wow
Not a single post here in November, not even a book review. And I haven't signed in to lurk on others' pages either. I really need to work on this. I always enjoyed being here on LJ. Facebook, Twitter and my own website have someone taken over my online time so completely that I don't even sign in here anymore.
It's December. How did that happen?
Writing wise, I bombed NaNoWriMo completely, but mid-month it went from just not writing enough each night to a conscious decision. Too much to do, something had to give to decrease stress, and worrying about word count was what went. I know a lot of my writer friends would say "wrong choice, especially when you've struggled with writing all year and this should have been a motivator to get you back on track." And they're not wrong. NaNo was supposed to be my Great Redeemer, pushing me to write a group of short stories fleshing out my characters of my "John Carter-ish" set of worlds, and pushing me to finish Ambergrin Hall. And I did work a little on each throughout the month, but didn't come anywhere near 50,000 words nor anywhere near finishing either.
Reading-wise, I've been all over the map. I have a few book reviews to catch up on, and a few I can't publish because the reviews will be appearing in ICARUS or have appeared recently in ICARUS and CHELSEA STATION. Yes, two magazines focused on gay characters and content are now publishing my book reviews, which means I've been reading more of that than anything else. I still want to finish the books I started reading this year before the end of the year (The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes and the second Song of Ice & Fire book, and John Lithgow's memoir) so I can say they were done in 2011.
Website wise -- well, I obviously stopped posting about it here (and I shouldn't have) but I've been interviewing all kinds of wonderful folk, from LJ mainstays like jaylake and ellen_datlow to bands like Burnham and Hollywood Ending to Scottish artist Lynn Bennett-mackenzie. I've enjoyed all of them, and there are a bunch of fun ones coming up.
I find that I've really enjoyed promoting other peoples' work. Getting people to vote for The Feaver to win a spot on the School Jams finals, letting people know that Dennis R. Miller has a killer western out there, giving people a chance to win a copy of Supernatural Noir and drawing more attention to Ellen's recent anthologies... it's been feeling really good to do this. And I've been making some wonderful friends in the process.
Did I mention here that I got my first short story sale in a long, long time? Editor Bryan Thomas Schmidt accepted "A Day on the Parantwer" for his Space Battles anthology, due out in 2012. Hopefully the first of many, but I need to send stories out before they'll get accepted, right? Another thing I need to do more of in 2012.
Well, okay, at least I've posted something! Time to work on the book reviews I owe those nice writers Maurice Broaddus and Linda Poitevin.
It's December. How did that happen?
Writing wise, I bombed NaNoWriMo completely, but mid-month it went from just not writing enough each night to a conscious decision. Too much to do, something had to give to decrease stress, and worrying about word count was what went. I know a lot of my writer friends would say "wrong choice, especially when you've struggled with writing all year and this should have been a motivator to get you back on track." And they're not wrong. NaNo was supposed to be my Great Redeemer, pushing me to write a group of short stories fleshing out my characters of my "John Carter-ish" set of worlds, and pushing me to finish Ambergrin Hall. And I did work a little on each throughout the month, but didn't come anywhere near 50,000 words nor anywhere near finishing either.
Reading-wise, I've been all over the map. I have a few book reviews to catch up on, and a few I can't publish because the reviews will be appearing in ICARUS or have appeared recently in ICARUS and CHELSEA STATION. Yes, two magazines focused on gay characters and content are now publishing my book reviews, which means I've been reading more of that than anything else. I still want to finish the books I started reading this year before the end of the year (The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes and the second Song of Ice & Fire book, and John Lithgow's memoir) so I can say they were done in 2011.
Website wise -- well, I obviously stopped posting about it here (and I shouldn't have) but I've been interviewing all kinds of wonderful folk, from LJ mainstays like jaylake and ellen_datlow to bands like Burnham and Hollywood Ending to Scottish artist Lynn Bennett-mackenzie. I've enjoyed all of them, and there are a bunch of fun ones coming up.
I find that I've really enjoyed promoting other peoples' work. Getting people to vote for The Feaver to win a spot on the School Jams finals, letting people know that Dennis R. Miller has a killer western out there, giving people a chance to win a copy of Supernatural Noir and drawing more attention to Ellen's recent anthologies... it's been feeling really good to do this. And I've been making some wonderful friends in the process.
Did I mention here that I got my first short story sale in a long, long time? Editor Bryan Thomas Schmidt accepted "A Day on the Parantwer" for his Space Battles anthology, due out in 2012. Hopefully the first of many, but I need to send stories out before they'll get accepted, right? Another thing I need to do more of in 2012.
Well, okay, at least I've posted something! Time to work on the book reviews I owe those nice writers Maurice Broaddus and Linda Poitevin.