A Week in Writing #270

My big accomplishment of the week was finishing my rewrite on Broken People. The ending that I remembered as being overly long turned out not to be that way upon final review. I think I was remembering an earlier version.

So, I've gone through it for what feels like the umpteenth time, spell checked and even gone through it to make sure the chapter numbers are well-centered. The next thing to do is to resume the query process. To that end, I did some more research using Query Tracker as the starting point. From there, I look up the individual agents on their agency's websites.

The first disappointment is when the genres listed on Query Tracker are not reflected in the agent's profile or else it's the same word but they're looking for Young Adult mysteries, which, of course, is not what I'm writing. The only thing worse is finding out the agent you're looking for is no longer at the agency or even in the agent game. That happened to me this week when I was doing some research.

I didn't actually pull the trigger on sending new queries; I'm saving that pleasure for the coming week.

This week, for Powers Squared, we received four lettered pages from Trevor, so it was overall a slow week on the comic book. That didn't mean nothing happened. Paul and I, of course, did our usual Sunday YouTube video and our Friday night Podcast. On this last Friday's, we discussed writing the first storyline for the comic book. We initially wrote the first drafts more than 8 years ago and that first script went through a lot of changes between then and 2015 when we actually had the first issue drawn.

We also worked some on the Kickstarter we're doing for the comic book. There's a lot of planning that goes into it but we're also making changes on the fly as we're putting it together.

In addition to the work mentioned above, I wrote a new review for Trophy Unlocked, Revenge of the Creature, though I'm thinking it might wait until next October to get published. That's when the blog once again turns to horror. To complete the month's look at the genre we published Paul's review of
Scooby-Doo! Return to Zombie Island.

Things I need to do this next week, besides write, include finishing the Kickstarter stuff and making myself reach out once again to the editor on Familiar Stranger. I keep putting that off because I feel like I know how that will go. I'll call, leave a message and then never hear back. What is it they say about insanity? But I guess the thing is I don't expect a different outcome. Maybe fate will surprise me.

Keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #269

There were a lot of pluses and minuses this week in writing.

I continued to do rewrites on Broken People. I'm getting near the end of the book and for some reason, I was having a hard time concentrating on it. Part of it I'll put down to the day job taking it out on me. It's not that I do anything labor-intensive but it is a big chunk of the day, from leaving at 7 in the morning and not getting home until 6:30, most nights take a lot of wind out of your sails.

I decided to put it aside by mid-week. I should be able to finish it next week. There is some post-climax stuff that I'd like to cut down on. I think I go into too much explanation on what happens after the main story ends. I don't want to be too short, as I don't like to see things left dangling, but at the same time I think I say too much. I have to strike the right balance. And it's not what happens to the characters that I want to shorten, it's the bigger picture stuff. There are events that are put into motion that don't necessarily end with the end of the story if you know what I mean. That's the part that I think I go into too much detail explaining.

Did some work on future reviews for Trophy Unlocked, even completing one that probably won't show up again until next October, when the site does a salute to horror films. Saw and reviewed White Zombie (1932), a really low-budget horror film starring Bela Lugosi, who only the year before had appeared in Dracula (1931).

This week's horror film was The Banana Splits Movie (2019), a very badly done horror film starring a somewhat forgotten IP from the 1960s. After seeing the film, it would probably have been better served staying forgotten.

I also completed a review of Sabotage (1936), a British Hitchcock film that I also watched recently. Not sure when that will show up but it's now ready to go whenever it's called upon. That's one nice thing about writing reviews for older films, they are always relevant in their own way. They might become more so, if, for example, a particular subject matter came up in today's world or there is a milestone anniversary. But, for the most part, if the film stands the test of time, there is always room for writing about it.

We're still putting together our Kickstarter stuff for Powers Squared. We've lined up all the tier rewards and now it's down to putting it together and shooting a video. We want to include Trevor but he's away today at a seminar and Paul is still under the weather. We canceled our weekly Podcast, On the Air With Powers Squared, because he was still too sick to do it.

Last week, we ran a contest to try and cross-promote our A Week in Powers Squared videos, our newsletter, the Hound Dogs' Howl, and our podcast, On the Air With Powers Squared.  Fortunately, we had a winner within 48 hours. At least someone listens to OAPS.

We did receive four pages from our colorist but that was really all that happened with the actual comic book this week.

So next week, the goal is to finish the rewrites on Broken People and send out some more queries and to reach out, once again, to the elusive editor on Familiar Stranger to see if he's still alive and what the f- happened. These enduring mysteries keep us going.

Keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #268 - Lots of Rewrites

I've never been one to shy away from rewrites and, in fact, that's my favorite part of the writing process. This past week, I continued my work on Broken People and it's a good thing, too. I found where I had used the exact same passage in two places in the book, no doubt, the error from my previous rewrite on the book.

This book has gone through various rewrites in the past, the first being with my disappeared editor on Familiar Stranger. He had been slow back then but I don't remember so much radio silence in the past. Then, it was called Killer Blog, which was a sort of title that sounded okay but really meant nothing. It's not like a killer blog was a real thing but at the time, I liked it. I did query the book around and almost got somewhere with it.

An agency put me in touch with one of their editors and she gave me some feedback on it. I did find when going through it with her that there was some garbage stuff in the manuscript. Apparently, some time after my work with my editor the manuscript had gotten corrupted and things that I thought were there weren't and there was some real nonsense text in it as well. However, this isn't what she was pointing out to me.

After I completed that rewrite, I resubmitted it to the agency again and, of course, got nowhere fast. I was rejected there and other places with one female agent even calling it misogynistic, which frankly hurt and I felt was misguided. There is sex in the book, not graphic and the man, who is the protagonist, does describe the woman he's involved with but he also describes everyone he meets in some detail.

I rewrote it again, changing the name to Personal and Professional but got again, nowhere fast. I let it sit after a round of rejections. I started to look at it again because of a recent news story, not a couple of years old. There apparently was a couple, a doctor and his girlfriend, who would get women drunk and/or drugged and shoot video of them having sex with her. Now, there was something already similar in the book. My protagonist is a private detective and one of his clients in the book is a former news anchor who had appeared in a sex video.

In the earliest versions, that part was based on another news story in which an anchor went on vacation, got drunk and entered a wet t-shirt contest. She apparently wanted to win so bad that she stripped naked, or close to it, to win. Unbeknownst to her, they were recording the event and it got out and she lost her job as a result.

I had changed that to her being in a sex video while on vacation with her husband. A couple got her drunk and had their way with her and recorded it. That seemed rather out there until I heard about the couple in Newport Beach doing the same thing. So, I decided to take a new look at the book and I changed the name as I went. There was a song on the radio by Lovelytheband, called Broken, which I liked and thought one of the attractions between my hero and the former news reporter, was that she thought he was broken like her.

I thought I had done a pretty good rewrite but after getting nowhere with my few queries, I decided to go through it again and have been spending as much time on it the last few weeks before I resubmit it for querying. So far, none of the ones I've sent have gotten even a nibble, not even the online queries. I think the 6 weeks, if not two months, have passed so I'm calling them rejected.

I even took some time to rewrite the query letter, trying to concentrate on what I thought was the best parts of my previous one and pointing out that it is a character-driven murder mystery and trying to downplay some of the big city corruption that is also part of the story.

Work on the rewrite continues. I think it will take a couple of more weeks before I'm done and then it's back to the query cycle. They say you only have to impress one, right?

When that's done, I will go back again to see if the Familiar Stranger editor is still alive and find out what the f- happened. I may not be a patient person but I don't like to give up either.

In addition to the work on the book, I also completed a future review for Trophy Unlocked. This is a short film called Employee's Entrance, which was on TCM recently. I had started to watch it one morning while flipping channels and decided to record it along with several others so I could possibly review them later.

I also published on Saturday, The Fly, my second review for October and Trophy Unlocked's annual review of horror movies during the month.

Not a whole lot happened on Powers Squared this week. No new pages, though we did get a nice mention from our colorist on Instagram. Trevor did letter four pages so he's caught up for now.

Paul and I did our 54th video on YouTube on Sunday and our seventh podcast on Friday night in our effort to promote the comic book.

Well, that just about does it for this week. More rewrites and hopefully a new review. Keep writing. I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #267

Well, my big plans took a bit of a sidetrack. On Saturday night, last week, I decided to take a second look at Broken People before I sent off any more queries. Well, as I read through it, I found some misspelled words so I've been going back through the manuscript. The mistakes are no one's fault but mine and I'm making some other changes along the way.

It's not really a chore as I find myself liking editing. My goal is always to make whatever I'm working on better so I welcome the opportunity, though it has been distracting from other work.

Speaking of which, there are about three films that I'd like to write reviews of which I hope to get to in the next week or so, in between work on Broken People, The Runaway and whatever might come up on Powers Squared.

On the subject of Powers Squared, we had a pretty busy week. Spent some time this week making some inquiries on various tier rewards. We had to change up our supplier and the style of the t-shirt we want to use. We had worked with our artist, Rachel Wells, to come up with a design, highlighted the name of the school and featuring our Hound Dogs mascot, recently christened as Elvis, after the singer who popularized the song. For this nickname, we hosted a poll on our website and on Twitter and out of the four choices we gave, Elvis was a close but clear winner.

When we priced out the t-shirt on the first vendor we thought of using, the price was too high. Buying one shirt would cost close to $50, with shipping and for a better price, we would have to order 48 or more of them. While we're hoping for a successful Kickstarter, we don't want to get ahead of ourselves. We went back to our original supplier, Artithmeric, and we can produce either a black or white version for much less and still turn a profit. They will also handle our graphic novel.

For printed versions of the comic book, we're using another supplier, hoping to keep costs down there as much as we can.

Even though I haven't written any new reviews this week, I still had one posted as Trophy Unlocked's Saturday Morning Review, the original Cat People. October has been Horror film month on the blog, so this is the first of four that will be published this month.

We also posted a new review for Joker. This one was written by Paul. We like to mix in new films as well as older ones. And don't sleep on video games, either.

I'm going to keep working on Broken People and hopefully get to some reviews this week. And next up for us will be doing a video for the Kickstarter. Wish us luck. Keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #266

Somehow this wasn't the week to get back on track. It's sort of birthday week around here. First, it was my birthday on Wednesday and then my sons' birthdays on Saturday. Ports have fleet week and cities have fashion weeks, we have cake week in my house. My mother likes to call it the House of Libra, as my wife's birthday is in a couple of weeks, we are all born under the same zodiac sign. A lot of indecision around the house.

Sundays are always busy, football game notwithstanding. Paul and I have a weekly video we do for our YouTube channel. This past Sunday was our 52nd, our one year anniversary of our doing them. With the exception of Comic-Con, which delayed it until Monday, we've done them each and every Sunday. We talk about what is going on that week with the comic book, even some weeks when there is very little happening.

We also send out a weekly newsletter, The Hound Dogs' Howl, and again, even on lean weeks. We've been fortunate that there is usually something worth writing about, including our new Mascot.

Late on Sunday, we did receive some pages from our artist, Rachel. Our first pages since Hurricane Dorian forced her to temporarily relocate and after we had her finish up the mascot. We received four pages of pencils from Issue #12. Paul and I didn't have a chance to look at them until Monday night but we did give our notes.

Did some other writing on Monday on The Runaway but not much I'm afraid. I'm working on a part of the novel that I'm rethinking. I'm sort of using a recent story in the news but I don't want to be too on the nose, if you know what I mean. I'm going through a thought process and making some changes. That's what I get for being a pantser with no outline to guide me, the freedom to make changes on the fly.

Don't think I did much of anything on Tuesday but on my birthday, I actually wrote a review of the movie we went to see, Downton Abbey, which was posted on Trophy Unlocked the next morning. About 700 words, so not too bad between eating out, cake and presents.

Thursday night was mostly spent out again. Both sons were taking classes, so my wife and I decided to have a bit of a date night, but we also had to run an errand for the boys' birthday. Did manage some more work on The Runaway that night but again, not very much.

Friday night, Paul and I did another episode of On the Air with Powers Squared, our podcast on PodBean and iTunes.

Saturday was Paul and Trevor's birthday, so the day was mostly spent with them, which was fun. There are some things more important than writing and family is one of them. Some things, though, still go on. Trophy Unlocked published our usual Saturday Morning Review, The First Tree, a video game reviewed by Trevor.

Next week, I need to get back to things full swing. There is still so much to do, including sending out more queries for Broken People, more work on The Runaway and, of course, Powers Squared.

Keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week In Writing #265

This week has been more what I would call the business side of writing rather than the art of writing. Like every week, this one starts on Sunday, which is a busy day for Powers Squared. Paul and I do a weekly video for our YouTube channel. While the video doesn't take all that long to shoot, there is still some editing, which Paul does, then posting the video and hitting social media to promote it. I'm trying to be more efficient when posting but I sometimes forget.

Then we have a newsletter to get out. Usually, some work has been done on this already but there is always something to do on it, a test email to make sure the links all work and then finally sending it out. I usually take the newsletter and post it on Facebook and Tumblr, though I really doubt many people are really reading it that way.

Finally, there is this post which I also put up on Sunday, and then there is more posting on social media, Facebook and Twitter but different accounts than the comic book.

Did a little work on The Runaway but not much.

On Monday, more business. We were working with our artist on final design for the mascot and t-shirt design. Looking good.

Spent more time on the powerpoint for pitching Powers Squared as an animated series, which is one of our creative stretch goals. Making some edits and thinking about what else to do with it. Not much to show for the evening but sometimes it's just that way.

Tuesday night I worked on two reviews for Trophy Unlocked. They were already written but I wanted to put them up on the blog site and add photographs. These are reviews for The Fly and Cat People, reviews for October and Trophy Unlocked's annual salute to the horror genre.

Since it had been about six weeks since I had sent in a couple of queries for Broken People, and, of course, heard nothing back, I had to take them off my list. I did some more research on agents and even did some looking for a possible agent for Powers Squared. We're going to need representation to do a pitch anyway.

On the way home on Wednesday, I called the work number for the editor on Familiar Stranger. He had actually communicated during the summer and said he would be working on it during August. I think it was the occasion of his birthday and I told him I wouldn't bug him until September. I figured the middle of the month was a good time to try.

Not surprisingly, I got his voicemail at work and left a message. Almost right away I got a text saying to text him. I think this is something attached to the voicemail since I got the same message the last time I tried calling him during the summer.

So, I texted him that I was in the car and then texted him later when I wasn't. I also PM-ed him on Facebook, which was the last way we had communicated. Well, as I'm writing this no response, no real surprise. I'm disappointed but some people are unreliable. I don't like radio silence and I don't like being lied to. I'm going to have to move on since it's been almost a year and a half since I sent the manuscript to him. I knew he'd be slow but this is utterly ridiculous.

We also received pages that night from our colorist. Actually, we had received them the night before but it was late before we noticed so Paul and I sat down to go over them after we got back from dinner. Had a couple of minor issues that we asked her to fix. One of them was not her fault but she agreed to fix it anyway.

I also worked some more on the Pitch powerpoint, changing up the logline and some of the other details, like episode synopsis and images. I sent it on to Paul to look at for more changes. I never mind rewriting, since the point is always to get better.

Also, edited in the mascot in with the new banner that our artist sent us. We wanted to try to match the banner on the school newspaper. Our artist prepared us one that matched what she was doing in the comic book. I took that edited version and added to the template for the newsletter.

Sort of felt uninspired on Thursday, so I worked on this blog, so pretty much everything written to this point was done on Thursday night. I'm trying to figure out a way to squeeze in as much time as I can on Sunday.

I also toyed around with a t-shirt design though I didn't save it. Just wanted to see what it might look like. Maybe I'll try to recreate it later this week.

On Friday, Paul and I recorded our fourth podcast, which is available on PodBean and iTunes. This week, we talked about the origins of the two main characters not named Marty or Eli.

Also received a couple of revised pages from Nina. We had her fix a continuity error that we didn't catch when this was in pencils or inks. She was kind enough to correct it and then we asked her for one more favor, which she did.

Saturday was spent mostly out of the house. We went as a family to see Genndy Tarakovsky's Primal, which was playing at the Downtown Independent theater, we think trying to qualify for an Academy Award nomination. You can read Trevor's review on Trophy Unlocked.

Well, that about does it for the week. Promise to actually write more this coming week. You, keep writing and I'll see you next week.

A Week in Writing #264

This past Sunday was the first of the football season. While the three-plus hours I spent watching the game were worth it, as my team won, the loss of the time meant we had to squeeze more into less time. As a result, we had to shoot our weekly video early and we left something out of the newsletter. I take a bit of responsibility for that, as I did most of the writing on Saturday but the fact I was trying to get it out quickly meant mistakes were made.

After the game, I did a little work on the Powerpoint I had started last week before all things Office went bluey. Trying to put together a Pitch Packet for Powers Squared. We think it would make for a good animated series but no one will know unless we put together a Pitch. Made some progress but I don't think it's quite as good as the version I lost but isn't that always the way it goes? The second time from scratch never seems to be as good as you remember it.

Did some work on The Runaway but not very much as it turns out.

Monday night, after dinner, I worked on the Powerpoint again and came up with what I'm sure will be the first version. I'm going to take a look at it again before showing it to Paul and Trevor. Not sure if its going to be Tuesday or not but I know it needs more work.

On Tuesday, I worked before dinner on a review for Susan Lenox (Her Rise and Fall) a 1931 film starring Greta Garbo and Clark Gable, which I happened by happenstance to see from the beginning while flipping channels. Wrote about 1200 words and I'm still not done.

After dinner, worked some more on The Runaway. I'm trying to incorporate an idea that came to me last week. I see a big rewrite in my future after I get done with this draft but I have to get through this draft.

Received a message on Linkedin asking if I wanted to be on a Podcast, presumably to talk about Powers Squared. I'm going to try to listen to one of their Podcasts to see if it's a good fit. Don't want to walk away from an opportunity to market the comic book but don't want to make a fool of myself either.

Wednesday night got back to the powerpoint and made enough updates to warrant sending it to Paul. A WIP the point it to make it better.

Rachel sent us updates for our mascot and T-shirt project. Paul and I sat down after dinner to go through them, picking a couple that we liked but also asking for some modifications. Who would have thought collar colors would be so important?

She gave us three options for the t-shirt design, including the one we thought we wanted. However, we opted for a more open/cleaner design that she came up with, which seems to be modeled after an example t-shirt we sent her at the beginning of the project.

After that, I finished my review of Susan Lenox (Her Rise and Fall), adding another approximately 1000 words. Still, need to look for images for the review.

On Thursday, we received artwork for our Mascot and t-shirt from Rachel. There is still some back and forth going on but I think we're really getting close. She sent us two sets of drawings but there are still a couple of tweaks we'd like her to make before we decide on finished images.

Worked some more on the powerpoint pitch packet, taking into account Paul's suggestions after having looked at the first version. Nothing too radical but anything to make it better. I'll take another pass before I send it to him again to review. Both he and Trevor have been in enough classes and seminars to know what to include, though none of us have ever presented. Still a little bit of work to do to get it ready for that.

Even though I said I was finished with the Susan Lenox review, I went back and added a new paragraph to the review. While commuting I was thinking there was something I needed to mention about the film and had to wait about 14 hours to actually write it down. I don't know if you're like me but sometimes what I think of in the car is so much better than what actually gets written. I don't think I'm alone in that.

The same is true with fiction writing. Some of my best dialogue is "written" in transit. I'll run through an exchange between characters and not quite capture that "magic" when I get to sit down behind the computer. Sometimes it gets better sometimes it doesn't.

Worked briefly at the end of the night on The Runaway, starting the next chapter but not getting a page or more into it before calling it a night.

On Friday, Paul and I, with Trevor, recorded our third On the Air with Powers Squared for Podbean. This time, we discussed the main characters of Powers Squared, Marty and Eli, which like the boys are identical twins. You can listen to this at https://ontheairwithpowerssquared.podbean.com/. We're also in the process of having them available on iTunes and will let you know when they're available there as well.

Saturday, we had some work done at the house, so had to spend a lot of time at home. Spent some of the time working on the Powers Squared newsletter The Hound Dog's Howl. Hate to sound like an advertisement but you can subscribe to that at https://mailchi.mp/9ac7714b0aaa/powerssquaredcomicbook.

Also wrote a review of the film we watched on Friday night, The Fly (1958). Ended up writing over 2000 words and will most likely publish this one during October when Trophy Unlocked celebrates the horror genre for Halloween. This week's Saturday Movie review was Paul's review of Megamind, a film we also watched a few Fridays ago.

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