The Sum of David

I entered the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest.

I’ve been sitting on The Sum of David for years now — the first draft was completed Christmas of 2006 — and man do I hate putting time into the getting published portion of… getting published. I am totally my worst enemy.

I like the story writing part, not the paperwork. I’m a designer, remember. There’s thankfully little paperwork in design.

Anyway.

This year’s competition has a separate category for Young Adult Fiction, which TSoD falls right into. I’ve struggled with writing summaries of varying length for TSoD in the past, but I guess ignoring the whole process for a year will freshen you up: I threw something down from scratch and Josh said was the absolute best pitch I’d ever done for the story. That’s encouraging. Hopefully the judges think so, too.

I like to consider myself a realist (doesn’t everyone?), so I’m not holding out extraordinary hopes. I indulged myself with a single day dream in which I won the whole shebang, but even in my fantasy I hung up on the person, jumping on them for making such a cruel joke of someone’s passion.

Maybe I’m not a realist. Maybe I’m a full-blown pessimist.

Whatever the outcome, I will  be exceptionally pleased with myself if I can make it past the first round… wouldn’t that be grand?

Amazon is accepting submissions through February 7, 2010 at 11:59 pm, or until they have recieved 5,000 entries in each category. If you have a finished novel sitting in a drawer collecting dust, now would be the time to break that baby out and give it some air.  Best of luck to those submitting!

I guess this is like the newsletter that some families send out with their Christmas cards. Except it’s on the internet.

I’m from the future.

52ills
I can’t say that I succeeded in producing an illustration every seven days, but I’d happily commit to “weekly-ish” success. When the last week of 2009 rolled around, I was only three behind. Josh has mentioned I could technically go back and change the time stamp on the blog entries, and make me look like a real champ, but that part isn’t really the point — the whole idea of 52ills was to see if I could complete it in the first place, and as of December 31st, I had 52 ills. Go me, and I want some pie.

As an exercise, it was an excellent experience. I learned more about Illustrator and due to the volume of pieces, I was able to reach beyond my comfort zone and usual material*. I’ve happily settled into a colorful, cute style. I kind of knew that already, but practice makes perfect and all that. I also developed some good habits: composing via silhouettes, utilizing interesting textures, and grounding subjects with some kind of background element.

I’d love to get some (or all?) of them into a gallery this year, but if nothing else, I have some new portfolio pieces.

*Although there are still quite a few zombies and robots.

Writing
I did embarrassingly little writing in 2009. Even my blogging decreased in frequency. The remaining 82 pages of my last manuscript have been sitting in my parents’ living room for the last year, so I am proceeding without my mom’s trained-but-unavailable eye. My apologies to the next editor in line. I am using January to comb through the 2nd book again before I hand it off, and a first draft for the third and final David book will be complete by June 30th, 2010. That’s right, you heard it here first. Only 180 days away and counting.

Geeze, when I write it like that, it sounds downright terrifying.

Studio
First things first, however. I’ve spent hundreds of hours on Pittsburgh’s South Side working on my creative projects. When we got our dog, we decided we wouldn’t be away from home as often as we have been in the past. I technically have my own studio room, although it’s been pretty junked up for a long time. So: I’ve resolved to redo the room in a way that allows me to go in there and work until my eyes fall out, while not neglecting our new pet, plus saving gas and time and money.

The room is 1/3 of the way done, and I’m very excited. I estimate it will be complete in early February, and I can’t wait. It’s going to be amazing to have my own space. Woo.

Josh has planted the seed for another blog.

I need another blog like I need another hole in my head, but I have to say I am tempted.

I enjoy Pittsburgh’s public transportation system every weekday, and Josh is delighted every time I come home with a new Bus Adventure. I’ve been riding the public transport in Pittsburgh and Charleston, WV since I was in 7th grade… I can recount such entertaining tales as:

• The guy that pretended to kill me every time we rode together (via fake grenades, rocket launchers and machine guns)
• The guy that called me “Sawah” and was my best friend until I got my nose pierced and he and his religion were very disappointed in me
• The lady that smacked me in the shins with her umbrella because I was “in her seat”
• The multitude of people who have sat on me

I am fascinated with the how, why, and what-the-hell of people… and the bus carries every kind of person imaginable. Maybe it’s not a bad idea after all.

Also, it might not be bad practice for writing some short stories. Hm.

Of course, I could just put them here, but I have the best idea for the banner graphic…

There are certain times during the year that demand contemplation on the Future. New Year’s is one of those times for many people, but I find myself also thinking about things when the seasons change. It just so happens my birthday is at that part of the year where Western PA is debating between snow and summer-like heat (it usually just settles on rain). And since there’s changes afoot in the natural world, there may as well be potential changes afoot with me, my age and my plans.

I already mentioned I’m taking the summer off to write, and it’s a good thing too — I’ve decided on a deadline for the culmination of my David trilogy. My brother graduates high school in May 2010, and I’d like to hand him a little set of the trilogy as a graduation present. I began The Sum of David in 2005 as a gift for him, so I think it appropriate to present him with a set of the finished product when he’s beginning a new chapter in his life.

I’ll even put some money in there, so he doesn’t have to pretend to be excited.

That’s almost an entire year. A year sounds like a lot, doesn’t it? You’d think so, but no: my first editor has had my 3rd draft manuscript for David 2 for going on five months now. So in order to get it through the hands of at least three editors by May 1st, when I would send away to get the one-off books made, I’m going to need a completed first draft by… next Tuesday, probably.

Surprisingly, I’m actually almost ready to get started. I need to sift through David 2 once before it goes to Editor #2 — who, by the way, agreed so quickly to edit yet another of my stories that I could have cried — and then I’m back in the races, ready to rock.

Dare I say it, @joshsager? The next six months will be very interesting.

It’s that time of year again. Magic’s in the air.

Josh and I had a funny conversation the other day.

I have known for a while that Josh is not a particularly huge fan of the fantasy genre, and we tried to figure out exactly which parts turned him off. Is it the magic? I ask. No. Weird powers? No. The creatures? No, those are cool. The differing social structures, maybe? No.

“None of those,” he admits. “I think it’s mainly the names.”

The names?

His complaint is that you’re beebopping along in a story. You’re happy and familiar with the current characters, and then you’re being introduced to some new characters and of course none of them are named George or Bob or Roger or Amanda — they’re each an Aragorn or Akbar or Severus. I’ve heard this complaint before, and I’m somewhat guilty of the same thing. My brain’ll gloss over something if I deem it too bizarre or unpronounceable.

Actually, a group of us were all reading Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series in high school, and one of them asked how I pronouced one of the words. It was an important word, one I’d seen hundreds of times on the page, but even deep into the fourth book, I was at a loss — my brain had been pronouncing it something close to ‘blah’ in my head for months.

Josh read and enjoyed The Sum of David, but hated many of the names. Bear he could handle. Thor was not common, but doable. But Holder, Jameela, and Tanece? I believe his words were “Those are stupid. No one can remember that!”

And Calemadestes, a name and character of which I’m particularly proud? Totally made him want to strangle someone.

Meanwhile, if and when we get a pet in the future, we already have a name picked out: Polly. Which is short for Polamalu. Go figure.

Michael Crichton died unexpectedly on Wednesday after battling cancer. He was 66.

Crichton wrote a lot of books, but my faves are Jurassic Park and The Lost World.  I don’t like horror or slash movies, but I could read about dinos eating people all day long. I have dreams of being chased and eaten by dinos, and they are never nightmares (they are always awesome). I will always be indebted to him for finding a somewhat scientifically plausible means allowing dinos to exist in the modern day.

As a kid, I remember walking the family dog at night and running back to the house because, swear-to-god, I heard a T-Rex in the woods.

Ironically enough, I began re-reading Jurassic Park last week. It won’t be the last time.

Rest in Peace, Michael Crichton, and all my sympathy to his friends, family and fans.

Remember last month when I declared that I was going to take a month off to concentrate on my writing?

Recall, if you will, that I was going to weed through the first draft twice before the Sept 1st deadline.

Remember that sometimes, just sometimes, I’m a big fat liar.

Recent events have forced me to adjust that schedule a little. It’s not because I’m lazy or don’t want to — on the contrary, I’d love nothing more than to sit and dedicate a nice delicious block of time to it.

Taking August off didn’t work out quite out the way I had intended, but it is absolutely 100% okay. An exciting project came along that I just couldn’t pass up; and, considering the grand scheme of things — you know, the things that don’t contribute to me meeting my writing deadline — in the grand scheme of things it will work out wonderfully. I get to flex my illustration muscles and creative mojo, and the financial boost will be perfectly timed by the project’s completion.

I pulled the trigger on a two-week trip overseas last week. Which is very frightening. And very exciting. And très cher.

I truly never thought I would ever deeply care about the value of the American dollar (that’s for old people, right?) but I so do. If it could shape up in the next week to something reasonably comparable to the Euro, that’d just be grand.
In other words, I have to take into account the extra-curricular paying passion, instead of the just time-eating passion. Nothing eats my insides like excuses, but I’m not really considering this as an excuse — rather, I’ve dubbed it necessary prioritization.

My words will still be there when I get back.

So I was catching up with Justin last week and he asked, quite casually, “So what’s your next deadline for David?”

Ha.

I’m one goal-oriented sucka*, so my brain kind of stalled for a second when I realized I hadn’t set one yet (What? Preposterous! Unconceivable! I’ve been done for almost two months!). While my mind was sputtering (what is it now…? June. Or July? And then, what’s next: August? I mean, there’s like 200 pages, so that’s how many pages per day? Yikes!) my mouth responded with a cool “Uh, September 1st.”

Ha.

One way I make sure I meet my deadlines is to tell people, so I have to burden some self-imposed shame if I don’t make it… so I guess Sept 1st is now official. If I’d thought about it for longer, it might have been October 1st, or maybe even November 1st; but now it’s September 1st, which is sooner. Like, 30 or so days sooner. And I wrote SIX WHOLE LINES this week. Yeeg.

Which brings me to consider the illustration work that is eating all my Writing Time. So, in light of that: I’m taking a month off. Dammit. I will not be taking any new projects in the month of August, so if you want to commission me for something pretty before then, please let me know soon. I’ll be a wild, drawing, burn-me-out-to-blindness machine until July 30th. At that time, I will trade my Wacom for some good ol’ fashioned keys. Illustrator will be turned in for basic Word. And exhaustion will once again be based on the brain and not my eyes because of my ITTY-BITTY-MICROSCOPIC-SPECIMEN OF A COMPUTER SCREEN.

* See also: crazed, obsessed

Taking the month of May off of writing was the best thing I could have done. This time two years ago, when I’d finished first installment of The Sum of David on May 1st, I was chomping at the bit to get back into it two weeks later. I enjoyed the full four weeks off this round, taking care of some general life things while my brain recuperated from my writing binge in April.

I feel recovered, and my mind’s inner storyteller is ready to rock again. I’m getting random little jolts of inspiration throughout the day — when I sleep, on the bus, during work, when I’m reading. My brain is sucking up every day observations like a sponge takes water, playing out little daydreams on how I could use them on my characters and then tucking the scenarios away. That means it’s time.

I went to the coffee shop last night feeling nervous. I’ve been excited about getting back down to business since last week, but there are times when you just can’t get it right, despite the best intentions. I was afraid I’d sit down and dig my heels in only to find myself feeling lost and overwhelmed. Fortunately, after the caffeine was flowing and the music got loud, things happened.

There’s certainly no dressing it up, though. This one’s going to be tough. There’s so many little parts and pieces that have to fit together by the end. The first draft was hard, but I’ve got several parts that are missing that need to be filled in, and revelations I made a week ago that have to be put into place. This is by far the most complicated story I’ve tried to wrangle so far.

It also has the potential to be the best piece of fiction I’ve ever created.

I think I’ve got it in me. Time will only tell.

My 27th birthday came and went last week. To be honest, I sometimes forget exactly how old I am. If asked, I will undoubtedly pause and think about it. And then Josh will correct me when I guess wrong. (In my defense, I’m usually only a year off. They all started to blend together after 23.)

Anyway. I’ve been struggling for a couple months now with my various activities — Design, Illustration, and Writing — and how they affect my life and balance with one another. And there’s a battle going on.

Design will always be Priority #1. It’s not only my bread and butter, but I lurve it. I love creating visual solutions, and drooling over other people’s work. Package design, a good logo, a beautifully integrated illustration or an amazing commercial… it all makes me warm and fuzzy inside. There are so many wonderful ways to conquer the same problem — that is, communicate a message in a unique and memorable way — and I haven’t found them all yet. There’s nothing else I’d rather spend 40 - 60 hours a week doing. Illustration is that back-burner love that has fallen back into my lap, which is lovely. And writing is something I’ve been doing for years, and I’m only recently feeling ready to explore the professional end of it.

This is where my conflict lies. I have three things that I love to do, and so I divide my time amongst those three occupations. I understand the idea of wearing many different hats, and I’ve been juggling all three competently enough. But does splitting my time between those three somehow rob one of them of the potential to be the best it can be?

For example: if I’m never published, will it be because I didn’t give writing the due concentration it needed?

I never want to stop pushing myself, and I love them all. But I have to wonder if I’m sacrificing the quality of one to pursue the others. So what matters most here? Quality? Or quantity? I would usually say quality… but when the quantity is improving the quality of life as a whole… where does that leave things?

This is heavy thought for a beautiful Friday. Let’s have a donut.