A Week in Writing #371 - The Week That Wasn't

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

Every Sunday when I sit down to write this post, I like to look back on what I did during the week. Just so you know, I'm doing this as much for myself as I am for you, dear reader. I like to think this is a way for me to stay true to my goal of writing and trying to make a living out of it.

Well, this is one of those weeks when I look back in horror and the evidence of my writing is hard to find. I know I sat down at this little laptop every night, but what I have to show for it seems less than normal.

Now, let me start with the excuses. Saturday was my birthday, and I know what you're thinking, great, a day to do what you want and, of course, writing would be right there at the top of those things. Well, it didn't quite work out that way this year. Instead, I scheduled someone from AT&T to come and upgrade our wifi to fiber optics and our speed along with it. It wasn't like I was going to go anywhere and it seemed like the best time to do it. But even though he was here for about two and a half hours, it sort of took the guts out of the day. We had to move things to give him access and then there's the fun of putting it back.

After we got around to the celebratory dinner, Chinese food, and watching The Maltese Falcon, I wasn't good for much, though I did manage to work on the review I've been working on since last weekend, The Adventures of Prince Achmed, though I'm still not done with it yet; I mean it was one of those weeks.

The only thing I can remember really working on was Powers Squared and even then, it wasn't much. Oh, there was the usual looking at thumbnails and giving comments, but that really only shot a hole in one evening. The rest of the time, I was working on a one-sheet for our Pitch Deck. It was harder than I would have thought to try to get it down to one page. In fact, it took four nights but I sort of think I managed. Still waiting for feedback, so I'm sure I'm not done, and then it's on to a shortened pitch, like 3 to 5 pages, before a full-length one.

While we're on the subject of Powers Squared, Issue #12 "What's in a Name? Part 3" finally drops on Wednesday on ComiXology. I'm still glad we went ahead and released it, no reason to wait for them, but if you've been waiting for that release of the issue, check out the link on our website: https://powerssquaredcomicbook.com/the-campus-store.

As it turns out, even though I didn't finish a new review, an older one of mine was Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review: Batman: The Dark Knight Returns Part 1 and 2. Coincidentally, Part One came out on that day, my birthday, back in 2012. Wednesday's GameDay review was Paul's review of Deltarune Chapter 2.

So, there's nothing new to report on Skylar this week and no new queries, but that should hopefully change next week. I'm going to make more of an effort to get more done.

Anyway, that's about all for me. Keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #352 - What Does it Mean to Be Published?

Hope everyone is staying safe and writing.

This past Wednesday, we dropped the 11th issue of Powers Squared. The issue is available on five different platforms and in print and digital formats. I remember the day we published the first issue and really not that much has changed about the experience. While I want to be excited about each new issue's release, every time is pretty much like the one before, which means nothing seems to change.

We publish on a Wednesday, which is traditionally new comic book day, at least in the U.S. The date is chosen, not by us but by ComiXology, the first site we published on. Since then, despite moving to additional platforms, we've let them set the date. They are, after all, the largest one we publish on.

But the actual day is no different than any other Wednesday, except that I have additional work to do. I still go to work, even if it's working from home, go to meetings, etc., and clock out at the end of the day no different than when I started the day. I'm not sure what I'm expecting to change but the fact is nothing does. Worse yet, there is usually no more money in the bank because of it.

As a writer, you really want people to read and hopefully enjoy your work. You might not expect to get rich off your endeavors but you really want a reaction of some kind. I know that comic books might not be considered high literature to some but it is storytelling, a collaborative creative effort, and something that I'm very proud of. I just wish others would be aware of it and we would hear some feedback from those who had. Is that too much to ask?

While I wait for that answer, let's move on.

Ever have to buy a printer in a hurry? I did. The printer we had been using for several years now ran out of ink and I had neglected to order any.  After ordering more, my wife and I went to our local Office Depot to get a new cartridge of black ink. We put it in and got a message that the ink cartridge was damaged. Never had gotten that message before, so back to the store, the woman gives us a new one, we take it home and it's damaged, too. We did a little research and it appeared it wasn't something wrong with the cartridge but the printer.

As we're both working from home, printing is really something you can't wait the few days it might take to get the printer fixed. And there was no telling if it could be fixed at all and would it cost as much as a new printer would. Couldn't take the time, so a new printer we bought. Maybe it's nostalgia but we miss the other printer. Isn't that just the way it is?

In other writing, I actually had a really good day working on Skylar. Saturday morning and afternoon I was sort of on a roll and hit that proverbial 1000 words a day and then some. It really felt good. That's a feeling I miss most nights.

No new queries this week, as I'm holding at five out. I'll check the status of those and decide if I need to DNR one and send out a new one. But if I can save myself the stress one week, I'm not above doing that.

This Saturday night, rather than draining the DVR, we watched a blu-ray disc of The Sign of the Cross (1932). I'm working on that review and am about 2000 words into it. In other review news, this past Saturday's review of Resident Evil Village (PS5), by Paul, was the blog's 1200th. In the week prior, in order to get to 1200, we had How to Train Your Dragon week, with reviews of all three films, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, How to Train Your Dragon, How to Train Your Dragon 2, and How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, respectively. The first was written by Trevor and the other two by Paul.

In other news, my sons and I finally got our second vaccine shot this past Tuesday. Hope if you're not fully vaccinated, you're in the process.

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

A Week in Writing #351 - Blame it on the Pizza

Hope everyone is staying safe and writing.

Usually, on Saturday nights, my family watches a movie that we've recorded on the DVR, okay I've recorded on the DVR. After we watch it, I delete it and write a review. Not this week, and I'm blaming it on the pizza. A national chain was having a 49% sale which I thought would be fun, as a change of pace. However, it went awry from there. I'll take responsibility for it but one of the local stores is partially to blame.

Occasionally, I'll select the wrong location online and, usually, I'll catch it before I leave home. However, last night, we went to the store we usually use and waited, you know with the emergency brake a-blazing. One of the workers came out to deliver to another customer and asked the name my order was under. I gave her my name and waited. She came back a few minutes later and told us that the order was still in the oven. All, I think, is right with the world.

Well, I get the indication on the app that the order is ready and we wait. After about five minutes and a couple of tries to get someone to talk at the door, another worker goes back and a few minutes later tells us that we don't have an order at that store.

We check the app and head to the right store. They were very attentive and they give us our order. However, by then, it had been over an hour and it was too late to watch a movie, so no movie and no review for me this week.

That is not to say that there was a dearth of reviews on Trophy Unlocked. On Wednesday, Trevor's review of Star Wars Racer Revenge went up, and on Saturday, Paul's review of  The Great Mouse Detective was the featured review. On Sunday, Trevor posted our MonsterVerse Review Hub, one place for all of the recent Godzilla-King Kong tetralogy of films.

This week, the blog will hit 1200 reviews on Saturday, so stay tuned.

On Thursday, I managed to send off a new query, again through an online form. If you've read this blog before, you know how little I like this part of the writing process. This one wasn't as bad as others, though I did have to come up with who might want to read Broken People and I was spared trying to think of marketing schemes for it. Of course, it's a wait-and-see process now. But I do have five out that can be considered active.

All of this is the background for what was the biggest item of the week. On Thursday, I was notified that ComiXology was going to publish our book on Wednesday, May 19th, or six days later. That put into process a lot of footwork on our part, including uploading issues to Kindle and GlobalComix, two of the platforms we publish on. I had already made the .mobi file I needed for Kindle but I hadn't uploaded it since I didn't know the date it was going to be released at the time. When we went to add the issue to GlobalComix, it was already there ready to go. I don't think either of us remembered uploading it but that made it go much faster than I expected.

We were lucky to have a review in the pipeline, and one that was particularly positive. You can read it here.

Paul and I also shot a commercial, which Paul edited, which we plan to post on the day it comes out. Additionally, we wrote and published our first Bark in quite a while. What had been a weekly newsletter is now to used for events like this. One will also be sent out on the day of publication.

Around that, we had a roundtable with the creative team on Friday and then a team-building exercise on Sunday afternoon, playing Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes. We had some technical issues both times but Paul figured it out and both Rachel and Julia were very patient with things. I don't want to take up too much of their private time but I think we all had fun.

I would, of course, ask you to consider purchasing the new issue on one of the five platforms we publish on. These are available through our website at The Campus Store. The links will be live as soon as we know them but for now, you can read about the new issue and perhaps catch up on the back issues you haven't read yet. And, while you're there, you can enroll at San Romero Community College and join our mailing list. It's always FREE!

Commercial over, I'll wrap up with my current book, Skylar, which isn't getting all the love it deserves. Maybe when things calm down I'll be able to get back to it. It is not that I haven't been thinking about it, though. My plan is to add a murder in the mix sooner than later in the story. But that doesn't make up for the lack of actually writing on it.

Next week, Paul, Trevor and I will be getting our second COVID shot on Tuesday, which might make Wednesday interesting if I have any sort of bad reaction but we'll see. I would encourage anyone who hasn't gotten vaccinated to do so as soon as possible.

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

A Week in Writing #346 - Rejection Comes at All Hours

Hope everyone is staying safe and writing.

Has this happened to you? I was sort of feeling really tired on Monday night. After realizing that I wasn't going to be able to do any deep thinking on the review for The Guardsman (1931) that I was writing I happened to take a look at social media and finally my email. There, I found a rejection for Broken People from the agent I queried about three weeks before. Not a great way to finish the evening. It came in at 9:24 pm my time which means the agent either stayed up late to ruin my night or scheduled the email; I'm thinking the latter.

It should come as no surprise that the email seems like a form with BROKEN PEOPLE inserted in all CAPS, as it was about the hook rather than the writing. I will work on the hook before I send the next query. While this was a disappointment it is also why I didn't want to wallpaper all the agents with my query at one time. Better to try to learn from one mistake before moving forward.

If you're concerned, I did finish that review of The Guardsman, as well as one for Mank and another for The Last Flight (1931). The first and last of these have not been scheduled but Mank was released earlier today. While we're on the subject of Trophy Unlocked, this was Resistance Week on the blog with Trevor's review of Resistance: Fall of Man on Monday, Resistance 2 on Wednesday, and Resistance 3 on Friday. For a change of pace, my review of Rationing (1944) was the Saturday Morning Review.

On this week's On the Air with Powers Squared podcast, we had the entire creative team on the show. It was great to catch up with everyone and to let them know what we had been working on. One of them was, after talking to Eric Tapper at GlobalComix, we made the first three issues of Powers Squared free on their service. If you've been hesitating about reading it, you can't beat free. Check it out at https://globalcomix.com/a/powers-squared/comics.

Our guest next week is scheduled to be John Barber, the Editor-in-Chief at IDW. It's a long story that we'll get to on the show but you're invited to watch at twitch.tv/powerssquared at 6 pm PDT next Friday.

In other Powers Squared news, we submitted Issue #11 to ComiXology, so the release is coming soon. We also did an unboxing video on Twitch this morning. You can watch us unbox proofs of Issue #11 and #12 at twitch.tv/powerssquared. Upon reviewing of the proofs we did have some comments for one of the suppliers, so I had to write to them as well.

With Skylar, I made some more changes, which I hope will move the plot along a little faster. I was inspired to rewrite the first meeting between the title character and protagonist J.D. Barrister, a P.I. I'm setting it in a post-COVID world which means I may have to adjust the timeline as things unfold. Right now I picture it being Fall but I hope it's sooner than that.

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

A Week in Writing #327 - Let's Talk Wednesday

Hope everyone is staying well and had a Happy and safe Thanksgiving.

I know last week I wrote a lot about the previous Thursday, I thought today I'd write about this past Wednesday, or the release date of the latest issue of Powers Squared, #10 What's in a Name? Part 1. I know that sometimes I plug hard the comic book but it's only because I want it to be a success. As with any endeavor a writer undertakes, he/she wants it to be a success. I double down on Powers Squared since it is also something I am self-publishing. i.e. paying for. If you insist on supporting me in this, then please go to https://powerssquaredcomicbook.com/the-campus-store.

Well, it may sound easy to self-publish a comic book but there are a lot of steps involved, which you can multiply by the number of outlets or platforms you're going out on. As a publisher, you stress over each one.

The first step, which I undertook sometime back, was to submit the comic book to the various outlets. We're on ComiXology, Artithmeric.com, IndyPlanet and Kindle, each with their own requirements, though many overlap. By that I mean if I meet the specs for say IndyPlanet, I can pretty much send the same files to the other outlets as well. I have been updating the cover for ComiXology, which doesn't like a border around the cover.

The submission process is a little different for each site. As an example, neither ComiXology or Kindle require you to purchase the book when you put it up. To be honest, neither Artithmeric or IndyPlanet require that either, but you want to see what a book looks like before you sell it, you have to order one and have it printed and shipped. With Issue #10, we have two covers, so I had to have two different copies from each of those outlets.

Some are more helpful than others. Paul and I had decided on our own that we wanted to have the issue out before Artithmeric's Black Friday Sale, which is going on right now through December 4, so we picked November 25th, the day before Thanksgiving. Releasing prior to a holiday, or a big convention, is probably not the best idea, as people's minds are elsewhere, but that was the date we chose. It was only a week before the release that ComiXology confirmed that they were also releasing it on that date as well.

ComiXology is the only outlet that you have no control over when the release date is picked and my guess is that they pick the dates based on some sort of algorithm rather than what is the best date to release it. They've picked dates that were the Wednesday before Comic-Con, the day before the 4th of July and this time the day before Thanksgiving.

So everything seemed to be in place except for something special I wanted to do on IndyPlanet. I had given them more than a week but never heard back on it. We wanted our B cover or Covid Cover to be print only and when submitting the issue, I didn't see a way to do that. I wrote to them a couple of times but it wasn't until the 25th before they confirmed they would do it.

About a week before the release, we sent out Press Releases to eight comic book news websites. This netted one story on First Comics News, who has been pretty supportive of us. That story came out the next day. I checked the other outlets today before writing this and that would otherwise be a goose egg.

Then there was the review. First Comics News has also been the only outlet to review all the issues and I was expecting it to be up on the day of release but it wasn't. It took a couple of emails on Wednesday and bothering the editor on Thanksgiving but it did go up a day late.

I also purchased some Facebook ads. I believe I had sworn off those earlier but I was hoping to see if things had changed. Each ad is $10 and runs for five days. We placed one when we launched our new landing page. Despite reaching 5558 people, I don't believe any of them actually signed up. We placed one when the issue was released. So far, that's reached only 984 people 31 clicked the link; no telling if any bought the book. On Friday, we put out another one for the Black Friday Sale. 1204 reached two clicks. I keep telling myself this is a marathon but it would be nice to get somewhere now.

So, the jury is still out on the ads and the release. I'll report back here if I receive any numbers on sales.

No queries this week. Thursday is my night and it was Thanksgiving. For those keeping score, I have sent out four and have one rejection.

I did work a couple of nights on Skylar. I guess a word count would be appropriate; that way we can all track how I'm doing on that project. So, right now I'm at 16535 words. Check back next week to see how much futher I get.

My review of The Clay Pigeon was Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review, thus ending our Noirvember salute. There were two more reviews this week on the blog, Trevor's review of  Transformers: Prime - One Shall Stand went up on Thursday to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the series that it derived from. And on Wednesday, there was Trevor's review of Adventure Time: Pirates of the Enchiridion (PS4).

Next month starts the blog's salute to Christmas titles. Not necessarily for next month, I did write three reviews this weekend of Christmas titles, including A Christmas Carol (1910), Mickey's Christmas Carol, and A Charlie Brown Christmas. Maybe they will come out this year, maybe next. I think we have enough for this year so it's nice to get ahead.

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

A Week in Writing #326 - Let's Talk Thursday

I hope everyone is staying safe and, of course, writing.

Let me start with a plug: Powers Squared Issue #10, What's in a Name? Part 1, releases on Wednesday, November 25th. If you're reading this, I would really appreciate the support. Issues are available in print and digital and links will be live on the day of release at the website's new Campus Store. There is also going to be a Black Friday Sale at artithmeric.com for a week. You can get 25% off by using the code BLACKFRIDAY. If you've ever thought about buying an issue of the comic book I write about each week, then this would be a golden time to do it.

I don't know about you, but some days are more successful than others when it comes to writing. This week, Thursday sticks out as a particularly busy day. As with most weeks it seems, it starts with Powers Squared.

It began in the morning, when I received an email from the US Copyright Office, in effect, denying our request to update the copyright. It wasn't so much that we couldn't but the mechanism the Copyright Office had told us to do it turned out to be wrong. I don't mind re-doing the claim, with the right instructions, but I was resisted to losing the $200 fee they charged me to make the revised claim, since I was working off their instructions. To their credit, the agent I was working with has offered to see if the fee can be refunded, so that's still up in the air.

During the day, we received pages from Rachel; pencils for the last four pages of Issue #16 as well as the cover. Paul and I did sit down and review after dinner. These sessions don't usually last very long but there are usually comments which are sent back to her and that night was no exception. Nothing really major mind you; all minor. I was reminded with getting Issue #10 ready for ComiXology that they didn't like the cover having a border. I've had to make adjustments and since I'm making changes months after the issue has been drawn, colored, and lettered, I have to be careful not to go outside the margins so to speak. Don't know if you've ever published a comic book, but print versions have margin and trim spaces. I don't think making that change or any of the changes we asked for were necessarily difficult since the next morning, she had the changes ready to go.

That night, I had some things to take care of with posting the new issue of Powers Squared on IndyPlanet. It consisted of adding preview pages. Earlier I had a question about the page count and I still have a question about whether or not one of the covers (we have two this time) can be print only; IndyPlanet offers both print and digital. That question is still outstanding. We're good either way but it would be good to know.

I then made the edits on the next script for Powers Squared, a sort of Metal Gear homage, tentatively called Mission: Istanistan. I was making updates Paul had suggested and I also moved one panel to the previous page. Again, nothing too hard.

I then worked out some talking points for our OAPS podcast. We had Kathryn Calamia on. She currently has a Kickstarter going for her comic book Like Father, Like Daughter. I had met her through a Facebook post in which she was looking for indie comics to use as tier rewards. I thought letting her use Issue #1 of Powers Squared might find us some new readers. I asked her to be on our show but I wanted us to prep for her. The actual interview took place the next evening and you can watch or listen to the show through links you can find here. I think the show went pretty well.

Next, I sent a query letter out for Broken People, trying to keep to my one-a-week goal. I had found this particular agent on QueryTracker as someone "new" that week. It was a bit of a gamble. QueryTracker shows she represents Crime Fiction, which is what I'm hawking, but the agency's website stated True Crime, but I thought it was worth a chance and a new assistant agent might be wanting to build a list.

Well, I was wrong. I sent the query at about 9:40 pm on Thursday and by 1:30 in the afternoon, I was rejected. "Thank you for your query, but unfortunately, I don't think this is a fit for me. I appreciate your getting in touch, though, and wish you the best with this project." Not the most informative of rejections but they rarely are. I don't think it has anything to do with the actual writing, since I didn't send any samples. The instructions on the agency's websites only asked for a query letter.

I'll give the agent credit for being quick. The rejection was sort of like ripping off a bandage. Painful, as always, but quick and over with. So if you're keeping track at home, that's four sent and one rejection. And now I need to send out two more.

I finished that night off with some writing and updates on Skylar, the most recent manuscript I'm working on. I'm reimagining some of what I had written to get to the action quicker and to introduce characters more judiciously.

Not a typical day but you sort of get a sense of what I'm up to; divided in all sorts of ways.

I would be remiss not to mention my Saturday Morning Review on Trophy Unlocked, Scene of the Crime; part of our Noirvember celebration. This was also My Little Pony week on Trophy Unlocked with five reviews featuring My Little Pony: Equestria Girls; My Little Pony: Equestria Girls - Rainbow Rocks; My Little Pony: Equestria Girls - Friendship Games; My Little Pony: Equestria Girls - Legend of Everfree; and My Little Pony: The Movie (2017). Those reviews were written by Paul and Trevor, so check them out, too.

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

A Week in Writing #323 - First Query

 

Hope is everyone is staying safe, wearing a mask, and writing.

I want to start with a bit of good news. After writing about it for weeks now, I actually did send a query this week for Broken People. I decided that I was only holding myself back and that if I wanted to reach my goals, I had to do something positive towards that. So, on Thursday night, I finally sat down and sent out a query, through a form, to an agent. They claim they'll take four to six weeks to get back to me.

I don't know about you but I've had queries rejected within hours of submitting them, so I'd like to think four to six weeks will mean some sort of contemplation on their end. Of course, I am on alert to hear back before that and prepared for never hearing back from them at all, you know how it is. I don't mean to sound down on the process but I have been down this road before.

Even though they asked if the query was out to other agents, and I answered no, I do plan to send out more in the next few days. I don't want to run through all the agents on my list but I do want to get and have at least five out there at a time. There is always the hope that you'll figure out where you went wrong with one query or the other but my experience has been that agents never give you that kind of detail if they reject you. It's usually just a terse prefab email. I hope I'm wrong and I will, of course, report back here as things go.

I worked more on my Skylar manuscript, deciding to restart the story closer to the action, or in this case, the start of the assignment. I think it makes it better and I don't think I'll have to lose too much of what I've already written. But this is the way it works when you're a pantser like myself.

The issue I highlighted last week, our submission to Comixology, got straightened out and we were told which of the two series to use. The bad one is still there but we should be able to avoid that pitfall in future submissions.

Still, a lot to do to get ready for the release. We need to try to line up reviews and any publicity we can. We need to make a video for our social media. We need to create a Kindle version. We need to finalize the website changes and the new landing page. But the main thing is we're one step closer to being ready. And on top of that, we still need to work on our Pitch Packet. So much to do.

Today we published our monthly newsletter, The Hound Dogs' Howl. I'm giving you a link to it, here, in case you're curious about it. I would also encourage you to subscribe to it as well. I would really appreciate the support.

We had a really good conversation on our On the Air with Powers Squared podcast/Twitch Stream. We interviewed another creator, Lucas Scheffel, the man behind Angry Fred Comics. We had never actually met until Friday night, even though we had supported each other's Kickstarters and social media accounts. Lucas is down in Australia so it was the next day down there when we spoke. Really cool. I hope you'll watch or listen and, of course, support him as well.

My review of Revenge of the Creature rounded out Spooktober on Trophy Unlocked. As always, there was a new video game review on Wednesday, Silent Hill 2: Restless Dreams written by Paul.

Since Saturday was Halloween, the movie we watched to delete off the DVR was The Return of Dr. X (1939). That review may wait until next year, but Halloween is only 365 days away.

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

A Week in Writing #322 - Missteps

 

Hope everyone reading this is staying safe and wearing your mask.

So, this week, let's start with Powers Squared. We finally took the last step in publishing Issue #10, submitting to comiXology but we didn't get past the first step. I'm not blaming comiXology but somewhere along the way, two series were set up for Powers Squared. We found this out the hard way when we published one issue and it ended up being listed separately from the other issues. Not sure how that happened and the digital publisher did fix it right away. They also told us that they had removed the second series so we wouldn't have the same issue the next time.

Well, when Paul and I sat down to submit, guess what we saw:

They're not the same number, so we're not seeing double but we didn't know which one to choose. We tried to search for something on the website that would point us to the right one but that's not available or at least we couldn't find it. This Series number is a background thing but we didn't want to go down the slippery slope and pick the wrong one, so we stopped the process and emailed support to sort it out.

Did some work on the Pitch Packet. Trying to get more current images into the deck, as the current visuals are closer to what we want to present. There are only a couple that we can't seem to replace. I'd really like to get this behind us. As with everything doing with Powers Squared, we're sort of learning as we go.

In other writing, I completed another review for Trophy Unlocked. As per the usual, we watched a film on our DVR so we could delete it. This week, it was Our Betters (1933), a film I believe I came across by accident but was interested in based on the pre-film discussion on TCM. They were discussing an actor who didn't appear until the last five minutes and his importance to LGBT depiction in films in pre-code Hollywood. Curious, I recorded it and really forgot about the why until we watched it. What did I think will have to wait.

In the meantime, my review of Abbott and Costello Meets Frankenstein was the Saturday Morning Review. But earlier in the week, Trophy Unlocked celebrated its 1100th review with one Paul wrote for P.T., a playable teaser for a video game that was never made. The game, Silent Hills, was to be a horror game designed by Hideo Kojima and Gullermo del Toro, and also fit in with our Spooktober theme for the month.

To further mix the streams, Paul played the teaser on our Powers Squared Twitch channel. Streaming a video game was something Paul has been wanting to do but this was the first time. He asked me to sit with him for support, so if you watch it, you'll see me reacting and asking the occasional question.

As far as my other writing goes, I did some more work on Skylar, though never enough. I believe I got through another couple of chapters and moved the story forward, so that's good.

On the subject of querying, I did some more prep work on that this weekend. I researched if there were any new agents and deleted one from my list as their definition of mystery is cozy. I also realized that I have a little more to do based on the first online query I started. Not only do I need to decide who would want to read my book, but also provide a one-line Pitch. I know, excuses, but they're all I have.

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

A Week in Writing #321 - One More Birthday!

Another week, another birthday at my house. This final one of the year belonging to my wife. No age or birth year, but if you've been paying attention, we're all Libras, which means decisions here are few and far between. Just thought I'd point that out because of the hole in the week.

Has this ever happened to you? I had sort of an interesting night of it on Thursday, the day after the B-day mentioned above. I basically live with insomnia always being a possibility. I may lay down my head on the pillow but if something is off in my routine, I stop reading too soon or turn off the TV too early, or whatever, I can lie awake for hours. What kept going through my head this night was that I hadn't really written anything that day. So to get over that, I got up at about 2 a.m., came out to my office, the end of the dining room table, and made myself write 1000 words on the Skylar story I believe I've mentioned here a few times. Now, what I wrote, I think I'm going to scrap, not because it's bad but because it doesn't fit in with the story I'm writing now. It does work for an idea I've been tossing around during those sleepless nights so I'll put it aside for now and get it back out when I start on that story.

Per my Fitbit, I got a 76 rated sleep, which is both surprising, given the shortness of time (3 hours and 22 minutes), and good for me in general. A great night of sleep for me is an 80 and that is sadly very rare; I'm usually in the mid to low 70s. I'm not writing to get sympathy, but sometimes the lack of sleep does play into the output of the next day. While I made it through work and OAPS with no real issues, I did fall asleep off and on during our Friday night movie. I hate it when that happens.

Speaking of movies, we played drain the DVR again on Saturday night and I wrote a review for Trophy Unlocked as a result; No Questions Asked (1951). Not sure when that will come out, though another one of mine went up on Saturday, The Curse of the Cat People (1944), as part of our October Spooktober series of horror films. This past Wednesday, videogame review day, Trevor's review of Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time.

Big News: This coming Wednesday, Trophy Unlocked will be celebrating a milestone 1100 reviews. I won't ruin the surprise, but there is a special review planned for that day, so please check back then for that review.

In Powers Squared news, Julia Canon, our colorist, joined us for our On the Air with Powers Squared twitch stream/podcast this Friday. She's always fun to listen to, so I hope you'll tune in somewhere it is available. See https://powerssquaredcomicbook.com/media for where you can watch and/or listen to it.

This week, I submitted the Covid Cover for Issue #10 to both Ka-Blam and Artithmeric for proofs. We've never had an alternative cover before, so it's a big deal for us. Not sure we'll wait for them to come back before we submit to Comixology, which we still need to do. There's always something on the horizon that you've got to do.

I wanted to give you an update on our copyright issue. So you don't have to scroll back and look for it in a previous post, we had a slight issue with copyright for a couple of issues, i.e. the script got copyrighted but the artwork didn't. The copyright office told us to rectify this through a Supplementary registration, which didn't seem like it worked. I called the copyright office at the end of September and they couldn't tell me what we had submitted, which sort of scared me, since who else would know what the copyright office had besides the copyright office?

Well, it turns out that what we were trying to do might actually work after all. I got an email from the U.S. Copyright office during the week, asking me, in fact, what we were trying to do. Paul and I sat down today to read through their question and I sent a response to them. They gave me 45 days to respond, which might tell you how fast things move in that bureaucracy. Fingers crossed things will work out for us. I'm at least hopeful now.

On that upbeat note, I'll sign off for today. Keep writing, stay safe, and I'll see you back here next week.

A Week in Writing #298 - The New Reality

I don't know how you're doing with the COVID stay at home orders and the partial-lifting thereof. I hope that everyone reading this is listening to the medical advice coming from the CDC or your own personal physician.

Public Service Announcement over with, let's get into the writing this week.

It probably won't come as a surprise to anyone that reads this that this past week has been spent primarily on Power Squared. Work sort of intensified as we're getting ready to launch Issue #9 on Wednesday the 13th. (You can order it here, BTW.)

I'm finding the more platforms you're on, the harder it is to coordinate not only the same product but release dates as well. We've been letting comiXology dictate the release date, more out of loyalty than anything else. They, in turn, give you a week's heads up on the date, which means you then need to scramble to get other platforms ready. For me, this included a new pdf for Artithmeric, our first Print-on-Demand platform to use, which they put up a week too soon.

Then there is the usual work, looking at thumbnails and cover art for the issue we're working on. Our artist, Rachel Wells, made a couple of suggestions which Paul and I agreed were beneficial to the story. I really like that part of working with her. I never felt the script was written in cement and the goal is always to make it better.

Did a little more work on the Pitch Packet, but that's still not ready for primetime, as they used to say.

I did manage to work some more on The Runaway. I don't know if this ever happens to you, but one night I was planning on working on it when the whole Issue #9 thing happened and I had to make and send a new .pdf. That somehow delayed me enough that I didn't really work on The Runaway that night.

Well, it turns out to have been one of those nights of sleep, when you don't. That used to happen to me all the time but it hasn't happened recently, or at least more infrequently than it used to. Well, that morning around 2 I got up and came out to my computer and wrote about 500 words, that I have been able to use to complete the chapter I was working on. I think I'm about one to two chapters now from wrapping the whole draft up.

I want to use the "free time" after that to send out more pre-rejection queries to see if I can manage to land an agent using a previous book.

One new review this week, The Third Man, a film that I actually own but happened to catch on Saturday morning on TCM. It is one of those films I've been meaning to watch and it was too easy to watch it then, so I did.

This is still part of Scooby-Doo month on Trophy Unlocked, so the Saturday Morning Review was Scooby-Doo and the Alien Invaders. Another review appeared on Wednesday, MediEvil (PS4), which is becoming an unofficially new game review Wednesday on the blog. It's all good.

Well, that's all for now. Keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #297 - Stay at Home Week 7

I'm going to have to rethink the slug for these as I may be staying home permanently. Now don't worry, dear reader, I have not been fired nor am I losing my job but they're letting us decide if we want to work in the office, post-stay-at-home orders, every day, some days or no days a week. If you go in every day, you get a place to sit, which I guess would be six feet of bench, rather than the current three feet. If you go in less than that, you get "hoteled", meaning you sit where there is available space that day. If you work from home, it's the end of the dining room table, which is what it is now. We have to make the decision during a pandemic that will affect us going forward, even after there is a vaccine.

Since I have to make that decision now, I'm opting to stay home. I'm not anxious to be there every day since that would be a bit of a crapshoot with my health and well-being. And going in even one day a week would still be a bit of crapshoot as well as there are no guaranteed COVID-free days.

There would definitely be advantages like no commute and no ironing. I'm thinking that would save me the equivalent of one and a half workdays a week or about 75 workdays a year. Hopefully, I will put that added time to better use than sitting in a car on the 101, 405 and 10 freeways every day.

Now, what I am doing with the time I have been saving? The short answer is never enough, especially when it comes to The Runaway. I worked a couple of nights on the book but never got traction on the chapter I need to write. It's one of those, I know what I want to happen, it's how to get into it. That said, I did finish one new chapter this week but I need to get on it more than I have been.

One new review this week, The Sea Hawk (1940). We watched the film on Friday night and in-between other writing this weekend I finished it. It goes into the backlog for me and I'm not sure when it will appear on the blog. This month, we're celebrating Scooby-Doo month on Trophy Unlocked. The Saturday Morning Review was Trevor's review of Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost.

So that brings us back to the third leg of my writing trifecta, Powers Squared. This week, it's been more about the business side of things as we wait for a date Issue #9 will go up on comiXology and then scramble to get the other platforms synched up.

This week, we've been having some issues with our Podcast. The week before last, Paul and I watched a Zoom presentation about expanding your podcast's audience and some of the ways we were given haven't panned out as well as I'd hoped. I don't want to get into everything but I've been documenting my issues the same way I would at work, which you know is not fun. I'm hoping the support people at Podbean can straighten us out.

Got to try my hand at writing a feature story for our newsletter, The Hound Dogs' Howl. We've been trying for the last couple of months to feature other Creative Twins and another creative pointed us to some brothers who are out to be models and actors and I wrote up their story based on an email they sent us. We want to have more subscribers to the newsletter, which I hope some of you would do. In the meantime, I'm going to link to a preview if you want to take a look at what we put out every Sunday. You can read it here and if that looks interesting, sign up here. Go ahead and sign up even if it doesn't look interesting because you'll get a free digital copy of the first issue if you do and then you'll know what I'm writing about, though I have to warn you it only gets better.

I've also been working on revising our Pitch packet for that someday pitch we hope to do for an animated series based on Powers Squared. You gotta have dreams.

In the it's-not-all-about-me department, we did a table read this week after dinner of a script Paul wrote as part of a writing program submission, an episode of Rick and Morty. I won't go into specifics, but I have to give him credit for writing in the voice of the show. I mean it does read like an episode. He's done this before during an animation writing class he did. He wrote a script for a show called Tutenstein and someone who had worked on the show told him the same thing, that it read like an episode. That's quite a talent, if you ask me. I'd like to think I could do that if given the chance but he actually can do it now.

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

A Week in Writing #295 - Stay at Home Week 5

Does this feel like the new normal yet? If I could I would work from home, though I'd prefer it to be writing for a living rather than what I currently do for a living. There's nothing wrong with what I do and there is nothing wrong with the company I do work for, but writing is what I want to do and it is still only an avocation.

I'm still not seeing this abundance of time even though there isn't that commute. When I get off work, I'm trying to go for a walk which means that's time I'm not writing. In my case, I need the steps. I know there is nothing magical about 10,000 steps but I do know it's better than zero steps, so I do try to make an effort to get some walking in, though I sometimes feel like it's an uphill battle.

Powers Squared once again took a big chunk of the week's writing. Again, it's not so much the writing but what I say is the business side of the project. For the first time, we had an issue rejected by Comixology. And it wasn't for content but formatting. We submitted the same file we had used during the Kickstarter and apparently, it wasn't as good as it could have been. They didn't like the border around the cover, some pixelation on a page and the margins around the outside were too wide, or at least could have been thinner. All fair critiques and I had no problem fixing them but it's a little time-consuming and as much as I don't mind editing to make something better, I don't like having to re-do things. I know that's a bit of a contradiction but that's how I feel. I resubmitted it a couple of days later, so I think we're good. Now I'm wondering if I need to change files used elsewhere.

We also received new inked pages from Rachel, which we needed to review and there was one page that was revised, so we had to send it to Julia, our colorist, before she did too much on it. We were wondering how she was doing, so during our intermission on movie night, we noticed she was streaming her work on the book, so we dropped in for a quick chat.

And, of course, there's the podcast/twitch stream, the newsletter and the YouTube video that have to be done every week as well.

Finished one review this week, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, but that may wait until October. I think I'm one short of the five we'll need for that month. We're trying to go through our DVR every Saturday so who knows what we'll find there.

I actually have a new review up on Trophy Unlocked this week as the Saturday morning review, Little Big Man (1970), a sort of  Forrest Gump of the Indian Wars.

And then there's The Runaway. I'm still working on the book. I got through one chapter but there is still a lot of work left to be done. I keep thinking tomorrow or tonight and something always seems to come up. I won't outright lie and say this will be my priority for the week but I really want it to be. When I finish this draft, I'll have to take some time to send out queries. What's a pandemic without some rejections thrown in for good measure?

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

A Week in Writing #294 - Stay at Home Week 4

Am I the only one who doesn't see an end in sight for this? Not that I really miss most of the workday experience but it's the rest of it that sort of gets to me.

I feel like I've lost the little bit of private space I have in the house, which has never been very much to begin with. I usually write either at the end of the dining room table or on a tray in the living room. I also work from home from the dining room table, which means there is no mental separation. To make it a little harder is that my wife is also working from home and the laptop she's using is also on the dining room table, so while I'm trying to write, she's also on her computer, doing what I don't know. What matters is that the time and place I used to call my own is now a shared space. It's a little thing but it does sort of inhibit me a little. I really wish I had a private place I could go but that's not in the cards.

This week, I did manage to do a little more writing on The Runaway, finishing one chapter and starting another. I think things are progressing but never as fast as I want them to.

I did write a couple of reviews for Trophy Unlocked, Gulliver's Travels (1939) and Little Big Man. I'm not sure when these will appear. My co-writers on the blog have a large backlog of reviews and theirs have been featured much more of late. This Saturday Morning's Review was the recent video game Doom Eternal. And I know they've planned out special months for part of the year so I'm not sure where I am in line.

We tried to upload the next issue of Powers Squared (#9) onto the ComiXology site but ran into a potential issue. When we uploaded Issue #8 earlier this year, it ended up as a different series than the rest of them. For whatever reason, there were two Powers Squared series listed and only one of them is good. I was able to get the renegade issue put back with the pack and was told the other series had been or would be deleted. However, it was back on Saturday night. I've also found out that the person that had helped me is no longer with the company so we're still up in a little limbo at the moment. I'm pretty sure which one to use but I was also pretty sure last time and you can see where that got me.

More rewrites on the Pilot script but they're mostly format issues. Paul has taken a course in animation writing and, I believe, has a flair for it so I'm counting on him to point out the error in my ways. Hopefully, we're coming to the end of that and I'll be able to work on the pitch deck. All these new talents I have to develop on the fly.

We sort of cut corners this week. We decided to do a different sort of Podcast this week, which we also simul-stream on Twitch. For this week's installment of On the Air with Powers Squared, we read the first issue, which I know is great for an audio podcast but we did our best to describe the artwork. Well, we liked the video so well that we also used it for our A Week in Powers Squared video. Hey, it's Easter, so come on. For anyone counting, we've done 31 podcasts and 80 weekly videos and this is the first time we've crossed the streams so to speak. I've also posted the video on our website, so no reason not to watch.

Well, that is about all for this week. Keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #284 - Realities

There is a lot of excitement around getting published, even self-published, which is essentially what we're doing. January 29th was the date ComiXology decided to put up our latest issue of Powers Squared: Mathemagical Part 1, or Issue #8 so that became our publication date, and if you remember from last week's post, Powers Squared Day.

We did what we could to get the word out but there is a good chance most of the world doesn't know it's been released, let alone know the comic book exists. But that's not to say we don't want it presented in the best way possible.

With this issue, in addition to ComiXology and Artithmeric, we added a third platform, IndyPlanet but in some ways that only added to the difficulties, or realities that headline this post. Before I discuss these, I do want to point out that each one was taken care of quickly, though they did still happen. Names will be changed to protect the innocent and all that and really no real harm happened.

To begin with, one platform put it out there early and had to pull it back. For another, Issue #8 was listed separately from the previous seven. And finally, one item that we thought would be up wasn't listed. Again, all of these issues were quickly dealt with but it is a sign that you can never really totally relax and assume everything will go according to plan.

Speaking of plans, we're closer to selecting a new colorist. We had three very good candidates and have received test pages back. We're still evaluating them, as not everyone on the creative team has had a chance to weigh in. But the decision will be made soon.

Meanwhile, progress continues to be made on Issue #13. Rachel sent us new pages and Paul and I used reviewing them as the basis for our weekly Podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared. We try to take people behind the scenes and this week we went as far behind the scenes as we possibly could.

One new review from me this week, Parasite, the 2019 Korean film that is getting all the hype and buzz. We watched it on Friday night and the review should go up on February 5 as Trophy Unlocked tries to play catch up before the Academy Awards.

New reviews in that vein on the blog, with Trevor's review of Frozen II getting published as the Saturday Morning Review. Check it out. Also coming, Sonic Week, leading up to the release of the new film, which will most likely be our first 2020 film to be reviewed.

I continued to work on The Runaway, finishing up a couple of new chapters as I'm going. I had what I think is a really good idea on Saturday morning which I can't wait to get to for the book. Sometimes things come together in bits and pieces so I'm hopeful this book will work out. It's the writing and having the time for the writing that is keeping me back.

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

A Week in Writing #283 - 1000 Reviews and Powers Squared Day

Let me explain the headline. The 1000 review milestone was reached by Trophy Unlocked, which is a blog that Paul started a little over 9 years ago and to which, you know dear reader, that I contribute to. It's a really cool milestone and it works out to a little over 100 reviews each year. Quite an accomplishment and a team effort. Paul started the blog after watching Tron: Legacy at the El Capitan Theatre when the film opened. He invited Trevor and then myself to contribute reviews. My bent is more of the classic films, but I've done current films as well. It's really been a pleasure working with him and Trevor on it.

That working relationship even precedes our working together on Powers Squared. I don't know if that's normal, for a family to work together on various writing projects, but for the most part, it seems to work for us.

The 1000th review was a re-review of the first film and went up on Saturday. We're not close to being done with it either and we're already mapping out special months and weeks for 2020, so please keep reading, or start reading if you haven't yet. End of plug.

I did write another review for future use on the blog, Monty Python's Life of Brian. We watched the film this Friday following the recent news of the death of Terry Jones, the director of the film and one of the founding members of Monty Python. There is some really strong imagery in the film which is cut, for the most part, by the usual humor of the group, which goes from witty to grotesque at the drop of a hat.

Powers Squared Day was our idea to promote the release of Issue 8, Mathemagical Part 1, as well as merch that we had only previously made available during the Kickstarter. We've let ComiXology set the date and we're releasing simultaneously on two other platforms: Artithmeric.com, which has been our print-on-demand partner and a new platform, Indy Planet, which is related to Ka-Blam, which has done printing for us before. The Merch, the two collegiate t-shirts and the hardback trade will be available only through Artithmeric, which had supplied them for the Kickstarter.

On Saturday, I sent out some new press releases for Powers Squared Day. We don't have a large roster of press that we rely on, though we've occasionally gotten a nibble. We will most likely get a review for First Comic News and hopefully some press from other websites as well.

We've been doing the usual promotion work for the comic book, the podcast and the video, as well as our new weekly newsletter, The Bark. I invited you to subscribe to one or more of them, as we can really use all the following we can find. All are free and usually the videos and the audio are in the 10-minute range, so what have you got to lose?

New pages, pencils from Rachel this week so Issue #13 is starting to take shape. We're still looking for a colorist but I believe we have three good candidates, one of which most likely will be our new colorist.

I've been shy or lazy about calling the comic book store about setting up a signing. There's a lot that goes into it, including money and the calendar and I guess I get nervous they may say "no". I guess I'm a big scaredy-cat when it comes right down to it. Also, it's hard to get away from work and make a call in the alley but that's really not an excuse.

So with all of that, how am I doing on The Runaway? I will admit not as well as I would have hoped. I did do some writing on the book but nothing to brag about this week. It's sometimes hard to get the time and the energy to really dig into it. I'm hoping to do some more work tonight but no promises.

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

A Week in Writing #280 - Pretty Much Taking the Week Off

The holidays and writing aren't always complimentary. While I did do some writing, I didn't do as much as I thought I would have. Maybe not the best way to start the New Year but what are you going to do.

Let's start with what I did do. I did some rewrites on The Runaway but didn't really do anything on it after Monday. I believe I've gotten through all the changes I needed to make so far in the story. Making a change in a story is like throwing a rock in the water, it starts a ripple effect and there might be changes still to come as I continue the rewrite process.

On Saturday, a review I wrote last year about Treasure Island (1950) was published as Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review. Next week, we'll be featuring a review of a remake of sorts, Treasure Planet, which Trevor wrote as a companion piece. The blog is counting down to its 1000th review. Mine makes 995 so we're getting close. 

Before the year ended, all three of the writers on Trophy Unlocked published our highlight/lowlight lists for 2019. Mine is more film-centric than Paul's or Trevor's.

I also wrote a new one for Charlie Chaplin's The Circus, a film we watched as part of our annual post-Christmas movie day. We have more than one copy of the film in our library. The version we watched as a Criterion Blu-Ray of the 1969 re-release. The review ended up being about 2500 words. 

Work on Powers Squared continued. The comic book seems to be the one thing that we never take a break from, at least not a long break. Paul and I spent part of a day doing some business work, checking to see if we need any new copyrights, not yet; uploading a digital copy of Issue #8 onto the Comixology website and reviewing some candidates for the coloring opening we have.

During the past week, we also made our first attempt to line up a signing at a comic book store. I will admit I was a little surprised at the positive response to our overture but there is still more to do before I mention the who involved but it is one of our goals for the new year and I was happy  we at least got a start on it.

Later that day, I uploaded issues we have on Ka-Blam to their IndyPlanet website. IndyPlanet provides both digital and printed versions, so we're hoping that it will increase our readership and coffers.

I also paid for all the Kickstarter Rewards with our physical providers and updated the Kickstarter page with information from one of them. 

Paul and I continued to do our weekly On The Air with Powers Squared podcast and A Week in Powers Squared YouTube video. We are changing the newsletter from weekly to monthly. It's a real grind to do a full-blown weekly newsletter. We're still going to email our list throughout the month but make them more targeted. In fact, I imagine we'll be sending out more emails than before.

Seems like a busy week, though I always feel like there is more I could have done. But holidays are meant to be enjoyed. Next week, reality comes back with a vengeance. It will be back to a routine and I'm hoping there will be more time to write as a result.

In the meantime, keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #237

Quite a week when you consider that two new issues of Power Squared dropped on Wednesday. For the first time since we started producing issues, we published in both digital and print-on-demand. That same night, we made an unboxing video of the first five issues which arrived in printed form from Artithmeric that same day.

Our March 6th unboxing video.

Paul and I have been making weekly videos for the past 6 months and we usually average anywhere from 0 to 2 views, which I've written about before is kind of depressing. Our unboxing video, for us, went viral, as we had nearly 50 views as of Sunday when we posted our 24th A Week in Powers Squared videos on our YouTube channel. Our subscribers have more than doubled to 7 and our Twitter feed is growing as well. I won't say we're on our way but the trend is up. Please keep it up.

I find publication day a little anti-climatic. My expectations are too high, I guess. I think people at work are going to come up and congratulate me on the new issues. In truth, most people don't know and even fewer even care, so while I'm all excited, it's a work day as usual. Receiving the printed versions add some anticipation to the day, which was cool.

Cool to finally find our listing on comixology, too bad it's the wrong issue.

Comixology didn't do us any favors, again. While last time they arranged for some release publicity, which resulted in sales (?), that was more making up for the lack of doing anything the first time around. Even with some publicity, getting noticed on comixology is akin to being some show on Netflix. Someone has to know you're there and then search for you. While you can search for Powers Squared on comixology and find the issues (go ahead, I'll wait while you look...and you'll want to hit the add to cart button...good, now the other one...good, now pay...good. So we're back.), I wanted to see if you could find us through the multitude of new releases that day. There were 45 pages of digital first releases that day and while I did find a Powers Squared issue on page 30, it wasn't one of the new ones for some f-ed up reason. It was Issue #3, which came out last summer, you know one of the ones with some pre-release publicity.

I'm still exploring other formats but they each require their own amount of extra work to get done, as they either have their own templates or they have limitations on how much can be uploaded at any given time. That takes time, so I do them as I can. The latest one I'm trying is Kindle Digital Printing, which, while an Amazon company, like comixology, has it's own software that you have to use to build your book. When I tried it for the first time, it took about ten tries to get it to build the first issue. It kept crapping out when I added the last page of the issue, totally closing out and making me start again. Very frustrating.

In a bit of crossing the streams, in our latest weekly video, Paul and I discussed the recently released Captain Marvel movie, which we had seen on Saturday morning and which was also reviewed by me on Trophy Unlocked. (See how I made a transition there.) Sort of a busy week on the blog as well.  On Saturday morning, we published my review of Bohemian Rhapsody. On Friday, Trevor published a review hub for the Devil May Cry videogame series in honor of the release of the 5th installment. On Thursday, Paul published a review for the videogame Bendy and the Ink Machine.

I'm also working on a review for Gone With the Wind. I'm about 2700 words in and probably have that much to go. Sometimes big movies take longer because there is so much to stay and, frankly, after 80 years, I'm not worried about ruining it for someone.

In what has become a backburner project, I haven't had much time for The Runaway or anything to do with the J.D. Barrister series. No new query letters, I'm sorry to say. And no word of any kind from the editor on Familiar Stranger. Hard not to feel ignored!

So, this upcoming week, I'm hoping that the time change won't take it out of me too bad. I'm hoping to finish my review of Gone With the Wind, work some more on new platforms for Powers Squared, and get back to actually writing. A stretch goal would be a query letter or two. Boy does that make me nervous to even write that.

A Week in Writing #236

This was another week of writing where it was once again dominated by Powers Squared. A lot of time was spent not on writing but on creating uploadable files for various outlets. Each platform has its own limitations and requirements so I spent a good deal of time making files or renaming existing ones.

While we now have a print-on-demand version, through Artithmeric.com, we've been trying to branch out to more outlets as well, including other digital platforms and perhaps other print-on-demand websites. I've been renaming files and making multiple .pdfs for one issue as required by another digital platform. I regret that I haven't yet uploaded files to that new site.

Earlier this week, I was surprised when I opened the Powers Squared twitter account @Martyand Eli, and saw images of a printed version of our comic book and the following comments:

Super cool. And I was a little jealous since I'm still waiting for my issues to arrive.

It was really cool to see such a great reaction from anyone.

That same day, I received notification that our new issues were going to drop on comixology.com on March 6th. It seems like forever since these issues were finished but I always want to have some in reserve. We also decided to make them available day and date on Artithmeric, so we've uploaded the files (more uploading), but it will be really cool to see them. I still have to order them myself.

I'm exploring another print-on-demand site as well, looking for a possible tier gift for our Kickstarter. I said I wanted to do it in February but that's now gone by the wayside. I want this to work so I'm trying to make sure we have good gifts if we fund. Printed versions would make a good alternative to a digital-only release.

I notified First Comic News about the date on Thursday and on Saturday, their reviewer published his reviews. I can't say that I wasn't a little disappointed at his 3 out of 5 ratings for both and no mention of the new look, but there is nothing wrong with getting some advance publicity. Sometimes, you have to move on. I'm more interested in getting the publicity than the exact review I'd like.

With the new reviews, I had to make more updates to the website to accommodate them, which is more time spent on things other than writing. All necessary but all time is precious and fleeting. I do that and I'm not writing.

On Friday, Rachel sent us thumbnails for the last four pages of Issue #10, as well as possible covers. Paul and I didn't sit down until Saturday, but we managed to go through them and give her our feedback. For the most part, we picked one set for each page, though we did have some exchanges and comments on Panel 5 on three of the pages, which is more of a coincidence than anything else.

Nina is busy prepping for her first Artist Alley appearance at The Atlanta Sci-fi and Fantasy Expo next weekend, so the coloring can wait for a week or so. If you're at the Expo, please drop by and support her.

In other writing, I did finish my review of Bohemian Rhapsody but that was not Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review. That belonged to Paul's review of Kingdom Hearts III, which is a game he's been waiting for 13 years to play. Patience finally paid off so it was fitting he got to review it and that it would the 925th on the blog he started.

I did manage to squeeze in a little more work on The Runaway but that was fleeting and on only one day.

As promised, I did reach out to the "editor" on Familiar Stranger. I'm assuming he's still alive but, as per the usual, no reply to my email. I can't help to feel a little insulted and very disappointed in his lack of response. We are coming up on a year since I sent him the manuscript. I don't know what possibly could be delaying any response from him. How hard is it to return an email? Well, if he's been any indication, very hard indeed.

Well, that's this week. I imagine next week will also be a lot about Powers Squared, so stay tuned. Would really appreciate it if you could take a look at the new issues and even tell your friends. If one of them is my editor, tell him all will be forgiven if he just writes back.

A Week in Writing #235

This has been one of those weeks where Powers Squared has been dominating for me. I try to keep several balls in the air every week, but sometimes one will take precedence over another. This past week has been mostly about Powers Squared.

To begin with there are the pages of the current issue #10 (What's in a Name?). Rachel Wells, our artist, delivered us the final inks for pages 9-16. We received them in two sets and it took us a little while to look at them based on schedules. We try to get back to her or to Nina the same day we receive their work. We know from our own experience that waiting for feedback sucks, so our goal is to get back as soon as possible. Sometimes, however, there are times when we can't do that based on timing. But now we're down to the artwork for the final four pages and the cover.

Nina Gaillard, our colorist, sent us four pages this month, the first four pages of the same issue. She has a bit of a time crunch, with an upcoming convention, so we're not going to get the next four until next month. We want to be flexible and real-life does impact all of us.

With the first four pages in hand, we've sent them to Trevor to letter. So the beat goes on.

These are the usual activities but this has been a different sort of week. As I've written here, several times, that sales have never been what we want, which is a nice way of saying they're low. It's finally time for us to take control of our IP. Comixology has been supportive, in the past, but we don't have to be hamstrung by them and have the right and desire to get the product out there on other formats.

Being an independent comic book is a bit of a hindrance and it can be very hard to get traction but if we limit ourselves to only one channel of distribution, we're only hurting ourselves. We don't have the money to print a bunch of issues and warehouse them in hopes of selling them. The same with t-shirts and merch. To that end, we've been looking for some way to allow readers to print issues on demand.

This week, we've started working with our first partner in this, artithmeric.com, which allows independent creators to provide physical copies and t-shirts on a print-on-demand basis. We've put up the first five issues and three t-shirts this week on the site. This website is out of the UK so the prices are in pounds and may frankly seem high for our readers in the U.S. but we are looking at other outlets both physical and digital and there will be more announcements soon.

But to make that happen means formatting pages in the site's formats, which can be somewhat time-consuming to put together. And then there is updating the website to handle as well as making updates to Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to announce these. With time being a premium these all take away from other work.

I've also decided, that except for a select few people, I'm not going to give the book away anymore. The point of it wasn't to have a free to own comic book. What makes me tired of this process, is even then, it takes them a long time to actually read it. The final straw for me was someone saying they liked the artwork. While I certainly have nothing against artists, in fact, I love the two we're working with, the last thing a writer wants to hear are comments from someone you've given a free copy to of your work that sounds, at least through omission, that they don't like the writing. "The artwork is pretty good." That really sticks with me and hurts a little, too. I'm sure an artist would feel the same way if someone said: "the writing is pretty good." It feels like someone who saw you act in a play, comments to you, "Yeah, that was a play you were in."

One last thing, on Saturday afternoon, Trevor, Paul and I attended a two-hour seminar regarding Pitch Packets through the Ground Zero Animation Expo down in Stanton, California. I was there to see what I would need to do to someday pitch Powers Squared as an animated series. The seminar was led by Caroline Foley, who has worked in the industry. The parts about putting together a packet were quite helpful, as well as what to be prepared for when making a pitch. As with all of these, there is the gray area about how to set one up, which you're supposed to do that through your various contacts in the animation industry, that you have, of course, already developed. Well, then.

I did spend one night this week working on a review for Trophy Unlocked. I had made the commitment to doing reviews of shorts during the month of February and I was one short, so to speak. In one night, I watched Buster Keaton's The High Sign, twice, then researched and wrote the review for it, found images and uploaded all to the blog site. That review was published as our Saturday Morning Review.

In addition to that one, we published the review of Green Book on Wednesday as part of our effort to watch more of the films that are nominated for Best Picture. We watched Bohemian Rhapsody on Friday and will review it sometime after the Academy Awards.

I'm afraid to say that between the formatting, uploading, and promotions for the new comic book venture, as well as writing a review, I haven't spent any time on the novel, The Runaway. I really hate that I haven't. Nor have I had the time to chase down the editor on Familiar Stranger, though I will email him after writing this.

As far as Agent queries, there is another goose egg to report. I only have so many hours in a day to spend on writing and something had to give.

If we're hoping to work with other platforms on Powers Squared, then I'm going to have to spend some more time next week on them as well.