Blink and You'll Miss It--August is Here!
The Cat and the Comma Issue #12
July came and went, just like the rest of this year. It’s summer, it’s unbearably hot, and my brain has been a little weird lately. But, there are always upsides. Let’s talk about July.
Misc. Professional Update
I passed my insurance license test and am currently pending approval for my actual license. Not that it matters, though, because I got accepted into Boeing! Moving up in the world, slowly but surely. Sucks I sank a lot of money into getting a license I won’t use, but it’s alright. I’m better off, anyhow.
Here’s a small list of writing things I accomplished, meanwhile:
I released my first “Behind the Scenes” post for my top-tier patrons, which is part 1 of a series surrounding my fantasy twist on the myth of Eros and Psyche. It’s on the longer side and goes over how the outline changed as I developed the idea more and what I aim to do next with the short.
Speaking of, if you wanted to see the first scene and a look at the latest outline, that’s also available on my Patreon to the lower tiers.
Which reminds me, if you missed the announcement last month, I launched a Gumroad page and will be using it as my storefront at this time. Here is my Gumroad page. The plan will be to put all my stories here, both in digital and physical form. I want to start making more physical copies of my works, starting with the longer ones as I publish them. And it looks like this novella is going to be the start of that—but we’ll see.
As a result of this decision, I have decided at this time to close my Ko-Fi storefront. Ko-Fi is still there as a tip jar of sorts, though, if you feel like you want to toss some coins my way.
Writing Update
I am taking a break from ASMLP for a couple of weeks to crank out some words on my new short story/novella, Across This Haunted Distance. I’ve mentioned it before as “that one retelling of the myth of Eros and Psyche”, and now it has an actual title and plot!
Here’s a bit of what I’m currently working on:
The wedding was short-lived by Perovian standards. As was tradition, the Beaufort family returned in the coming weeks with carts stuffed full of gifts: pottery from the finest sculptors in Akala; tins of powdered candies from the northern-most province of Hadorae; pristine sets of planers and saws and calipers for use in the Kask lumber mill; small boxes of coins freshly-minted from around the world.
Rianne had not thought much of her betrothal as a child, and had possessed less reason to consider it as a blossoming member of the Keraz student body. Now that she was a full-grown woman, though, there was something almost unsettling about seeing her worth boiled down to gifts in hulking chests. Still, she swallowed the discomfort down when she saw the elation in her fathers’ faces. Though neither of them had said as much, she had spared her own glances at the ledgers. This arrangement did their mill a favor–in more ways than one.
I finished the outline, which is available on my Patreon as I mentioned earlier. Now, I’m going through and typing out the story start to finish. So far, I’ve mostly stuck to the outline, though I’ve already added a scene that wasn’t accounted for. The wordcount continues to grow before my eyes, which has me thinking this will likely end up being a novella. Not that I mind, honestly.
I’m still mulling over a completely unrelated short story, tentatively titled In Time for the Wedding, very loosely based on real events (in that the crux of the plot was going to happen IRL and then could not). This one I am also outlining. Work on this one is incredibly slow due to… everything else.
On a final note, once ASMLP is completed and I have more work done on the stories mentioned above, I haven’t fully decided what I would like to take a look at next. I do want to take a proper crack at outlining and writing my novel set in the same universe as ASMLP, A Bitter-Tasting Blade. It’s about monster hunters and a (somewhat)reformed monster woman who go from bitter enemies to reluctant allies to… perhaps something more. Otherwise, I do have Before the Moon Sets to consider as well, which is especially relevant given it is also a novella.
Media Update
Jade Legacy. That is all.
On a lengthier note, I finished said novel and. The most series of all time. I enjoyed every second and it even made me cry a bit. It’s really difficult for books to do that to me.
I also finished Consider This from Chuck Palahniuk and it was… okay. Some funny moments and some good advice to be had, but overall it was kind of mediocre. He also made a couple of… pretty questionable statements.
I now also got my copy of A Day of Fallen Night from the library and have been absolutely devouring that as well. Next up is also Ring Shout by P. Djèlí Clark, which I’m excited to read, as well as restarting The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo. I fell off of reading it, but it’s quite relevant to my current project and I’ve been meaning to return to it, anyway.
In terms of video games, I restarted Pokemon Platinum. I challenged myself to try making a team with less-used Pokemon (the same 6 Pokemon tend to be Sinnoh staples, so I barred myself from using any of them). Now, my team is Naia the Shellos, Teles the Porygon, Thanatos the Duskull, Hermes the Buneary, Apollon the Murkrow, and Ivory the Torterra.
I also turned back to a TV series I haven’t watched in forever: Chuck. Yeah, it’s pretty dated and I’ve cringed at a few things, but in general I’m having a fun time. It brings back some rare good memories.
Blog Update
I wrote a post recapping the books I read for the first half of the year, which you can read here.
I’ve also been pecking at, but have yet to finish, a post on some writing advice I saw about how the biggest theme of your work should be a question you are trying to answer. I wrote a messier version of it here, but I want to clean it up some.
The Cat Recommends
I like to use this space to shout out other indie writers, cause I think we could all use a boost from time to time. This time, I’m using this space to shout out Vanessa Roades, author of Deep Roots, a book which debuted in June! Here’s the summary:
It’s the summer festival in the elvish kingdom of Cypress. A month of drama, debauchery, and divine devotion—and half-elf Irving’s arrested on the first day. They intend to escape their sentence before it starts, hoping their legendary prophet of a father never finds out. At least until a risky opportunity to change their fate comes help a priestess (of a goddess Irving once shunned) smuggle sacred Cypress devices into the human realm, and earn their ticket out.
Here is the project page about the book, and here it is on Amazon! And here is the rest of Vanessa’s projects, if you decide you want more.
The Cat Thanks
One of the perks for higher-tier patrons is shout-outs at the end of newsletters. Special thanks to my patrons: Ceph the Ghost Writer and Larkspur.
Well, that’s a wrap! Here’s hoping I get more accomplished this month, and that my start at Boeing goes well for me. Wish me luck!
Kind regards,
Alex