Hello Fall! Oh how I have missed you! The turning of the leaves! The blessedly cold air! The stews, bread, and other cold weather food! Ah, it’s my favorite time of year!
August was a bit of a rough month, as you can tell by the fact that I didn’t have an update for you last month. I had a bit of a mental health hit, but thanks to adjustments to my daily brain chemistry supplement, I’m doing much better.
I also started a new novel called Nemetona, which was based on an idea I got while considering writing for LeVar Burton’s Short Story Contest for his podcast. I didn’t end up entering the contest because the idea expanded into novel size, and well, here we are. Coming off of August, it was hard for me to sit at the computer and write because I kept distracting myself with things like YouTube, new fountain pens, and other various things. So instead of typing the novel right now, I decided to put my collection of fountain pens and notebooks to good use and am writing it longhand. It’s been working pretty well so far (as in, I’m actually writing the dang thing!).
The notebook I’ve been using is awesome. I had to scour the internet to find more of them, but finally found a local supplier. What kind of notebook is this, you ask? From what I understand, the format is called the Oxford Lecture notebook. It’s lined, but with a blank one inch margin on the right. I love it because I can make novel notes in the margin without having to squeeze it between the text, or fight with the binding and holes! The one in the picture is from Clairefontaine (link is in French) so it has beautiful paper for use with fountain pens.
Speaking of pens and ink, I have new stuff!
The three inks are three more Pilot Iroshizuku inks. I’m quite obsessed with these inks. The colors are amazing, and the inks just work with any pen I throw at them. I think I have about half the collection now. I will collect them all!
The orange pen I bought from Jetpens and is called the Moonman pen from Korea. The cool thing about this pen is that you can swap out the regular fountain pen nib for a glass pen nib! I haven’t tried using the glass nib for writing yet, but I might try it later.
Underneath the Moonman pen is the new TWSBI Swipe, which is TWSBI’s first cartridge pen. This is also my first stub nib and I really dig it. It makes my writing look good without trying real hard! The grey capped pen next to it is a TWSBI Eco with a stub nib, which I just got today. All TWSBIs just really work so well and I adore them!
The funky looking pen in the picture is yet another Rotring Core pen. This one is black and blue-grey. My lord, these pens are my new obsession! They’re really comfortable to write with and have that cool scifi look about them. (And I’m super excited because I have a red and black one on the way!!) I still think it’s a shame that Rotring stopped making these pens.
I’ve been reading a lot lately since I’m backing off of most social media for awhile. Most of the books I’ve been reading are spicy romances because it’s hard for me to read other scifi while writing scifi. This month I’ve been reading Gail Carriger’s San Andreas Shifter’s series. If you like steamy paranormal gay male werewolf romance, then this will hit the spot. (Pun intended.) If you like your shifter smut of the cis het variety, I can recommend Zoe Chant’s Bodyguard Shifters series (actually, I’ve read a good chunk of all of her series, and all that I’ve read are fun, steamy reads with happy endings).
One more book note before I get back to novel writing: I’ve pushed out the publication date for the Survey series until early next year. No major problems or anything, it’s just logistics. I also want to say big thanks to my beta readers for being awesome people!
Released
The Four Keys – Download or get a paperback version from Amazon: US Link – German Link
I write fanfiction, too (all PG/PG-13): AO3 Fanfiction
In Progress
Survey Foundation Series
Survey: In the far future, on a globally sponsored science station, a woman discovers the key to making a functional AGI work in the midst of political unrest. (First Draft Complete – with beta readers)
Unity: A military chaplain and her bodyguard get embroiled in a major conspiracy that threatens the humans colonies of Unity and the AIs Nation of Survey. (First Edit Pass Complete – with beta readers )
Colony: After the events of Unity, Jenny returns to her home colony where she, Lulu and another agent realize that someone else was also behind the New Harmonists pulling strings. (First Draft Complete! –with beta readers)
Consortium: After the events of Unity, Jack and Marsha get assigned by Survey to help an AI who had been exiled and has asked for help. (First Draft Complete– with beta readers)
Legend Series
Nemetona: A lone Captain and his AI answer a distress call from a sentient species who are dying. (Writing — Longhand, so I don’t know the word count yet.)
Mercury Series
Mercury: The Mercury Generation Ship begins it’s journey to the Andromeda galaxy. (Started, but stalled.)