Why “Just Sit Down and Write” Doesn’t Always Work

If you’ve done any prowling around internet circles, you’ve likely heard the bit of writing advice which boils down to (however it is actually phrased) “Just sit down and write”, as if, through sheer willpower, any and all obstacles keeping one’s WIP from being completed can be surmounted by placing fingers to keys and writing. To this advice, I reply in the words of Truman Capote: “That’s not writing, it’s typing”. To be fair, he said this to mock writers like Jack Kerouac and others who, for whatever reason, were not up to his snuff, but I think if we ignore this intention (death of the author, and all that), it’s actually pretty accurate.

The Styx Trilogy Book Giveaway!

From today until July 31^st, you can enter for a chance to

win the entire Styx Trilogy. Enter on Tumblr or Twitter.

Recast Light Sneak Peek

Eustis Wilfrock once said, “Just because things don’t turn out the way you expect doesn’t make it a failure.” Well, things have not been going as I expected this time last year. I fully intended, once upon a time, to have Recast Light out in time for preorders, which obviously didn’t happen, and now it’s looking like it won’t be available by June 30^th either. I have only a chapter and a half left to edit, but those chapters are the trickiest. Then comes formatting, which can either be very easy or drenched in technological problems which should not be possible (have I told the story about how Word added an invisible page to my Outcast Shadows document, thus swapping the following even and odd page numbers to the wrong side? Well it did…). Once formatted, I have to send the final cover template to my sister/illustrator (this depends on the final page count for the spine width), then I’ll upload it and order a sample copy to make sure the colors and formatting all look like they’re supposed to, and only then will I okay it for purchase. Thus, Recast Light will be out in July, hopefully sooner rather than later.

In the meantime, here is a sneak peek of things to come. The prologue and first chapter are much too spoilery for people who haven’t read Outcast Shadows, so I took a part of Chapter 3: Black and White and Dead All Over instead. Enjoy!

Recast Light Cover Reveal!

At long last, we have a cover, featuring the lovely Alcea, looking like she'll kill you if you step out of line:

And that's all for now. I am busily editing (Two weeks before the release? Don't do this at home, kids!), getting the plot all bright and shiny. Stay tuned!

What of Word Counts?

I was thinking this morning about the whole "write every day" thing so often said to new writers (at a later date, I will write at length about why this is terrible advice), and was thinking about how much of the culture of internet writing, particularly from younger writers, is focused on word count. There is of course NaNoWriMo, but there are also people who have "word wars" with each other to see who can get the most words down in  a given amount time, as well as people who will set daily writing goals of a certain amount of words per day.