A Week in Writing #573 - Happy New Year 2026

Hope everyone is staying safe, and, of course, writing.

Well, the new year is upon us now. I'm sort of beyond the age to make new year's resolutions. We all want to be healthier and to keep working on what we love. So, while not resolutions, the goals remain the same.

Paul and I talked about goals on our recent podcast, OAPS #332- Powers Squared 2026 Preview. Even though it says Powers Squared, we also talked about The Blade of Miracles and, of course, the podcast. You can still catch it on our twitch channel for the next week, listen to it here or wait and watch it on our our YouTube channel on Wednesday at 2:30 pm. Still trying to work out a time to have our new artist on the podcast, but the time difference makes that tricky.

On the subject of Powers Squared, this was newsletter week, which went out this morning. Of course, I'd like you to sign up for The Hound Dogs' Howl, which is free, of course. You can sign up here.

My review of Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail was the Saturday Morning Review on Trophy Unlocked. Prior to that, each of the reviewers on Trophy Unlocked wrote their highlights/disappointments from 2025. You can read Paul's here, Trevor's here and mine here. I also wrote a review for One Battle After Another, which I presume will show up sooner than later.

I made some progress on my own Blackmail, but not as much as I had hoped for. I'm up to just over 76,000 words as of now, which is about 2800 more than last week, but I would have hoped for more, but there were other things to work on. I did have an idea about rewriting the opening of the book, which is more of a moving the first two chapters around and getting to the action sooner.

I watched a seminar on agents and query letters to prepare myself for getting back into the hunt on those. It's depressing to be ghosted, but that's the way it is, I guess but you've got to play the game.

Well, it's back to work this week, but I still want to keep working on Blackmail and hopefully review more new pages for Powers Squared.

That about does it for me. Keep writing, and I'll see you back here next week.

A Week in Writing #572 - Christmastime

Hope everyone is staying safe, and, of course, writing.

Christmas at my house is really great and very physical media heavy, including books, movies, video games and music. The biggest problem is getting to everything, but that is fodder for another day. But they will probably be sources for reviews on Trophy Unlocked sometime in the future.

Speaking of Trophy Unlocked, the holiday didn't stop reviews, including Paul's Game Day review of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (2011), which came out on Wednesday the 24th. My review of Blast of Silence was the Saturday Morning Review. I didn't think of it at the time, but the story of the movie takes place between Christmas and New Years, so it was an appropriate pick for the holiday week.

I aslo have written three reviews this past week, including two holiday specials It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown, and The Little Drummer Boy. The third one was Ninotchka from 1939, which was one of the movies we watched on "Movie Day", our post-Christmas day ritual. These will all come out some time in the future, so stay turned.

SRCC Press didn't stop either, as we launched Trevor's 10th issue of The Blade of Miracles on Christmas Eve. Titled, "Mordred, Part 3", the book is available in both print and digital through The Campus Store on our website.

Our new artist continued work on Powers Squared and didn't take the holiday off either, turning in several pages during the past week. I'm very happy with her and hope this will continue for a long while.

As far as my writing, I made some updates to previous books, Getting Even and The Runaway, while also working on Blackmail. For those following along, I'm now up to 73,207 words.

We actually pre-recorded this past week's podcast to take into account Movie Day. Recorded on the 16th, OAPS #331 - Kickstarter Unboxing - Pirates and Robots had us unboxing recent Kickstarter deliveries, including Pirates: A Graphic History (But not THAT kind of graphic) and Transformers, The Compendium Set.  You can still watch it on our twitch.tv channel, listen to it here or wait until the 31st at 2:30 pm PST and watch it here.

Next week, I've got a newsletter to work on, a highlights/disappointments post to do for Trophy Unlocked and I'd like to work more on Blackmail.

A Week in Writing #571 - The Holidays Are Coming

Hope everyone is staying safe, and, of course writing.

Sorry to borrow a line from that terrible AI Coca-Cola commercial, but I'm sure the sentiment existed before they used it. The truth is Christmas will be quickly upon us. I hope yours is happy and safe.

Even though it's the holidays, we are still releasing one issue of The Blade of Miracles, #10, on Christmas Eve and on Kindle on Christmas Day; couldn't be helped. It could be considered a very last minute gift or a diversion if needed. You'll be able to find links to it at The Campus Store on our website.

We're still getting pages from our new artist for Powers Squared. Not only is she good, but she's quick and, as I said last time, it feels like it's a comic book again.

We talked about that change, as well as other events for Powers Squared and The Blade of Miracles, on our podcast, which comes out on Christmas Day. Called Powers Squared 2025 Rewind, the podcast can still be watched on our twitch.tv channel for the rest of the week, listened to here, and watched on our YouTube channel on Christmas Day after 2:30 pm PT.

No new review this week from me. Last night, we went to the mall, as a sort of tradition. Our shopping is complete, but it's nice to walk around and see what's what and say hi to Santa, if not sit on his knee.

That's not to say we don't have reviews. This was a big week for Trophy Unlocked, which celebrated it's 15 year and nearly 1700 reviews of movies and videogames. The anniversary post was Paul's review of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009). Prior to that, on Wednesday was Trevor's review of Tron RUN/r. Yesterday, the Saturday Morning Review was mine for O. Henry’s Full House (1952). It's an anthology film of the writer's work and includes "The Gift of the Magi", which seemed appropriate for the season.

Work continued on Blackmail. I'm now up to 71, 343, so with everything, I did get in over 1000 words this week. I also continued going through older books and looking for descriptions of one of the main characters. However, with one book, The Runaway, I found that the chapter numbering made no sense, so I had to go back through it and renumber them, which wasn't hard, but just time-consuming, and a little embarassing as well. Not sure what happened there.

This coming week, I'm hoping to get more work in on Blackmail. There is also our own made-up holiday, "Movie Day", which is the day after. We still believe in physical media, so we spend a day watching some of the new titles we've just received. I'm sure you have your own way that you spend your time with family and friends.

Well, that about does it for me. Keep writing and I'll see you next week. Happy holidays!

A Week in Writing #570 - Things Don't Always Go According to Plan

Hope everyone is staying safe, and, of course, writing.

I believe the plan was to work a lot on Blackmail this week. While I did some work in the book, and passed 70,000 words on the road to 80,000, I didn't work on it as much as I wanted to. But the word count now is 70011 and growing. I also spent some time doing some retro work on previous books. I know it might seem odd but with this book, I believe I've finally nailed the description for one of the characters and I wanted to be sure it is the same in previous books.

One of the thing that has occupied my time has been our new artist turning in pages, which has been missing from my life for months. I was telling the other creators, my sons, that it feels like Powers Squared is a comic book again. Yeah!

On the subject of comic books, our podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared, this week was about Trevor's The Blade of Miracles and the new issue coming out later this month. You can watch it on twitch.tv for the next few days, listen to it now here, or wait and watch it on YouTube after 2:30 pm PST on Wednesday here. I've also added a preview of the book on our website, so check it out.

SRCC Press learned this week that we've been waitlisted for WonderCon 2026, which is disappointing, considering we've also been waitlisted for San Diego Comic-Con. You never know, but I'm not sure if we would want to do Small Press again there. We're hoping for Artists Alley since that's where the action is at that Con.

Trophy Unlocked gets into the holiday mode, with Miracle on Main Street (1939), which is one that I wrote. Before that it was Game Day on the blog with Paul's review of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. And that would be a lot, but not for Trophy Unlocked, because the week started with Paul's review of the film Five Nights at Freddy's 2. I also wrote a review of Cash on Demand (1961), a British Christmastime bank robbery film that I stumbled across on Saturday night. Most likely, it will be on hold until next Christmas, but it would be worth waiting for. 

The Trophy Unlocked blog is also only a few days away from celebrating it's 15th anniversary. The first post was a review by Paul of Tron: Legacy on December 18, 2010. Now there are over 1725 reviews. I don't know if Paul had this in mind when he started the blog, but it's quite an achievement and one I'm happy to be a part of.

Next week, here's hoping for more pages of Powers Squared and Blackmail.

Well, that about does it for me. Keep writing and I'll see you again next week.

A Week in Writing #569 - New Artist and the Newsletter

Hope everyone is staying safe, and, of course, writing.

We're coming down to the end of the year and there's been a bit of good news. We've officially hired a new artist for Powers Squared and one who is turning in pages, yeah. Her name is Wendie Renard, and she's an artist I found on Instagram. I had looked at her work earlier, when we were beginning to really consider letting the old one go, due to lack of performance and communication. I had a lawyer friend redo our artist agreement and that became a time-consuming process, but he has since sent it to her and she's signed it. Hopefully, we'll be able to get back on a real schedule again with production of the book.

This was also newsletter week for Powers Squared, The Hound Dogs' Howl. If you didn't get yours, then you're not a subscriber. I make this pitch once a month with little hope that someone who reads this blog would also be interested in one of the main projects I'm involved with. That said, you're more than welcomed to sign up. Since the comic book takes place at San Romero Community College, you "enroll" at the school, which unlike some substacks is FREE; and you get a free digital copy of Issue #1 to get you started. You can enroll here if you're interested. End of plug.

Now that Christmas time is here, Trophy Unlocked will have more holiday-themed reviews, starting with my review of Larceny, Inc. (1942). But that's not the only review on the blog this week. On Wednesday, Game Day, was Paul's review of Sonic Heroes. And we're also staying current with what's in the theaters with Trevor's review of Zootopia 2 which came out today. And soon, there will be Paul's review of Five Nights at Freddy's 2, a film we watched on Saturday. No new review from me this week, though; it happens.

In keeping with the holiday theme, our podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared, was about the four animated specials of Prep and Landing. 'tis the season as they say. As always, you can still watch it on our Twitch channel here for the next few days, listen to it here, or wait until Wednesday at 2:30 pm PST and watch it on our YouTube channel.

Not much work on Blackmail this week, I'm afraid. I did work a little on it, but not enough to brag about. I'm up to 68,764, which is pretty close to what I was at last week, so enough said about that.

Well, that about does it for me. I believe this coming week will be mostly about Powers Squared and Blackmail, or at least, that's the plan.

Keep writing and I'll see you back here next week.

A Week in Writing #568 - Happy Holidays

Hope everyone is staying safe, and, of course, writing.

I'm hoping everyone had a safe and happy Thanksgiving. Mine was good, up on Thanksgiving to San Mateo and back the next day. It's a lot of driving let me tell you, which is not my favorite way to spend the day.

Not much Black Friday shopping, save for our annual trip to Barnes & Noble; we go other times, too, but always on Black Friday. Black Friday isn't what it used to be, which is both good and bad. I miss the hubbub but at the same time, I don't. But now it's like Black Friday Month, so the actual day means nothing.

I'm happy to report that despite a shorter week, I managed to write more on Blackmail than I have in a long while. I'm now up to 68,432, so we're getting closer; 80,000 is my goal.

We recorded what might be our shortest podcast ever on Wednesday and were back in time to post it on Friday. In OAPS #327 - Powers Squared State of Play 2025, we discuss the current status of Powers Squared, which is missing an artist. Again it's short, but you can watch it here for a few more days, listen to it here or wait until Wednesday at 2:30 pm PST and watch it here.

Speaking of the artist, our lawyer sent her the contract he drafted on Thanksgiving Day, but haven't heard anything back. Hopefully, soon we'll be able to announce the hire and we can get back to producing the book.

Wednesday was a busy one for us, as the 9th issue of The Blade of Miracles, Trevor's comic book series, came out on that day. This is "Mordred, Part 2" and in this issue, "The final battle begins!" The issue, like all of the series, is available in print and digital through The Campus Store on our website.

The holiday didn't stop Trophy Unlocked. On Wednesday, Game Day, Paul's review of Dispatch, a recent PC game, went up. My review of Armored Car Robbery was the Saturday Morning Review, as well as the last of our Noirvember reviews. Not really working on a new one. Finally finished the Batman serial review, but I haven't yet started Heroes For Sale. We did see Zootopia 2 earlier today, but I'll let someone else review that one.

This week, it's truly newsletter time, so I'll be working on this. I hope to be working on Blackmail, and I might be looking back at some other books, since I've hit on the description of one of the main characters and would like to make sure it's the same one when she's described.

Well, that about does it for me. Keep writing and I'll see you back here next week.

A Week in Writing #567 - Blame it on the Contract

Hope everyone is staying safe, and, of course, writing.

This week was mostly spent in reviewing an artist contract for our "new" artist. There was some back and forth with the lawyer and I wanted to make sure everyone on our side was happy with it. You might not think it would be that big of a deal, but it does take time. It started when I wanted to be sure the new contract took into account AI and the lawyer went on from there. At this point, it's close and I want this to be over, so we can get the artist working.

In other Powers Squared  news, we were notified on Friday that we're waitlisted for San Diego Comic-Con 2026. Hopefully, we'll get in and get more than three weeks of a heads-up.

We also shot our podcast a day early, so that took Thursday night away as well. The podcast was to provide Trevor with the chance to preview the new issue of his book, The Blade of Miracles, "Mordred, Part 2." The 9th issue drops on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and will be available in both print and digital at The Campus Store on our website.

Because we pre-recorded the podcast, the easiest thing would be to stream the recording on time, but I managed to mess that up, so it went out about 15 minutes late. Still, you can watch it on our twitch channel for the next few days, listen to it here or wait until Wednesday at 2:30 pm and watch it here.

My review of The Big Steal went up on Trophy Unlocked as part of our celebration of Noirvember. Paul's review of Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution  for the Game Boy Advance went up as the Wednesday Game Day review. Trevor's review of Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan: At a Confessional went up this morning. This was a film that we watched on Friday night. We did watch a movie on Saturday night, The Lost World (1925), but since most of us fell asleep during it, I don't think I'll be reviewing it. I'm still working on The Batman serial and Heroes for Sale, so I've got my hands full at the moment.

The way the week went meant I didn't get much of a chance to work on Blackmail this week, so we're standing still at 66,618 words.

As I'm sure everyone is aware, this next week includes the Thanksgiving Day holiday, which means there will probably be no writing on either Thursday or Friday. I aslo realize that sooner than later, I'll have to work on the next newsletter but luckily the first Sunday of December isn't until the 7th. So, I'm going to apologize now if my output isn't up to expectations for the next few weeks, though I want to get going again with Blackmail.

Well, that about does it for me. Keep writing and I'll see you back here next week.