Tag Archives: found 2

A single inch: Friday Update

01 Friday Nov 2024

Posted by in A Few Thoughts, Novels, Series, Short Stories, Writing

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I want to write a big thing here about what’s coming up, but I’m temperamentally incapable of writing about things that matter, at least directly. I can’t contain a single matter to a single post. There’s too many variables that feed into it and too many lives at stake. I’ve never been good at debate or argument. I see every side and try to address them to the point that I neglect my own.

I’m angry and I’m scared because my own personal life is at stake according to certain policies that certain politicians wish to implement, have already implemented, and will continue to make every effort to implement (and will likely succeed, regardless of who wins, due to keen long-game strategy). I’m angry and scared because my life is just one of billions at stake due to climate change (trillions, if you count the mass extinctions of other animals than humans). I’m angry and scared because I’m watching a slaughter in real time and people in power seem to have declared them not only expendable but vermin worthy of extermination. I could keep going, but what’s the use?

I don’t know how I’m going to get through these next few days and possibly these next few years. My only solution is to get through a day at a time and just be who I am for as long as I can. After all, who am I to have anything to say, other than someone who lives here, same as you?

I voted. There is a difference between a shit sandwich and a shit sandwich with a side of vomit and a glass of toxic waste. Please vote.

News:

Moved over to a new computer. Still fixing some glitches from the moving over of files, but I think I’ll have that finished by this weekend. I’ve gotten used to the new keyboard, and I’ve christened it with stickers, so I think she and I are in a good place now.

FOUND 2: More stories of found footage is out and available to all. My story “Nuisance Notifications” is part of it. All those notifications you get on the phone and can’t do anything about… All here, with all the other cursed media.

I don’t normally reference Amazon reviews because they’re easily accessible, but my Meridian series doesn’t get a lot of love, and I appreciated the review from Jennifer Hines (The Literary Tryst) for Avarice & Creed (Meridian Book 4):

Let me start off by saying this is the best book I have read in a while. It is also my first by Aurelia Evans. I have to say that now not only do I want to read the first three books in this series, but also see what else she may have written.

Works in Progress:

I had an outline in place for Rack & Ruin (Meridian Book 8) from after I finished Tooth & Claw (Meridian Book 7), so I’d know I had a story and because I seem to need outlines more often than I used to. Well, I opened up the R&R document and approached it with dread instead of excitement, and I was almost immediately bored. I wasn’t months ago when I came up with the story, but I think I need to do something different, so I’ve altered the main character, which makes certain elements of the story more interesting to me and less repetitive with other stories in the series. There will be some unanticipated challenges in working off the outline with this new main character, but I think I have more to look forward to with these changes. I certainly don’t want to finish up the Meridian series with a book I don’t like.

If it doesn’t work, I’ll do what I did for Tooth & Claw and set it aside for a while. I just hope I don’t have to. I’m ready to be done with the development of this series and down only to editing. I finished my first round of edits for Book & Candle (Meridian Book 5), and I’m just waiting for the final proofreading copy.

However, I think I’m generally tired from the work this year and from *waves at everything*. I’m looking forward to doing edits after R&R is through. Masque and the DRI were so much fun to write, and though Masque will need some extensive reworking, I’m looking forward to it. I may also need to find a developmental editor for the DRI to make sure I’m on the right track and get some feedback, because I’m too enamored with it. There’s so much Dracula stuff (for good reason, because it’s a blast), I don’t want to necessarily get lost under all the noise.

Things I’m Reading:

The Apocalypse and Satan’s Gloryhole by Timothy W. Long and Jonathan Moon
Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton

Things I’m Listening To:

Halloween playlist

Things I’m Watching:

Hell Fest
The Curse of Bridge Hollow
Murder, She Wrote: South by Southwest
Grave Encounters
As Above, So Below
Sleepy Hollow
Hocus Pocus
Trick ‘r’ Treat
Muppet Haunted Mansion
Rose Red series (finished)
Unsolved Mysteries series (finished)
Halloween Wars series (finished)
Halloween Baking Championship series (finished)
The Last Bite series (finished)
Outrageous Pumpkins series (finished)
Columbo series
S.W.A.T. series

Poem of the Week:

sagrado corazón
dead center bleeding
sanguinary transfusion
the blood of three
killing her sweetly
but blood of el maldito
brings vida eterna
la sangre es la vida

Waiting for autumn: Friday Update

11 Friday Oct 2024

Posted by in A Few Thoughts, Novelettes/Novellas, Novels, Writing

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News:

Halloween and autumn decorations are up in the house, but a proper Texas autumn should be coming next week. In autumn and winter, we too often have to get by on vibes rather than weather, but I’m not complaining about the milder late summer or what autumn and winter we do get.

In Found 2 news, they’re pushing the release date back a week to the 25th.

Works in Progress:

I finished the Dracula reimagining on Saturday, which was a total of 26 days’ work. By the end, I had 103,246 words, which was less than I thought I’d have. So the final word count is actually quite manageable, because I should be able to cut it under 100K words without trouble. To give you an idea of novel size, the original Dracula is around 160K words (about the length of an average Thorns novel).

The 103K was prior to stitching everything together, removing the outline (which I always include as word count so that it feels productive), and writing a new scene a few days later. After writing the new scene, I had 46 separate files, most of them composed of only one scene and averaging about 2-3K words.

Once I stitched everything together, removed any parts already marked to cut, and added the new scene, my official first draft word count is 99,222 words. Yet, even a few days later, I’m still missing being in that world and wanting more, which I think is a good thing, that I was able to enjoy it so much for so long. I’m slated to edit the DRI sometime in December, depending on when I finish Masque edits, and those are going to be more involved.

However, I get the feeling that something’s missing from the DRI, like I either need to add significantly more or, paradoxically, cut down some things I like to make it even more streamlined than I tried to write it, closer to the original conception. I think I’ll do one editing pass for consistency, since I wrote it out of order, before sending it to my alpha reader to see if she can pinpoint what might be missing or if I’m just perpetually unsatisfied in the Dracula world, which explains the plethora of adaptations, retellings, and reimaginings in my collection.

With the DRI done and dusted, I’ve moved on to editing The Damp, which is the only thing I can fit in before PitDark. I don’t think anything will come of it, but it’s worth a shot. I’ll shop it around a bit, but in the absence of interest, I think it would actually make a good double novella feature with A Woman Alone one day. I think I can finish with the first round of edits by Tuesday. Honestly, the first draft is pretty solid. Most of these edits are minor. Maybe, just maybe, I can have it done by next weekend at the latest?

Cleaned up some poetry from September and early October. From some recurring themes, I might have an idea for another mini-collection/chapbook (because those have been so successful /s). A few of the pieces were really solid, however, even though I had some trouble getting into the long-poem groove.

Things I’m Reading:

Found edited by Gabino Iglesias and Andrew Cull (finished)
The Apocalypse and Satan’s Gloryhole by Timothy W. Long and Jonathan Moon (bizarro horror picked up at Texas Frightmare, and it is weird)

Things I’m Listening To:

Halloween playlist

Things I’m Watching:

The Craft
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
Halloween (2018)
Thir13en Ghosts
The Order (2003)
Halloween Wars series
Halloween Baking Championship series
The Last Bite series
Outrageous Pumpkins series
Columbo series
Abbott Elementary series
Shogun series
S.W.A.T. series
Supernatural series

Poem of the Week:

you won’t hear it
until it is upon you
with smothering wings
talon to pierce flesh
and wide lantern eye
an owl sure an owl
let’s go with that

Notes: Friday Update

20 Friday Sep 2024

Posted by in A Few Thoughts, Novels, Short Stories, Writing

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News:

I’ve had a brief break in the drought with “Nuisance Notifications,” a short story that was accepted by Gabino Iglesias and Andrew Cull for Found 2: More Stories of Found Footage Horror. I’m really honored to be a part of it, and it’s HWA pro-rate, so that’s a bit of a relief, too. It’ll cover one month’s medications, thank goodness.

I make no bones about how much I love epistolary and its progeny, found footage. Found media in general is such a great way to write spare, tight horror. The first Found is amazing so far, and Found 2 is available for pre-order and is coming out October 18.

Works in Progress:

This is my second week working on the Dracula reimagining, and I think I figured out why I’m having such a good time with it. I mean, sure, I’m living the dream of writing a DRI, which has been on my bucket list for a long time, and especially since the last effort was such a disaster, having it work makes a helluva difference.

The reason why it’s consistently fun, though, in spite of the fact that I’m doing everything differently than usual, is because it doesn’t feel like I’m writing a novel. Because it’s modern epistolary/found media and I have discrete documents for each piece, it feels more like I’m writing a bunch of themed short pieces, even though I know I’m writing a novel. Every few thousand words (give or take), I close a document and cross it off my outline, and it hits my brain with endorphins like I’ve finished. So instead of having to wait a month to get that little high, I get one or a few a day. It’s nice.

It wouldn’t work for just any project. This epistolary novel really is like making different-sized granny squares for a throw blanket rather than do a continuous series of crochet stitches. Sure, I have a pattern. I’m not just stitching willy-nilly. And both kinds end up the same size one way or another. But each granny square has its own end, to eventually be stitched together when they’re all done, rather than building a single giant throw on my lap. I couldn’t separate out chapters this way, because it all still feels connected. It’s a unique project, with a unique process, and I’m really enjoying the novelty of both.

Right now, I’m at about 37,000 words of a projected 90,000, but I’m still concerned this is going to cross over 100K, maybe even up to 120K, because I have an awful lot of my outline left to cross out (although some scenes have more notes than others, so it’s a little deceiving). In edits, I’ll probably remove a lot of editorializing; it’s there for me more than the story right now, despite some intended subjectivity. But it’s definitely bigger in scope than I thought. I’d originally conceived DRI to be minimalistic, kind of a counterpoint to the original Dracula tome. Maybe some of the things I’ve written simply won’t be included? But I love relevant detritus and effluvia. It’s like the pumpkin spice of a novel. I guess, as usual, we’ll see.

Definitely throws me even more off-schedule, though. I probably won’t get as much edited by next PitDark as I’d planned, especially if I get the edits for Book & Candle (Meridian 5) back within the next month.

Nevertheless, I’ll aim for crossing off as much of DRI as possible this month, finishing as soon as possible in October, and editing Masque and The Damp before PitDark. Masque will be the wild card, because I already know I need to rewrite the end, and I’ll hear from my alpha reader if there’s anything else I need to reconfigure. Maybe I’ll get The Damp out of the way first, because it feels like all it needs is a standard double edit, and it’s shorter.

Things I’m Reading:

Needful Things by Stephen King (finished)
Found edited by Gabino Iglesias and Andrew Cull

Things I’m Listening To:

Hannibal series soundtracks
DRI playlist
Dracula collection playlist

Things I’m Watching:

Hannibal
Aliens
Nosferatu (1979)
Columbo series
America’s Got Talent series
American Horror Story: Cult series
Unsolved Mysteries (Netflix) series (finished)
Worst Ex Ever series
Supernatural series
Grey’s Anatomy series
Murder, She Wrote series (finished!)

Poem of the Week: (from September 2021)

The nexus of our roads
Holds the power of convergence
Within this taut place,
This knot of paths taken
And paths not taken
And paths yet to take.
We call upon the dervish wind
For all curses and hexes
Under a dust-cloud sun.