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.

A Week in Writing #566 - Getting Nowhere Fast

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

I wish I could say we've finalized the deal with the artist, but we're all but there. I had asked the lawyer who drafted the original agreement we use to review it to see if there needs to be any updates (No AI, etc.). Since it's a favor, I can't get too mad, but the artist is chomping at the bit to get started and I'm anxiously waiting, too.

We had a second conversation with James Silvani, a comic book artist and the creator of Pirates: A Graphic History (But not THAT kind of graphic), which had a successful Kickstarter last year. My sons had run into him at Comic-Con and he said he was interested in appearing again, which is always nice to hear. You can watch it on our twitch.tv/powerssquared for the next few days, listen to it here or wait and watch it on our YouTube channel on Wednesday at 2:30 pm.

On Trophy Unlocked, we continued Noirvember with my Saturday Morning review of I Wake Up Screaming. On Wednesday, Game Day, was Trevor's review of Once Upon a Katamari. I'm working on my review of The Batman serial, which is going to be long; and Heroes For Sale (1933).

I'm finding, and I'm not sure it's all blameable on Daylight Savings Time, but I'm getting to things later in the evening and thus have less time to go from being productive to being a half-awake zombie at a laptop. Part of it has been dealing with our prospective artist and sending things to them, but work seems to go on longer and that makes everything get pushed back. Also, we shot our podcast on Thursday night, rather than Friday, and had some retakes we had to do because of audio issues, but that sort of took up two nights, the first being getting ready for it after the guest confirmed two nights before at 11:30 pm.

As a result, my output on Blackmail wasn't what I wanted it to be. I started a new chapter but I'm not happy with the results but let's count the words for 66,618, which I don't think really moves the needle much.

I'll try to do better this week, but it's a pledge, not a promise.

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

A Week in Writing #565 - Getting Close

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

We're very close to announcing a new artist for Powers Squared. I believe we're just down to the contract and I've asked a lawyer friend of mine to review it to see if we need to make any updates to the terms. The artist seems anxious to get going, too. That would be big news for us.

We signed up for Pasadena Comic Con next January, so I hope if you're attending you'll stop by and say hello. More details to come as we know them. I did some ordering over the weekend to get prepared. I'm not one of those creators who has a thousand copies of each book in the garage.

Our guest on Friday was Chris Ayers, a character designer/art director and the creator of The Daily Zoo, which he's been doing now for 20 years. Really nice guy and I think it was a good interview. You can check it on twitch.tv/powerssquared for the next week, listen to it here, or wait until Wednesday at 2:30 pm to watch it on our YouTube channel.

Sometimes nailing down guests is a little like herding kittens. We're still working on someone for next week, I won't say who, but it's finding a day and time to do it that's the issue, I think.

In honor of Noirvember, my review for Odds Against Tomorrow was the Saturday morning review on Trophy Unlocked. We're still going through The Batman serial, two episodes left, but I am working on a review for Blind Spot, a film noir I caught afterwards. Seeing as this is Noirvember, I suspect more of my backlog will appear.

I did some more work this week on Blackmail. I finished the next chapter and started a new one. I'm trying to show the character's attempts to balance his professional career, as a private detective, with his personal life, which includes a pregnant wife and a young child by another woman. I know I don't usually write much about my stories here but I thought you might find that interesting. Oh, and the case he's working on involves his wife and her ex-husband. The word count is now 65,570, so we're like a 1000 words a week, rather than a day.

Next week, I'm hoping to wrap up the contract with the new artist; work on prepping for the next few releases of The Blade of Miracles; finish my reivew of Blind Spot; and to work more on Blackmail. Let's see what gets in the way.

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

A Week in Writing #564 - Newsletter and Dodgers

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

Not the biggest Dodgers fan, not into baseball in general, but I like watching the World Series. Last Monday's game nearly did me in as it went 18 innings and sort of threw me off my routine and sleep, at least for that day. We ended watching most of the games, so everything was a little delyaed on those nights.

Still, got the newsletter done and out and that was the project for the week. For the most part, it writes itself, as it's a collection of things we've already done and most of the sections are standard, though there is new writing as well, including a Heard on Campus (it is supposed to be the school paper), a recommendation, and a highlight on twins. If you're curious you can always subscribe. And this is not a substack asking for money; our newsletter is monthly and free.

On the Powers Squared front, I think we're getting close to signing a new artist.

Four reviews on Trophy Unlocked this week and none of them mine, which is okay. Wednesday was Game Day with Trevor's look at Little Nightmares III. That was followed on Thursday with Paul's review of Fobia, Vol, 1, a horror anthology by Derrick Acosta of Mega64. Friday saw Paul's review of Silent Hill f  and Saturday Trevor's review of Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc.

No review this week from me and we didn't even watch any of The Batman serial that we've been watching. Blame the Dodgers for that, too, going into extra innings and all. We had just come from watching Back to the Future. My sons have loved the movie, but had never seen it in a theater. Hopefully, we'll get back our routine next week.

Our podcast this week was Halloween-themed. Since it was to air, originally, on Halloween, we decided to reminisce about past Halloweens, which was really fun. You can watch it for the next few days on our twitch channel, or listen to the audio here, or wait until Wednesday at 2:30 pm to watch it on our YouTube channel.

Once again, no new queries from me and, surprise, surprise, no responses from agents either.

I did some work this week on Blackmail. I thought of a plot point that would allow me to make the story more interesting and still add to my word count, which is at 64,583, still 15,000+ short. As always, I want to work on it more.

Next week, it will be back to Standard Time and I hope the switch goes well.

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

A Week in Writing #563 - New Issue of The Blade of Miracles

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

Well, it's not Powers Squared, but there will be a new issue of The Blade of Miracles, which will be released later this week. The eighth issue of a twelve-issue run is called "Mordred, Part 1" and, as they all have been, was written, drawn and lettered by Trevor and edited by Paul. The issue will be available in print and digital through The Campus Store on our website.

It should be no surprise that the release of "Mordred, Part 1" was the subject of our podcast on Friday, OAPS #322 - TBOM #8 Preview. If you missed it, you can stil catch it on twitch.tv/powerssquared for the next few days, listen to it here or wait and watch it on our YouTube channel on Wednesday at 2:30 pm.

To support the release, I've written a press release and a new The Bark, both of which are pending review.

Trevor has been busy, as he also had four reviews on Trophy Unlcoked this week, starting with Me & My Katamari on Monday followed by Second Look - Beautiful Katamari (+ DLC) on Tuesday, Katamari Forever; and Second Look - Touch My Katamari on Friday. My review of Frankenstein was the Saturday Morning Review. No new review this week from me.

We did watch the original Scream on Friday and Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc on Sunday morning, so I would be expecting reviews for them to be out in the near future.

We attended LightBox Expo on Saturday in Pasadena. Though the Con has panels, which are hard to get into, it is basically a giant artist alley. We walked the floor, talked to some artists, made a few invitations to appear on our podcast and spent a lot of money. Just me and the boys this time. Fun and tiring, but no report from the front for this one.

Some work this week on Blackmail. I'm now over 63,000 words, so there is progress. I've gone back through the book and made edits for the time being and I'm working on a new chapter. I'm still about 17,000 words short of my goal, but the important thing is to keep working on it.

This coming week is, once again, newsletter time, so I'll be working on that.

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

A Week in Writing # 562 - The Time Had Come

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

Well, things finally came to a head this week and I fired the artist on Powers Squared. It was not something I wanted to do, but after two months and no finished pages and two weeks and no response to a direct message, I didn't feel like I had a choice. It was time to move on. We're in the process of looking for a new artist and hopefully we'll find one soon. There have, so far, been only four artists to draw the book, which isn't bad for 28 issues. One drew five, another drew four, this last one did only one and one aritst drew 18 issues in all.

On this week's podcast, Paul and I discussed horror movies, in time for Halloween. I figured if we did it on Halloween it would be too late. For me, watching horror films after Halloween is a little like watching Christmas movies in January; the season has passed. You can still watch it on our twitch channel for the next few days, listen to it now here, or wait and watch it in all its glory on Wednesday at 2:30 pm PDT here. The choice is yours.

Next week's podcast should be a preview for the next issue of Trevor's book The Blade of Miracles, #8, "Mordred, Part 1". There is also a new review of the book for your perusal. And the peek-of-the-week is from that book as well.

Speaking of horror films, or more like Gothic Science Fiction, we attended a screening of Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein this past Saturday. I was anxious to see it because I had read the Mary Shelley novel and had high hopes del Toro's version would be a closer adaptation to the book than Universal's Frankenstein (1931) had been. My review will go up next Saturday, so you'll have to wait until then to know how I feel about the new movie.

In the meantime, Paul's review of Tron: Ares went up on Saturday on Trophy Unlocked. And on Game Day Wednesday, Trevor's review of the PC game Tron: Catalyst was featured.

I also did some prelimary research on the Batman serial we're watching, though we didn't watch any this past Saturday.

More work on Blackmail this week, but more like editing, though I did add a chapter. The word count is now 61,671, so some movement forward on that. This Tuesday past was my wife's birthday, so I took the day off. Since it was raining, we sheltered in place for half the day and I was able to get some work done on the book.

No new queries this week. I've got to get back on that horse soon.

The next week, we'll keep working on finding a new artist and I hope to get in more writing on Blackmail.

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

A Week in Writing #561 - Not As Bad As Advertised

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

I sort of lost part of a day this week. It was colonoscopy time again, which I had scheduled for Wednesday. I feared I would be more out of it that day/night, but it wasn't that bad. I'm not going to make this blog about getting screened, but it's better to know either way than not know. I'll leave it to you to decide what you want to do.

I did do some writing on Blackmail, which was supposed to be the week's main event. I ended up adding a new chapter and making some other revisions. Now, I'm up to 61,000+ words, but still about 19,000 to go with more story to tell.

Our podcast this week was our 21st Comic Book Club, Grommets by Rick Remender and Brian Posehn. Julia Canon and Rachel Wells joined us for the discussion. You can see it for the next few days on our twitch channel, listen to it here or wait and watch it on our YouTube channel on Wednesday at 2:30 pm PT. Our next book will be Vagabond by Takehiko Inoue, if you want to virtually participate. Not sure when that podcast will be made.

We had a bit of a discussion, offline, about the sitch with Powers Squared and I will be letting our current artist go come Monday. By then it will have been two weeks of radio silence, which for me is a no-go. We've been stuck about five pages in on an issue for over two months, so I don't see it getting done this year. Time to make a change.

The Saturday Morning Review this week on Trophy Unlocked was my review of The Sound of Music. Next week will be Paul's for Tron: Ares, which we watched yesterday in IMAX 3D, the way it was intended. We're still slogging our way through The Batman 1943 serial, so that review is still several weeks away.

I need to get back into the query game soon. Hopefully next week or the week after, depending on how things go.

This week, I also need to prep for the next issue of The Blade of Miracles #8, "Mordred, Part 1", which is coming out at the end of the month, October 29. Several things need to happen before then, so it's not a mad rush like last month.

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

A Week in Writing #560 - Newsletter Week, Again!

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

My whole family had our COVID vaccinations yesterday. It seems vaccines effect people differently. Besides the sore shoulder, I know that at about 10 last night my mind went to mush. Now, it seems to do that more and more to me anyway. I try to write until about 11 pm and some nights by 10:30 I'm really done. If I'm not falling asleep at the keyboard, then I'm in a half-sleep haze, wanting to do something but not quite making it happen. Time for bed at that point.

For our podcast on Friday, we interviewed Lewis Fenton of Mythos Comics. They were one of the booths next to us in Small Press at San Diego Comic-Con. It was a pretty good interview, and I ended up buying some books off their website as a result. One that Lewis had worked on, The Brave, is the story of Squanto, the indian who came forward to help the Pilgrims and also spoke perfect English. I also bought the two issues of Samaritan, a comic book that started out as a screenplay but became a comic book when the script didn't sell, but when it did, they lost rights to the story, so the book only had two issues. You can hear more by listening to the podcast here, watching it on twitch.tv/powerssquared for the next few days, or catching it on our YouTube channel on Wednesday after 2:30 pm PDT.

Following our interview, we watched Samaritan, which lives on Amazon Prime, and I wrote a review of it over the weekend. As always, not sure when it will go up. However, my review of Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale did go up as Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review. Earlier in the week, on Game Day Wednesday, Paul's review of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach went up as well.

This week was sort of dominated by The Hound Dogs' Howl, our monthly newsletter. This month, the featured twins are Bridgette and Paula Powers, no relation to Marty and Eli Powers, from Australia. There is also a round up of stories about Powers Squared, The Blade of Miracles and our videos and podcasts on YouTube. It's FREE if you want to subscribe. In keeping with the collegiate theme, you "enroll" at San Romero Community College to get on the list, plus you get a free digital copy of Issue #1. You can sign up here. End of plug.

I am about finished with our current artist on Powers Squared. I believe I mentioned last week that we got pages a week and a day late, but there has been no communication back since we sent her comments, which we sent on the 29th and we're coming up on a week of radio silence. I don't like firing people, but it seems to be headed in that direction.

On the subject of Powers Squared, we sent in the physical issues required as part of the application for Small Press. They had to be postmarked by the 11th, but I wanted to get them sent and not have to worry.

Some work this week as well on Blackmail; remember, this was supposed to be a newsletter week. I'm writing a couple of chapters that are out of my wheelhouse totally, so I'm making up procedures that a law enforcement organization would follow. It makes me feel rather tentative while writing it. My best hope is to get through it, which I've done. I'm at 58,526 words, which is about 22,00 short, with more to come.

I've got to get back to Blackmail this week, though I will warn you I'm going to miss a day, but that can wait until next week.

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

A Week in Writing #559 - Birthday, Birthday, Birthday

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

There is a three week period, starting in late September, when we celebrate four birthdays in my family of four. This is that week, starting with mine on Thursday and my sons' today. That doesn't mean I took the week off, but the output might not be as great as it could be.

Paul and I took a nostalgic look back at the videos on our YouTube channel that had garnered the most views on this week's On the Air with Powers Squared podcast. The videos cover a variety of the topics our videos cover, from interviews with other creators but also comic book clubs, Who is...? videos for our characters, taste tests, vlogs about SDCC, etc. I'll grant you it's a little meta, but it is what it is. You can listen to it here or watch it on our YouTube channel on Wednesday after 2:30 pm PDT here.

I did write two reviews this week, one for Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale, which we watched on my birthday, and The Invisible Man Returns for October, which we watched on Friday night. We're still watching The Batman serial, as well. I would imagine The Grand Finale will be up soon. Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review this week was Paul's review of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Infinity Castle and this week a surprise Sunday morning review by Paul of Elio.

We published two books this week, "The Great Escape", #26 from Powers Squared, and "Vivienne", #7 of Trevor's book, The Blade of Miracles. Both are available in print and digital through The Campus Store on our website. Shout out to Ka-Blam and their platform Indy Planet. We were having issues with the .pdf for "The Great Escape", but they managed to get it up on Indy Planet the same day they got the revised .pdf. I really appreciate their extra effort to make it work. I also want to add that the black border around the cover, rather than white, was their idea.

And, as if that wasn't enough, we submitted our third trade to ComicsPlus by Library Pass. This one includes issues 10-14, The "What's in a Name" through "The Imposter" storylines. Not sure when that will be available.

Spoke to our local comic book store about doing a signing and selling our trades there. Went well, but more to come on that.

I'm honestly to beyond the point of no return with our current artist, who is about two months overdue. I did receive pages, but a week and a day after they were supposed to be turned in. It's really adversely affecting Powers Squared and a change is in the offing.

We applied today to table at the Golden State Fur Con in 2026, as we think there is furry appeal in both The Blade of Miracles and to an extent, Powers Squared. More to come on that as well.

I managed to do some work on Blackmail. Almost to 58,000 words. I completed one chapter and started on the next one. I believe I'm entering what would be called the third act. I think I need to do some research before I get too much futher.

Next week, it's newsletter time again, so that will definitely play into whatever else I do.

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

A Week in Writing #558 - The Sound of Music

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

Rarely does a review dominate a week as much as The Sound of Music took. I hate to say it, but it took up most of my writing time this week working on it. It's a little short of 3000 words. Since we watched it on Sunday afternoon, I didn't really get to it until Monday, and then it was a combination of a late start and trying to pay attention to a replay of a Cowboys game, which took time. I had to watch the game over two nights as it was. Anyway, the review is done and I don't have a new one to work on this week.

Since Saturday was also Batman Day, we ended up watching three episodes of the Batman serial from 1943. As you can imagine, as it was made during World War II, there are racist comments about the Japanese. My idea is to watch the serial and then review it, so this will be a few weeks in the making, but we'll be ready for Batman Day next year for sure.

Batman Day also has a certain place in Powers Squared history as that was the day, four year ago, when we (Paul, Trevor, myself and Julia Canon) had our signing at Golden Apple in Hollywood. I remember because we were also asked to hand out free Batman books.

Speaking of Powers Squared, the next issue, #26 - "The Great Escape", is coming out on Wednesday, September 24. On the same day, the next issue of Trevor's The Blade of Miracles, #7 - "Vivienne", is also being released. To commemorate the ocassion, our podcast on Friday, OAPS #317 - "SRCC Press September MEGA Update", was a preview of both issues, with Julia Canon guesting to talk about "The Great Escape". You can still catch it on twitch.tv (at least the live version), or listen to it here, or watch it on our YouTube channel on Wednesday, after 2:30 pm PDT.

In the meantime, you can watch Oreo-Reese's Taste Test that went up this afternoon. In it, Paul samples the various Oreo and Reese's combinations that are currently on the market and gives his opinion.

The Saturday Morning Review on Trophy Unlocked, was Trevor's review of Lilo & Stitch (2025), one of the summer movies that we decided to wait until it was on Disney+. We recently had that same experience with Elio and a review from Paul will probably be out next week or soon after.

My work this week on Blackmail, isn't worth writing about, so we'll leave it there.

This coming week, I need to produce a press release and Bark newsletter about the new issue. Other than that, I'm hoping to spend most of my time working on Blackmail.

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

A Week in Writing #557 - Never too Late

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

Just to show that it's never too late to hear back from an agent, I received an email on Monday, September 8, for a query I sent on May 8, and which I wrote off as DNR on July 8. But that doesn't mean the agent was done with me. It should come as no surprise that it wasn't a request for more pages or even a personalized rejection. Just a form response:

"Thank you so much for giving me a chance to consider your work. Unfortunately, I don’t believe I’m the right person to represent it effectively. Publishing is such a subjective industry; so, please don’t be discouraged. I wish you the absolute best of luck finding an agent who can represent your work with the enthusiasm it deserves."

Not necessarily worth waiting for, but it does show some agents do respond, it's just not in a timely manner.

No queries this week, again. I'm hoping to learn some things soon and will get back into the query game after that.

I did work some on Blackmail this week, though I'm rewriting the newest chapter I'd written, and I've added a few things in what I had already written. One of the things I like about writing is seeing something current and make it relate to what I'm writing. I came across such a story this week, and while I won't name names, it involved two atheletes, from different sports, who had a relationship. It was some of the things the woman said about the man fit in with my book, so I made a point of using the spirit of how she described it, though I made sure not to quote her. So, the word count is now over 56,000, but I am making progress.

Had a little issue with the next issue of Powers Squared. We got back a proof and there was dialogue credited to the wrong character, an easy fix, and why you get proofs, but I wasn't sure if I should delay the issue by a month. I changed my mind this week and it may not be available everywhere on the first day, but that's life.

So, there'll be two issues coming out on the 24th: Issue #7 of The Blade of Miracles and #26 of Powers Squared. I had intended to release four issues of Powers Squared this year, but production issues with #29 have me rethinking that.

Trophy Unlocked hit 1700 reviews this week, with Trevor's review of Look Back having the honors. On Wednesday, Paul put up a review of ENA: Dream BBQ Chapter 1 - Lonely Door. Saturday night was upheaved this week because Paul was judging at a Yu-Gi-Oh! Regional, but we went to see a 60th anniversary showing of The Sound of Music today, and I'll probably be the one reviewing it.

Speaking of Paul's judging, our Friday podcast was about his previous experience with doing that at a previous Regional. I know I learned a few things during the show. You can listen to it here, watch it  on our twitch channel for a few more days, or watch it on our You Tube channel (@powerssquared) here Wednesday after 2:30 pm PDT.

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

A Week in Writing #556 - And now Football

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

I am not the type of guy that watches college and pro football from Saturday morning until Monday night, but I do find the three hours a week I spend watching games can seem like a real waste of time, especially if the team loses and I've done nothing else while watching. By the way, I follow only one team, the Dallas Cowboys, which is where I'm from, and that's about it. I'll watch the Super Bowl, but  I'm not watching every other game and on weekends when they're not playing, I think of as a gold mine of time.

So, that's a way of saying I didn't send a query out on Thursday because the team was playing, and losing. I can do things while I'm watching the game, like work on the newsletter, but I don't think it would be a good result to work on a query letter part-time. I know I said I'd start sending them again after Labor Day, but I didn't this week.

Speaking of the newsletter, that went out this morning. Again, I would encourage you to sign up for it. If you're thinking it's the same as this blog, it isn't. We cover some of the same ground, but it is more focused on the SRCC Press universe than this is. You can sign up, its FREE, here. If you've ever been curious about this Powers Squared I keep writing about, you'll get a free digital issue for your trouble. End of plug.

I did work on Blackmail this week. That chapter I'd been wanting to write got written and I was able to sprinkle a few updates I had been thinking out. I find the drive to and from work provides a certain amount of time to think about the story, the only problem is I have to wait until the end of the day and after dinner before I can implement any of it. Somehow, in the hours in between, what seemed focused in the morning gets a little less so twelve or so hours later. The word count is now 54,419. I think I'm about 25,000 words short so far.

My review of Thunderbolts* was the Saturday morning review on Trophy Unlocked. I know you're thinking that came out in May and it did. And we just watched it recently on Disney+. In retrospect, it would probably have been worth watching in the theater but at the time, it wasn't considered so. I've also just finished a new review of Tight Spot, a 1955 film noir I've had on the DVR for years and finally watched. As always, no idea when it will appear on the blog.

The podcast this week was the three of us, Paul, Trevor and I, talking about the Fourth Doctor (Dr. Who for the uninformed). Yes, I know it's over 50 years old, but we had been watching the Tom Baker years for a while and thought to talk about it while it was still fresh on our minds. We're still waiting for the BBC to release season two, but that's not until next year and we had a podcast on Friday. We're still reaching out a second time to creators we met at Comic-Con to appear and we have issues to discuss, so OAPS isn't going to turn into us discusccing old British Sci-Fi. You can watch it here now, and for a few more days, or here on Wednesday after 2:30 pm PDT, or listen anytime here. (And if you don't like our website, there are links to the other platforms where the podcast appears.)

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

A Week in Writing #555 - A Much Better Week

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

I feel like I'm finally getting back in the groove, so to speak. While I could have done better, I think I'm feeling good for the first time in about a month.

I'll start with Blackmail, which I usally end with. Previously, I had been waffling about getting started on the next chapter, which I can now report I've finished. Word count is now 52684, which is going in the right direction.

Our podcast was also about books, or rather our 20th Comic Book Club. Of the other members, outside of the Hankins family, only one attended, Rachel Wells. We discussed Look Back by Tatsuki Fujimoto. Rather than live, we had pre-recorded it a couple of weeks ago. You can listen to it here or watch it on Wednesday after 2:30 on our YouTube channel (@powerssquared). The next book, in case you want to read along, is Grommets, written by Rick Remender and Brian Posehn.

We also recorded a new taste test video on Saturday night and put it up this afternoon. Paul taste tests three unique Mountain Dew Flavors: Baja Blast (Taco Bell), Mango Rush (Little Caesars) and Purple Thunder (Circle K). You can find it here.

Wrote a new review this weekend for Thunderbolts*. It came out in May, but we waited until it was on Disney+ to watch it. I would imagine the review will be up sooner rather than later. My review of 3 Bad Men was the Saturday morning review on Trophy Unlocked.

I did some preliminary work on the newsletter this week, writing the twin profile piece, and some other odds and ends. That comes out next Sunday, so there is still time to sign up for it, which you can do here.

Our artist has contracted COVID, so I'm not sure what the status is for the next five pages. Our colorist has completed the first four pages of the issue, as well as the covers for the third trade.

We do have a new issue of Powers Squared coming out at the end of September, our 26th, "The Great Escape", as well as the 7th issue of The Blade of Miracles, "Vivienne". So another big month for SRCC Press.

So, hopefully more on Blackmail, finishing the newsletter and working on other projects (maybe even a new query) are on the horizon for next week.

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

A Week in Writing #554 - A Few Setbacks But Getting There

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

A few setbacks this week and it's really no one's fault but mine. Let's start with the query letter. Yeah, that's right no queries again this week. Partly it's because I was still messing around with the synopsis in the query letter. I'm trying to condense, what I think is a complicated plot, to as few paragraphs as I can, while still getting the main parts of the story across. It's still six paragraphs long, so I need to keep working on it. I've also decided that with summer coming to an end, I'm going to put off more queries until after Labor Day. It'll give some more time to work on the query.

The other setback has come with the pages of Powers Squared that I spent several hours reshaping. I decided on my own that I had set the margins too wide, so I'm going back and trying to amend them each slightly, about a quarter inch on all four sides. I know I'm putting off the query to the distributor but I want to put the best foot forward since I may only get one bite at the apple.

On the subject of Powers Squared, some progress but no new pages since the last batch last month.

Our podcast this week is a preview of Trevor's 6th issue of The Blade of Miracles, which is dropping on Wednesday, August 27. Due to delays, I'm not sure if the print option will be available when we want it to be, but I don't think it could be helped. We didn't even have a copy of the book when we did the podcast, which I think is the first time ever for On the Air With Powers Squared. You can listen to it here or watch it on Wednesday at 2:30 pm PDT here. The book will be availbable through The Campus Store on our website, where all the previous issues are available as well. (Yes, that's a hint)

Coming up soon is the next newsletter, The Hound Dogs' Howl, but I believe I've got another weekend to go before that's due. We publish that the first Sunday in every month, so I have until the 6th of September, but I should probably start on that soon. But there will be a Bark heralding the new release.

My review of The Fantastic Four: First Steps was the Saturday Morning Review on Trophy Unlocked. It's about a month old by now, but we've got to slot them in when we can, including going to the movies. Even though we had watched the other films, this version came out the weekend we were tabling at SDCC, so we had to put it off.

I also finished a review for Smart Blonde, the first in the Torchy Blane series from Warner Brothers from 1937. It was on TCM recently, so I recorded it. When I told a co-worker about our DVR he sort of looked at me like I was a dinosaur, but it's a usually reliable way to record movies, etc., that you're not going to see live. Draining it is another story, though.

And finally, Blackmail the current book I'm working on. I'm having a little trouble picking it back up again. It's not writer's block, but rather rethinking how I want to pick up on the story. I've started it a couple of times but end up back at zero before I get too far. I think though I know how to get it going again, so hopefully more to report next week.

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

A Week in Writing #553 - A Meh Week

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

I want to say I spent a good portion of the week working on issues #1-5. I was trying to prepare .pdfs for a submission, and all of the remastered issues looked bad, the margins were way too large. So, I went through the first five issues, re-sized each page and then moved around the various elements to try and make each issue more consistent with each other and to have less margins. I worked on this most nights and just finished with the .pdfs this afternoon. I know it sounds simple and for some issues went quickly for others not so much. But that's now behind and I can start working on the submission this week.

I'm also trying to work on our third trade, which I would like to have ready by Fall.

I know I said I would do a new query this week but I decided at the last minute to rewrite the query letter, taking yet another shot at it. I'm not saying this to be bragging, but there is almost too much going on in the book to easily condense. But I've got to try and hopefully catch an agent's eye. (I know, bad rhyme.) But I'll finish this week and retry.

This weekend, we did two podcasts. On Friday, we had David Petersen, the creator of Mouse Guard on, for the second time. He talked about his work on Magic: The Gathering cards and what's going on with Mouse Guard. As always, you can listen to "Magic and Mice", here or wait and watch it on our YouTube channel here on Wednesday at 2:30 pm PDT.

We also recorded a future podcast, our 20th Comic Book Club, Look Back by Tatsuki Fujimoto. I set to record on Saturday to make it more available to everyone, but only our former artist, Rachel Wells, made it on the podcast. I'm thinking that will go up soon.

As far as movie reviews, Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review was Trevor's review of Freakier Friday. I'm going to work on one for The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which we watched this morning, and Trevor will be working on one for the anime of Look Back, which we watched on Saturday night.

Editing continues on Blackmail, and I'm only at 51,209 words. I'm almost done with editing what I've written and hope to move on to new chapters this week.

So, submission, queries and Blackmail are on this week's agenda. But plans can change, I'm afraid.

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

A Week in Writing #552 - Another Down Week

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

I seem to be racking up disappointing weeks here. I'm not sure what the issue is, but I'm pretty sure it's time, or lack thereof.

On the accomplishment-side of the equation, I did rewatch Brother Orchid and write the review. As always, I don't know when it will see the light of day. That doesn't mean things haven't been busy on Trophy Unlocked. My review of the new Superman movie went up on Wednesday. Saturday saw Trevor's review of Freaky Friday, and then today, his review of Bad Guys 2 went up. Soon, there will be his review of Freakier Friday, which we watched this morning. I also started working on one for The Gangster, another recording from the last Summer of Darkness on TCM.

We also discussed movies on our podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared. Paul and I reviewed the summer movies, or the few we wanted to talk about, as there were like 139 films that will have come out between the beginning of May and the end of August. There are several which we think are better to wait for streaming. You can listen to the podcast here, watch it for a couple of days here or wait until Wednesday at 2:30 pm to watch it here.

In the meantime, another video went up today on our YouTube channel, Paul's SDCC 2025 Vlog. After about 20 years of SDCC, we got to experience it from the other side of the table. Paul talks about how that went from his perspective. You can watch it now here.

One of the outgrowths of Comic-Con is that we might have found a distributor. However, I'm going through the .pdfs of our remastered first five issues and there are a lot of changes as far as placement that I need to go through. By that, I mean the margins, which for some reason are really off. I'm going back and trying to correct them before moving on with pursuing the distributor, as they want .pdfs. I've done one issue this afternoon and will keep working on that.

We also registered the next two issues of Powers Squared, #26 and 27, for copyright, so I have to update them as well before getting test printings done. It never seems to stop.

No queries again this week, as we spent some of that time inviting people we met at Comic-Con to be guests on the podcast. So far, the only one to come back to us is David Petersen, the creator of Mouse Guard. This would be his second time on the show. Stay tuned. We're also trying to line up a Comic Book Club session as well.

I did some work on Blackmail this week. Still editing. I'm not really happy with one chapter, so I'm going to work some more on it before moving on with the book. I'm a couple of hundred words south of 51,000 with 80,000 a minimum.

This week, I've got pages to realign, as well as a review to work on. I'm sort of promising to do a new query and to work more on Blackmail.

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

A Week in Writing #551 - Not a Banner Week

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

This was not a great week for me, writing-wise. I'm not sure if it was Comic-Con hangover or getting back to reality, but I didn't seem to have the stamina to get much done.

I spent most of the week working on The Hound Dogs' Howl newsletter, which seemed to be as much as I could muster.

I also added the 16 to 17 names who signed up at Comic-Con to our mailing list. I say 16 or 17 because one email address didn't work, no matter how we tried to enter it. (Sorry, Caitilin, if you're out there).

I guess I got too clever, because I thought to send a notice to the new members, thanking them for stopping by and telling them something about the newsletter, and explaining the "Hey Hound Dogs" salutation. I sent them all as a group on blindcopy and they all came back as undeliverable. The actual newsletter apparently went through, no bounces, so I'm not sure why the emails weren't delivered. I probably should have sent them individually, but I was trying to be efficient.

We also contacted most of the people we had talked to about possibly appearing on our podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared. No undeliverables, but no replies as of yet, though it was only yesterday that we sent them. Still have a couple to go.

Comic-Con was the subject of two videos that we put up on our YouTube channel. First, was Paul's SDCC 2025 Haul video, which you can watch here. And, surprise-surprise, Paul and I talked about it on our weekly podcast On the Air with Powers Squared. You can listen to it here, or watch it for the next few days at twitch.tv/powerssuared, or wait until Wednesday at 2:30 pm PDT to watch it on our YouTube channel here.

I finished my review of Superman, and I believe it will go up mid-week. I'm sort of working on a review for Brother Orchard, but I'll admit I'm having to watch certain sections of the movie over as I sort of dozed in parts; I was tired, it was not the movie.

The Saturday Morning review this week on Trophy Unlocked was Paul's review of A Minecraft Movie. The Wednesday Game Day review was Trevor's review of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4.

No new query this week, put it down to fatigue. I'm pretty sure there are bunch of DNRs, but that's for next week.

I'm still editing what I've already written on Blackmail; 50449 words, so far.

So, not a banner week for me with the promise to do better.

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

A Week in Writing #550 - Report From the Front: San Diego Comic-Con 2025

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

I know this is a day late but we didn't get home from San Diego Comic-Con until about 10:30 on Sunday night and I was in no shape to be doing much other than eating, unloading and sleeping.

For the first time ever, SRCC Press (Powers Squared and The Book of Miracles) tabled at San Diego Comic-Con. As I believe I mentioned in an earlier post, we didn't know we would be tabling until July 3rd at 6:30 pm, so it gave a little less that three weeks to pull everything together. If we had had more time, we might have ordered different things, like a table runner for SRCC Press and maybe a banner for The Blade of Miracles. But we had to make do with what we had, though we did order some more trades and copies of issues to have on hand.

We went down on Tuesday to set up at the Convention Center. Things went surprisingly easy as far as that went. While Paul and I were officially the exhibitors, we were able to have my wife, and Trevor, help us set up the table.

Doing that then, freed up Wednesday, so we could wander around the Gaslamp District and see the installation of the installations. I guess I never realized they were ready so close to the start of the Con. Preview Night is a different experience when you're behind a table. As soon as the doors open, there is a mad dash for exclusives. Since we had no exclusives, business was slow, though we did sell one copy of Issue One.

I won't go through each day, but it was safe to say, even though this wasn't a money-maker, we did far better than LA Comic-Con and Wonder Con combined. We were hindered by the short lead time (we didn't make the printed program) and by a neighboring table, which not only partially blocked us from view, but also attracted enough of a crowd that further blocked us. However, some people did find us.

We sold about 8 times as much as we did at WonderCon, which is a nice trajectory to see. We had one customer come by and after hearing my spiel, bought the first five issues, and then she came back later that evening to buy the other 20 issues. That was 25 issues in one day, which is definitely a record for us. Also a record, 17 new names signed up for our mailing list.

On another day, someone bought the run for The Blade of Miracles, which currently has five issues out. Our overall take, which is paltry, was still about 3.5 times what we made at WonderCon.

You can see photos from SDCC 2025 on our website at https://powerssquaredcomicbook.com/events.

Since we were gone on Friday, artist Julia Canon took over as host of the podcast, On the Air With Powers Squared, and one of her guests is me, live from the floor. She also shows how she colors Power Squared. You can watch it at twitch.tv/powerssquared. You can listen to it on our website here or watch it on Wednesday after 2:30 pm here.

And just because we were away, that doesn't mean things came to a stop on Trophy Unlocked. With the new Fantastic Four opening on Friday, we went old school with a review (a second look) at the last version of the story, Fantastic Four (2015).

This was nearly a week without any writing from me. I did manage a little work on Blackmail, so I'm at about 50,160 words, which is good, but I'm far from through with the story.

And, it should go without saying, no new queries from me.

This coming week will involve adding all the names on our sign up sheet, writing the newsletter and getting everything put away.

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

A Week in Writing # 549 - Getting Ready

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

This has really been a week of prep for SRCC Press going to San Diego Comic-Con. And it's busy and expensive to boot as it seems every day we need to buy something else.

The biggest item purchased this week were Exhibitor-Attendee badges for Trevor and my wife, Nancy. That allows them to be behind the table during exhibition hours, while Paul and I will be the Exhibitors allowing us early and late access to the floor. I wasn't sure if I could purchase them, but it worked when I tried.

I'm sure the Exhibitors Relations Office is really busy, but they are not all that communicative, but we'll get there and see what happens.

I'd like to say Ka-Blam came through and we received the books we'd ordered on Friday, which lifted a big load off my mind. I was a little worried when the first indication from the Post Office was this coming Monday by 9 pm, which would have been cutting it close to say the least. Now, I'm wondering if I ordered enough of the right stuff, but that's what we'll learn from tabling.

To help us get ready, we had artist Don Nguyen on our podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared. Don is a frequent exhibitor in Artist Alley and while he won't be there this year, we know that he has a lot of experience with SDCC. He gave us some good advice and led to a few additional purchases since Friday. Find out what he suggested when you listen to it here or watch it here for the next few days, and here, when it goes up on Wednesday.

Artist Julia Canon will be handling the podcast in our absence, so be sure to tune in on Friday at 6 pm on https://www.twitch.tv/powerssquared to be supportive.

Next week, though it will most likely be Monday, I'll be doing a Report from the Front, though I'm not sure at this point how many panels I'll be attending, or how exciting it will be reporting on tabling, but we'll find that out together. If you're reading this and attending SDCC, come by M-11 in Small Press and say hello.

We opted out of movies on Saturday night, so no new review from me, though I did manage to finish the one I was writing on 3 Bad Men; as always, not sure when it will appear. There were two new reviews on Trophy Unlocked  this week, Trevor's review of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, on the anniversary of its release on Friday, and Paul's review of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer was the Saturday Morning Review.

No new queries this week, as something had to get squeezed out of the way.

I did more editing on Blackmail, though the word count is still hovering just under 50,000 words. I don't want to promise I'll get much further this week, as we're going down on Tuesday to set up.

Well, that about does it for me. Keep writing, and I'll see you back here next week (unless I see you in San Diego).

A Week in Writing #548 - Going to the Show

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

The big news is that SRCC Press (Powers Squared and The Blade of Mircales) is going to be tabling at San Diego Comic-Con. And we're pretty much ready, though I wish things were moving a little faster. By that, I mean working with Comic-Con International. I am not a patient man, but I don't see why it took 7 days to go from we have an opening, are you interested to here is your table number. And, while I've paid for the table, I'm still waiting to buy the badges, because they haven't approved a form I sent them on Friday.

So, if you are going, look for us:

If all goes right, we should be M-11 in Small Press. It's going to be a bit of a grind, but it should be fun but in a different way. Looking forward to going and I hope we not only make some sales, but also get more people interested in our books.

We did a mock set up today. We're going to incorporate video into our booth, so we're having to buy a monitor for the occasion. And there are still some odds and ends we still need to buy. Nothing like having a three-week lead time for the biggest event in your creative career.

A fair warning, this post will be late a couple of weeks from now, because of SDCC, but that's getting ahead of ourselves.

We had a come to Jesus moment with our artist on Saturday. I'm not sure what's going on sometimes, but I'm hopeful she'll turn it around and get us pages. Otherwise, we're standing still and like a shark, that's deadly for a comic book.

I got to a "refueling point" with Blackmail. By that, I mean I came to a spot where I needed to sort of rethink things and get a running start. For me, that's going back through the book to sort of refamiliarize myself with it and then when I get to the end of what I've written, keep going. I don't think my word count has really shot up as a result. I'm now at 49,726 words and I don't see that number really changing too much either way until I get back to where I left off.

One new query this week. Trying to get back on the horse after missing it for a couple of weeks. All quiet on the agent front.

As far as reviews, I'm currently working on one for 3 Bad Men (1926), a John Ford western. I got interested in it since I'm reading Joy Girl: A Novel of Olive Borden (Forgotten Actresses) by Laini Giles. I've really enjoyed her series of books about silent film stars that are mostly forgotten today. Borden was one of the romantic leads in 3 Bad Men.

Trophy Unlocked doesn't wait for me. The Wednesday Game Day review was Trevor's for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2x and the Saturday Morning Review was his as well for Fantastic Four (2005) + Extended Edition. The latter is our look at the previous films leading up to this year's reboot.

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

A Week in Writing #547 - A Weird Week

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

A short week with a National holiday at the end really sort of threw me off my game. Let's begin with Thursday. I didn't submit a new query. I know I said I would, but I figured no one was going to react on the 4th of July and I didn't want to start the DNR clock on anything queries. I know it's an excuse, but it makes sense, at least it did to me.

Friday, even though we had pre-taped the podcast, we all forgot about it until about 6:40 pm, only 40 mnutes late. It went up and if I hadn't told you that, you probably wouldn't have known. But we're all about honesty here. This podcast was our 19th Comic Book Club, yes 19. We were a small party of four, with only Julia Canon joining Trevor, Paul and myself in discussing Stan Sakai's Usagi Yojimbo: Ice and Snow. You can still catch it on twitch for a little longer this time (one week), listen to it now here or watch it on YouTube when it goes up on Wednesday, July 9 at 2:30 pm PDT.

On Saturday, which is usually a night that we watch a movie that I review, we instead watched A Minecraft Movie, which Paul is reviewing. So no new review from me for two weeks in a row. As I said, this is a weird week. That said, the Saturday Morning Review on Trophy Unlocked was my review of Gulliver's Travels, the 1939 film, which was the second animated feature film made; the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

My big project this week was to write the Powers Squared newsletter, The Hound Dogs' Howl, which I'm happy to say went out on time, so something worked this week. This was our June wrap up. A typical newsletter, it talks about what happened in the worlds of Powers Squared and The Blade of Miracles during the past month, including new issues for each. We also recounted the news as it relates to Golden Apple, as well as going vertical with the first issue of each book.

There is then a wrap up of the videos we've done, a link to the current audio podcast we had last Friday (see above), a section I call "Heard Around Campus" (since this is supposed to be a school paper), a spotlight on twins, a recommendation, a list of upcoming Powers Squared  milestones, and any social media mentions of us, if there were any. As always, you can subscribe here, if the spirit so moves you. And, it's FREE.

On to Blackmail, the book I'm currently writing. I added the chapter I was thinking about, which accounts for most of my work on the book. The word count is a little more than 49,000 words, so there has been progress.

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

A Week in Writing #546 - Three Down (Well Almost)

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

The three down are in reference to my queries for Past Present. One rejection came in this week, ironically, the last query I sent out was the first rejection I received. I won't go into what it said, but safe to say it was a form letter; what else do you expect these days from agents, other than no response at all? I wonder how many form letter emails I'll receive which will include "...please forgive me for responding with a form letter."

The first one I sent, in late April, has over-ripened into a DNR, as it's been two months. And the second one I sent is a few days away at best from spoiling as well.

And, to top it off, no new query this week. I spent most of Thursday night either getting ready for the trip I mentioned last week, or waiting to talk to the artist who did our podcast this past Friday.

Speaking of On the Air with Powers Squared, Julia Canon, our artist/colorst, hosted the show, bringing in her own guest, Kevin Krust. If you have a good memory, you might remember that we had Kevin on as a guest many moons ago, OAPS # 231 - Attempting to Impart Wisdom, She brought him back for OAPS #305 - The Return of KevinKrust...Hold the Krust. You can listen to it here, or watch it on YouTube on Wednesday at 2:30 pm PDT. And, if you act fast, you can still catch it on our twitch channel but only until next Friday.

Despite being out of town, there was a new review on Trophy Unlocked, Trevor's review of to a T. Since we weren't home, no Friday night movie, no Saturday night movie and no new review from me. We'll have to correct that in due time.

Even though I was away for part of the time, I'm now up to over 47,700 words on Blackmail. I did have an idea for it, so I'm going to add a bit at the beginning of the book to, hopefully, set up the subplot of the book. So for a short week, I managed to write nearly 4000 words. I'm impressing myself with that.

For the coming week, I've got a newsletter to write and a new query to make. I'm also having an issue with the copyright office, which I need to address. Oh, the fun never stops.

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