Reading List 2016

I don't really use Goodreads any more, so I have to record my 2016 reading progress here.

It was a slow start to the year: I kept trying to read books but somehow I was unable to get into any of the several I'd started.  But about three quarters of the way through March I bought two books by Oscar de Muriel mostly because they had interesting covers.  It took me a little while to get into the first, The Strings of Murder, but once I did I finished it at a phenomenal rate and started the second, A Fever of The Blood, immediately after.  That one stalled a little in the middle but when I finished it I was really disappointed that it had been published this year, as now I have to wait for the next one to be written...

After that, I finished off The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman.  It was an okay book that could have used better editing: the story only started to get interesting just over halfway through and the ending was an inconclusive disappointment.  I have no idea if there is a sequel, or if there had been one intended before the weird ending.

Then it was onto a spot of non-fiction, with How To Manage Your Slaves by Jerry Toner / Marcus Sidonius Falx which is... well, exactly that: how to buy and manage your slaves in the ancient Roman empire--but delivered with a sense of humour.  Ah, the joys of research.

After that I moved on to The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra by Vaseem Khan, a very lovely book I read a review of in the Daily Mail (don't shoot me) and then forgot the title of.  I had to explain the book to the very nice man in Waterstones who knew exactly which one I meant--and couldn't remember its title either.  He had to Google it, then trotted off to find it on the shelf, came back when it wasn't there, had another look on the system, then located it on a table near the door...  But it was well worth the hunting.

As well as reading that, I read Hitman Anders and The Meaning Of It All by Jonas Jonasson, bought from WH Smith because I spotted it while ordering some pastels.  It's a peculiar and enjoyable novel that isn't quite what you expect it to be when you read the description.

I also managed to finish Snuff by Terry Pratchett, which I'd started last year but for the life of me just could not get into, which was a tiny bit distressing.  It seems that the opening quarter or fifth or so is just quite boring though, and once past that I really enjoyed it.

Then it was Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett which was, I think, a fitting end to the main Discworld stories.  I still have the last Tiffany Aching book to go but... I'll read that when I'm feeling a little less sad, I think.

So it's onto The Girl On The Train by Paula Hawkins, which I picked up at Waterstones for the very reasonable price of £4, as it was half price.  And who can say no to a half-price book?  it was a better book than I’d anticipated too.  I don’t often read straight-up thriller-type novels because I guess the endings too well, but I enjoyed this — even if I guessed the ending before I was a third of the way through the book.  One thing I didn’t expect was to like the main narrator so much: I’d seen people comment about how unlikeable she was, but she was... well, human, and I appreciated her fallibility.

After that is Storm Front by Jim Butcher, book 1 of The Dresden Files, although it felt a little more like I was several books in and had missed out on some things.  Sometimes I enjoy that feeling but in this case it was a little frustrating, even if I did enjoy the book a lot more than I expected I would.  Still, I’m glad to cross this one off my TBR pile, as it’s been glaring down from the top of the bookcase for a couple of years now — I just wish I wasn’t planning on adding the next one along to it.

Boneshaker by Cherie Priest was given to me by a friend who hadn’t enjoyed it.  I can sort of see why.  In some ways it’s enjoyable and the author has a way with words, but it takes too long to get going, I didn’t care too much about the characters, plot twists were apparent a mile off and both the identity of one character and the ending in general were incredibly anticlimactic.

Next up was The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, again given to me for the same reason by the friend who hadn’t enjoyed the previous book.  It’s all written in present tense which sometimes I don’t notice, and other times suddenly lunges out at me and feelings glaringly obvious, but that mostly settles by the end of the book.  Of particular irritation is the author’s continual use of the word ‘chile’ instead of ‘chilli’ for the pepper.  Yes, it’s a nonstandard spelling but I just keep scanning it as the country and then need to reread the line again.  On the whole the book is... odd, with some peculiar pacing and with an ending I found somehow unsatisfactory but can’t exactly put my finger on why.

In the middle of reading that (it was a slog), I also read The Uncommoners: The Crooked Sixpence by Jennifer Bell.  It has some grammatical issues and managed to confuse me by referring to one character as having green eyes, then three pages later stating they’re brown, then half a book later saying they were green again.  This was a problem given a particular plot point; I didn’t know whether I could actually trust the character until I got to the end and realised it was just an error.  Proofreading fail from Penguin, but they’ve been accumulating black marks on that front for a while now so I guess it should be no surprise.  Those aside, it was an enjoyable YA book with an interesting premise—which sounds like damning with faint praise given the aforementioned complaint, but it is an enjoyable book, it just needed more care given to it.

Onto Fool Moon by Jim Butcher, because it turned out I couldn’t be in a bookshop and not buy the next three books.  Then Grave Peril, which had me spending ages fretting about the fate of one character, and then Summer Knight.  And now I’m out of Dresden books again...

So it’s onto Stephen King’s Cell that I picked up cheap in a small bookstore in the Broadmarsh and which I enjoyed immensely.  Now King has achieved a kind of literary fame it seems like critics fall over themselves to call his books ‘thrillers’, but let’s be honest here: this is a lovingly-crafted horror.  It plays on those popular little fears about technology and I couldn’t put it down.  I can’t decide if I’d have liked a little explanation about how it all happened or not, as I liked how it ended anyway...

I picked up the next book cheap in the same bookstore too, and it’s another Stephen King: Full Dark, No Stars, which is a collection of four excellent short stories, with one bonus story.  Needless to say, I enjoyed them all a lot.

After that, I had a small interlude when I was reading two books at once, which then became three.  I started with Jim Butcher’s The Aeronaut’s Windlass, the first of a new series.  In some ways it was reminiscent of the Ketty Jay series by Chris Wooding, particularly in the relationship between two characters, but it was also very much its own beast.  Butcher always describes Harry’s cat wonderfully in the Dresden books and this time was just as fantastic.  Rowl really stole many of the scenes he was in, but I grew very attached to all the characters and I’m very much looking forward to the next book.

I was also reading M. C. Beaton’s The Quiche of Death, the first in the Agatha Raisin novels I bought my mother while she was ill.  I’m still reading it but I’m enjoying it a lot: it’s moved from being my ‘Downstairs’ book to replacing The Aeronaut’s Windlass as my ‘Upstairs’ book.  They’re quite short books with sparse prose, but humorous and Agatha is definitely a character and a half...

I bought Alice by Christina Henry while I was waiting for my new phone’s new sim card to activate (turns out it’s dangerous letting me even be in the same city as a book shop) and started reading it in the Nottingham Waterstones’ Costa cafe.  It’s a simplistically written (moreso than Lewis Carroll’s style, which I think was what was aimed for) but enjoyable new version of Alice in Wonderland, although not one for the faint of heart.  I devoured it in a couple of days.

As such I then moved on to the next book by Christina Henry, Red Queen, although so far I’ve not made much progress through it.

At the same time, I also started Ransom Riggs’ Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children, which I’ve been meaning to buy ever since I read the beautiful comic version illustrated by Cassandra Jean (the second of which I'm waiting to arrive...!).  I rather wish I’d bought it sooner, as it’s very well written and honestly I’m struggling to put it down...

This will, of course, be updated again once I finish it... or remember to, at any rate.

No Self-Control and WiPpet Wednesday

I shouldn't be allowed to keep my computers and my debit card near each other, and particularly not when I'm not exactly feeling cheery.  I end up... buying things.  And I forget to read the dimensions on the things I'm buying, so when they arrive I get a bit of a surprise.

At least it gives me things to play with on my desk.

...Not that I can be trusted on that front either...

Still got very little on the actual writing front done, though at some point I know I'm going to have to stop staring at one of these stories and start writing.  At least the characters are still fidgeting around in my head and providing new revelations—for instance, one did actually deign to tell me his name was Demiah and he has heterochromia, so now I at least know what he looks like.  Always useful.

In non-writing news, although I've not resumed work on the other four (*sigh*) crochet projects, I did sit down yesterday and crochet a cuddly bunny.  It was kind of an experiment, to see if it'd be feasible to make some for my NaNoWriMo group, but he was too fiddly and time consuming: around five hours total, start to finish and finding eyes etc.  Plus, making him used almost all of a 50g ball of yarn, soooo...

And halfway through it I remembered stray fibres really don't play so well with my sinuses, so that wasn't much fun either.

Ahh, it's been such an exciting week.

WiPpet Wednesday

WiPpet Wednesday is K. L. Schwengel's brilliant blog hop, where everyone shares snippets of their works in progress with just one twist: the snippet must in some way relate to the date!  It's a lot of fun (I say this every week, don't I?  Well, it's true) and you can sign up and read other participants' WiPpets here.

Apropos of last week, I meant to reply to everyone's comments but somehow it got away from me...  I should say that RQ isn't a crossdresser in the everyday, 21st century meaning of the term.  It's a little hard to explain, but (as I'll no doubt go into further detail on later), he was born on and has lived his entire life on an orbital space station—and a quite particular one at that, but that's a little spoileriffic—with its attendant lack of access to anything other than plain, functional clothes that are assigned to pretty much everyone on board.

...In short, as far as RQ's concerned, if the clothes fit and look good on him, he couldn't care less who they were intended for.  This in no way reflects personal reasons for my general horror over clothing stores and their layouts, of course.  And Fayth certainly isn't complaining.  :p

It's the 3rd June today (and a surprisingly humid day too), and as a result my maths is 3 × 6 = 18, plus 2 from the year for a total of 20 paragraphs.  They don't follow exactly on from where I last posted, I skipped a little bit about Fayth asking why RQ was kidnapped for his gardening skills so I could have a section instead that shows how sheltered RQ actually is...

When he looked up again, it was with a proud smile that took Fayth’s breath away. “I’m the only person who can grow Halfeti roses in space.”

Fayth stared blankly at him.

He’d feared his incomprehension would dim the man’s pride; instead, the Rose Queen grinned. “They’re black roses, hence the name.”

Well, that made sense, as much as anything plant-related did, although it didn’t necessarily answer one important thing: “but... Queen?”

The Rose Queen shrugged. “I know as much as you do about that. It’s probably the hair. It usually is.”

It was so, so difficult to resist the urge to lean across and run his fingers through the glossy black strands, but Fayth had already seen how unexpected contact seemed to make him nervous, and with good reason judging from the events of a few hours before. Still, he couldn’t help imagining touching it, envisioning it spread behind him like a dark halo as he lay, sweet and compliant and beautifully naked, on the floor beneath him—

He hurriedly turned his attention to the navigation panel. “Maybe it was to throw people off the scent.” His voice sounded thicker than it should; he swallowed a few times, trying desperately to clear his mind. “You know, to make sure people were looking for a woman, not for a man.”

“Maybe.” The Rose Queen didn’t sound convinced.

Fayth waited until it was clear no further answer was forthcoming, then busied himself with re-checking their co-ordinates for the fourth time in as many minutes. No change; big surprise. He leaned forward to flick to another exterior camera.

The Rose Queen murmured something in surprise and reached out toward Fayth’s hand, pausing when Fayth froze. “Can I look?”

“At what?”

“Your knuckles,” he said, frowning at the hand in question. “When you hit—there was blood. You hurt yourself.”

“Oh, yeah. That.” Swallowing again, he let the Rose Queen very gently take his right hand and turn it this way and that. “My nanites are pretty good. I was fixed up within a minute.”

His frown deepened. “Nanites?”

Some people might be suspicious of them, but pretty much everyone Fayth had ever met at least knew what they were. How could the Rose Queen not? It was Fayth’s turn to frown at nothing in particular, the feeling of the Rose Queen’s skin on his own momentarily forgotten. “Yeah. You know.” But his mystified expression made it obvious he didn’t. “Tiny robots designed to repair any scratches or scrapes I get... or pretty much anything else so long as it’s not too badly damaged. They even fix diseases.”

The Rose Queen dropped his hand like it burned. “Really?” His voice filled with either distaste or panic, and Fayth wasn’t sure which. “They’re inside you? Can they get out?”

“Well, I assume I lose some when I sweat or sneeze or whatever, but they replicate to keep up a steady supply, so—what?”

Horror was written plainly across the other man’s face. “I could catch them from you?”

“No!” He laughed, unsure whether to be amused or just slightly insulted. “No, they’re hardcoded to my DNA. They won’t work for anyone else so don’t worry, you’re safe.”

“Oh...” The Rose Queen breathed, taking possession of Fayth’s hand again to stare more closely at his knuckles. There was no trace of the graze beyond some flecks of dried blood staining the back of his hand, which the Rose Queen flaked away with one nail.

Shiny Distractions and WiPpet Wednesday

Sooo...  After another fairly unproductive week (but I wrote 271 words on Gabrys's story and... a sentence? on Jonathan's, so that's something, right?), my preorder of The Witcher III arrived yesterday and therefore I'm pretty sure that all production is now firmly out the window.  (I'm lucky it arrived at all; my bank have now frozen my account for fraud protection three times this year—third time being straight after my preorder shipped—and it's a massive pain.  Weren't so keen to protect me when I was broke!)

I'd read The Last Wish and loved it (I've read it three times now) but I couldn't get into Blood of Elves at all and all the other books took so long to be published in the UK that I actually ended up with them all fan-translated from other languages before I had the physical paperbacks...  So on the whole I was a little dubious about the games, but my mother bought me The Witcher II for the 360 for my birthday, and after a somewhat convoluted saga I even got to play it—and loved it.

Because of my attention span issues (mostly that I don't exactly have an attention span) it's quite rare for me to finish games.  That's why gaming has its own New Year's Resolution: it's the best way to get me to finally finish some although, like books, I continue insist on buying them.  So with that in mind, when I say that I powered through all 30 hours of my first playthrough of The Witcher II, finished it and then promptly restarted it so I could play through the other side of the story, that should tell you just how much that game excited me.

In the end I spent 60 hours on that game, it's gorgeous, I never did find Odrin, and the Harpy feather quest has become a household running joke.

This one is even more gorgeous, and I suspect it'll take me more than 60 hours just to play it once.  It's huge.  When they said it made Skyrim look small, it doesn't seem they were exaggerating.  I've already gotten lost a couple of times, even with the quest trail marker on.  Sod finding Ciri, I'm having enough trouble finding myself...

WiPpet Wednesday

WiPpet Wednesday is a weekly blog-hop where participants share excerpts from their Works in Progress that in some way relate to the date, either via simple maths (like 20 sentences for the 20th) or somewhat less simple maths such as dividing the date by the month for 4 paragraphs.  You can find out more, read other participants' entries and join in yourself here.

My picture of RQ finally rendered!  It's not much but I do like making pictures of him...  Poor Fayth is distinctly neglected in this department, I'm sorry to say, which is kind of a shame because he does have his own charm too...

Convoluted maths today so I can get my own way (which is pretty much the only reason I'll ever willingly do maths): adding together the year, 2015: 2 + 0 = 2; 1 + 5 = 6; 6 - 2 = 4.  Today is the 20th May, so 20 - 4 = 16, for sixteen sentences that follow on from Fayth and RQ making good their escape from the Orenda.

Once the ship was comfortably blazing along in slipspace, an aurora of colour dancing across the cockpit window, Fayth unbuckled his straps and stretched in his seat with his arms above his head. “That went better than expected.”

Wordlessly, the Rose Queen turned to Fayth and raised both hands, held together at the wrist.

“What’re you—oh...” Fayth’s voice trailed off as he stared at the metallic cord still binding his narrow wrists together. “But just now, you touched me—”

The Rose Queen wiggled one set of fingers at him. “Them being tied together doesn’t stop me from using them independently, you know.”

He had a point, but Fayth couldn’t help wishing that a smile had accompanied the gesture, or at least something that didn’t indicate the Rose Queen thought him a complete moron. He’d had other things on his mind, like fulfilling his request; he couldn’t be expected to remember everything.

Judging from his blank expression, the Rose Queen expected him to.

Fayth sighed as he set to work untying the knot that seemed to have worked itself tighter since he’d first tied it. Every brush of his knuckles over the Rose Queen’s soft skin sent a jolt of energy the length of his arm and straight to his heart if he was romantic—straight to his groin if he was honest—but the black-haired man sat and watched the movement of his fingers without the slightest hint he felt anything similar. And why should he? They’d known each other for less than a day and soon enough they’d never see each other again.

It was going to be a long three weeks. 

Blog Challenges and WiPpet Wednesday

Alex and Milos. This is actually my most
favourite 3D render of them... and ever.

Sooooo.  I signed up to the Blogging From A to Z challenge fairly early on last month which... arguably was incredibly stupid of me, considering my mood at the time.

My mood is a little improved now, but instead I seem to have developed a phobia of or anxiety about writing—which is patently stupid, I know—which is throwing a bit of a spanner into the works because, let's face it, I've got nothing I can write for 26 days about except stories.

My ever-supportive NaNo group's only comment was, "yeah, you won't be getting that done then."

I guess I should do it just to show them exactly where they can put that sentiment, eh?

In somewhat better news, certain characters are starting to become more vocal which should help.  Just lately it's been supernatural government agent Alex and his genetically-modified dokkalfa partner Milos, the two characters I've written the most about over the years (so naturally they're the ones no-one knows anything about).  They've both managed to pick their own "theme songs" over the course of time which should hopefully help.  Hopefully.

If you want a sneak-peek at Alex's theme song, it's...  well, right here.  Small profanity warning.

3OH!3 - Colorado Sunrise

He's an odd one, that man.

If anyone has any hints or ideas on how to write more than snippets of conversation without my hands shaking and my brain freezing up, I would desperately love to know, because I really want to write one of the Fayth/RQ music-inspired ones...

In a less self-pitying note, though, I recommend checking out the challenge link.  It certainly looks interesting.

WiPpet Wednesday

It's that time of the week again: K. L. Schwengel's awesome blog hop where all the participants share snippets of their works-in-progress.  You can check out everyone else's and sign up yourself over here.  It's well worth it, everyone is lovely.

Today's WiPpet maths is convoluted, just so I can get my own way.  It's the 11th March 2015, so my maths goes something like this: 11 × 3 = 33.  2 + 0 + 1 + 5 = 8.  33 - 8 = 25.  So it's 25 lines from the second chapter of The Rose Queen.

Having rescued RQ from Evil Crewman #1 (thanks Gloria, perfect title while he looks for a name!), Fayth has found that it's only recently a few people have been acting quite so threateningly towards him.  Unfortunately, the good news is a bit short-lived...

“Where are you taking him?”  The question came from an older crewman with laughter lines around his eyes, his neat black hair fading to white at the temples, who blocked Fayth’s path.

“The Captain asked to see him.”  Fayth did his best to ignore the Rose Queen’s sudden nervous fidgeting.

“Really?”  He asked, quirking up one eyebrow.

Fayth nodded curtly.  “So if you could please let us pass...”

“You see,” the crewman said slowly, grey eyes flicking from head to foot and back again, “I’m the Captain and I don’t seem to recall asking anyone to fetch him.  Care to enlighten me?”

The doors were right there.  Fayth gave the Captain his best innocent grin, carefully taking a firm hold of the Rose Queen’s wrist.  “Sorry, my mistake.  Must’ve been the Vice-Captain instead.  Anyway, it was nice to meet you, but since we’ve never been formally introduced, well, I’ve heard I should never talk to strangers—”

The Captain’s mouth opened, but Fayth had no idea what he actually said: he’d already broken into a run, dragging a stumbling Rose Queen after him.  He almost threw the poor man through the door, spinning and slamming the hackpad’s white plastic unit against the override controls with his momentum.  Its tiny screen flashed with digits.

The door slid closed inches from the Captain’s face.  A deafening alarm filled the corridor that almost, but not quite, drowned out the Captain pounding against the metal and the sound of shouting at the distant end of the docking bay corridor.  The white strip lighting dimmed to an ominous red that flashed in time with the klaxon.

“You heard you should never talk to strangers?”  The Rose Queen snorted, slumping back against the closed door and giving Fayth a distinctly amused look.  The red glow turned his eyes a disconcerting shade of purple.  “Because that was so effective when I used it ten minutes ago, wasn’t it?”

Snippets and WiPpets

So I've been kind of badly behaved this week*.  Though I've not written anything I've still rewarded myself for it.  Well... not rewarded, exactly, and not exactly for that, but the upshot is, to distract myself from the fact words mostly seem like a forlorn hope I've treated myself.

I've wanted a Playstation Vita for a while, despite not being the biggest fan of Sony as a company and having never owned any kind of Playstation in the past.  It wasn't the price of the console or the games that put me off either, but the extortionate cost of the proprietary memory cards.  But since the price of them doesn't look to be changing much, now seemed as good a time as any.

As a result, I find myself with a surprisingly nice handheld console, more games for it than I had a week after buying my 3DS, and something to retreat into when my brain wants to escape.  In short, I'm enjoying it a lot.

It's also been a good week stationery-wise.  I saw this calligraphy / stamp set when I ordered the games and couldn't resist.  The box is very attractive and I'm not going to say no to another nib, dip pen and bottle of ink.  The paper base comes out and it has a velvet inner so I'm probably going to keep my other pen and nibs in there as well.

Today also heralds the arrival of my new Lamy Al-Star in Copperorange (their name for it, not mine) along with two extra nibs (one F black, one calligraphy) and a bottle of Ocean Blue J. Herbin 1670 ink with actual gold flakes.  I'd intended to use it with dip nibs but I might just look at the pretty bottle instead...

And when I say I've not written anything, that's not entirely true.  The Vita, its memory card and a wired Xbox 360 controller (not for my Xbox, ironically enough, but my PC) were all dispatched from Amazon on the same day, but in three separate packages (bear with me).  Last month K. S. Norton wrote something about "the what-if scenes of life".  I don't really get them in relation to family life, but I do get random story snippets that relate to absolutely nothing, and as such I usually ignore them.  This time, however, faced with the sudden, abrupt idea that it'd be incredibly embarrassing to mess up and deliver each item separately, I did my best to pin it down.  At around 1am.  ...It may not entirely make sense but hey, for once I actually managed to write something.  And you're getting it right here, or I'll end up forgetting all about it.

He stared down at the package in his hands.  One package.  One last package and his round would be done.  But why did it have to be here?  Of all the places...

Nothing for it.  Heart in his mouth, he knocked on the door.

Wide eyes greeted him.  Wide brown eyes and a tentative smile.  "Yes?  Can I help you... again?"

He proffered the package, squinting against the expected tirade.  "Your delivery, sir.  Your last delivery." 

The expected tirade didn't materialise.  When he looked up, the tentative smile had become a full-blown grin.  "My third one today.  I am lucky.  Or... did you just not arrange your deliveries properly?" 

He again cursed his stupidity for telling his coworker about the handsome young man on his round who always opened the door with such cheerfulness.  "I..." 

The man leaned in to take the package and simply didn't move from there.  His breath tickled his lips.  "Or would it just be easier to give you my phone number?" 

His heart skipped a beat; he didn't let go of the box.  "I could... warn you about deliveries beforehand..." 

The grin widened.  "How about you warn me of the delivery I really want.  Say yourself, at six o'clock?" 

Phrased like that, how could he refuse?  After all, he'd always been told the customer was always right...

And that's not even today's WiP.

Oh, and there was a very short exchange between Fayth and RQ too, but you'd have to ask nicely for that one.

* I've started to notice that my weeks no longer run from Monday to Sunday, but from Wednesday to Wednesday...  Don't know whether to be amused or worried.

WiPpet Wednesday

First off, WiPpet Wednesday is K. L. Schwengel's fantastic idea, a blog hop where participants post sections of their works in progress and relate it to the date.  You can read the other posts (which are always brilliant) and take part yourself over here.

What with The Rose Queen not being originally intended to be my main canon, so to speak, I've run into a bit of a problem.  There's the snippet I want to post, which makes no sense without context you didn't get, and there's the context, which is from the first chapter and thus isn't in chronological order.

In the end, since it explains both what was going on with RQ when Fayth arrived as well as just why he's so lost the second he leaves the habitat again, we're flicking back to Chapter One.  Sorry about that.  Normal(ish) service will be resumed next week.

Since it's the 18th February 2015, this is 1+8 for a total of 9 paragraphs and has a profanity and content warning.  Fayth has just arrived on the ship and is trying to blend in with the crew while he finds his way toward the habitat, though not all the crew seem worth blending in with.

It was a fucking rabbit warren.  He’d expected neat, straight corridors that mirrored the rigid, austere lines of the ship, but no.  Someone had decided that twists and turns were the way to go, and just when he thought he was heading towards the habitat he realised he was off in completely the wrong direction for the fifth or sixth time.  For all of its massive size, the giant dome seemed to be the last place they wanted anyone to go, and it had taken him an embarrassing twenty minutes to reach this conclusion while spectacularly failing to reach the dome itself.  In desperation he swung around a corner into the crew quarters, and straight into a group of men huddled around a single small screen.

“Sorry,” Fayth said, as nonchalantly as possible despite his pounding heart.  Shit, worst possible timing; all it’d take was one person to notice he’d never been there before...

The expected anger never materialised.  It was all the injured party could do to lift his eyes from the screen.  “No problem, mate.”

Fayth shrugged and resumed padding down the corridor while the men resumed their conversation.  “I always figured ‘Ice Queen’ was a better name,” one said, snorting back a laugh, “but shit, looks like I was way off the mark there.”

Pausing ostensibly to look at a overstuffed noticeboard, Fayth suddenly found their inane conversation the most interesting thing in the universe.

“No kidding.”  The second whistled appreciatively, never taking his eyes from the flickering display.  “Certainly opened up for him.”

“They’re not speaking now, but it’s not stopping everyone else having a go,” the first said.  “Maybe even you’ve got a chance.”

“Chance?”  The third said, licking his lips.  “From what I hear, all you gotta do is ask and you’ll receive.”

“Ask?”  This time the first speaker’s laugh was ugly; Fayth crushed the urge to stride over and punch him.  “I don’t remember saying anything about asking.”

WiPpet Wednesday

It's fair to say I've done sod-all this week.

Well, no, that's not entirely true.  I've written 281 words.

I've fended off my depression plenty of times before but I've been feeling it gnawing at the edges of my consciousness and right now, on top of still being ill, I've not been able to deal with it.  I hate it.  I know it's there, a floating black cloud, but it makes me feel like a fraud on every level.  Not only does it remind me how incredibly futile everything I do is and how little any of it actually matters—and all the rest of it—but even feeling like that makes me feel like I shouldn't be feeling it.  That it's all just some massive ploy.  Despite the fact I think this is the first time I've actually written about it.

So every time I've sat down to write, I've ended up doing other stuff instead.  I've found a Commodore 64 emulator and have been playing digital versions of games we already have (without having to wait anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour for the game to load) and am now significantly better at Flip & Flop than I was as a child—which isn't hard.  I've been reading, and the book I'm on is significantly better once I got past the first chapter.  And I've been practicing calligraphy and general dip pen work since I found that Rhodia notebooks work just as well with dip pens as they do with fountain pens.

Unfortunately, you can see the extent of my attention span perfectly right at the end there.  (Autumn Oak is the name of that ink and the lyrics are courtesy of a few FiXT artists.)

I guess I'll get over it eventually.

WiPpet Wednesday

WiPpet Wednesday is K.L. Schwengel's work-in-progress blog hop.  You can find other authors and sign up for yourself just here.

Well, it's the start of a new month.  Based on the abysmal performance above, you're getting another bit of The Rose Queen instead.

Generic maths.  It's the 4th February, so you're getting four unedited paragraphs from chapter 2, following hot on the heels of the last section.  (Basically, you're getting the stuff I enjoyed writing.)

“Before I go with you,” the Rose Queen said quietly, catching Fayth’s hand, “tell me why I should trust you.”

His touch was soft, his skin cool and smooth, and Fayth really wished that he could stop imagining what they’d feel like touching his chest, his hips, his—  He swallowed and carefully prised the Rose Queen’s fingers away.  “I can’t tell you that.  I can tell you that I’m Admiral Fayth, and I can tell you that it’s taken me a year to find you, but tell you why you should trust me?”  He quashed his rampant imagination and laughed.  “You’re probably better off not doing that.”

But dear God those eyes were amazing as they stared at him, weighing and assessing.  How could one man’s eyes be such an incredible colour?  When the Rose Queen nodded once, as much to himself as to Fayth, it took Fayth a moment to realise that he was agreeing.  Agreeing to go with him.

The return journey was going to feel like an age.

Poor Fayth.  Cursed with an overactive imagination. 

Procrastination Station: Melody's Escape

Shocking!  I finally managed to find some time to sit, re-familiarise myself with the game and record some footage!

What's the game?

Today's Procrastination Station timesink is Melody's Escape a music-based indie platformer.  It's currently listed as an "Early Access Game" but in the developer's words it's "almost feature-complete and is in a very stable state."  There's no demo available.

When it came up on my recommended list on Steam I was intrigued by the gameplay videos, particularly as at the time Sixteen was my sole computer and there was no demo available for me to try and see if it'd work.  It was cheap enough (£6.99), however, that I felt inclined to take a punt on it nonetheless.

I then had to turn most of the settings off.  It ran, yes, but it was slow and jerky until almost all the settings were off or lowered (such as the background affected by the music, the rain in the walking sections etc.), then it ran nicely.  With the exception of the hair dynamics.  That didn't go so well; it actually slowed the game down more with it off, but on didn't seem to make a difference.  The irony is, once you play the game you don't miss the fancy effects you've turned off, because your attention is solely focused on hitting the next button.  Since I've been playing it on Echo with all the fancy effects on again, I've still not noticed them.

Honestly, watching the video I recorded above is the first time I've actually paid attention to anything in the game beyond hitting the next key.  I didn't realise, watching it back, just how fast it seems--it doesn't feel as fast when you're playing as it looks when you're watching.

There are several different difficulty settings, from Relaxing, through Medium and Intense (which is what I'm playing) to Overload.  Relaxing has everything tied to one button per section whether they're slides, jumps or the floating rings; Medium has both rings and directions in matching colours, so up is both a jump and an up on the ring.  Intense has everything split into two sections, so WASD keys control movement and the arrows keys control the rings, or vice versa, depending on your preference--mine is set for my faulty brain.  Overload is...  huh.  I personally can't keep up with Overload.

There's also a custom setting to design your own style of level and an autoplay if you just want to watch.  (Wish I'd remembered that was there before I sat and played the song myself.)

Note, though: it's possibly not best to start out with Relaxing and move through the difficulties.  Each step up has a learning curve that can be frustrating if you don't persevere with it, and persevering can feel more like work than play to start with.

And what have I actually learned about my characters by procrastinating with this game?

A surprisingly large amount actually.  For me, this kind of game is best played without engaging the brain, because if I think about the oncoming colours and directions I'm guaranteed to press the wrong button entirely.  Accordingly, that makes it perfect for rooting out plot problems while listening to songs that inspire the stories, or in some cases realising which songs make perfect character themes (and then playing them to death).

I managed to work out some of the early kinks of Corliss's appearance in The Rose Queen by playing a lot of Machinae Supremacy as well as giving myself a boost to get a move on with a scene between RQ and Fayth by playing Celldweller's Heart On.  (Yes, it is likely pretty much what you're thinking.  Yes it suits them perfectly.)  It's also helped somewhat with Dust & Ash through a zen-like playthrough of two albums by The Pierces--though it's not helped with actually plotting the bloody thing--and it let me scrape my brain clean during the early stages of The Reconstruction of Kirill.  (What do you mean I'm still in the early stages now?  Shush.)

Will it help for anyone else?  I have no idea, but if you're one of those people who can only play rhythm and dance games by not thinking about what you're doing rather than focusing on the upcoming moves, then it's a nice way to relax and think about other things at the same time.  Choose a setting, pick your song or set your playlist, and off you go.  Just... try not to get too engrossed so you forget to write.  Or competitive.  Just because there's no centralised scoreboard doesn't stop you from wanting to get a Perfect rating or two or three or four...

Work, Writing and WiPpet Wednesday

Work has exploded.  Brains over the wall, blood pooling in awkward puddles you'll never get out of the carpet, exploded.

Okay, well, maybe not quite so literally but we've had a lot of new hours scheduled, which means that it's time I'm spending not writing.  'Even more time I'm spending not writing' would probably be more accurate.  Yes, excuses excuses.  It's also time I spend thinking longingly about writing, but never seem to get any done when I do have the time (for various reasons).

So while I'm getting next to nothing done, I am getting the story fixed in my head, which is an improvement of sorts.  There are scenes I'm looking forwards to writing--including the return of a character I became unexpectedly fond of in the first story, despite their very little 'screen time'--and one in particular I'm really not, for the same reason the first story hitched and stuttered while I was writing.

I did, however, manage to render a picture of Kirill with a very awkward smile.  It's for my Goodreads profile, working on the theory that since you're getting a picture of me the day hell freezes over (or heats up, depending on your beliefs), you might as well have one of a character of mine instead.  My previous one was a sullen and glare-y Milos flashing his chest, but pretty much no one reads my Unravel stuff and it's a bit awkward to turn into any sort of an eBook.  Not least because I've not actually finished Milos's introduction to HEL, the first arc is all over the place, there's a NaNo in the middle of it and the second arc is occasionally ongoing, not to mention the section about Alex's schooldays or the disturbing stuff when Milos was a teenager...  so I doubt anyone actually knows who Milos even is.  Poor sod.  These days I'm not sure even he knows any more.

I might work on it some more in what free time I have.  This doesn't actually eat much writing time because while fiddling with things does take up some of it, most of any kind of 3D work is spent waiting for it to render.  Might go quicker on Echo than it ever did on Sixteen, but hair is still a massive timesink.

Fun fact: I re-read The Destruction of Kirill the other day, just to double-check some things and remind myself of events I'd semi-forgotten.  It took me a lot longer than it took my lovely beta @SplitShilo and just made me appreciate her all the more.

With that in mind...

WiPpet Wednesday

WiPpet Wednesday is K. L. Schwengel's genius idea: a blog-hop with excerpts from works-in-progress.  You can find other blogs and add yours here.

My brain is still refusing to compute any WiPpet maths (I brained too hard at work and I cannae brain nae more, Cap'n) and I'm slightly embarrassed by the sheer lack of progress on The Reconstruction of Kirill, so today you're getting something slightly further along: The Rose Queen.

Since it's the 14th January, 14/1, you're getting 14 lines from the first chapter, which I coincidentally wrote while not wholly well.  Turns out, catching 'flu does a lot to kickstart projects you thought you'd long abandoned but doesn't do so much for your coherency.  One of my friends had to point out that I'd forgotten to write half a sentence; the missing half was in the middle.  It's been patched up since, but... yep.  First draft ickiness, as ever.

Here the hero, Fayth, has infiltrated a kidnapper's ship to return his target--who he knows only as 'The Rose Queen', and has very little information on...

He'd hesitated to stare at a flower the size of his head hanging from halfway up a tall pillar when he realised that the curve didn't exactly follow the walls: he was a bare ten meters from the rich brown trunk of the central tree and the only thing hiding him from view was the dense viney growth that wrapped thickly around the dull grey metal.  Worse--or better, depending on his point of view--was the kneeling figure at the base of the tree.

His breath caught in his throat.

The Rose Queen.  Her straight black hair fell in front of her face, obscuring it from view.  Fayth waited for her to brush it back, tuck it behind an ear and reveal her features, but instead it cast them more deeply into shadow as she began work on a second hole, less than a foot from the first.  She was completely unaware of his presence, blissfully unaware of everything except for her work.

Including the man who stepped from the path that ringed the tree.  Fayth opened his mouth to shout, then clamped it closed again.  Idiot; announcing his presence now would be suicide.  He could only watch, heart climbing into his throat, as the crewman grabbed the Rose Queen's shoulder and shoved her onto her back.  She let out a surprisingly deep grunt, squirming as the crewman forced her brown trouser-clad legs apart, and snapped, "get the hell off me."

She.

He. 

Just in case, y'know, you thought the 'Rose Queen' was a title that actually meant a damn thing.

Procrastination Station: Beat Hazard

A confession that'll come as absolutely no surprise to anyone ever: I procrastinate.  A lot.  If there's something I'm supposed to be doing (like writing), it's guaranteed I'll be doing anything else instead while thinking about it, because thinking about what I'm not doing is almost the same as doing it, right?

Well, not exactly...  Though not exactly not, either.  Doesn't sound like it makes sense, doesn't it?  Bear with me, here.

I have a deep love for rhythm-based video games.  Not ones that use pre-recorded tracks (though those aren't too bad either), but ones that generate gameplay from the user's own music collection.  My favourite method of procrastination is to set up songs I usually write to in these games and indulge in something that allows me to not think about what I'm doing while letting my subconscious wander around in the music and fix whichever issue is bothering me at the time.

It sounds ridiculous, but it's remarkably helpful.  Except for the keeping me from writing bit, but you can't have everything.

What's the game?

Today's Procrastination Station example is Beat Hazard, a music-based indie shoot-em-up that handily (or dangerously) also has a demo available.

Apologies for 4:3 screen resolution.  It mildly horrified a guy from my ISP too when he saw it.

I'm not actually a fan of shmups at all.  I grew up playing them, sure: it was the 80s/90s, there was a plethora of them available.  But the gameplay never caught my attention.  They were just timekillers and, when playing, there was always that inevitable moment you picked up something that was supposed to be an upgrade only to find the "upgrade" downgraded your hard-fought-for weaponry into something that was supposed to be more powerful but functionally useless for the stage you were on--

--Yes, as you can see, I harbour grudges against ancient gameplay mechanics.

Luckily, Beat Hazard doesn't do that.  You have two sets of powerups: volume and power.  You gain them by killing enemies or destroying asteroids and they increase the breadth and power of your attacks (big surprise).  If you die you lose them all, but your carcass also contains the remains of some of your former glory so the only time you're likely to feel powerless is at the very start--and after you've played the game for a while and unlocked some perks with the cash that also appears when you wreak your gloriously retina-burning destruction, you can even start out fairly powerfully.

The default game is enjoyable, addictive even, but gets a little boring after a few hours.  Luckily (or unluckily?) there are two DLC packs available, which expand the game so much with new enemies, bosses and modes it feels almost totally new.  I bought both after maybe a couple of hours' play.

And what have I actually learned about my characters by procrastinating with this game?

Sod all on existing projects, actually, other than a vague relief that slipspace is brightly coloured in The Rose Queen, and the realisation that gunfire is probably the same sorts of colours--though it's hit and miss whether we'll see that, what with Fayth being pretty pacifistic for a thief...

I did, however, accidentally spawn two new characters, Aneirin and Rheon, who wandered into my head while I was playing and pretty much said, "new sci-fi characters reporting for duty, sir".  So I got something out of it alright: the realisation I have more people I need to do something with.

Oh joy.

The Writer's Blog Tour

Not too long ago, the ever-lovely Nicole Nally asked me if I'd like to take part in a Writer's Blog Tour questionnaire she'd been tagged in, and I thought, what the hell, it sounds like fun.

And then I kind of forgot about it, but now she's posted her entry and that serves as a remarkably good reminder.

What Am I Currently Working On?

I've got several projects on the go, all in various states of disrepair—and then there the ones I should have on the go, but am apparently trying to avoid by trying to avoid working on other things instead.

Gratuitous Kir nudity is always fun

I guess, most pertinently, there's The Reconstruction of Kirill, the sequel to The Destruction of Kirill, which takes place in Gascony, which, in my steampunk universe, is a separate country from France.  I've just started chapter 5 and life is becoming rapidly terrible for the unfortunate hero (again).  It's all plotted out so there's nothing keeping me from writing it except the fact that it's all plotted out.  I had this problem with its predecessor too.

On that note, there's a short novella I'm supposed to be writing about Kirill and Niko's first Christmas as a couple, but that one's quite slow going....  Does so far involve sugar plums and smut though.

There's also The Rose Queen, a scifi about a man who's hired to steal a very quiet, shut-in young lady and discovers that if the information in the file is sparse, it's probably best not to make assumptions...  It's actually in marginally better shape than Reconstruction as I'm on chapter 6, but unlike Reconstruction it's not plotted out and suffers somewhat from the fact I was incredibly 'flu-ey when I started writing it.  It... needs some significant work, let's put it that way, but I think it has promise.

I'm supposed to be detailing the writing process of Dust & Ash for this blog, but it's safe to say there's not actually been that much progress to detail.  I discovered that it didn't feel inclined towards being plotted meticulously out like Destruction was so I've found myself starting chapter 4 and feeling a bit lost.  It needs even more work than Rose Queen does, or at least a spark of sudden plotting inspiration.

I should also have nearly finished with Three Graces: Spectrum now, but it's safe to say I've done absolutely sod-all on that in ages.  I reread the existing pieces and I've figured out why I got suddenly and abruptly stuck on it ('Black' and 'White' are in the wrong order, of all the stupid things) but I've yet to sit down and finish it.  I think I'm worried that how I write now is actually worse than how I wrote then (true, not actually just paranoia), so I keep putting it off.

And on the subject of putting it off...  I've been prodding a story called Chime lately because I feel incredibly bad about not even finishing chapter 3, but as I started it in 2011 I think we may be waiting some time for that...

And finally, I write occasional stories about a genetically modified dokkalfa (dark elf) and his co-worker / lover / ever-ready irritant human who work for a shadowy, semi-governmental British , which can be found both on this blog and on the Radial: Unravel tab up top there.  I love those dorky boys so I can never keep away from them for too long.  They're a comfort blanket.

How Does My Work Differ From Others In My Genre?

I honestly couldn't tell you...  I don't stick well to one particular genre—I write fantasy, sci-fi, steampunk (though I guess that's a derivative of one or the other, or both, aforementioned genres) and contemporary sci-fantasy—and as a 'genre', the m/m one is pretty colossal.  There's probably a ton of people who write the same kind of stuff I do, and I've just not met them yet.  Although I'd say perhaps my work differs in that other people actually have a knack for finishing it...

Though again, if they were just like me and didn't, we'd never know, would we?

Why Do I Write What I Do?

To be honest, I have no idea.  I've just always written like this, usually in the same genres.  Way (way) back in school, if ever there was a question in an exam that was just a single word, it was pretty much guaranteed that I'd write fiction for it.

For my A-Level English Language & Literature exams (that's a mouthful) there was one such prompt, which of course meant that I needed to write about two demons having thinly-veiled metaphorical sex in a dreamworld, that left one stabbed to a tree... and it was only a thinly-veiled metaphor because I wasn't too sure how well gay demon sex would go down (hah) with the examiners.  I kind of wish I'd written it explicitly now, just to see what would happen.

That was a depressingly long amount of time ago, and I'm still writing in the same genre, so I think we're stuck with one another now.  (And the demons; I still have those characters too.  I miss them but don't need another project right now.  So, guess what I'll no doubt be doing next week...)

So basically...  The short answer is: I can't help it.  The characters and events appear in my head, so I write them.

How Does My Writing Process Work?

It varies depending on the project is the short answer.  The long answer is that I actually am not quite sure, because of the fact it varies between projects.  Some projects seem to lend themselves to being plotted out chapter by chapter while others seem to demand being flown by the seat of the pants, and a few like to straddle the line between them without ever managing to put a foot in either camp.

A lot start out like the image to the left: a stream-of-consciousness set of notes that helps me sketch out ideas and work out who's doing what and where.  These all go in one notebook and I use different coloured inks to keep the stories separate.

If they're lucky, they then end up like the picture on the right: a series of key scenes.  In this case, the red ones were the ones I thought of before I started plotting Destruction out, and the green ones were ones I'd thought of during the plotting process.  I'm not entirely sure why I decided to to it that way, but it made sense at the time.  (Disclaimer: this might as well be my battle cry and will probably end up on my gravestone.)

Also, might include spoilers so on the off chance you actually want to read The Destruction of Kirill proceed carefully and possibly avoid the stuff in green.

Once I've got the scenes in non-specific order, I can figure out where it is I want them to go, hence the purple numbers beside it.  The actual plotting is always done in purple (I'm on my second atyouSpica Lavender pen) because somehow it just feels right.  And if it feels right I'm not going to argue with it.

When I've got those basics, I can either skip straight to the plotting, or I can make a detour via beats/breakdowns which is (in my case) when I break down the plot into a string of events.  I use a two-column method because I can then use the second column for relevant notes, cute ideas etc. that link directly to the first, left-hand, beat.

To the left is the start of Reconstruction (so no actual spoilers), complete with little note about the the room Kirill and Niko are sparring in and an addition to a section from the second chapter.  Some pages have nothing in this column, others have five or six notes.

Then, once that's done, I can move on to the actual plotting.  In my case, it's a scene-by-scene stream of text, all in the aforementioned lavender pen (which actually ran out halfway through the plotting of Reconstruction as a dodgy kind of portent), which expands on the breakdown until it fills out approximately a chapter.  Again, if you want to read Reconstruction you might want to not look at the right-hand image too closely as it possibly contains spoilers, coming quite near the end.  It was when I'd just replaced the pen, so it's in a stronger colour than pretty much everything before then.

Once I've got that, I'm all set to write.  The one problem with this approach is that you can feel like you've already written it so it can take away the desire to rewrite it.  On the other hand, you have a very clear roadmap of where you're going so, unlike writing by the seat of your pants, you're unlikely to get stuck unless your characters suddenly and wildly deviate from the plot (which is always possible, admittedly).

Obviously, when it comes to thinks like Rose Queen, it all starts and ends with the first step.  Everything else is crammed into my head—so if I get hit by a truck tomorrow, that'll be where it stays.  If you're worried about the possibility of sudden death, plotting might be the best way to go.

I Tag...

As the adorable Nicole tagged me (and you can read her four answers over at her blog: http://nicolenally.wordpress.com/2014/08/22/the-writers-blog-tour/), I choose to pass the baton on to Danni and Windi.

Danni has a degree in Writing Contemporary Fiction from Southampton Solent University, writes fanfiction and is a fiend at NaNoWriMo (my description, not hers, but anyone who writes 55,000 words in 18 days is a fiend).  She likes shiny things, has an impressive collection of notebooks that I am just a little big jealous of, and is a Fountain Pen Enabler—mostly by encouraging everyone around her to buy them.  You can find her stationery-based blog entries at: http://fourwordsfourworlds.wordpress.com/category/danni/.

Windi is another stationery addict and the owner of some very beautiful handwriting.  She has a lot of varied interests and tends to gravitate to new things often, but her love of Matt Damon and Jack Davenport will never die.  She also likes shiny things and notebooks, and is a very sweet and enthusiastic personality who is currently finishing up a novel.  You can find her various blog entries on a variety of themes here: http://windismusings.wordpress.com/.

Craft Sunday: A Slightly Less Nekkid Box

I know I said these would be occasional but I guess this is a little ridiculous.  Sorry about that.

Still, I've not had much to blog about in this regard.  Or at least, looking at all the photos, it turns out that how I feel and how I've been documenting it haven't quite matched up, so this might turn out to be a little longer than expected.

Two months ago, shortly after my first post, I met up with my fellow Notts NaNoers (my local writing group as well as my local NaNo group, and all at least as odd as me in their own ways) and after chat and food, @anikadaniels and I went and examined the paint department of the Broadmarsh Wilkos.  To be honest, I didn't have much idea what I was looking for and I'm pretty indecisive, so having Anika with me was a great help, particularly when it came down to narrowing a surprisingly large amount of wood stains and varnishes down to particularly 'steampunk' colours.  We settled on Teak and Antique Pine.

The first thing I've learned about painting wood is...

Shake the goddamn bottle properly.

That, to the left, is Teak.  Or at least, it would be if I'd given the bottle/can the thrashing it clearly needed, because it came out looking remarkably pine-y.

In hindsight, that photo is hilarious.  You'll see why, assuming you haven't already scrolled down or seen a later picture.  But still, let that be a lesson to you all.  If you're going to paint something, really, really shake the can, because otherwise you'll end up with a wishy-washy colour.

So I picked the damn thing up and gave it a proper shake.

Significantly better results.

Still a bit light though; I wanted to go for something deep and rich.

It should be noted here that I'm doing all of this with a very cheap paintbrush that I'd bought specially for the job.  I've got proper paintbrushes and there is no way I'd use one with wood stain or paint, but cheap ones from The Works do a remarkably good job, even if I had to clean what looked like glue off the one I'd chosen for the job—which came from a sealed pack.  I suspect whatever they used to glue the bristles in leaked somewhat.

So I kept on and the more coats I applied, the darker it got, until I
settled on a nice dark colour.

Using a brush gave the effect of it being made out of real, solid wood, rather than the balsa wood it's actually made out of, and looks better in person than these pictures would lead you to believe.  I started out by painting the inside of the box just to test it (and you can see why above), but after a while it became...  I don't know, just something that felt like it should be done.  I know I'm planning on covering it over, but it didn't feel right to leave it naked.

I'm undecided about covering over the inside top as well, so I painted that too.

It's quick-dry paint so it didn't take too long to get through layers, and I still have a lot left which is handy as my mother has now put in her request for one too.  (I don't think I can make an industry out of it.  I'm having a hard enough time sticking to writing.)

I've designed the top, but it's still as yet unpainted, because I'm not wholly sure how to approach it.  I don't know whether to outline the cogs in waterproof pen and then paint, as the cogs are supposed to be Antique Pine while the rest of the lid matches the box, or whether there needs to be a design in the middle.  I've considered buying watch parts too and simply attaching a real cog in the center.

On that note, if anyone knows of any good UK-based sellers of steampunk construction pieces or jewelry box items, I'd love to know about it.  I'm particularly looking for interior chains to stop the lid opening all the way, but anything would be good.

All that was done over the course of May.  At the start of this month (June), I headed to John Lewis in the Victoria Center with @SplitShilo and @AgentNotts, where we proceeded to ooh and ahh over the various fabrics, some of which are eye-wateringly expensive.  If I won the lottery I'd just camp out there and sniff material, I swear.  We examined all the fabrics and I stupidly neglected to bring the actual box along to check colours, but both my friends are very talented artists and could take a good guess at the colour I meant, and in the end we settled on this particularly nice burgundy taffeta.  I only bought half a metre (£3) but there's a lot there for the size of the box.

I've yet to figure out how to actually line the box, so any details there would be greatly appreciated.  It's probably not a good idea to start a project like this without any actual idea what I'm doing, but being thrown in at the deep end is the best way to learn.

Probably.

Not that I could resist the lure of all the fabrics entirely.  I did end up splurging on some expensive but beautiful material.

I've got no idea what I'll do with it, but the squares are surprisingly large and the material's pretty thick.

I even ended up buying a £35 sewing machine (for light work).

Now I just find myself wishing that my sum total knowledge of sewing wasn't a couple of weeks of art classes where we all made T-shirts to a pre-ordained design and size.

I still have it, sixteen years later.  It still fits.

That doesn't say much for the T-shirt; I hope this is a much greater success.

Adventures With The IRS - Receiving An EIN

As I'm in the preliminary stages of preparing for my first "proper" ebook release I realised that I needed to stop faffing around and (finally) apply for an EIN from the US Internal Revenue Service.

The thing is, I'm terrible with phones.  Anything that involves calling people I will try to put off time and again.  It's hard to believe that I was actually a legal secretary once upon a time (well, four or five years ago) and therefore had to field calls all the time.

As a result, it's been pointed out to me that with the amount of time I've now spent avoiding calling the IRS, I could have just faxed them the relevant form and had the EIN...  so, with that in mind, I loaded up Skype with £10 credit, sat in my office, steeled myself and gave them a call.

Whereon, having selected option "1" from the automated system... I promptly ended up on hold.  Their opening hours are 6am to 11pm EST so I was actually ringing around 10am, pretty much when other people finally screw up the courage to ring about tax issues, but I was only on hold for about 6 minutes, which was impressive.  If I'd been ringing the UK version I'm pretty sure it would have been significantly longer than that.

When my call was answered, I'm not entirely sure I made myself clear straight out the gate (I'm really out of practice with phones...) but once we got past my stupidity and he identified the fact that I'm clearly an idiot he spelled everything out for me and made it all significantly less scary.  We went through the form SS4, which I'd already filled out in Acrobat (you can download both it and its help file here), and I discovered that I am apparently unable to phrase the letter "D" (it's the Midlands English accent), which made life difficult as my address contains a few of the little blighters... but about ten minutes later he gave me my EIN and also answered my question on whether I have to file a 0 amount to the IRS for tax purposes (the answer is no, you just file taxes in your own country as normal).

So I'd like to extend a huge thank you to the lovely Mr. Witt, should he ever see this (and hopefully I've got his name right; I'm terrible when I panic), because he spelled my name properly, he made the whole process easy, quick and painless, and he also made me laugh (intentionally).

If you're putting off getting your EIN because it seems daunting, or because calling the US is a frightening and potentially expensive experience, don't.  It's a super-easy process, especially if you've already completed your SS4, you get your number straight away over the phone with a confirmation posted to you, and the best part?

As I called using Skype, a 15-minute phone call cost me 35p.

Efficient and affordable.

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?