No-Nonsense Reviews - First There Wasn't, Then There Was by Troy Blackford

Pros
+ Brilliantly written and difficult to put down
+ Gripping story
+ Unexpectedly emotional

YMMV
+/- Near-impossible to categorise

To be honest, this is the most difficult book I've ever tried to review or describe.  It's just... so different, and that's not a bad thing.  It's just a little awkward in this situation, because many parts of it that make it so remarkable would be giving away spoilers.

It's well written and very difficult to put down once you've started it, but as it's quite short it's a two or three hour read.  The story flits from the present to the past, but the interruptions are well done and although I was a bit dubious about the modern-day office boys to begin with, they grew on me and shared my sense of "wait, I want to know what happens!"  Each chapter is masterfully finished, which only compounded the issue of "can't put it down!"

At one point, I was a bit confused to find myself crying at it.

I'm not sure whether it's a supernatural story, or a metaphysical one, or a metaphor for something and to be honest, I don't really care. (Although for me, I liked to take it at face value as a supernatural story.)

It's a bloody good read.

• First There Wasn't, Then There Was on Goodreads
• Buy First There Wasn't, Then There Was at Amazon

The Rose Queen

I used to take part in NaNoMangO, a twice-yearly comics event in the vein of NaNoWriMo, only instead of 50,000 words in a month the object was to draw 30 pages.  I very rarely finished NNMO, mind.  My best was to complete 30 pages of two projects in the month; one of my worst is probably The Rose Queen in 2010, where I managed—drumroll please—

—two pages!

The problem was, aside from the fact that I decided to not only sketch it, but line and colour it (bad idea), that beyond the faintest outline of the story I had no idea what was happening.  I knew it involved a man boarding a ship to steal the Rose Queen, and he didn't exactly know what the Rose Queen was.  It would turn out to be a woman.

That's it.  That's all I had.  The whole premise, and both characters names, was based around a newsreader's vocal stumble and something I misread.   It's no wonder I only got to two pages.

In a fit of procrastination driven by a bout of something that could be a cold, or could be 'flu (shush), I sat in the conservatory that was, for once, fairly warm, and felt sorry for myself rather than write.

The next thing I knew, the Rose Queen was a man instead of a woman.

And a whole new world of questions suddenly opened up, ones that hadn't existed four years ago, and I could (can) barely keep up with them.

There are a lot more now

This is odd for me.  Normally a story starts to grow in my head, and I ignore it until I'm ready to do something with it.  This one has crashed headlong through the ceiling and is giving me funny looks.

The oddest thing has to be the characters.  I had a vague idea about and a 3D version of Admiral Fayth, and a 3D version of the female Rose Queen that I've since lost (I think it's on another computer), but no grasp of their personalities.  Now, with RQ's sex change he's developed a personality—and a strong sense of sarcasm—and, even odder, he and Fayth are getting along so well that I've got unsolicited sex scenes floating around in my imagination.

I'm starting to think I need to imagine a bucket of cold water.

So now my question is: wait until I know what's going on, or start writing and pray it comes to me?  And more to the point, will these boys actually let me wait?

As a bonus, here is RQ dressed up... or down? for Easter.  He wasn't particularly amused about it.

Who says procrastination is always a bad thing?

Craft Sunday: The Nekkid Box

I say 'Craft Sunday', but it's only going to be an occasional thing.

I bought this box online a few days ago, because I need somewhere to put the necklaces I keep buying and not wearing.  It's just a cheap balsa-wood thing and the corner decoration is glued on rather than properly secured, but I'm (hopefully) intending to decorate it up and make it suitably steampunky.

I'm not wholly sure how to yet though!

One thing I'd definitely like to do is get some material (possibly felt?) and line the inside, padding it a little with cotton wool to protect the contents, although I'm not quite sure what colour yet, and it all kinda depends on what I can find.  I'm hoping for some kind of deep orange-brown, rich red or coppery.  Here's hoping that I can find something particularly steampunk, but I'm not holding my breath for that.

For the box itself, I'm not sure (big surprise), but I was considering staining the box in two different colours, a light one for a suitable pattern—I'll probably be generic and work out a cog design—and a dark one for the rest of the box, but I'm always open to suggestions.

As to the corners, I'm not quite sure what to do about them.  Glue isn't exactly anachronistic, but it doesn't really fit the style of the box/project.  I don't know whether to try to remove the corners entirely and screw them in instead, sand down the glue and somehow fake a screw head, or leave them be.

So, this is my 'nekkid box', a bare canvas for ideas... when I have some.  It's likely to be the start of next month when I actually try to work on it, since that's when I'll be heading into Nottingham to meet up with friends/writers, but there'll be photos of anything fun I can find and when I actually get cracking.

I don't know whether I'm looking forward to it or dreading it...

No-Nonsense Reviews - Nothing Save The Bones Inside Her by Clayton Lindemuth

Pros
+ Well written and immediately attention-catching
+ Impressive sense of foreboding
+ Very, very difficult to put down

YMMV
+/- Some sections possibly not for the squeamish
+/- Moral is a little heavy-handed near the end

Cons
- "Aughhhh noooo" (that was actually in my notes)

I have to start this by saying that if I'd known that this was a Christian novel, I probably wouldn't have bought it.  That says a lot more about me than it does about the book, which I could not put down to save my life.

The author describes it as "rural noir", which seems a more suitable category as one thing it is, is most definitely dark.  It grabbed me as soon as I started reading and refused to let go despite the feeling of doom that started very soon.  That's not to say it smacked me over the head with the foreboding; instead it builds gradually, until I realised that yes, things really were going to get that bad.

The characters were either likeable, in their own ways, or were well-written enough that I didn't mind that they were loathsome (and some really are), and yes, my note really does say "aughhhh noooo" in near-incoherent scribble, which was jotted down around the halfway mark and which I can't say any more about for fear of spoiling it.  I'll just say that later on in the book, I realised that the main character's path was going to be just a little different from what I'd expected...  The moral did become a little heavy-handed later, but it was only for one section and by then I was so hooked it didn't really matter.

It's probably not a book for the squeamish.  It starts out violently enough and while it's neither sustained or gets particularly worse, the times it does appear made even me go "huh..."

If you're not a fan of 'Christian fiction' (and this isn't like others I've read, believe me), call this one "supernatural" instead, it's equally fitting, but give it a try nonetheless.

• Author page for Nothing Save The Bones Inside Her
• Goodreads page for Nothing Save The Bones Inside Her

Collecting Pen-Based Addictions

(Oh look, I'm remembering to post on the right day!)

Like a lot of writers, I'm a bit of a stationery nut.  My favourite places in Nottingham involve either books or stationery (and the best kinds of places contain both), but until recently I mostly contained it to notebooks.

I think, between here and Twitter, I've documented fairly well my love of all things gel pen, particularly of the novelty kind, and my undying adoration for the Copic atyouSpica glitter pens (also known as my preciousssss).  But recently, my pen-based addiction has taken a darker, more sinister turn...

Lamy fountain pens.

(Did you think I meant sniffing permanent markers?)

My friends Claire and Danni are big, big stationery fans (I am but an apprentice in the art) and one of the things that they both mention, now and again, are Lamy pens.  They come in different varieties: not only fountain, but ballpoint and pencil too, and in various different styles and themes and, in the end, my curiosity won out.

I've not used a fountain pen in... well, over a decade, not since I was 14 or so, and I've never bought any of my own, so when I became curious I turned to them for advice and in the end bought a Lamy Nexx (the grey one) and a Safari (the blue).  I have suitable ink cartridges to go with them, and a couple of converters that allow me to use bottled inks—one of which I wrote The Fair Automaton with, and covered myself with it in the process—and, to my surprise, I've been getting on really well with them.

Recently Lamy brought out a new special edition AL-star pen in a particularly violent shade of coral.  Pink isn't really my colour, but while I was looking at it my eye was caught by the beautiful colour of the bluegreen AL-star and... well, let's just say that as you can see, my tiny pen family has grown, and my non-too-fondness of pink didn't stop me from buying two sets of limited-edition coral cartridges either.  And, of course, where there's a pen order there's other stuff too, and I seem to have found myself the owner of three Rhodia notebooks I didn't quite intend to buy (they leapt into the cart themselves, honest!) and a pretty nifty mechanical pencil that rotates itself every time you use it.

So it looks like I've picked up another addiction, to go with my sparkle-pen one and my gel pen habit...  because where there's fountain pens, there has to be a healthy range of inks to go with it!  And on the up side, at least it means I'm physically writing a lot more now, even if none of it seems to be related to what I'm supposed to be finishing this month (sorry, all two readers of Three Graces, it's not the sequel yet).

I'd say I think the guilty parties responsible for this particular addiction know what they've done, but I also think they're both quite gleeful about it really...

No-Nonsense Reviews - The Phoenix Conspiracy by Richard L. Sanders

Pros
+ Technically well written, for the most part
+ Nice cover

Cons
- Drags on too long
- Generally unlikeable characters
- Plodding pacing that never changes
- A prime example of telling, not showing
- I might as well have played Mass Effect and had fun

As part of my intention of making a dent in my unread Kindle books, I started reading this one because the cover looked interesting.

I wish I'd chosen something else instead.

While technically well written--up until the last quarter of the book, anyway--the interest piqued by the opening chapter soon goes out the window.  Calvin Cross is, it seems, intended to be a quirky and intelligent character but instead comes across as arrogant and stupid, doing things for no real reason.  Not enough time is spent with his crew, ostensibly his friends, to give you any real reason to care about them, and the love interest Summers Presley is a downright unpleasant woman.

Plot points are introduced that go nowhere and serve little purpose other than to give the main character a free source of information; I presume they're intended to be elaborated on later in the series.  At one point a minor character is revealed to speak an alien language, which is promptly disregarded a couple of pages later when they meet a friendly alien and never mentioned again.  I was actively hoping for some characters to get killed.

The main issue is that the whole novel felt like an overlong Mass Effect fanfic with the names changed.  Well, some names: I assume the passing reference to an "Alenko" was intended to be humour, but combined with some others I can link to the game series, I'm not sure.

The writing started out well, insofar as sentences were structured well and contained correct punctuation, but the pacing never changed.  There was an attempt to punch-up some sentences in the last quarter but they seemed to mostly consist of putting full stops in the middle of a sentence. And then carrying on like nothing had happened.

I really wanted to like it.  On the surface it has everything I love in a sci-fi novel, but on the whole I wish I'd just dusted off Mass Effect again.

• Goodreads page for The Phoenix Conspiracy
• Richard L. Sanders' store page for The Phoenix Conspiracy

My Spare Time (Not All That Spare)

First off, apologies for the fact I seem to have forgotten that I usually blog on Tuesdays.  It doesn't much  help that I actually thought today was also Tuesday and I'm now slightly concerned to find it's Wednesday.

I'm not sure I actually remember Tuesday.  This is the downside to working from home: all the days seem to blur together.

Victoria 4, based on the singer Nana Mizuki

I've been writing (and traumatising my teachers with my stories) since I was a child, but the other pastime I have is a little more recent... relatively speaking.  For at least seven years now I've had an interest in 3D artwork.

That makes it sound like some sort of therapy introduction, doesn't it?  Arguably it can become quite addictive; you can certainly lose a lot of time in it without meaning to.  I'm not a talented 3D modeller—what little I can do revolves around clothing and I'm appalling at making it follow the figure afterwards—so a lot of what I end up using is made by other artists and is sold via online stores such as Daz3D and Renderosity.  That doesn't mean, however, I have to be constrained by those.

You can also buy things called texture packs, which can be either a pre-made set of textures for a specific item, or a set of flat photographs that you can apply to any model you wish.  Some come with settings that turn them into seamless tiles—meaning the image can be repeated into infinity, theoretically, if your model was large enough—and others are literally just photos that you can use to make your own textures.  You can even take photographs of your own and use those.

'Ring' for the JSF Onepiece

If you're a fashion-minded person, you can create your own textures in Photoshop too and then apply them to outfits.  It requires different skills to straight-up rendering, but is a different way to personalise outfits and scenes.  (It also takes me ages and I struggle with inspiration, so I only do it infrequently.)

'Ring', to the left, is one texture I made for an outfit called the Japanese Style Fashion Onepiece and released free for other people with the same outfit to use.  The bodice section is made from a photo of my own leather trousers; a subtle pattern in the red came from a notebook, and the design was done painstakingly in Photoshop—arguably more difficult than the slow but straightforward process of making the texture itself.

Dokkalfa Milos London (and his arse)

3D is in essence like digital photography, only instead of hiring the model, telling them what to wear, lighting them and photographing (I'm over-simplifying the process, I know), I have instead to make the model male or female, put skin on them while trying to ensure it looks semi-realistic or at least suits the scene, dress them, manually pose them and their outfit, find (or design, if I use a Pixar-style program like Garibaldi—something I used for David's stubble on the Three Graces cover) suitable hair, ensure that all the textures work well, light the scene and render it.  For something a lot of people deride as "easy", it's a lot of hard work.

To me, at least, the end results are worth it.  I don't have to trawl around the internet hunting for a photograph that resembles my character and then worry about acquiring the rights to it if I want to use it in an image.  Instead I make the figure resemble my character, and I can then render at any resolution.  This is particularly handy for characters like my dokkalfa Milos, who would require more effort in Photoshop with a photograph than I ever have to put into a render, especially now I've got his settings how I want them.

It's time-consuming to do, requires practice (like most things!) and may one day kill my laptop, but it's a remarkably enjoyable way to kill time.  Even if I have grossly over-simplified it here!

If this sounds interesting, you can find information for beginners on Smith Micro's Beginner's Poser Tutorials or HubPages' Daz Studio Tutorial.  Daz Studio is a free program you can pick up here; Poser Debut is $49.99 from Content Paradise and the more fully-equipped Poser 10 is $129.99.

National Stationery Week, Day 7

Dear readers,

No, you've not accidentally missed out a day.  I was in Nottingham with my friends / local National Novel Writing Month writers yesterday, so there's no #NSW14 Day 6 post for yesterday.  But don't worry, you're not missing anything: it was Get Organised Day, so you'd only have seen another photo of my (still tidy) desk, with the words "this is as organised as I'll ever get".

Well, not quite.  I have a To-Do list and Daily Chores on HabitRPG, and that is probably as organised as I'll ever get.

Today (Day 7) is Write A Letter Day, and it's not something I do very often.

Actually, I can't remember the last time I wrote one (I don't think birthday cards count).

So you, lovely readers, are getting a letter.  They're not much different to blog posts, are they?  (Or, at least, not in my case.  Sorry about that.)

Although, if anyone would like an actual letter from me, handwritten (probably in a weird colour, possibly with sparkles) on actual paper, sent through the post with a stamp and everything, please drop me a DM on Twitter and I'd be more than happy to send one, complete with terrible handwriting and... hell, if you want, I'd even write flash fiction for you.  All addresses would be confidential and would only be used to write to you all of once etc. etc., blah blah, seriously I spend my day job swatting spam, I've got no interest in adding to it.  Especially not through the post.  Junk mail is a pain in the arse.  I'm also not a burglar, won't sell your details, really won't stalk you (too much effort and it'd mean leaving the house) and so on.

There's not really much else to say, is there?  I was very restrained yesterday, I didn't buy any more notebooks.  I did buy two Andrzej Sapkowski novels though, and a worrying amount of comics, and the gift of the entire Game of Thrones novel series from a friend.

And DVDs.  Lots of DVDs.  Turns out Hansel And Gretel, Witch Hunters is a pretty terrible film that's funny for all the wrong reasons, but The Lone Ranger is actually a pretty funny and very enjoyable movie.  Even if Armie Hammer is three years younger than me.

I feel old.

Now I'd say it's probably a good time to sign off, so have fun and take care of yourselves.  This returns you to the usual (sensible) blogging schedule for the foreseeable future.

Best regards and all that,

Pax

No-Nonsense Reviews - Blackout by Emily Barr

Pros
+ Short, fast-moving story
+ Interesting plot twists
+ Large, easy-to-read font
+ Interesting presentation

YMMV
+/- Slightly implausible ending

Cons
- Very few contractions in writing makes it feel stilted and simplified

I picked up this book at Waterstones on a whim without knowing anything about the author and little about the plot as the blurb isn't exactly detailed--but for £1 you can hardly go wrong.  I finished it in around an hour (they really are quick reads).

It didn't start entirely promisingly as the writing felt a bit stilted, but once beyond the first chapter things picked up and I found that I couldn't tear myself away.  The change in font between present and past sections was jarring but made it clear at a glance exactly when things were happening, and the starkness of the font for the past sections was an interesting choice given the plot.

It doesn't take long for you to start feeling sorry for Sophie and the plot moves at a fair lick, being well paced despite the slightly odd way it's written.  It manages to keep you on her side despite the events of the past and you root for her in the present sections, although the ending came a little quickly and I wasn't wholly sure I believed in it.

Nonetheless, it was an enjoyable way to while away an hour or so.

• Goodreads page for Blackout

National Stationery Week, Day 5

Today is Pencil Case Day, which is quite a difficult one for me.  Honestly, I haven't had a pencil case since I left school, and gods only know where that one is.  It was a plain metal flip-lid case that I glued cut-out anime pictures on and covered with plastic.  Now and again I'd peel off the plastic, change the images and re-cover it.

I was actually 17 or 18 at the time, so it's even more pathetic than it sounds.

Since then I haven't bothered with one, for the simple reason I never needed to.  My house is littered with pens, pencils and large tins of crayons, and somewhere there's a toolbox full of acrylics and gouache, but I haven't seen that in years either so I think it's taken itself off in disgust.  Most stationery just floats around on desks or in drawers.

However!  Very recently I did splurge on a Kokuyo NeoCritz Transformer pencil case, in order to keep my inking pens in line.  They were spilling over the case of the unused desktop and I'm fairly sure they were planning a rebellion with the Cocoiro pens, but now they're neatly penned away in their own case.

It keeps them all together, is perked up by four OHTO Smile Slide Clips—I didn't buy them to clip paper together, they were just so cute I wanted to own them—and they're chaperoned by Barkvolio, my furry bookmark who's currently on sabbatical while I work my way through some ebooks.

I no longer have to clatter around fishing out the right pen for the line I'm drawing and it keeps everything in line so efficiently I'm actually tempted to buy another to keep the gel pens in...

Not too bad for my first pencil case in twelve years.

National Stationery Week, Day 4

After all the excitement of yesterday's Pen & Ink day (well, my excitement, anyway!), today is a more relaxed and sedate affair.

Allegedly.

Today is Tidy Desk Day, a kick up the arse for people like me who just seem to attract mess.  Papers everywhere, notebooks left and right, an abandoned crochet project with my PC screwdriver wedged in it and my latest stationery order strewn across the disused desktop (not mine—the desktop, that is; the pens definitely are).

There are times I think I should stuff a "Where's Wally" figure in there and be done with it.

So, in honour of Tidy Desk day I caved in and... well, tidied.  They say a tidy desk is the sign of a tidy mind, although back when I worked in an office it was actually a sign of having nothing to do.

I'm hoping that at least in this case a tidy desk will actually lead to being able to write without having to dig around desperately for something every ten minutes or so.  Although it probably can't do anything for chronic procrastination or mild ADD.

Yes that is an old cellphone propping Sixteen up.

And I have to admit, it does look better tidy.  Not least because now I have space to display Shiki; he's no longer wedged down the side of the desktop gathering dust—since being almost completely black and glossy means he shows it to perfection.  At least Akira is predominantly grey and it blends in with him.

While I'm more sure than ever that a tidy desk has nothing to do with a tidy mind, since mine's as cluttered as ever, it does feel nice to not feel penned (ahah) in again.

We'll see how long it lasts this time!

Tomorrow: Pencil Case Day.

National Stationery Week, Day 3: The Fair Automaton

Day 3 is Pen & Ink Day, which meant undertaking a special project: a short Steampunk romance story, handwritten with a Lamy fountain pen in Ancient Copper ink (a recommendation from the lovely KenouniRenashin, and very aptly named).

There are many different kinds of pen and ink, not just of the writing variety, so there are also two illustrations, done with my trusty Copics, inked with Microns and embellished with a Gelly Roll metallic pen.  Although I don't draw too much any more, and I usually avoid fancy handwriting like the plague (downside of writing like a drunken spider normally), they've been really fun to draw.

So, without further ado, you can find the opening two paragraphs just here and the story and illustrations proper under the "read more" (please be aware they're quite large).  I hope you enjoy it, and that my handwriting isn't too terrible!

National Stationery Week, Day 2

I lied to you yesterday: today is not Pen & Ink Day, but Notepad Day.

I have a love-hate relationship with notepads.  I accumulate them without really trying, to the point where I had to start using them because I had developed a hefty pile that had no chance of ever diminishing.  I am, or at least was, primarily a laptop kind of person who carried all their plotlines in their head.

This is all well and good until you start becoming ancient and decrepit, like me.  I figured there might be a problem when I forgot the name of AU!Alex's sister.  (For the record, and before I forget again, it's Melia.)  That's when the ever-growing stack of notebooks starts to look like a good idea.

They have another purpose too, one I wouldn't have believed a couple of years ago: I actually use them for plotting.  Whether it's just a list of prompts I'm using for chapters, like the Unravel AUs, or full-blown semi-detailed plots as I've done for the still-untitled Kirill stories, they've turned out to be remarkably handy and I'm now starting to get through them.  Well, some of them.  There's nine around me at the minute that are unused, three of which are likely to stay that way forever.  *cough*BeautifulPaperblanksbooks*cough*

No, those serve another purpose: my ridiculous 'artistic' photography.  The thing with Paperblanks notebooks (such as the filigree ones to the right) is that they are stupidly beautiful and make for a variety of stunning photos, even in the amateur hands of people like myself.  Combined with other items, such as jewelry from my favourite online store, and you can end up with some surprisingly lovely pictures.

I daren't actually use those though.  I'd need to be sure of both a fantastic idea and the sudden ability to write neatly and coherently.  I just like looking at them and trying not to think about the price.

No, the ones I use for writing usually come from The Works.  They're still attractive, but they aren't so expensive that I'd panic about messing them up... which is quite handy, because my notes are always anything but clear, or even sometimes legible.  They're usually written in my favourite atyouSpica pens with different colours for different sections.  Plots, for example, are in purple; notes are orange.  Pre-considered sections are green, while new ones are red.

The book at the front on the left with the pink handwriting (solely my Kuretake Zig Cocoiro letter pen with brush nib) is for my book review notes when I read, although sorely neglected at the minute.  The book at the back contains the first draft of the story I wrote for National Stationery Week.  Everything else is, unusually for me, plot-related for several different stories.

Tomorrow: Pen & Ink Day, for real this time!