Catching Fire

Looking Into December

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Moving out of NaNoWriMo I’m determined to keep the momentum that NaNo gave me going and increase my productivity from here on out. As I said I’m back on getting Project Apollo finished off and sent to Owen so he can go through it. I’m over halfway with The edits on Apollo now and once it’s done I’ll be going through the notes Chrystalyn Hope and myself have made on The Residents so it’s in my mind for when we start looking at it next year (okay I admit I made some additional notes last night 😛 )

Reading wise I’ve just started Shadows Of The Realm by Dionne Lister, I gave up with Shutter Island. I just couldn’t get into it. It wasn’t a book which was on my radar but Tracie wanted me to watch the movie so I thought I’d read the book first, I couldn’t get into it as I said so I’ll just watch the movie 😀
Shadows Of The Realm has started well and I’m looking forward to diving into it fully. This will be my first attempt at reading a fantasy story so I’m interested to see how I do with it. Normally I like my fiction to be at least modern day and future so it’s a step away from my normal genre.

TV wise I’ve just started working my way through The 4400. I’ve had this for a couple of months now but I’ve not really had a chance to start on it. I’ve got the entire collection so I can watch the entire run of it in my own time. I’m through to the fifth episode now and I’m enjoying it a lot so far.

Tomorrow night I’m off to see Catching Fire which I’m really looking forward to, but movie wise that’s about it for this month. Nothing else had really caught my eye movie wise. Me and Tracie may still try to see Carrie and Gravity is still one I’d like to see.

In the run up to Christmas though I will be mainly focusing on getting Project Apollo sorted, that will be done by Christmas. Oh and I need to finish off my Christmas shopping.

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A Quick Post

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Just a quick post here this morning because I’ve got to get into work early today.

I’ve had a pretty good Bank Holiday weekend in which I finished reading The Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins. This hit my expectations and wrapped the trilogy up really well, I’m kind of gutted its all over now as I enjoyed reading the books. Catching Fire, the second book in the trilogy is out as a movie some time this year so I’m looking forward to that 🙂 I’ve now started reading The Umbrella Conspiracy. This is the first of the Resident Evil novels. I’ve also made a start on volume 1. Of the Judge Dredd Case files. A collection of all of the Judge Dread comics.

Writing on Project Apollo is going okay and me and Owen are working on developing the surrounding universe this is set it.

Right, I’m off to get ready for the day job. Have a good and productive day everyone 🙂

A Quick Update 25/4/13

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Morning all, this post was meant to be written last night but after I finished a bit of planning work I read the end of Catching Fire, The second book in The Hunger Games trilogy. It’s good people, definitely worth a read. The ending is amazing and has set the third book up perfectly. This is definitely a 5-Star book. Once I finished that I read a short story by Cinta Garcia de la Rosa (http://www.cintagarciadelarosa.com/) called A Foreigner In London and this one blew me away. if Catching fire is a 5-Star book due to its epic story line, it’s amazing characters, fascinating universe and awesome writing then A Foreigner In London is a 5-Star piece of work because looks at one persons struggle and we, the reader, feel that struggle. I’m lucky enough to know Cinta, I consider her a very dear friend, but I say this as a reader, she is an amazing writer. To get an emotional response out of me like this book did then she has to be. Please go over to her website and check her out, it’s worth a little of your time.

I started writing lasts night but I got about five lines handwritten, and that took me half an hour, I just could not get my head into gear with writing new fiction so I dived into a bit of planning for the story that I’m planning on writing during NaNoWriMo. I know that’s a few months away but I’m seriously beginning to think that I loose momentum when writing because I’m not getting outlines down on paper before I start so I’m giving this a go.

Good Morning Wednesday!

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Good morning Internet, last night I finished a short story that I wrote a good couple of years ago. My amazing Beta readers had read it last year some time and I finally got through the notes that I was given back, making some of the changes suggested (Including the title of the story) and then I read through it to make sure I was happy with the final draft. I will probably do one last read through in a months time to make sure that its as polished as I can make it. This will not involve any changes to the story of the characters (unless I see a massive mistake). It will be just to make sure the are no typos and so forth.

What next? Well I’m working on something new which will be a short story, although I haven’t planned it out and I’ve only written a handful of words for it so far. That’s what I’m trying to work on during my lunch breaks. I will also start looking at the first of my vampire stories. These I am still thinking about putting into a collection and putting up online, but it is a lot of work and really I’d like to have ten stories included in it and although each is an independent story I’d like there to be a story arc over the collection. So I need to write another five stories and have them all tie in.

I’ve almost finished Catching Fire now, this book is playing havoc with my sleep. I’m about fifty pages off wrapping it up so it should be done by tomorrow 🙂

Project Apollo Outline Is Done

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After a fair bit of work I’ve got the outline for Project Apollo done! Well a rough outline at least. After reading through what I wrote during NaNoWriMo I’ve realised that it is not as bad as I thought. There is bits that obviously need reworking but its not going to take as much effort as I thought it was going to.
Now I’m going to type up the outline and notes and send them off to Owen to see what he thinks. Then i think it will be maybe a little more of a detailed outline and then hopefully we’ll be back on it within a couple of weeks 🙂

I’m making good process with Catching Fire which is the second of the Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins and I’ve been listening to Apocalypse Z: The Beginning Of The End by Manel Loureiro at work. I’ve got about two and half hours to go on it and I’m looking forward to seeing how it ends.

Now I’m off to type it up and email it off to Owen as I watch Star Wars 🙂

Today’s Post 17th April, 2013

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I’m slowly getting there with working out a plan with Project Apollo. What I did during NaNoWriMo (2012) is about 20% of the size of the story, so there’s a lot of work to be done and what I’ve done tonight is really only looking at that first 20% and see what’s working and what is not. I’d say I have an idea of about a third of how I want the story to go and hopefully tomorrow ill get another third loosely mapped out and then the final third on Friday. Then ill talk to Owen and we can add his notes and so on and see what we have left over.

I’m feeling quite productive at the moment. I am trying out a few things to get me to get more writing work done. To set the scene a little let me just say that I work a five and a half day week, the other half a day is normally taken up with little bits and pieces, cleaning out the hen house etc. Saturday nights and Sundays are when I tend to spend as much time as I can with Tracie. So that leaves me with weeknights, about three hours if I get cracking and don’t faff about on Facebook (easier said then done) So what I’m trying at the moment is have a list of things that I want to get done of an evening. So far tonight I have done one, but once I’ve done this blog post that’ll be two 😉 lol the other two items on the list are to check out two writers that have popped up on my radar today. I’ve moved them over to tomorrow’s list as neither are a high priority, I think at the moment getting my own writing stuff sorting is a much more pressing matter.
Come the end of the week anything left on my list will be done Friday night, well, that’s the plan anyway.

As for what I’m reading, I’ve just started the second Hunger Games book, Catching Fire. Check Goodreads to follow my progress with it. That link, and Facebook and Twitter are on the right hand side of the screen.
Speaking of Hunger Games, I’ve just watched the movie of the first book again, as a quick reminder of some of the key points of book one and each item I see a certain actor who’s in this movie I can’t help but think want an amazing actor he is. That is Donald Sutherland. I’ve seen a fair few of his movies and I don’t think I’ve ever seen one where he is bad in it. Sutherland is not only one of the best actors of his generation but, in my humble opinion, he is one of the greatest actors ever.

Taking Insperation

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While at work today I have been listening to On Writing by Stephen King(I have the audiobook not the paper edition). This is his book on the art of writing, but its also a bit of an autobiography. I’ve got about an hour and a half to go of it and it is an amazing listen. King himself narrates it and this gives it a much more heartfelt feel. He is direct and honest with his words and the advice he gives and its Stephen King! The man has written a shed load of books and short stories and is arguably one of the greatest writers of his generation. So it’s not like someone who has only had a couple of little sales here and there.

In the audio version King is also very easy to listen to and I would recommend that people get hold of this version because, as I said earlier it is a very heartfelt reading. What I have taken from it mostly though is inspiration. I will learn many things from this about the craft of writing but it is the sheer love of writing that we get from King that has struck a cord inside of me.

Despite my personal doubts I have been told that I can write and listening to King makes me feel like I am wasting what may be talent but not getting my arse into gear and getting the words on the page. Getting editing done and getting published.

I’ve asked Tracie to tell me to listen to On Writing whenever I feel down about my writing because I think it will inspire me to get cracking once more 🙂

One thing that King said was that writers need to read, this I know but I really need to get into gear and get more read. I’m going to get more audiobooks which will help me get some more good fiction read/listened (see previous post about audiobooks). That said I’m just about to start reading the second Hunger Games book, Catching Fire 🙂

On a more sober note, as I am writing this I am watching news reports about the Boston Marathon bombings. Words fail me when these things happen and my thoughts go out to anyone who is affected by this terrible act.