I'm gonna get better

Last week was extremely unproductive. I have a lot of reasons that I could say for that but most of it was health related and this week I'm feeling better so far. I'm hoping that this week will prove a lot more productive.

I did do some writing last week, mostly about league but it's still writing. I felt extra frazzled this week but hopefully I'll find the other side of it. I want to get into writing on some of my stories. So badly! It's hard to figure out how to get past the blocks. I've been working on getting back into Uncommon Valor by handwriting what I've already had written. I think it might help in the long run.

I also think I should revisit writing fanfiction. Even if it's just drabbles but just getting out words and getting affirmation tha feels good. It's encouraging and I think it could help motivate me to get done what I want to get done. It's just so hard for so long.

I've been watching Scandal. It's really good. I've already finished the first three seasons. It makes me want to look toward picking up Political Gamble again but I might have to wait a bit on that. I think Uncommon Valor is where I  need to start on my original work so I can get it finished.

I'm also going to return to reading regularly I know that that generally helps writing. If I read more then I will write more. I'm going to do better. I think I'll be happier if I get more writing done.

The struggle is real

So, I'm going to keep up regularly updating my blog. I haven't really been able to work much on the writing front. I've read. I've been listening to the audio book for Hard Choices by Hillary Clinton and reading another book at times. I've got way too many books in my currently reading but I hope to finish at least 3 more this month (I've already finished one).

I've been marathoning watching Scandal. It's really addicting. I'm really frustrated with the current Jake arc and I'm ready for it to be over. It's making me turn back to one of my older novels I planned out and I think I might start looking into working in it again. It's called Political Gamble and is set during the JFK era. However, I think finishing Uncommon Valor might be in order. I need to finish something.

I'm still working on writing out on paper from the online document of my manuscript of Uncommon Valor. I think that it's helping me slowly get out of my funk. I want to write. I really do. I think not writing has been making me more depressed but it's so hard to fight through the depression and how much my job saps my energy. I feel empty everyday after work.

Maybe I should write a story about that. Just a dreary life sucks sort of story. Somehow, I don't think people want to read about that though! I have to do better. I think blogging will continue to help. I'll keep trying.

Reading

I haven't really done much writing yet, even the cowrite with Sammy. The energy that it takes to right has been sapped from me. I haven't been feeling well and I've been feeling rather depressed lately. I'm trying to keep up with at least writing on my blog as frequently as possible. Though, I don't particularly have a decent topic this time around.


Even though I haven't been writing, I have been reading quite a bit. Right now, I'm swapping between a harlequin book, the bell jar and I am Malala depending on what sounds good at the time. Though, I am Malala is my work book currently since I have it in physical form so can clearly read it at my desk. The others are ebooks.


My hope is that the more I read the sooner I will get to the point where I can really attain writing again. I miss writing but I just feel so drained all the time and like there's nothing left for me to put into my writing.


I'm also going to be working on handwriting one of my stories from an online document to paper. I've found that that really reacquaints me with a story moreso than just rereading it. I also enjoy writing on paper so I think maybe going through that medium might help as well.


Do you have any strange or unique strategies for getting back into a story you set aside?

Reboot

I'm going to reboot this thing. I've started a league of legends blog as well. Just a simple one of course. This one isn't much either, I suppose. This is just a recentering post. I'm not going to be posting much content in this particular post but it is more of a place holder for starting over.


I'm going to start with weekly writing blogs for this blog and my league of legends blog. I hope that it will help inspire me to write more and also I enjoy the idea of blogging for an audience (hopefully I can have one someday).


In any case, keep an eye out for great things here!

I'm on time!

I missed a week on updating the blog. Which I'm upset with myself about. I had it all written out but class had me extra burnt out and I just never had the motivation to type it all up. So, that means this week I am going to post two free fictions: one SFW and one NSFW. It's only Wednesday but this will be typed up and scheduled for Friday!

So, last weekend I went and saw The Monuments Men and it was even better than I thought it would be. It broke my heart but made me feel really good at the same time. Art, of every kind, is so important. It's our spirit and our legacy, proof that we existed. It was so humbling to see a movie about people who fought and died to save the human spirit. Their work was so magnificent and The Monuments Men did so much against such difficult odds.

Since the movie moved me so much and WWII fascinates me anyway,  I have started reading The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves, and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History by Robert M. Edsel. His introduction made me cry. I'm really enjoying the book, though, I am reading it very slowly. I recommend it if you love history!

I also recently finished reading the second book in the Lynda Chance trilogy that I talked about previously. Blackmailed into Bed is so much worse than the first and I didn't think that was possible. I feel like even smutty stories should always have character depth. Also, rapey main guys aren't sexy to me at all. This novella just felt really lazy over all and so I am dreading reading the last one in the trilogy: Bedded by the Boss.

I haven't really made any progress on House of Bathory. But, I have started reading Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. So, that's fun. I have a hard time reading only one book at a time most of the time. But it works for me if I read several at once and bounce around to what suits me at the moment.

I wrote a fanfiction drabble of a lesbian pair and actually finished it. That's the first thing I've finished in ages. I'm super proud. LOL. I've got to get writing my Bygone Beasts submission for SMP! March 30th will be here before I know it.

Well, that's all I have this week. Let's move on to the free fiction!

Giro di Venezia (NSFW, m/m erotica)

New Life (Safe for work)

Let me know what you think! I really appreciate any comments I think.

Ooops late but I had this written before Friday! T_T

Hello again! I'm on time twice (except I didn't type it until tonight)! I think I'm getting into the habit of getting these blogs up on time every single week. The more often I write them, the more I want to find a better methodology for my topics. Does anyone have suggestions for that?

I don't want my blog posts to be aimless and I want to make them interesting to read and comment on (duh!)! I don't think that's too tall an order. I just have to figure out a good direction to go.

The weather has been really weird. I'm hoping that it won't snow anymore until I get home at least TT But who knows how that will go! I can't complain about the weather too much since it's not as bad as out East. But walking to and from work has been a task! ㅠㅠ

So! I've been reading a lot. I finished Seduced by an American Millionaire by Lynda Chance. It's a novella and took me a while to get through. I usually don't mind the whole Harlequin plot what plot books but this one bothered me a lot. It was formatted badly and it had increasing instances of simple grammatical errors and typos toward the end of the story. I found the characters very two dimensional the book was very misogynistic. It's the first time I've given a book two stars in ages.

I did realize how important it is to not suddenly switch povs or settings without a separator or segue. It was very jarring and made it hard for the story to flow naturally. I'm definitely going to be watching for that in my own writing.

I've also started House of Bathory by Linda Lafferty. It was a bit slow at first but it's really picking up. I like the seamless transitions between historical and modern settings. I'm really excited to see where it's going and how the two eras are going to intermingle and come together plot wise.

The third book I've been reading has been getting the most attention from me. It's No One Else Can Have You by Kathleen Hale. It's a young adult murder mystery, I suppose. I'm pretty far into the book and I'm still not 100% what the driving force of the plot is supposed to be. However, it's enjoyable and I do love Kippy's narration.

I suppose that's enough for now! I haven't written much this week but I did do some brainstorming and plotting for some short story submissions. But for this week... we have a really short short (312 words) called No Regrets. Please be aware by clicking the following link there is a trigger warning for suicide (very mild). It's another older story I wrote and it's a bit dark. Would love to know what people think of it! Thank you!

No Regrets

See you Friday~!

Hey, look! I'm on time!

Guess what?! It's Friday again! Actually while I'm writing this, it's Thursday. I hope everyone's been having a good week! I started a job in tech support on Monday. So, without fail I'm now gunning to do a lot of writing.

On Wednesday, I started a submission story for "Have A Drink" from Storm Moon Press. So~ It's a lesbian vampire theme and I really enjoy the vampire that sprung into my mind. ^_~ But, it came to me in 1st person for some reason. I'm going with it but I feel like it's going to be pretty difficult.

Last post, I mentioned I had bought a domain. Now I've found someone who can help my co-writer (Sammy) and I get it off the ground!

But in the meantime, I'm still using this and Free Fiction Friday will continue! Here's what's up for this week~ ^_^

I have another older story for you guys. It's from when I was really, really interesting in writing from the point of view of inanimate objects who have living consciousness. (I was really inspired by LotR.) So, this one is written from the point of view of a knife. It's another really short one but I'd love to have any thoughts you might have on it:

Pieces

See you next week!

New Website!

So! I meant to post this on Friday but never got past writing the subject. I found a place that made it easy to create a nice website ( http://kitemry.webs.com/ )! After that, I ended up purchasing my own domain but it's going to take me a little while to figure out how to get it up and running.

I did post a free fiction last Friday. It's from 2008 but when I reread it, it really affected me. I was kind of surprised it was able to do that and I worry my writing has become worse since then. But that just means I need to start writing more again; and I need to keep reading a lot!

But in any case, please check out the free short I posted and let me know what you think: http://kitemry.webs.com/apps/blog/

I'd also like to share writing.com with fellow readers and writers! Join with this link: http://www.Writing.Com?rfrid=candiedinago

See you later this week!

Long time, no see

I could give a lot of excuses as to why I fell off the blogging train again. The truth is that I was too unmotivated and depressed over the past few months to even try. I haven't been able to get any interviews even and not having a job has always proven to be the worst thing that could ever happen to my writing. I'm hoping that with the recent interview I had that this is something that will be changing soon. <br><br>

I was working on a submission that was going to be due in July and I had missed the deadline but then I looked at the site I want to sub to and found out that the deadline has been pushed back until december 31. This is exciting and means I have more time to truly put my best foot forward. It's still a story I plan to write in novel length but this way I can give it a happy ending... kind of like a west side story for romeo and juliet. ^^ It makes it easier to stomach the hardships my characters will be going through. <br><br>

As well as determining that I'm going to submit to this anthology I've found about 10 other upcomings on storm moon press that I am interested in subbing to. It's going to take a lot of work but it's time for me to buckle down. I'm thinking of picking 5 of them to use as my nanowrimo... You know, a kind of short story anthology of it's on and then I can get them proofread reworked before I submit them. <br><br>

I just have to buckle down and get to writing regularly again no matter how unmotivated I feel. Giving into this feeling only makes it all worse. I'm better than this! As always I'd appreciate knowing you're in my corner so leave me comments here or email me at kitemry @ gmail or tweet me at @jjangonestar and just ask me how my writing is going! I need the push right now to keep going.

Of Editing

So, I've figured out that editing for other people is a lot easier than editing for myself. I spent about 30 minutes editing a 2,500 word short story that Sammy, my co-author, wrote. It's really, really good and wasn't that difficult to edit. Hopefully she'll be sharing it with everyone soon because it's so awesome... sad but awesome.

We were talking and she's going to do an alphabet based serial starting with her first one. I'm thinking that might be a good way to go for  myself as well. So I'm going to try and get some written and see how it goes. I'm also working on The Pink Triangle projects still and that should stay my primary focus along with the co-writing works with Sammy.

I've started watching The Tudors and I have a feeling I'll want to write something in the era...

I've also been reading And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini. It's a brilliant book that has me completely riveted and I'm completely surprised by that to be honest. It's not often a book can bring me to the verge of tears and not even 15% into the ebook and I've already teared up three or so times.

This is another short update but please keep tuned!

I'm also participating in this giveaway! The book looks so good. :( I don't really know what else to say to really blog about a giveaway but I'm excited to participate and share it this way. Check it out!

The first 10k is the hardest...?

I might or might not have mentioned that I have a roommate -- Sammy. She's got a blog at sammyly. Make sure to give her some attention too and follow her updates! She'll be offering free fiction as well.

Together, we've been working on a novel. It's set in Seoul and it's about two step-brothers who get into drag racing. They'll be a lot of action and romance and, of course, hot cars. I hope you'll keep an eye out for when we finish it. Last night, we tipped over the 10k mark and I'm really excited about it! It's been a while since I've gotten anything to that point.

I've also started to try and edit some old short stories that I could share for Free Fiction Friday. It's slow going and I'm going to have at least a few done and ready to go before I start sharing. Please anticipate!

I don't have much else to share at the moment. Wish me good luck in my writing adventures!

Have a great week!

A new start!

A lot has happened since I last made an entry. Mainly, I'm now jobless again and so I'm taking the time while I'm job searching to get into the groove of writing seriously again. It's hard to get in that habit even more the more time you have. Life's kind of funny this way. But I've got a lot of ideas and I'm currently in the process of starting a novella with my roommate, Sammy. I'm also pulling out some of my old short stories to edit and finish and then use as free fiction here.

I talked about before how my first novel was going to be a WWII setting but the story is proving much more heavy and difficult to write. It is coming slowly and well... I think I just need to let it come naturally as it does. If I force it I don't think it's going to turn out the way I want and it's too important of a story to me to do half-way!

That's kind of where things are now. I just wanted to note turning over the new leaf and hopefully I'll be making blog entries at least once a week if not more! Once I get my short stories in line I'll start having Short Story Saturday. That'll be my little corner where I can share some free fiction with y'all!

I'm also opening to doing reviews of any sort! So please if you want a short story, novel or anything else reviewed please let me know. I do have limited funds so I cant purchase too many books to do this but I'm willing to purchase as many as I can. I do know sometimes authors will gift a book in return for reviews. I've done this in the past and I've found some great books this way and I know it helps my fellow authors. I'm also looking for blogs to follow and read as well as more friends on twitter (@jongupped) or goodreads!

That being said. I'm going to get my writing on for the night and possibly get some more reading done on The Hobbit which I've been making my way through again!

Writer's Group 5/12/2011

This week I was finally able to make it to my writing group again and that was amazing. We chatted quite a bit of course but I actually put down about a paragraph on my short story on top of about 500 words between the two writing prompts. I rather liked working with the prompts even though I found the second one 'Now that she was gone, I could tell the truth.' really difficult to work with. I managed about a paragraph on it though! And it would make for an interesting beginning to a short story but I'm not sure it's a story I'd actually be all that interested in.

The first prompt was to write about the first time your character felt humiliated. I had a lot of fun with that prompt and it could also be an interesting flash fiction but I don't really know (or care) how to expand on it so I think I will merely leave it alone. It's saved so I could always go back to it if I felt like I wanted to.

I'm happy that my Damon and Luke story is now sitting at 3880 words which means that progress has been made. I'm going to get some more work done on it and I'll be at starbucks all day which always helps the creative processes.

Of headaches and nonsense

I woke up this morning with a sore throat and a massive headache. The sore throat is now coming and going but the headache is a constant annoyance and I've taken just about every drug I can think of to try and make it go away. Anytime I move my shoulders or head my neck cracks and that's just a wonderful sign.

Today, I'm planning on finishing season 7 of 24. I'm on the last episode so that won't be a difficult task and then there's only season 8 left. I can see how they have to start winding down the show at this point. I'm also going to finish reading The Divide today. I have a transcription job that I was supposed to have done a few days ago and it's near done so I will be finishing that as well. After that is done I will finish reading The Catalyst and write my review and then make a WordPress entry.

Lastly, I plan to start work on my short story again. I really want to be able to finish it soon, get it edited and then submitted for publication hopefully. *crosses fingers* It's about an interracial homosexual couple and I'm about 3,000 words in.

Later, I will probably echo a post I made with all my current active and inactive writing projects and their progress so I can get a feel for maybe what everyone here is interested in. :)