Updates March 27-31

Hello,

Thank you for the likes and follows.

Last week was an interesting week.  We all waited for a prediction that didn’t happen.  I am not saying any names, but we all know what I am typing about.  Historic times we are living in. 

We are still in the process of moving.  My room is almost painted.  My daughter and dad will start to paint the living room next.  Our major project will be the kitchen.    This process kind of took over the weekend. 

Besides keeping my eye on the news last week and working at the day job, I watched Invisible City on Netflix and worked on Connection Lost.  Getting back into the story took some time.  It is a mindset I didn’t even know was missing until I tried to pick up where I left off.  I found myself stuck on various character’s motivations.  Where certain characters should be introduced into the story and how their importance to the main character differed.  For example – Somer is a classic middle child.  She has 3 older siblings and 3 younger siblings.  The six all displayed their manifest will at an early age, they are considered prodigies.  However, Somer does not have that type of ability.  Her ability cannot be displayed, her Djinn godfather bonded her to a familiar.  This is an outdated practice. In the present-day supernatural world, you either have the ability/skills or not.  I didn’t consider what kind of relationship Somer had with her older siblings.  Her incarceration did change things for everyone.  But what was it like before that?  By the third novella, Somer is supposed to be comfortable as a “gray sheep” of the family.   As a younger sibling myself, I know that an older sister and brother, I have both, may perceive their shared history differently from the younger person.  There are times when the younger sibling is living in the older one’s shadow. It can be a frustrating place.  I wrote down thoughts on how admiration and love can turn to annoyance.  Or how harmful neglect and overprotection can be even from a sibling. I must make some decisions and they probably should’ve been there already. 

A quick word on Invisible City.  The show was interesting.  I binged it in one night, the season just five episodes.  It was good but did not pique my interest the way that the first season had.  The characters’ development seemed plausible, but I felt like I was misled.   It does make me want to research into Brazilian folklore.  My mother is from Guyana, it shares a border with Brazil, and I wonder if there is folklore transfer, in one country the entity is called this but called something else in another country.  Like how cassava is also called yuca.   If there was a season 3 I would watch it but I think the story ended the best way the writers could do it. 

This week, I will continue to work on Connection Lost, specifically on the characters.  I will be completing the Dragon Blood Omnibus and then decide if I want to continue with the series.   As research I will be looking up articles on antagonists.  There is also the first quarter review and the set up for the second quarter.  I have all the stickers and washi tape; I think I need.  That is all for now.

Please feel free to leave a comment.  Remember to be kind and be aware of positive opportunities.

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Updates March 21-24

Hello,

Thank you for the likes and follows.  

Photo by Skyler Ewing on Pexels.com

This post was put up on Tuesday instead of Monday because time got away from me. Not sure if I mentioned it in other posts. We are moving from Queens back to Brooklyn.  The shutdown of the Queen’s house is taking a lot of time.  I have to figure out what to keep and what to throw away.  These are truly tough choices.  Most of the packing is happening on the weekend. From Tuesday night to Saturday morning, is reserved for the day job.  So much time, but it pays the bills.  There are small pockets of time to get writing done but I end up using them for reading via audiobook. 

Last week I wrote that I would be working diligently on Connection Lost, act 2. That did not happen. There is no excuse except that I got caught up in work and other things.  I feel like I am coming out of a fog.  For about 3 weeks or so I had no desire to write, even though I knew the story was right there waiting for me to continue it.  Instead of working, I listened to Mary Robinette Kowal’s The Spare Man.  It was an audiobook read by the author.  Mary Robinette is a very good voice actor.  I had several books with her voice before I realized that she was a great storyteller.  I also listen to all the audiobooks available in the Legacy of Magic series by Lindsay Buroker.  There are five books published.  I don’t know the reason why books 4 and 5 are not an audiobook.  I have them on a kindle and I will wait for the audiobook to keep the set together.   Lindsay Buroker is an amazing world-builder.  I started to listen to another series by her called Dragon Blood, which is a Steampunk/magic series. It is a unique world that has completely shunned magic and magic users.  It is a safe bet that one of the main characters in the series is a magic user. She also writes believable romances between adults.  

Some of you may be wondering what about the vampire paranormal story.  It has suffered the same fate as Connection Lost.  Gothic is older than Connection Lost, however, Connection Lost is more structured.  Which is under the working title umbrella of Midnight Fantasy Witch Tech.  There are supposed to be 3 or 4 novella-type stories about Somer and her world.  Most of what was written in Gothic had to be trashed and rebuilt from the ground up.  It is easy to get lost in backstory or character development.  I have been fighting it for a long time now, but I will have to cut some characters.  Many of them don’t have little to no role in how I want the story to develop.  Again, faced with tough choices.

The plan for this week is to catch two episodes of Invisible City on Netflix, season 2 starting later in the week.  Instead of binging, I will watch it in doses.  Season 1 of Invisible City was predictable but also satisfying. The voice actors did well but there were times when the performance was cringe-worthy.  I will also be working on the Gothic outline.  The task for Connection Lost from last week will be carrying over.  Since time and energy is an issue, I will be evaluating this as well. 

That is all for now.  I hope these words find you all doing well.  Remember to be kind.  I think we need that more than ever.  

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PS: The March flowers of the Month are daffodils, and jonquils and I read somewhere cherry blossoms. Jonquils and daffodils are hard to tell apart