The best discoveries are the accidental ones.

While shopping at my local bookstore I saw "Old Man's War" by John Scalzi. I read the first couple of pages and was hooked. Read the the first chapter on my way home and was blown away. Finished that book in a couple of days. TBH it's short. I need to read it again. It's possible it could replace my current favorite space book, "Ender's Game"/"Speaker for the Dead" but let's not get ahead of ourselves. "Old Man's War" is a masterclass in character, action, and world building. I want to study this book. 

I love Scalzi's snarky tone. Which I thought was indicative of the main character, John Perry. And it is, but it is the John Scalzi way of writing (and living if his Twitter account is any indication.) The Interdependency trilogy has the same tone all the way through it too. This style may get on some people's nerves but I love it. I really appreciate his direct writing style - and then there was an explosion. Could be boring, but it's all about timing. It avoids confusion and that is something to be appreciated. 

I plan on writing more about the trilogy as well as "Old Man's War" but for now I wanted to put it out in the universe that I'm really enjoying my chance discovery. I'm off to get the follow up to "Old Man's War" which is called "The Ghost Brigades." Happy reading!

​Star Wars is a Tragedy
 
I don’t rant that often but I have a bone to pick with the Star Wars universe. As much as I love interplanetary travel, the variety of alien life, and laser swords there is a profoundly tragic trend in the Disney canon. All the romantic couples are tragic. At least all the couples I know about. I’m a lifelong SW fan but I don’t consume all the media and there are tons of books and comics I have not read.
 

• Han & Leia - estranged, living separate lives
• Anakin & Padme - he is responsible for her death
• Jyn Erso & Cassian Andor - both killed on Scarif
• Han & Qi’ra - he was ditched by her, who knows if they ever meet again
• Obi-wan & Satine - both chose duty over love, she dies in his arms
• Kanan & Hera - he’s dead, leaving her alone
• Beckett & Val - she sacrificed herself for the team, he was later killed
• Ben & Rey - he’s dead, leaving her alone
• Poe & Zorri - we aren't sure the nature of their relationship, but since she was ready to kill him it makes this list.

 
I suppose if Cassian and Jyn had lived they might have been okay, but given Disney’s track record so far, I doubt it.
 
Of course this is all current canon. In the Legends books, the old canon that Disney scrapped, Han & Leia are married with three kids and they are as feisty as they ever were in the movies. Luke is married to Mara Jade. SInce there are several comics set after the original trilogy full of Skywalkers I can only conclude that Luke and Mara have kids (I’m sure a quick check on Wookiepedia would confirm this.)
 
Not so in the Disneyfied version Star Wars, which is weird considering Disney is known for it’s happy endings. To “disneyfy” something is a word in the dictionary.
 
verb. cause (something) to become reminiscent of a film or theme park created by the Walt Disney Company, especially in being sanitized or romanticized. (bold text, my emphasis)
 
Thus the crux of my complaint with Disney. Disney’s MO for most of their history has been to take out all the sad parts of fairy tales and give us a happy ending. Guess that only applies to European folktales. Walking out of The Rise of Skywalker, I was thoroughly depressed. They try to play it off as a happy ending, but the First Order is still out there, the big space fight in the movie was against only the Emperor's ships (the FInal Order) so presumably the legions First Order people are still around to contend with. There is no central government and our heroes are camping out on some jungle planet.
 
By contrast one of the absolute best things about Parks & Recreation is that all the couples portrayed are in happy, healthy relationships.
 

• Jerry & Gayle
• Leslie & Ben
• Ann & Chris
• Andy & April
• Ron & Diane
• Tom & Wendy

 
Even the player, Tom, learns how to have a good relationship by the end of the show. Parks & Rec is almost a celebration of good relationships. Most of the peer to peer connections are exemplary. The whole conflict of the final season, Ron & Leslie’s rivalry, ends with them as better friends than before their fall out.
 
Moving on…
 
If you want to get super picky Mr. & Mrs. Frog in the Mandalorian seem to be thriving and happy. So there, way to go Disney, we have one happy couple, tertiary characters, but sure, we’ll count it. Mando on the other hand avoids relationships like Anakin avoids sand. Presumably out of duty, but we don’t actually know why since we know he can care deeply about something, i.e. Baby Yoda.
 
Tragedy runs throughout many parts of the Star Wars universe, it is about a never ending war after all. If you Google “Star Wars” and “Tragedy” you’ll get plenty of hits examining all aspects of this idea. I wanted to highlight the central relationships since characters are what makes me, and most people, care about the story in the first place. It’s really sad to me that in such a vast and interesting universe no one seems to get a happily ever after ending.
 
This week’s chatter is about them bringing in Mara Jade into the current cannon so we’ll see how that turns out. Considering Luke is alone on an island during the events of The Last Jedi, it doesn’t look good for them. If you know of any happy couples in the Star Wars universe, please let me know, I need something to hope for.

t​Under normal circumstances I like to read adventure and intergalactic travel in the summer time but at the moment it’s all I want. Escapism is a very real and very necessary thing. For me at least. It’s why I watch movies and read fiction. I avoid most dramas (even genre dramas) because they deal with real life issues. I want the farfetched and fantastical. I want a fully immersive experience forgetting everything about the current state of the world, whatever it may be. As we enter year two of a world-wide pandemic, I feel this need to escape more than ever.
 
I wanted to share some of my favorite reads so far. Movies and TV are great but they are over in a few hours. Also, they require zero imagination. When I have to conjure up the people, places, and things in my own mind, I feel like I’ve been there. I’m involved. Watching something is too passive. I am a slow reader so it takes me hours to work through a book. The more hours I spend reading, the less hours I have to be bored or freaked out.
 
Here are a few of my favorite escapes so far.
 
I’ve worked my way through a huge chunk of IDW’s Transformers, Phase Two series. Over 80 issues so far. This is a world I have wanted to be a part of since 1984. The comics, unlike the movies and TV shows have little to no humans, something I am very grateful for. I’m here for the giant robots. Period.
 
I recently read both The Night Circus and The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern. Probably the most fantastical novels in this bunch. If I could choose to live in either of those novels I would. They are beautiful and I love them.
 
In contrast, I just finished Dark Matter by Blake Crouch. It’s pretty grounded in reality, but not as we know it. It’s fast paced and exciting. The idea it plays with throughout is something I think about a lot and it was fun to see someone tackle the notion of the multiverse and all its possibilities.
 
One of my favorite random discoveries is the The Daevabad Trilogy by S.A. Chakraborty. I was in the bookstore and I was stopped in my tracks when I saw the cover of the second book, Kingdom of Copper. I quickly found the first one, City of Brass, and started reading it that day. Growing up one of my favorite books was Arabian Nights. This series is Arabian Nights to the nth degree. The world is vividly rendered in lavish colors and rich detail. The political intrigue and personal relationships are complex and surprising. I love so many of the characters. I have avoided the final book so it can never end but then again, I must know what happens. But Empire of Gold is next read and I have zero doubt that I will cry and be utterly amazed by the time I turn the last page.
 
I really enjoyed The Golem and the Ginni by Helene Wecker. While set in NYC, a place I have visited a few times, it’s in the past and entrenched in the day to day lives of some really wonderful characters. It’s anchored by the lives of these very normal people who have no idea the magic in their midst.
 
The Revenger Trilogy by Alastair Reynolds. I read book one, The Revenger, a couple of years again. At the time I was so bummed because I really liked the world he had built. There were some really cool concepts of time and space. When I found out that it was a trilogy, I immediately bought the other two books. Besides, it’s hard to get much cooler than space pirates.
 
The Prey of the Gods by Nicky Drayden was a little gory but unlike anything I have read in a while. The best word I can think of to describe this one is, unexpected.
 
Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia was not at all something I would usually read but I don’t regret it. It is a true gothic novel with giant scary house and a cast of suspicious characters. I admit I was enraptured by the mystery of what was going on that I read it only a few days. It was intense. But it did have an ending I could live with and that is important to me.
 
I finally read Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson. I see why so many people love it. It’s set in a hyper reality we move closer to every day and yet I’m not sure our tech will ever be as cool as it is in the book. It’s fast paced from page one and a lot of fun. I am 100% convinced we would not have Ready Player One without this book.
 
Stars Wars and Halo novels are good diversions. I have only read a fraction of these, but I am familiar enough with the overall scope of these worlds that I’m not usually too lost. When I am not sure what to read, I resort to my short story collections of Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury, both masters in imagination.
 
Those are few of my humble suggestions. If you have any great escapes to recommend, let me know on FB or Twitter. Stay safe and happy reading!

​It's a question any writer who has heard of NaNoWriMo asks themselves. I've participated in NaNo several times since 2009. I have won three times. I'm not gonna lie, it's hard. It's stressful and exhausting. Some days were full of dread because I didn't have a clue what I was going to write. 
 
AND THAT is why you should do NaNo. At least once. It's good to push yourself to your limits. NaNo must be the writer equivalent to running a marathon. Do it at least once. Not to win, but to give your all, whatever it is. Just see what happens. You'll be surprised. And when you see what you can do, it will feel amazing. 
 
Once you've done it, you can check it off your list of things to try and move on. You can do it again of course. You can do it a couple times of year if you find it really helps you. Or don't. My point is, do NaNo for yourself, not for others. 
 
These days I don't try to win at NaNo any more. It's too stressful. I decided a long time ago that if writing stopped giving me joy, I'd stop writing. Not that I don't have hard days but pushing myself to get those 50k words saps the joy out of the process for me. But even at a lower word count goal, NaNo is still good for pushing myself and resetting a daily writing habit. 
 
I also really like going to WriteIns (this obviously won't apply to this year.) There is a cool comradery that comes sitting with a bunch of other writers forging ahead in the same frenzy. I'll do this with other writers through MeetUp too, but there is something special about NaNo. It's a different kind of energy that rolls around in November. 
 
I say I've won three times, but I succeed every time. Words on the page, no matter how many they are, are progress. And progress no matter how slow means I am moving forward. So whether you do 50k or 5k in November, do challenge yourself and see how awesome you actually are when you pour yourself into something. 
 
Happy Writing!

I am in the midst of editing book 3 - Iteration. A lot of shuffling around of things has occurred. A whole lot of deleting and a whole lot of rewriting. Which is great. But it does mean sometimes you have to let that really cool moment go. Below is a such a moment between Lysandra and a kid. I really liked it and I wanted to preserve it in some way. So here is it for you.

NOTE: This is raw and unedited. Even my writing coach's comment was, "massive revision needed." Also, it is very much in the middle of the story and so it may be too confusing to even follow. It could potentially be spoilery, but again, since you have no context I'm not sure it does spoil anything. 

Happy reading!

New York City, 1200 hours
Lysandra had been to New York on several occasions so she knew the city pretty well. With a cup of coffee in hand she took out a burner phone she had purchased at the mall and put the battery in it. She did not turn it on. The coffee did not do a thing to clear the fog in her head from the drug that still lingered in her bloodstream.

She had to hand it to Nolin and Edward. They knew having enough people to confront would not do the trick. Drugging her had been a move neither she nor Esben had not expected. With the help of two Elbie it only set them back a few hours but it had been enough. As she sat on the bench, sipping her coffee, Qur’ag still had to work at keeping her adrenaline at a high level to counteract the drug.

Esben left her at the church to rest while he used the ACS guard to mail her watch to their final destination. This time she had no memories of what happened since she was not actually being active in what was happening to her. But they both knew what had to be done and so he left Qur’ag to complete the needed task. What she was about to do was also needed to ensure their activities stayed off the grid as long as possible.

She sat on a bench inside a fenced basketball court watching kids play basketball. Why these kids were not in school she did not know. Qur’ag protested leaving the church. He thought it best to stay put. That moving about would risk them being seen and worse, getting captured. With a staunch mental shut up at the morose Elbie she left the solemn quite of the sanctuary and went outside anyways.

Patience was a virtue when it came to crime. Crime tended to be a matter of opportunity. Knowing when and where to strike were an art form. It had been some time since she had participated in such activities. But old habits die hard. Fear and survival have a way of hardwiring themselves into all your actions even when you don’t want them to.

“Hey kid.” Lysandra called to a tween age boy with dark mussed hear and dirt smudges on his cheeks. “You got a phone?”

The boy was skeptical. Looked her over with a wary eye. “’Course I got a phone.”

“Let me see it.”

The kid squinted at her. “Why?” He inched closer anyways.

“Here,” Lysandra reached into her pocket and took out her phone and held it out to him. “I would love to trade you. What do you say?”

The kid hesitated, but slowly reached for it.

“Brand new. Only been used once.”

The kid turned it over. It was nicer than his phone.

He furrowed his eyebrows and looked at her. “Why you want mine?”

“When I was your age, I had one just like it. Call it nostalgia.” When she was his age, only rich people had cell phones.

“Nostalgia?” He wrinkled his nose. “What’s that?”

Lysandra blinked, she hadn’t stumped someone before with her vocabulary. “It means a fond memory. Think of your favorite thing.”

“Okay.”

“Then you lost it.”

“Uh- huh.”

“Then, several years later you found it again and it makes you feel happy.”

“Okay.”

“That feeling is nostalgia.”

The boy turned the phone on and went through some of the menus. He held up against the phone he brought with him. “What if someone calls for you?”

“They won’t.”

The kid dug his toe into the ground, openly examining her. Lysandra leaned on her elbows and smiled at him.

“What if someone calls for me?”

“I’ll give them your new number.”

“Well....” he drew out the vowel. “I guess so.”

“Sweet.” Lysandra held her hand for his phone.

He cocked his head to one side as he looked at it one last time and finally handed it to her. Even as they held their new phones he kept looking at the one her hand.

“Come on, Matt!” One of the other kids called from the across the basketball court.

Lysandra sat up.

“Thanks, lady!” The kid put the phone his pocket and bounced off towards his friends.

Matt.

The name rang in her ears. Would Matt approve of her actions? Even as she formed the question another thought berated her for even caring what others thought. But this was Matt. She had never cared about the approval of the crowd, just a select few. And when she was too busy learning protocol or radio code Matt had become one of those few.

Another voice chided her for such sniveling sentimentality. Esben’s reason for leaving Qur’ag with her made sense, the Elbie could be her back up in the same way they had been at the Seattle office. It was unfortunate that it had to be the worst of them all. This arrangement would not work for much longer.

Since the human was the one who had spent time in New York City, she was the one in control for now. Lysandra headed back to the church making several switchbacks and staying under the cover of eaves whenever possible.

Inside the cavernous interior of the sanctuary it was easy to spot Esben’s current host. Mimicking some of the other visitors in the church, she dipped her fingers in the water basin, crossed herself, and made a half bow before heading down the aisle. It was between services at the moment so the few worshippers there were scattered at great intervals throughout the pews.

She slid across the wood seat next to him. Esben had his head craned up, his eyes roving along the curved arches. She waited for him to speak, his eyes continued to examine the structure around them.

She cleared her throat. “All done?”

He reached into his jacket and handed her a receipt. It had the tracking number on it. “It will get there by 10 am, no signature needed.”

Lysandra crammed the paper into her pocket. “Are you sure we can leave your host behind?” His eyes searched the stained-glass stories. “Hey, is everything okay?” She put her hand on his forearm. He jumped at her touch.

“I’m fine.” He finally looked at her. “Each mind is so similar and yet totally different.”

Lysandra took her hand back. For a moment she saw Edward. Maybe it was the effect of his voice inflection. No matter what host Esben inhabited, the way the person spoke came out sounding like Edward. She shook herself. “Okay. Well, we need to get going then.” She put her hand on his neck and waited for Esben to transfer into her. Esben would take over immediately. Not something she really liked but for now it would have to do.

The man’s whole body relaxed. She folded his hands peacefully folded in his lap where he sat like he was praying.

The process is different for everyone. There is no wrong (or right) way to write. Each person has to figuret out for themselves what works and what doesn’t.
 
The Approach
For me the act of writing is a discovery process. Auguste Rodin said, “I invent nothing, I rediscover.” I am a big proponent of the Multiverse Theory and it’s infinite possibilities. As far as I am concerned each story world is it’s own reality. I’m a visitor looking around and taking notes. My characters are largely independent of me. They have the ability to surprise and infuriate me, just like all the people in my life. When I am not thinking/writing about them, they go on with their lives regardless of my attention. Even in world building mode when I am trying to construct systems of government and politico dynamics, et al, I still have this sense that, like Michaelangelo, the shape of the thing I’m trying to create is already present in the mass/mess, but I have to put in the work to reveal what has been there all along.
 
 
The Method
Generally speaking when I start a story I have two things to work with. A character and the ending. I usually know how a story will end but I have absolutely no idea how I will get there. I am a panster by nature. Whether or not you choose to outline, here’s the thing, a lot can happen between bullet points. You may have a list of well thought out plot points but how you move characters from one plot point to the next is still a crap shoot. There are a lot of choices to make for every scene and how you transition from one scene to next. Anyone of those choices can render the rest of your plot points totally moot and you have to rethink what happens next. Again, this is my writing style. Some authors wield an iron fist over their creations and have absolute control at all times, if that is you, must be nice.
 
The other element I have to work with is a person. Characters are the most important part of a story to me. Clever ideas are good but very few people will stick with you solely because of a cool premise. When I start there I usually have an image in my head and there is at least one person at the center. I have no idea who they are or what they want, but they’re there waiting for me to find out. I used to just start writing, using that one image in my head as the starting point for my exploration. Lately I’ve been intentional about figuring out who the character is first. The internet is full of tools for character building. The one that has really helped me story wise is K.M. Weiland’s book, “Creating Character Arcs.” The time I put into going through her questions and developing my main cast before I start writing has really helped me to understand who these people are. As a bonus I get all kinds of awesome plot ideas. Because the plot is largely determined by the characters, if I have no idea who they are or what they want then I have no story.
 
 
The Hard Part
Writing. Panster or plotter it makes no difference, writers write. Full stop. The internet is rife with memes about procrastinating writers because it is true. Why do so many of us avoid that which we long to do? Ask ten writers and you’ll get ten answers. Whatever the reasons, you will have to wrestle yourself into submission on that one. But there will come a time when there is nothing left to do but put words to a page.
 
Soapbox Tangent
It has always annoyed the crap out of me when people casually declare they will write a book someday. I think because they are literate and know how to construct a sentence they assume a book should be any easy thing to do. Well, it’s not. If it was easy there would not be thousands of how-to books on the subject.
 
Okay, now that I have that off my chest…. Whatever you have to do to get those words down, do it. Habit is your friend. Our brains love routine and patterns so if you can write at the same time everyday (week/month/year) it will help creativity to flow a lot better. I trick myself by saying I only have to write 500 words. That’s it. As an example, the first two sections of this entry are about that. BUT, once I get rolling, I don’t usually want to stop. It’s the getting started part I find hard.
 
I have to schedule my time. I make appointments with myself and do not change them for anyone. There will be a million opportunities to interrupt you so schedule time when you can be the least demanded upon. If you are so popular/busy that this is impossible then you are going to have to choose writing time over social time. If you are serious about writing you will find a way. One of my writing partners is a mother of two little kids. She writes when they nap. Sometimes she can’t because of other things she has to do, but when she can write, she does. Progress is still progress no matter how slow.
 
 
In Conclusion
This is my method. You need to find your own path but it’s always nice to know how other people go about it. Other strong suggestions are: read (fiction and nonfiction, in all sorts of genres,) talk to other writers, and find other writing to workshop your work. It’s scary letting other people see your work in a raw state but you will learn a lot and improve by leaps and bounds if you can take to heart their suggestions.

One of the best parts about being a fiction writer is all the lying. You can make up anything you want BUT it still has to be believable. Meaning, the world of your story has to have an internal logic that works within itself. 

No matter what you end up writing, chances are you will need to do research of some kind. Maybe it's just fighting styles or how far away point A is from point B. I have had to do research for each book that is all very different from book to book. I love to learn so this is always a fun part for me. 

TRESPASSING

I started with investigating the basics of neuroscience to see how the brain works and also particle physics because I wanted to base the Elbie on something. I love the sciences in general so this was a easy ask (of myself) and I still read neuroscience books when I find them because the human mind is a weird and wacky place.

 LINCHPIN

The big difference here was I was dealing with a people group from another culture so I wanted to make sure I represented the people correctly. I had found a bunch of videos on YouTube that were filmed in India with the desert tribes. I noticed they were posted all by the same person. So I contacted him, Rolf Lunheim, and asked him where I could find more information and he told me where to buy his book. He is an anthroplogist and studded the people group in my book.

I read Samit Basu's scifi books to get a feel for how someone from that culture writes about their own culture in the scifi genre. Here is the thing I discovered. No matter what background your characters come from we all experience love, pain, betrayal, friendship, disappoint, et al in similar ways. 

​For extra measure I asked a few Indian friends to read the book to make sure I didn't have any blind spots.

ITERATION

This book went in a direction I could not predict when I started this series. It also went into a realm that have very little knowledge of. I won't say much more but hopefully this example of my reading will get you excited for where this series is going. 

I was scanning through the site and saw this:

https://www.elbiefree.com/rants-n-raves/state-of-the-trilogy

And realized WOW, i did not make my goal. In the above mentioned blog I said book 3 would be done by 2018 come hell or high water. Well, it's not done and here's what I have to say about that. I did finish complete the 1st draft that November and at over 120k words.

Then it was submitted to my critique group. We have a 5k word maximum for each submission so getting the whole thing by them took most of a year. I also had my writing mentor read it. After it was all said and done I have over 600 comments to address and who knows how much rewriting and restructuring. Not to mention I am still reading several books to make sure I have correct ideas. 

So all that to say. It's really, really, happening. 70 chapters. New characters and old. And completed character  arcs to boot. It's gonna be good y'all. I can't wait for you to read it. I will be asking for beta readers. If you are interested please hit me up on Twitter or Facebook.

​Here is what editing a novel can look like.