I tried not to turn my TV on a lot over October.

I watched through She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, the MCU show on Disney +. I liked the show, especially how the main character kept breaking the fourth wall to share joked with the audience. The misogyny the character experienced was hard to watch, but I don’t think you could tell her story without it. At least the character had a fulfilling arc. I hope to see her in future shows.

Started the Andor show. I’m enjoying it so far, though I’m watching it more for what they’re doing with Mon Motha, the political character, than I am for what they’re doing with Andor. I mean, I like Andor, but I find her arc much more interesting. We’ll see how it turned out.

Books

Read through a five-book young adult series called the Phantasmagoria series, written by a Minnesota author named El Holly. The five books follow five middle schoolers who have to travel to a world of imagination called Phantasmagoria. They go to find balance between the worlds and save both from destruction. They’re books written for a younger audience, so there’s some wackiness in the story and some odd decisions, but it was still a fun series to read through.

I also read through a 40K book called ‘Battle of the Fang’, about the Thousand Sons attack on the Space Wolf homeworld of Fenris. A pretty decent book, as 40K books can go. A lot of cool combat sequences, some fantastic sci-fi, and a bunch of ‘seriously?’ moments. About what I’d expect.

Games

Finished Terran Command and Farcry: Primal. I may go back and finish some of the extras in both, but I don’t have to. I’ve got the stories done and that’s pretty decent. Playing through Epic 40K: Final Liberation, which is a game I played through way back in the 90’s when it first came out. I’m having another experience (like I did with C&C) where I’m playing much more competently now than I did as a child. Very much enjoying the playthrough.

Not much changing on the Role-Playing Game front. My Sunday night ‘Homecoming’ game should be wrapping up soon, so we’ll see if that ends on a high note. Hot Springs Island and Known World are still running great.

What’s Next

Focusing on NANOWRIMO (at least how I’m doing it this year). Got my eye on some conventions and events come the new year, hit 2023 swinging and selling. Keep selling on Fiverr if and when I can. And of course trying to blog more often.

Cheers!

Michael

Monthly Update

September 1st Update

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August becomes September, and summer becomes spring, and authors look at their coffee shop boards and see pumpkin spice. Such is the nature of things.

Writing

Book 3 is just shy of 90,000 words. I am currently working on the middle section, that connects the beginning and end. I am plotting out what needs to happen and working on a map of the area. Once I have it written then I can shift to ironing the story together and getting the rough draft done.

I am working on the Tales of the Templar short story book. I am just finishing up the second story and I’m well into the third. The goal is four to six.

I’m still picking on the Fantasy and Sci-Fi novels when I feel the need to write instead of plot. I worked out the mythology of the fantasy novel and the science of the sci-fi, so now I can get to the writing.

Movies and TV

In August I watched a number of new shows and films. I finally finished off Sherlock, the BBC show with Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman. I saw the first episode back when it came out and it so upset me I did not finish the season until now. The last two episodes were not as bad as I’d feared; I might even go as far as to say they revived my interest in the show.

In terms of movies I watched Bullet Train, the Brad Pitt action/comedy film in the theater. I like it and thought it was a fun film. Worth going to the local cinema to see.

At home I streamed The Batman, the latest Batman film with Robert Patterson. As odd as Patterson is when he’s playing Bruce Wayne, I liked how this entry was a proper detective story. I even like how Batman and Gordon make mistakes in their investigation. Their fallibility added to the story.

Finally, I saw Prey, the latest Predator movie set in the early 18th century and featuring American Indian tribes fighting the sci-fi hunter. Holy crap did that movie rock. I was thrilled the whole time. I’d like to see them do more Predator through the ages movies.

Books

Only got through two books this month, which is kind of disappointing, but they were both longer books.

Three Sisters, Three Queens is the next Philippa Gregory book, following Margaret Tudor, older sister of King Henry VIII and Queen of Scotland. I really liked this book, and I’m working on the book report right now.

The other book I read is Ways and Means, a look at the economics of the American Civil War. Mostly the book followed Salmon Chase as he built up the Federal government’s finances to pay for the ever more expensive civil war. The author also spent time talking about the Confederate banking system and the European responses. These are all things I knew little about, for all my education on the war, and for all the importance economics and finance has on a government’s ability to persecute a war.

Games

Stalled out on Starship Troopers: Terran Command. I hit a mission I haven’t been able to get past yet, but I’m still working on it.

Almost done with a console game, Farcry: Primal, set in Germany in about 5,000 BC. I found this game an interesting take on the normal Farcry build. The gameplay was about the same, but without the array of guns to collect and customize, you were much more reliant on melee weapons and special grenades. Pretty cool., though I’m looking forward to getting back to normal.

My Homecoming game continues into the final chapter. Monday night works into Hot Springs Island. And my charisma character is still doing a good job in the Thursday Night Known World Campaign. So, RPG wise, I’m doing really well.

What’s Next

I’ve got a Books and Beer Event on September 18th at Inbound BrewCo; I will be hosting, but I’ll still have a table and everything. Looking to get some tables going for events the rest of this year and into next, but don’t have anything signed up yet.

Have a seller’s profile on Fiverr. Now I’m building some gigs (services people can purchase from me). Working on graphics and will have those up shortly.

Still writing, still revising, still working.

Cheers!

Michael

Monthly Update

April and May Update

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Apologies. On the first of last month I was at work prepping the office to move that weekend and completely spaced sending an update. It was a long and grueling weekend but we got the office moved and set up. The new place is fantastic and, to my delight, has a coffee shop nearby I can go write at before heading into work. So I’m getting more writing done, which is always fun. So prepare for two-month update.

Writing

Book 3 is well over 50,000 words and closing on 60. I’m largely writing from the two ends to the middle, plugging away at scenes and fitting them in together. The rewrite is going to involve a lot of polishing.

A number of short stories are underway, including a number of Tales of the Templars. The possiblity of a short story collection in my fantasy world, or something of a sci-fi collection, is also appealing to me, since I’m being on my big book writing projects. Hey, it’s words on the page.

Movies/Tv

Haven’t watched too much new stuff the last few months. I did watch through the Last Kingdom, the Netflix show based off my favorite book series, and did a post about it. That was worth watching, and re-watching.

Reading

I started the two-moth period reading through a series of six short stories set in the Battletech universe (science fiction, large robot combat). These short stories dealt with the espionage and special operations the various factions therein did to obtain the plans to build their own battlemechs. They were a good intro to the world (which I know very little about compared to other scifi IPs), but not a lot of exciting mech combat.  

Then came the next book in Philippa Gregory’s series, the Constant Princess, about Katherine of Aragorn, first wife of King Henry VIII. Expect a book review soon.

Finished up a non-fiction book I was reading as research for Book 3. Small Unit Action in Vietnam: Summer 1966 is a collection of reports from squad, platoon and company skirmished and battles in Vietnam. It gave me some good ideas for the fights of book three, though the tech level of the Renaissance Army series is not at the Vietnam levels. Still, a lot of good bits in there.

Ten Tales of a Dark Tomorrow is a collection of science and speculative fiction stories from Keven A Kuhn, a fellow author of the Twin Cities who I befriended doing the Books and Beers events around town. Kevin’s first book, Do You Realize? left me in tears, and this one was just as striking. True, they were some dark tales, but damn if they weren’t good. 

To top off the list of books for the two months are three Warhammer 40K books. One from the Horus Heresy, Slave to Darkness, which was okay. I’ve read it, don’t need to do that again. Devastation of Baal, about the Tyranid invasion of the Blood Angel homeworld, was a fantastic book that felt like a true 40K novel, with heroic characters, alien mindsets, and jackasses I get to see die. The ending is a big deus ex, but against something like the Tyranids it kind of has to be. Finally there’s Gunheads, which pits Imperial Guards against orks. Lots of tank combat, which is fun, and against orks, which is even more fun.

Games

Have not been playing too many story games lately. Working through Warmachine: Tactics, still, but it doesn’t really hold my interest too well. Most of what I’ve played recently has been Surviving Mars and Surviving the Aftermath, two Paradox games about building communities (either on Mars or post-apocalyptic Earth). Both fun, maybe too addictive.

What’s Next

Keep reading and keep writing. I’m gaining traction on Book 3, slowly knocking scenes out and completing acts. If I’m not working on that, I’m working on some other short stories. Now that I’ve got a morning writing routine again, I’m excited to get into some thousand word mornings.

Cheers!