One of the topics of conversation within my circle of friends the past weekend is hard work, and how hard work doesn’t always yield results. I have to remind myself about this lately. Writing triggers joint and muscle pains for me, so when I’m curled up in pain after writing 2.5 epic fantasy novels within …
Read more “Managing Expectations…Another Self-Motivational Post”
Just a quick plug for my friend Andrew Rowe Steven Kelliher: If you’ve got no idea what’s up the The Landkist Saga, the short sell is that it’s an epic fantasy set in a dark world with an Eastern flair. It was partly inspired by the works of Hayao Miyazaki, namely Princess Mononoke, and has …
Read more “Release Day–The Emerald Blade for 99c! The first book, Valley of Embers is FREE”
By the time this blog post rolls out, and if I’m still alive and/or kept to my schedule like I’m supposed to, I should be nearing the halfway point of The Ikessar Falcon, Book 2 of Annals of the Bitch Queen. Right now, I’m only about 5k words in. Which isn’t a lot, but I only …
Read more “Thoughts on Writing While Working On The Ikessar Falcon”
My parents come from interesting backgrounds. My father was the middle son of a self-made furniture maker, who was able to establish shop in rural Philippines. Although life was plain, they had it well enough–my grandfather preached about the values of hard work, discipline, and precision, which culminated to my father becoming an engineer. My mother’s …
Harsh truth for a young writer: adhering to writing rules can’t actually help you find your voice. Avoiding cliches, “showing” instead of telling, using the active voice instead of passive voice…all this stuff…can’t help you create work with depth. They’re GOOD to know, but good storytelling goes beyond basic writing mechanics. Way, way beyond. Which …
Read more “My Take on Writing Rules, a.k.a. Paint by Numbers Novels”
