Ombailamos

reading list: 2019 through May

I read 85 books in 2018, which is waaaayy low for me (average is around 150) but in view of the amount of writing I did, unsurprising.

The same thing is happening this year. I have read so little of other peoples' work that I can fit five months in a single post without even squeezing. * denotes a new-to-me book.

January 2019

1. A Princess in Theory* by Alyssa Cole. I like this author a lot. This particular contemporary romance suffered from too much conflict. Like, ALL the conflict.

1.5 Too Clever By Half* by Nancy Yeager. A novella, meaning something quite short, and I still almost stopped reading it about ten times. Way too much 'setting up a series' and not enough 'why should I care.'

February 2019

2. Leverage in Death* by J.D. Robb. A very satisfying thriller.

3. Unmasked* by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Turned me into a superfan, basically. Hugely entertaining and educational.

March 2019

4. Cici and the Curator* by S.J. Wynde. A romp of a space fantasy.

5. Pulse* by Felix Francis. I read all of his collaborations with his father but this one probably shut me down for continuing his solo efforts. Not at all a bad writer, simply not my taste.

6. Proof by Dick Francis. Kindle sale. Apparently Amazon knew I needed some of the real thing. Love this book.

April 2019

7. Justice Hall, by Laurie R. King. Another Kindle sale resulting in more re-reading of a guaranteed good book.

8. Any Old Diamonds* by KJ Charles. AUUUGGH SO GOOD!! Sexy M/M historical romance built around a jewel heist. Painful, profound love story.

9. What The Parrot Saw* by Darlene Marshall. A ripping yarn involving a lady pirate in the Caribbean. Falls apart a bit at the end when the heroine goes into 'I can't ruin your life by marrying you' mode, which is very out of character given that she is loudly Doing What She Wants throughout up to that point (and earlier in the story [redacted] him with a [redacted]).

10. Someone to Trust* by Mary Balogh. Featuring another of her poisonous blondes. A lovely romance actually, a few too many series characters cluttering the corners.

11. Money in the Morgue* by Ngaio Marsh and Stella Duffy. A 'new' Alleyn mystery set in wartime (WWII) New Zealand. Good tone, plot, pacing, and language. Alleyn characterization inconsistent. Not a waste of time but not up to the original.

12. Miss Buncle's Book* by D.E. Stevenson. OMG I loved this. Thoroughly entertaining story of a small-town lady of little means who writes a book about her fellow villagers, which becomes a bestseller, and genteel mayhem ensues.

May 2019

13. Straight, by Dick Francis. Another sale, another favorite to re-read.

14. The Austen Playbook* by Lucy Parker. Very satisfying showbiz romance with two wholly lovable protagonists and a ton of complications.

15. Uncivil Defense* by M. Ruth Myers. Wartime mystery starring Maggie Sullivan, P.I. Really enjoy this series. Great central character, good plots, terrific period detail and a fun cast of supporting characters.

16. Wanted, a Gentleman* by KJ Charles. Quick-reading and very sexy M/M love story involving two men in pursuit of an eloping young lady and her dastardly swain.

16.5 Unfit to Print* by KJ Charles. A sexy M/M romance novella packed full of plot - this could easily have been a full-length novel - boiling down to the reunion of two school friends, solution of a murder, and joint custody of a fiendish cat.

17. The October Man* by Ben Aaronovitch. New novella in the Rivers of London paranormal mystery series, this one set in Germany with a new protagonist! Very much enjoyed.

18. Crooked House* by Agatha Christie. Very English mystery in which a child is the killer.

19. Band Sinister* by KJ Charles. Another sexy M/M historical romance. I loved this one so much I immediately re-read it.

20. The Tempest* by W. Shakespeare. These plays are not the length of a book but I am giving myself Full Book Credit for reading each one. The language, OMG.

 

reading list: catching up

Once upon a time, I posted a monthly reading list. Then I fell into the Writing Pool (May 2018) and since then I have been writing my own stuff at such a furious pace that I've hardly been reading at all. This may simply be a phase. It may have been (I believe it was) precipitated by reaching a critical mass of personal stress that added up to CREATE YOUR OWN WORLD BECAUSE THE REAL ONE TRULY STINKS RIGHT NOW.

And thus, thirteen new, published novellas, and three more ready to publish; three new, published novels, and one more ready to publish, and another well over 50% complete. I am writing.

But I do still read from time to time, because I must occasionally refresh my brain. Here, then, is part of the list since last update. * denotes a new-to-me book.

October 2018:

70. Green For Danger* by Christianna Brand. Cracking good wartime mystery (pub. 1944) about death in a military hospital.

71. Checking Out* by Nick Spalding. Absolutely loved this contemporary novel about a guy with terminal cancer. So funny and sad and true.

72. And Then We Danced* by Henry Alford. Very entertaining and relatable nonfiction book about adventures in dancing. Made me envious because wow some of those were cool adventures.

72.5 The Lady Astronaut of Mars* by Mary Robinette Kowal. An elegiac short story.

73. Withering By Sea* by Judith Russell. A very cute Joan Aiken-esque YA adventure complete with singing cats.

74. Golden Age and Other Stories* by Naomi Novik. Short fiction in the Temeraire world, all inspired by fan art. Some great stuff. Novik can do comedy, romance, drama, action, and heartbreak - sometimes all in the same chapter.

75. Midshipman's Hope* by David Feintuch. Military SF, first of a long series, and this one was good but enough for me.

November 2018

76. City on the Edge of Forever* by Harlan Ellison. The original teleplay, plus some revisions, plus a lot of bitching about Gene Roddenberry (who I'd say deserved it).

77. Dark in Death* by J.D. Robb. A respectable series entry in which the murderer has fixated on a writer.

78. Once a Scoundrel* by Mary Jo Putney. A 'Rogues Redeemed' Regency romance, set in the Middle East, which was an interesting departure.

79. Grey Expectations* by Clea Simon. A very annoying book about an academic with a ghost cat and her (the academic's) idiotic shenanigans in connection with campus crime. I wished I had it in paperback so I could throw it across the room.

80. Dating You/Hating You* by Christina Lauren. A clever contemporary romance in which both protagonists are Hollywood talent agents.

81. Love Lies Bleeding* by Edmund Crispin. A smart, fast-paced postwar mystery set in and around a boys' school, in which two teenage girls are resourceful, clever and brave. I approve!

82. His Perfect Partner* by Priscilla Oliveras. A contemporary romance distinguished by having Latinx protagonists. The heroine is a dancer. Some very good family and career stuff, I wasn't quite feeling the romance.

83. The Passion of Carlos Gardel* by Lazaro Droznes. Short biographical sketches mixed with a selection of tango lyrics. Ironically, Gardel was the composer, not the lyricist. Still a good resource.

83.5 Mating the Huntress* by Talia Hibbert. A fated-mates paranormal romance novella that I liked quite a lot.

December 2018

84. Banker by Dick Francis. Kindle sale, couldn't resist, loved it all over again.

85. The Vacillations of Poppy Carew* by Mary Wesley. British chick lit that's fallen down a Pythonesque rabbit hole full of violent accidents, impulsive and idiotic people, and a singularly annoying and feckless heroine. I almost stopped reading countless times.

 

And that's 2018. At least there was a lot of new material here, and not re-reading. Stay tuned for a 2019 catching-up post.

a writing process

(originally published October 2013; updated June 9, 2019)

To the extent that I have thought about my "writing process," it has been due to the guilty realization that I need to do something useful with my Amazon author page. But then I read this:

http://daringnovelist.blogspot.com/2011/04/blogging-my-process-character-in.html

and realized, you know, it might be kind of helpful to actually think through what my process is.  Both for the author page, and so that I can plan more effectively.  As I so often do, I am choosing to think out loud so that my cherished readers can revel in (or wonder at) the workings of my mind.

What I know for sure: my process for nonfiction is different from my process for fiction; my process for a full-length novel is different from my process for a novella; and my process for a contemporary novel is very different from my process for a historical novel.

Mind you, this is not based on a whole giant shelf full of finished work.  But it is based on thirty years of serious writing.  I think it is fair to say that I have finished enough stuff to know what works for me.

Note: my process for the blog is completely useless because I have no process.  I just start typing.

Nonfiction: I wrote tons of papers in college and grad school, as most humanities students do.  My process for those was to read (in the time available) as much as I could get my hands on that related to the topic, take copious notes (I used the index card method), string everything together, flesh it out, clean it up, done.  When you have a couple of weeks to deliver something, deathless prose is not the object.

My nonfiction projects are progressing differently, in part because I don't need to produce a detailed bibliography, footnotes, etc with the two projects I have going.  They are both based primarily on life experience.  They are both, essentially, "how-to's." 

And because I personally feel that any kind of "how-to" needs to be delivered with concision, precision, and attention to the reader's boredom threshold, I am going to be a little more concerned with how they read. 

I did not have to worry about boring my graduate-school advisors.  They had to read what I gave them no matter how boring it was!

I don't have any particular urgency* about completing these; the one I started last year is on the back burner, though, because the one I started this year is, at the moment, more compelling.  Also, frankly, easier to produce: the other one needs photographs (erk).  I have a vague intention of finishing NF Project #2 by the end of 2013.  Given that setup, my process is simply to sit and write a little bit often enough to get the project done.  And "done" is entirely subjective. 

Because it is a how-to, based on life experience, how much I put in is entirely up to me.  I can choose to make it as comprehensive or as lightweight as I like.  Because I want it to be of value to the target market, however, my intention is to make it as complete as it needs to be to answer the most obvious questions and settle the most likely confusions for someone in that market. 

I would like any "revised editions" that are issued down the road to be revised due to rule changes, and not because I left something really essential out.

So a necessary part of approaching this, in an organized way, is establishing for myself what those most obvious questions and most likely confusions are.  Then I have to produce a short explanation of each situation.  And then I need to either locate or create a sample document for addressing the situation.

As to the novellas: in many respects, my process for these is like the blog.  I just start typing.  I generally have an idea of who at least one of my protagonists will be, and that each story will focus on a romance.  The format I am choosing to write in is very dialogue-driven.  That is intentional.  It's not because I don't like writing lots of description and backstory;  I love that stuff. 

Backstory? Let me tell you about backstory.  I have an entire genealogy for four of the main characters in my historical novels.  I am down with backstory.  But it doesn't belong in a 22,000-word novella. 

Anyway, once I have determined who the "second lead" will be, and what the primary conflict (if any; I don't see that this is always strictly necessary) or obstacle (if any) will be, and what the milieu will be, I just go tearing off.  So far (twenty-four stories published and three more completed) I have not encountered much of a need to sit and think about what happens next.  The only notes I have taken have been after-the-fact, because all of the stories are somewhat interconnected and I have to keep that shit straight.

The first contemporary novel ('Home Sweet Home') was begun nearly twenty years ago; it changed significantly from my first conception of it to the finished product.  It didn't change through rewrites so much as from my own personal evolution; I had left the project at a certain point in the story, expecting it to go in one direction.  When I took it back up again, it went in a different direction. 

This is what writers mean when they say stuff like "the characters took over."  I was in a very different emotional place during completion than I was in during conception.  It shows in the work.  I had to do some fairly brutal editing to the early part of the thing to make it fit where the conclusion ended up.

I had minor research to do for that project; though "contemporary," it is set in the 1980s, and there is stuff I don't remember anymore.  Fortunately I have the Internet.

The historical novels (two complete, one at about 10%, one in the thinking-about-it stage) require tons, and tons, and tons of research.  This is all sooooo much easier now that I have the Internet.  My historical timelines have to be accurate, my geography has to be accurate, my fashions and foods and buildings and modes of travel have to be accurate.  The stories themselves are the easy part, and the characters just come out of the frickin' woodwork.

I have discarded most of my notes for everything leading up to Historical Novels #1 and #2.  My early drafts, etc: into the shredder.  I had to write up a timeline and a concordance, because the two books cross-reference events and people in some places, and things needed to match up.  I had another genealogy to create because of a plot point that invented itself about 1/3 of the way into #2.

I am trying my hardest NOT to do any work (research or jotting down a scene or anything STAY IN YOUR BOXES PEOPLE) for historical novel #4 because doing more than taking a note on where those characters are used earlier is going to take me out of #3 too much.  I can write another contemporary urban novella, or work on the nonfiction thing, without disrupting the cooking process for HN#3, but trying to actually compose another historical novel simultaneously would be, I think, a frustrating disaster.

 

Common to all: I edit as I go.  My reading speed is even more unearthly than my typing speed.  Each novella was read through every day I was writing. For me, it helps with pacing, and to see if another scene is needed or if a scene should be moved or whatever.

Long story short: My process, to the extent that you can call it that, is ultimately simply a matter of letting the writing be easy.  For a lot of years, it wasn't easy; I didn't touch it.  Right now, it's easy - so I'm doing as much as I can.

 

*both back-burnered till further notice

For more about my publications, visit https://www.thelastories.com