A Week in Writing #357 - Am I Ever Going to Make It?

Hope everyone is staying safe and writing.

I know the headline may seem alarmist but I had trouble sleeping last night. While that's not necessarily new what I was thinking about was the question above. It occurred to me that maybe this is never going to happen for me. Maybe I'm never going to make it as a writer or sell anything or whatever success looks like in an industry where apparently few actually do it as a living. I'm sure I'm not alone in these thoughts. Almost anyone trying to break into a creative field no doubt has had this thought before. I know I have but since it happened this week I thought I'd at least mention it. I'm not going to give up, but I do have those feelings.

So, this is another week when I ran out of time to query, which is one key for making the above happen. Part of what I decided last night was to double down on this and I will be spending some amount of time next week to get this going again. But time is always the most valuable commodity and how that gets spent is where the tension lies.

Like most of you, I only have so many hours in a day or week to work on my writing. This week, I spent a couple of nights hopefully giving something back to one of my sons, Paul. He's working on a sitcom pilot and I read it twice over two nights, made notes, and talked to him about it. Nothing I don't think any parent wouldn't do. While I know my comments aren't the last ones he'll get nor the best, I do hope that I was able to help.

I did do some more work this week on my Skylar manuscript. For those of you counting, and no one is, I'm on version 10. I'm rebuilding the chapters if that makes sense. I'm up to 13,000+ words so far and I think this time it's working better. This isn't all that unusual for me but I'll admit this manuscript has been harder than most to get a feel for. Hopefully, this one will take.

I know that every week I make a point of talking about Powers Squared. Things seem to be at an out point at the moment. While I'm hopeful things will work out, it's been about a month since we've had new colored pages. It's the same issue I have with my writing, our colorist has a job and it's getting to our work that she's having trouble with. I'm trying to be understanding, but it is still frustrating.

We're still working on a possible cover for our BD, even though nothing has been confirmed on that front. I'm sure our artist is up to the challenge but we're looking for something that reflects the spirit of the story without redoing an existing cover from one of the five issues being combined.

I did some more work on the Pitch Packet, combining and organizing the character descriptions I'd written and parts from a previous try at it. I'm waiting until Paul is done with his pilot script before getting into that with him; the pilot is more pressing at the moment.

This week, we watched An American Tragedy and I wrote a review of it for the future. This week, Trophy Unlocked featured a couple of game reviews, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart written by Trevor on Monday; and on Wednesday Trevor's review of TY the Tasmanian Tiger 2: Bush Rescue HD. I know that it seems like my reviews don't get published but next week, there will be five of my Pre-Code reviews up on the blog. We were talking about the backlog I had and I had the idea to maybe do a block of these films leading up to the anniversary of the start of the Production Code. Turns out, all films released after July 1, 1934, had to abide by the code so we decided to pull the trigger. I'll invite you to read the blog and I'll report on it, as I do, next week on what went up and when.

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

A Week in Writing #356 - End of a Crazy Week

Hope everyone is well and writing.

This was certainly a unique week for me in that the days were cut up with a graduation on Monday, two days of work, and two days off at the end of the week, one a vacation day and one a holiday.

I had low expectations for Monday since the big focus was Paul's graduation from UCLA's Writing Certificate Program. He wasn't exactly thrilled with what he had learned about his chosen field in college and wanted to learn more and this program certainly gave him a lot of experience and exposure to different types of writing, from novel to television animation writing. My wife and I got to play proud parents and be there, sort of.

We were actually in one outdoor stadium watching the procession that was going on in another outdoor stadium. It went pretty well, except it started about a half-hour late and we got sunburned. This was a day or so before California opened up completely, so I imagine it would have been a different experience any other time.

While we were waiting to leave, I did manage to complete the script I had been working on for a possible Powers Squared story arc and complete questions for our guest on our Friday On the Air with Powers Squared.

As I mentioned last week, we had planned to go to Disney's California Adventure Park on Thursday, ostensively in search of Oswald t-shirts. For those of you unfamiliar, Oswald was the pre-Mickey Mouse character that Disney worked on and lost to Universal Pictures. My son, Trevor, has developed quite an affinity for the character and we wanted to go to the park to shop in Oswald's, a store just inside the entrance. Surprisingly for a namesake, very little merch was to be had.

We did have a good time and spent longer than we thought we would at the park. I think the universal favorite was the Disney Animation Academy where you learn to draw characters. We went twice and drew Donald Duck and Stitch. Trevor's were the best and his Stitch actually got positive comments from other attendees.

We also walked and walked. To begin with, there was no Tram service so you have to hike to and fro to the parking garage. In all, including that trek, walking around the park, and walking to Downtown Disney for dinner, my fit clocked in at over 20,000 steps and over 10 miles. Given that and the heat, we sort of laid low on Friday, getting up enough energy to do OAPS.

This week, we had Nina Gaillard, a former colorist on Powers Squared, on the show. You can listen to the conversation here if you'd like.

In other Powers Squared news, besides the script I finished, we started to work out some very preliminary ideas for the Graphic Novel cover. I finally got some feedback from Artithmeric, which I wanted. And now our artist, Rachel Wells, is working on some possible thumbnails.

Despite the comings and goings, it was a busy week on Trophy Unlocked, with five reviews going up. The week started with Trevor's review of Cars, followed on Wednesday by his second look at Cars 2, followed on Friday by Paul's review of Cars 3; see a pattern? The Saturday morning review was Paul's review of FF7R Episode INTERmission, new DLC for Final Fantasy VII Remake. And today, Paul's review of Luca, the new Pixar feature that debuted on Friday on Disney+.

Even though I'm once again shut out, I did complete a new review of The Kiss (1930), the last silent film from MGM and star Greta Garbo. Not sure, as always, when that will come out. If we're counting words, that was 1836 worth.

I also had some time on Saturday to get back to Skylar and am starting over on the story. Since it takes place post-COVID re-opening, I had sort of a burst of thoughts. I'm up to about 3639 words since I started and hope to get more done later today/tonight.

If you're keeping track, no new queries this week, sorry no time. I promise to do better.

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

A Week in Writing #355 - Doing Two Things at Once

Hope this finds everyone well and writing.

I'm trying to write this while bidding on some items on eBay, so pardon me if I get distracted. I do have interests outside of writing and it's always a balance between the two.

We had our monthly all-hands-on-deck meeting on OAPS this week. If you're new to the blog, in addition to writing and producing a comic book, my son Paul and I host a podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared, which is essentially about our comic book but also about things related to it. We've done some interviews with other creators, marketing wiz Gamal Hennessy and IDW Editor-in-Chief John Barber. But I think the ones I like best are when we get the other creatives from our book (Rachel Wells, Julia Canon, and Trevor Hankins) on the show. It's a chance to catch up, tell them the bigger plans we have and encourage them.

You might not think about it but there is a lot that goes into doing a comic book even if you're not the artist. Very time-consuming little details, which every week I find someplace where I could do better. And it's hard sometimes to be timely with a tweet when the video goes up at 2:45 on Wednesday afternoons since I also have a full-time job.

And I haven't even scratched the surface on all of the things I should be doing if I had the know-how and the time to do it. Oh, sweet marketing, you're very confusing and mysterious.

This week, I did more work on a new story for the comic book. If you're not a reader (and you should be), this issue involves Dr. Atlas coming to the boys and Mocha for help. He must be pretty desperate to do that. Last week, I wrote part one of the story. This week, I wrote part two, which is about 4013 words long. I'm not done but this is what I spent a lot of my time on. You know, you get in the groove on something and it's working so you want to complete it.

I did write a 2400+ word review for Trophy Unlocked; So This is Paris, a silent comedy from 1926, directed by Ernst Lubitsch. This is one of those films I found that TCM was showing a while back and it sounded special from their description. As it turned out, it was really good. As always, not sure when this will see the light of day but it is another one in the bag, so to speak, and ready to go.

Otherwise, a pretty busy week on the blog with four reviews, including Duck Tales: Remastered (PS3) on Wednesday written by Paul; Friday saw another videogame review, Guilty Gear Xrd Rev 2 again written by Paul. On Saturday, my review of Ghost in the Shell (2017), the live-action remake of the anime classic, was featured; and on Sunday, Trevor's review of Raya and the Last Dragon plus the accompanying short Us Again.

By the time I got to Skylar, my novel, I started to rethink my rewrite so far. I want to get into the action pretty quickly but at the same time, this is part of a series and a lot has happened to my main character. I have to come up with a way of being able to bring all that out. I like the idea of showing rather than telling so I'm in a bit of a dilemma at the moment.

So, I know I'm bad with the queries. I did some more looking up possible agents to reject me this week but I did not pull the trigger on any submissions. I'd like to promise I'll do better next week but I won't.

While I will continue to write, this is going to be a very hit-and-miss week (which might be the subtitle for next week's blog).

On Monday, my son and co-creator Paul is going through a graduation ceremony at UCLA for his Fiction Writing Certificate program that he actually completed late last year. No promises on that day or on Thursday, when we're all going to Disneyland's next-door neighbor California Adventure Park. The real goal is not the Avengers Campus but actually the Oswald store that's just inside the gate. Long story and I'll probably tell it next week; got to give you something to come back for. Friday is a holiday, so maybe something will get done.

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

A Week in Writing #354 - Bumpy Week

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

This has been a surprisingly bumpy week for me. I never felt like I had the time to really get into anything very deep. It always seemed like by the time I got to sit down at my laptop to write I only had an hour or less left in the day. My sign-off for writing seems to be 10:30 at night and by that, I mean I'm physically unable to write anymore. It's like a little switch goes off and I'm done. Oh, I might be able to rekindle the fire but not for long.

So, what I'm trying to say is don't have big expectations as you're reading this.

I don't know if this is you but I have a routine I try to follow. Once work is over, there are things I do, like take a walk, watch the evening news, eat and then write. I might do some posts along the way but by and large, I usually get to writing sometime around 8:30 to 9 each night and that gives me 90 minutes to 2 hours to get something done.

Now, when I write it is usually on a TV tray in the living room with something on the TV that I'm already familiar with, like Friends or The Big Bang Theory. Something I can have on but not pay attention to. I know there's so much great TV these days and if I tried to watch it all I'd get nothing done.

One of the recurring items this week has been artwork for Powers Squared. On Tuesday, our artist sent us thumbnails for the last four pages of an issue and the choices for the cover. It's not hard work but it does sort of derail you. I once heard someone say that an interruption at work, like a phone call, lasts longer than the interruption itself. And that's true with this, though I don't want to call it an interruption, though the appearance of images to review can put off whatever else I might have wanted to work on that night. And this went on pretty much every night this week as we went back and forth and are still going back and forth on the cover image. In fact, there is a thumbnail from Friday that Paul and I still have to review and give comments on.

On Wednesday, my wife was feeling under the weather one day, so now I'm on the hook for dinner, which was takeout pizza, but still, it's getting out of the routine that is really the issue. And I know personal responsibility takes precedent over writing but this is a blog about writing, not about personal responsibilities.

Thursday night, the room where I sit to write was part of a staging area for the sale of a collection the next day. Not that I was really involved with that process but I wasn't able to really reclaim the space until after 10 and that only gave me 30 minutes at best. So, no new queries this week from me.

Friday nights I don't normally write as that's our family pizza/movie night. We do watch a movie on Saturdays, as part of our drain the DVR process. This week it was Mystery House (1938), which I did write a review of over two days, since at 10:30 on Saturday I was done for the night, at least writing-wise. As always, not sure when it will appear on Trophy Unlocked.

As always, it went on without me with two reviews, Astro Bot Rescue Mission written by Trevor on Wednesday and Paul's review of The Road to El Dorado on Saturday.

I finished my review up on Sunday morning as I also finished our Hound Dogs' Howl newsletter (which you can read) and a draft of character descriptions for our Pitch Packet (which you cannot).

Sadly, Skylar is the one who paid the price, as I never got to that book this week.

So, it's been a bumpy week for me.

Keep writing and I'll see you back here next week and hopefully, things will go smoother.

A Week in Writing #353 - Double Rejection

 

Hope everyone is staying safe and writing.

Well, last week I said I would check on the status of my queries. Well, for one of them, I didn't have to wait. Got an actual email rejection, this one from the British agent I had queried, sort of by mistake. Form letter and to the point: "Thank you for the submission of your novel, Broken People, to me. I am afraid that I do not feel that it is right for my list, but I appreciate you sending it to me. I wish you all the best in your search for an agent." At least they cared enough to send an email.

The other one was DNR. I had submitted to the agent on 3/25. Their submission page stated their policy: "If we are interested in reading your work, we will be in touch. If you have not heard from us within 6-8 weeks, it is safe to assume that we have passed on the opportunity." It's been eight weeks, no response, so they're passing, at least that's what I have to assume.

That put me down to three active and I know I had made the promise to query again. I was going to do that but decided I needed to write a shorter synopsis. It would be really nice if agents had a standard submission they wanted. Most agents want a short synopsis but that can be anything from a paragraph to 5 pages. The one I was interested in querying wanted a 1-2 page synopsis, regrettably not something I had on hand. To avoid trying to just edit down a longer one, I decided to handwrite it out, which I did. I just haven't tried to sit down and decipher my bad handwriting.

Having an extra couple of days around the holiday hasn't really been the write-fest I had hoped. I think the problem is there is still so much to write. I did work on the first part of a possible future script for Powers Squared. By that I got through a first draft with 20 pages and panels, so that's a win, I guess.

Started a review of Her Man (1930). The film was recently restored and shown on TCM as part of their film festival. Part of our drain the DVR Saturday night. There is surprisingly very little on the film, including the barest of synopsis, even on AFI's survey. As always, no idea when it will ever appear; I have to finish it first.

Trophy Unlocked goes on without me, with two reviews, both by Paul. On Wednesday, it was Watch Dogs: Legion (PS5) and on Saturday, The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run.

I did make some progress on Skylar. I've changed up the story, starting with a murder which I will link to the tontine storyline. Trying to get to the action as soon as possible.

On our weekly podcast, On the Air with Powers Squared, we started to talk about a new script, one on which Paul was the primary writer. I think we'll be following this issue on future episodes. Something we've talked about doing but I like the idea that we're starting from the beginning. If you're counting at home, this would be Issue #19.

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