jeriendhal | Entries tagged with writer's block

Unfortunately a combination of depression, work pressure, and lousy weather have been killing my creative juices the past couple of weeks, for which I apologize. So to try and get started again I'm throwing out a prompt call.

Rules:

1. Up three suggestions per person, one of which will get at least 250 to 500 words.

2. Priority given to my Patrons, after that first come first serve.

3. Max ten prompts total.

4. Open from now until March 7th, prompts provided by the end of March.

5. Author's preference towards his established 'verses, though I'm also open to completely original ideas. No fanfic suggestions please.

Current Universes: Red Vixen Adventures, Prisoners (Rolas the First), Groupmind 'verse, Unexpected Diversions, Triumvirate , Watchtower 'verse.

Crossposts: https://jeriendhal.livejournal.com/1318693.html

Pondering titles for stories.

I've got two currently in my queue in various states of unreadiness, that I wish to eventually finish, both of them coincidentally First Contact novels.

The first is the meeting between the Foxen of my "Red Vixen Adventures" universe and Humanity, set in Foxen Prime's late industrial era (about early post-World War 2 tech). *Technically* since it stars an older and creakier Rolas the First from "Prisoners of War" and the nearly complete "Prisoner of Midnight" it should logically follow with another "Prisoner" based title, tentatively "Prisoners of History." The downside to that is (bluntly) the first two Prisoner books are smut, and PoH would be more straight up sci-fi (more specifically an homage to Alan Dean Foster's Humanx novel "Nor Crystal Tears.") So I either keep the name and lose the chance to get conventional sci-fi fans, or I keep it and have disappointed smut fans. 

The second story is set in my "For Your Safety" universe, with the Groupmind being confronted with some rather desperate refugees entering the Solar System, and finding itself caught between a desire to eliminate their ship just to be safe, a human exploration crew who wants to save it, and a fragment of its own mind who thinks the Groupmind could use some competition. Currently this has the very generic title of "The Visitors." I'd rather ditch that, but my alternatives so far are "The Invaders" (also painfully generic) "Invaders of Mars" (gives away too much plot) or "For Your Defense" which sounds a bit too much like a Baen style Mil-Scifi piece.

Thoughts?

Crossposts: https://jeriendhal.livejournal.com/1308001.html

I'm not dead, just not feeling very creative. Which is not a good attitude for a writer trying to make money off their product, but I'm about a half step above "amateur hobbyist" in this business anyway.

Speaking of moving product, the first few days of January have been a bit odd, saleswise. January 1st I had three outright sales and two KOLL payments, as of today I've had ten sales total. Which is over 1/3 of what I made total last month. I suspect it's just the usual post-Christmas bump where everyone is using their Amazon gift cards.

My year end review is still a work in progress. I might wait on posting until I get the tax profit information from Amazon and my other sales venues. Adding up the total number of units sold gives some surprising results, but overall I think sales were down compared to the year before. Compared to 2013, I only published one new story and the audiobook version of Captive, which not a good way to either get new readers or continue feeding the old ones.

Bleah.

Current Mood: blah

I've only managed to add a few paragraphs to Shadow of the Red Vixen. Aside from the madness of getting the kids ready for school, I've finally realized I'm stuck on an upcoming plot point.

( Cut for spoilers )

[Poll #1862682]

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Ratchet from the Ratchet and Clank series of games. Fun guy to hang around with, no matter what the situation.

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Books to read, my eyes to read the stories in them and my hands to write down the ones I create in my own head.

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Healthcare. It should be universal and it should be affordable for everyone. Otherwise it can easily suck away the savings of even an upper middle class family, never mind someone closer to the margins.

Bad

1. Haven't been able to write anything signifigant for a week. All I've got is four pages of angst/fluff with Nez that isn't finished

2. I've got a cold, possibly with a low level fever (feel hot, but not achey or nauseous).

3. It's raining.

4. I'm tired.

Good

1. Rather than do anything useful at home I've been playing massive amounts of Gran Turismo. Finally raised my level enough to unlock the Endurance class races, and I'm playing through the first 300km race, currently on Lap 43. [1]

2. I can now download books for free from the PG County Library onto my Kindle for 14 days.

3. Work is slow enough to let me write whiny LJ entries.

[1] On the subject of Gran Turismo, I do love the game dearly, but I have a couple of nitpicks. One, the ability to save would be nice for the endurance races, given Thomas' tendency to take over when I step away from the controller. (trying to get through the 24 Hours of Nurburgringadingaling is going to be a challenge when I reach level 40).

Two, apparently the typeface for the game was made on the assumption you'd be viewing it on a Hi-Def screen the size of the Enterprise's viewscreen. I'm trying to read through car stats three feet away from a 36 inch flatscreen and getting eyestrain.

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Right now it's Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell (NPR commentator, Rolling Stone collumnist and the voice of Violet Parr in The Incredibles). It's a fun filled (or at least mildly snarky) trip across the United States, searching for the more obscure details (like the location of John Wilkes Booth's larynx) about the assassinations of Presidents Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley. Good reading so far.

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Define "Best". Best for techinical accuracy (at the time) would likely be "2001" or "Destination Moon". Best action adventure movie would be "Star Wars: Ep. IV". Best noir mystery would be "Blade Runner". Best comedy would be "Men in Black". Best animated sci-fi would be "Wall E" or "Ghost in the Shell". Asking me to pick a favorite is hopeless, the criteria for Science Fiction is just too broad.

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Gosh, what do you think? ;p

More seriously, I love writing it. Sometimes I have a harder time reading it, which is either Sturgeon's Law in action or me just being an elitist bastard, take your pick. Generally there are a good crop of writers in my chosen fandom (LMB) so that isn't much of a worry.

Been thinking about Andrea's Story and how it relates to my general dread of trying to write anything substantial at the moment. I think I need to admit to myself that I'm just not going to get that story finished at this point and declare it dead. Maybe I can just disconnect the "Andrea and Maria tease the shit out of Tez" plot and format it as a much shorter series of vingettes set to the tune of Andrea's slowly gathering trust and then quick disenchantment with her master, but I'm more inclined to just dump it altogether.

I think I'm going to write up what I've got tentatively titled as The Last Story (creative I know) which covers the inevitable end to Tez and Maria's relationship, and then I can finally send it to others for a beta read and a grammar check. I've got that damned cover art that

chaypeta did for me almost two years ago and I need to finally use it. Otherwise I'm betraying her trust and friendship.

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Royce's Random Thoughts

A Dark Journey Into Pointless Trivia

Entries tagged with writer's block

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Writer's Block: What I'm Reading This Summer.

Writer's Block: Future forward

Writer's Block: Sheldon and Penny 4ever!

Tez & Andrea vs. the Writer's Block

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