Monthly Archives: January 2012

Books I need to finish

Posted on January 26, 2012 by

Sitting on my shelf, full of bookmarks, waiting as the dust slowly rises. . .

Some of these will be difficult (I am looking at you, Murakami. I like your weirdness, I like your language, but I wish you’d actually come up with a story or at least try to wrangle in the mess you spill out onto paper), but I will finish most of these!  I swear.

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Deciding the direction of a story

Posted on January 19, 2012 by

I am working on a new story which takes bits and pieces, characters and ideas, from other failed projects and recycles them into a new tale. It’s kinda strange, to be honest. Some of these failed projects went over a hundred pages or so and I had invested a lot of effort and thought into developing the characters in those stories before realizing they just weren’t meant to be. And now they are as if a part of a circle of reincarnation contained only within the “library” of my writing. A minor side character is suddenly the star, while a … Click to read more!

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Pulp

Posted on January 10, 2012 by

I’ve been reading the Barsoom series (John Carter of Mars) as I’ve been branching out my reading into pulp over the last few years (already have torn through Robert E Howard’s Conan, read a number of Loftcraft stories, Dashell Hammett’s Red Harvest, and a number of Raymond Chandler Philip Marlowe stories). The stuff is quite fascinating. Edgar Rice Burrows (also of Tarzan fame) first penned the series back in 1911, and the first few novels read like wild serials. Action, action, action. Twist, twist, twist. One-dimensional characters, point-a to point-b plots, set in exotic worlds with strange creatures and simplified … Click to read more!

Posted in Thoughts on Genre | Leave a comment