RSS

Category Archives: My Writing

Yes, I talk to my characters…

At the risk of sounding schizophrenic (I’m pretty sure most people think I’m a bit neurotic, at the very least): Yes, I talk to my characters. And yes, they talk back to me. I don’t know if that’s the case for every fiction author, but I suspect it is, at least on some level.

To me, Alys Kinnear is a very real person. I don’t know if she only lives in my imagination, or if I’m tapping into (or, as Robert Heinlein proposed, actually creating) another universe to tell her stories. I’m not sure it matters, really.

Either way, characters in my novels – main characters, at least – are never just characters. I have conversations with them in my head, sometimes in the form of an interview, sometimes just talking. I use that as a way of getting to know them, which helps me flesh out who they are in the novel I’m working on.

If I can’t get a character to talk to me, it’s an early warning sign that the story isn’t working right. I wish I’d been aware of that when I was working on Knights Errant…sadly, it’s a realization that only came to me in the last couple of years. But realizing it has helped improve my writing by giving me a litmus test for the story.

The end result, or at least the ideal goal, is for the characters to become fully realized people. Not literally…Alys doesn’t actually appear and stand behind my shoulder while I’m writing, dictating her memoirs to me (or does she?). But she definitely does talk to me, helps me define who she is, and helps me write her stories. When she doesn’t…I know I’m doing something wrong, and it’s time to take a step back and review.

Robert Heinlein proposed the concept of “Pantheistic multiple-ego solipsism” (or the World as Myth) to describe the idea that an author (or artist of any variety) actually creates a parallel universe simply by writing about it. The pantheistic solipsism can be described as all myths and fictional universes existing as parallel universes to our own, and that persons and beings from those universes can interact with one another. Including – especially – creators and their creations.

He took it to its ultimate (and delightfully bonkers) conclusion in Number of the Beast, where his main characters hold a multi-universal convention, inviting all of the greatest writers and fictional characters to come and rub elbows with one another. Critics (and some reporters) were gently shown to a lounge where they could observe the proceedings but not interact with any of the guests…a lounge which turns out to be the dimensional equivalent of a Klein Bottle. Which tells us everything we need to know about Heinlein’s feelings on the matter. 😊

Does that mean that somewhere, in a nearby universe, Alys Kinnear is real and that I have some sort of connection with her? I like to think so. I find the idea very comforting, somehow. Am I telling her stories, or creating her stories?

I think the best answer is just “Yes.”

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on April 12, 2018 in My Writing, Ramblings

 

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Surface Pro Review

As promised, here’s my review of the Surface Pro I purchased a little over a month ago. For reference, I bought the 2017 Surface Pro, i5/8GB/256GB, and got the basic Surface Pro Keyboard and a Surface Pen for it.

First Impression: This thing is cool.

Second Impression: Seriously, it’s really cool. It’s like using something out of Star Trek. It’s every bit as powerful as my old laptop (mostly, more on that in a bit), while being considerably lighter and more compact. It does almost everything my old iPad can do, but better, with only a few exceptions.

The Surface Pro itself is a great tablet computer. I use both words there – tablet computer – instead of identifying it as one or the other, because it really can do duty as both. With a port replicator, an external monitor, and a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, this thing would make a serviceable desktop computer. Disconnected from its own peripherals (power adapter and keyboard), it’s a solid tablet. I had to load an Android emulator (Bluestacks) to get access to tablet games, but I was soon happily poking around in one of my go-to games (Transformers: Earth Wars, which turned out to be MUCH easier to play with a mouse and keyboard than it ever was with a touch screen).

Coming from a Mac environment, I had to find a few replacements for old software friends. Apple Mail was obviously right out of the question, so I did some searching and tried out a few email clients, finally settling on one called eM Client. Sorry, Outlook fans, it’s just not for me – I don’t find it at all user friendly (and I use it all the time at work!). eM Client isn’t perfect, but it does everything I expect a modern email program to do: It handles my seven email accounts gracefully, provides me by default with a unified inbox and the ability to filter for unread mail, and allows me to drag-and-drop mail from one account to another without any hiccups. It’s pretty nice looking, too, and not bank-breaking expensive.

My go-to writing apps, Scrivener and FocusWriter, are both available on Windows, and while Scrivener 3 for Windows is still in beta, the beta is working very nicely indeed. Only a few bugs, and none that affect me directly.

The rest – browser bookmarks, calendars, contacts, and so on – all came over fairly easily. Microsoft’s built in (and very nice) Calendar and People apps both have options for connecting to iCloud, which is very convenient. And, of course, Firefox and Chrome are Firefox and Chrome, no matter what platform you’re on.

The Surface Keyboard is one of the finest typing experiences I’ve ever had the pleasure of subjecting my poor, abused fingers to. The keys are very comfortable, with just the right spacing and amount of travel, and are very good for extended typing.

The Surface Pen is, for me, more of a gimmick than a tool. It’s very responsive, and yes you can actually write and draw directly on the Surface Pro with almost no noticeable lag. While I can definitely see it being a great tool for artists, graphic designers, and coloring books…for me, it spends most of its time magnetically attached (using surprisingly strong magnets) to the side of the tablet.

I added a 256GB Micro SD card for extra storage (there’s a Micro SD slot beneath the kickstand on the back), and put my music collection on that. There is precisely no lag time in reading from it, at least not that I can see, so music plays smoothly and without skipping. The last time I tried that – on my 2012 MacBook Air – the read time was so slow that music stuttered. Hooray for advancing technology!

So, what don’t I like? Well…it’s Windows. While Windows 10 has come a long way, it’s still a little quirky, at least from the perspective of a long-time Mac user. There are a few things here and there that don’t work the way I expect them to, but that’s a matter of adjustment. Yes, there’s more frequent updates, but that’s a good thing…Microsoft is working hard to patch vulnerabilities and fix bugs, something Apple does only half-heartedly at best these days.

It took me a while to get used to the new Start Menu, but remembering that I had a touchscreen to work with went a long way towards smoothing that out. I’ve even gotten used to the “Tiles” section of the Start Menu, and have begun to find it very convenient.

Its “lapability” (as the talking heads say) is acceptable. I don’t spend a lot of time using it that way, but the kickstand is sturdy enough to hold it up, and the keyboard is definitely solid enough to type on while on your lap. A word of advice: cover your legs (no shorts or short skirts) while using it on your lap. The kickstand WILL leave an indentation on your legs after a while. 🙂

Performance-wise, I have managed to make it slow down when I have a lot of windows open (or if I’m running Microsoft Word…jeez, Microsoft). I’m fairly certain that if I’d gone with one of the i7/16GB models, that wouldn’t happen. Next time.

The trackpad on the Surface Keyboard is kind of crap…there’s nothing really wrong with it, but it’s just a little bit too small to be used comfortably, and its not very good at ignoring palm input while I’m typing. Still, I’ve used worse…I’m looking at you, HP and Dell. But after the Mac trackpads, it’s definitely a step down.

Overall, I am really enjoying this thing. And it’s been fantastic for my writing…I’ve done more writing in the month since I bought my Surface Pro than I have in the last two years.

Rating: I give the 2017 Surface Pro a solid A. This is definitely the future of computers right here, a device which smoothly transitions from being a desktop, to a laptop, to a tablet, and does all of them pretty darn well.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on March 31, 2018 in Computers, My Writing, Ramblings

 

When a Story Goes Off the Rails

Ah, Knights Errant.

Some of my readers will immediately recognize the name (Nate, I’m looking at you), and feel a certain amount of nostalgia for this colossal train wreck. Others will have heard me mention it, probably ruefully, while the rest of you are scratching your heads right now. That’s OK. Let me tell you a little story. Think of this, if you will, as an act of confession.

Forgive me, Readers, for I have sinned. 😉

Once upon a time, back when I was in college, I joined a group of fellow Rifts(tm) RPG fanatics called the Palladium Mailing List. There, I made some good friends, including one who’s still a friend all these years later. We argued rules variations, posted our own creations and conversions from other games and settings into the Palladium(tm) game system, and formed our own corporate entities in the Rifts(tm) setting.

During that time, I started writing an ongoing story set in the Rifts(tm) universe called Knights Errant. It was mostly a way to work out some of my ideas for expanding my own little corner of the setting, setting down some recurring characters, and just having fun. It was probably the first real long-form fiction writing I’d done outside of creative writing class assignments. When our relationship with Palladium(tm) collapsed (a story in and of itself), we went our own ways.

But I couldn’t let go of Knights Errant. So with some help (Nate, I’m looking at you again), I was able to strip out every element of the story that had been specifically part of the Rifts(tm…oh, forget it) setting, or a conversion from another setting. What I was left with were some amusing characters, and fragments of a story. With an effort, and a bit more help, I knitted the whole thing back together.

A new setting was created. An alternate timeline for Earth was written, covering the 1940s through the mid-2300s. It’s incredibly detailed, marking major turning points in human history, noting births and deaths of important characters, and covering a certain amount of geopolitical development of the planet. Technology was drummed up – some of it was even scientifically sound – and detailed, mysterious aliens were added, genetic modification became a thing for humanity…

And the most critical part of the story made itself known to me. The story would take place during a massive civil war, engulfing the Sol system and its colonies, and the sides would rotate around this: The survival of humanity as a pure, unchanging species, vs. the voluntary change and development of humanity into lots of sub-species.

It felt like a solid story idea. Still does.

The problem was that it became the backdrop of the story. At the time, I was convinced that letting the characters do their own things was the right way to go, that I had to listen to them and let them be who they wanted to be, regardless of my plans. My civil war turned into a personal revenge story, that morphed into something that resembled a mashup of Gundam, Macross, and Star Wars. Sort of.

It was going great. The characters were developing and interacting well, I wrote what I felt were dynamic and exciting battle scenes, and even managed to sneak in a romance that (looking back on it now) falls squarely into the Strangled by the Red String trope. It was big, huge, space opera stuff. I chose a theme song for it, and had even envisioned an opening sequence for an animated show based on it.

200–odd pages into the manuscript, I made a horrifying discovery: It no longer had a plot.

It didn’t just not have a plot…I had no clue where the story was going, no idea what the end point was going to be. I still don’t.

I stopped writing. Stepped back and took a long, hard look at it. Tried to get a feel for the shape of it. And failed.

And there the story remains, to this day, almost twenty years later. I have occasionally – every couple of years, if I’m being honest – taken a stab at repairing the damage. Sometime I try to pick up where I left off and bend the story to some end. Other times I start over from scratch, shuffling characters, adding or removing technology, changing the shape of it to try and make it roll.

I’ve even tried writing other stories set in the same universe. I usually make it a couple of chapters in, and realize that I’m not sure where I want them to end up.

But I can’t quite give up on it. It’s always there in the back of my mind, simmering, stewing, bubbling…but never actually cooking.

I suppose trying to make it work again and again is my act of contrition. 😀

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on March 17, 2018 in My Writing, Ramblings

 

So, it’s been a while…

Yeah, I know, I’ve been amazingly lax in posting…well…anything on my blog. I’m not good at blogging, and I’m not too proud to admit it. Work has been grinding me down the last couple of years, and I haven’t had the time or energy to do much writing. I’m trying to break that trend.

I’ll start with a quick update on the state of my writing. After a year of slow editing and rewriting, my first non-Kinnear novel, Pluto, is just about ready for publication. It’s with my proofreaders, who seem to be enjoying it, and I’m starting to shop around for an actual agent. I’ll write more about that soon.

For those who’ve been waiting for it with baited breath (I really hope you’re actually out there!), the third Kinnear novel, Seasons of Healing, is almost done. I’m working on the last chapter, and then it’ll go to my proofreaders and editors to be ripped to shreds. 🙂

I haven’t taken part in National Novel Writing Month since the last time I wrote about it (2015), since the hardcore writing grind that year nearly burnt out my desire to write! There’ve been some changes to my writing toolkit lately though, so I’ll just mention the most dramatic: I’ve purchased a Surface Pro, and I’m in the process of migrating away from the macOS.

I honestly don’t think that Apple cares about its computer users anymore. They’re so busy producing phones and tablets with crippled operating systems, working on autonomous cars and going “All in” on original programming for the AppleTV (their words, not mine!), that they’ve forgotten they used to make computers.

Seriously, guys…you can’t keep calling your Server components “macOS Server” when you’re taking out DNS, DHCP, email, web services, and pretty much everything else that makes it a server! And for god’s sake, upgrade the Mac Mini and stop using those crap totally flat keyboards on your laptops!

Bah!

The good news is that Focuswriter (http://gottcode.org/focuswriter/) and Scrivener (https://www.literatureandlatte.com), my favorite writing programs, are also available for Windows. Hopefully, version 3 of Scrivener will be finished soon…in the meantime, I’m working well enough with the beta version.

But yeah, I’ve gone back to Windows. The Surface Pro is a superb piece of hardware in every way, but most importantly (to me) is that the keyboard is the most comfortable I’ve used on a device this portable. It is, in fact, possibly the most comfortable keyboard I’ve used on a laptop computer since my old Sager laptop (which was a cinderblock compared to this thing). I’ll write more about my impressions of the Surface Pro and Windows 10 another time.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on March 13, 2018 in My Writing, News, Ramblings, Rant

 

2015 National Novel Writing Month Toolkit

So, just like last year I’ve had a few people ask me what was in my writer’s toolkit for National Novel Writing Month this past November. Starting from the top, let’s go through the equipment, software and other tools that got me through the month in one piece (mostly).

Apple 13″ MacBook Pro Retina: It’s about a year and a half old now, and El Capitan (Mac OS 10.11) is riddled with weird problems…but the Mac OS platform is still a solid one. Sure, I have about two dozen third party applications that run at launch – I’ll get to that in a moment – but the Mac OS still provides, at least to my mind, a friendlier, more attractive work environment. I use Windows extensively at work (7, 8.1 and 10), and I still prefer to come home to a Mac at the end of the day.

Third Party Software for Modifying the Mac OS: Yeah, okay, here’s where the Mac OS falls down on the job: Apple wants me to do things their way, and I’ve never been much of a follower. I am very much a creature of habit, and I like to customize my work environment to make it more comfortable for the way I do things. To that end, the following third party apps enhance my use of the Mac OS. (This is a brief list – I’ve got a LOT more than just these running.)

Disclaimer: Because Apple has been making it harder and harder to modify the way their operating system works – sacrificing flexibility for stability and safety, according to them – running some of these apps requires violating a level of Apple’s ‘user security’ (ie: doing things the way they want it done) or two along the way. Do a little research before deciding if these are for you!

ClipMenu (http://www.clipmenu.com/): A compact clipboard manager which remembers the last X# of items you cut or copied (I have it set to 20, but it’ll keep a LOT more than that). Useful for the indecisive writer! It hasn’t been updated in a while, but it’s free and still works well in El Capitan.

TotalSpace & TotalSpaces Grid (http://totalspaces.binaryage.com/): A third party replacement for Apple’s Mission Control desktop manager. It works like the original version of Apple’s Spaces (from OS 10.6), and is enormously more flexible and useful, especially in this age of fullscreen applications.

Alfred (https://www.alfredapp.com/): A Spotlight search/launcher interface replacement with greater flexibility and a wider range of uses. It’s free for basic use, which covers a lot of ground, and the (relatively inexpensive) PowerPack just expands that.

Path Finder (http://www.cocoatech.com/pathfinder/): A total top-to-bottom replacement for Apple’s Finder (the Windows Explorer equivalent on the Mac). This is as much an aesthetic choice for me as a functionality one – in addition to a wider range of information being available at your fingertips, Path Finder gives you more options for viewing, sorting and filtering the contents of folders. It also replaces the basic Mac OS desktop interface, giving you a lot of options for customizing the layout of icons and what information they present at a glance. (It also uses a lot less in the way of system resources, if you’re willing to let it quit Apple’s Finder when it launches.)

BetterSnapTool (http://www.boastr.net/bettersnaptool/): Adds Windows-like “snap to edge” functionality to the Mac, which lets you drag windows to the sides of the screen to fill half of it, to the top to fill all of it, or to the corners to fill a quarter of the screen. Yes, El Capitan offers some of this functionality…but not all of it, and BetterSnapTool is smoother and more reliable in its behavior.

And now, back to mainstream software…

Scrivener (https://www.literatureandlatte.com/): I have yet to find a better all-in-one solution for writing. Scrivener is a place to keep all of my research, character biographies, setting notes, and the manuscript in a chapter-by-chapter format that makes editing and reorganizing the story very easy. It can also compile and export your manuscript in a variety of formats, including Microsoft Word, ePub, Mobi and PDF, for easy publishing. There is, to my mind, no better all-purpose writing environment than this.

As a side-note, Literature & Latte also produces a program called Scrapple, a great basic mind mapping program. I’ve used it a couple of times to help me reorganize and disentangle particularly difficult plot threads.

Scrivener and Scrapple both come in Mac and Windows flavors, and while the Windows version of Scrivener hasn’t quite caught up to the Mac version in terms of features, it’s well on its way and worth the money.

FocusWriter (http://gottcode.org/focuswriter/): Remains the best distraction free writing environment I’ve tried, and it’s still donationware (I happily made another donation this year – I love it that much). Best of all, there’s still no Markdown in sight, thank goodness. But as I said last year, it’s distraction free, not feature free. It remains a fully-functional Rich Text editor, which means you get all of the vital formatting tools you need (italics, bold, underline, etc.), and for those writing in foreign languages it will do right-to-left text.

Like Scrivener, FocusWriter is available on both the Mac and Windows platforms, in addition to having a couple of Linux version. You don’t get more flexible than that!

Generally, I compose in FocusWriter, then copy it into Scrivener for storage and editing. Between the two programs, they’re better than any word processor on the market for a serious writer.

Microsoft Sculpt Ergonomic Keyboard (http://www.amazon.com/Microsoft-Ergonomic-Keyboard-Business-5KV-00001/dp/B00CYX26BC): I bought this keyboard in October of 2014 for National Novel Writing Month that year. A year and about 300,000 words later (more or less – probably more), this keyboard is still going strong and I’m not having any Carpal Tunnel problems using it. The best keyboard on the market today, in my opinion. And yes, I bought a spare – just in case. 🙂

Microsoft Word 2016 & Apple Pages 5: I don’t have much to say about these this year. I’ve abandoned Pages entirely at this point – Apple has crippled it well past the point of it ever being useful as a serious writing tool. The few things I was using it for, Scrivener does better.

Word 2016 is a definite improvement over Word 2011, and has even improved the collaborative & editing tools that make it so useful for sharing documents (with, for example, your editor). But it’s an editing & finishing tool, not a writing tool. It has a tendency to bog down when working on large documents…as always.

Music: Music this year was odd and irregular. I was writing in silence as often as while listening to something, for a change. I can’t even really say what I was listening to…iTunes’s randomizer got a pretty solid workout.

 
3 Comments

Posted by on December 23, 2015 in My Writing, Ramblings

 

Tags: ,

New Kinnear Short Story!

I’ve made a new short story set in The Kinnear Chronicles available for free (in several formats) on my website. I had a lot of fun writing this one. Compared to the last one, it’s quite a bit more light-hearted (mostly) and was written almost purely for entertainment purposes. That said, keep an eye open for a few hidden plot-advancing gems hidden amidst the fluff…

Check it out!

The Kinnear Chronicles: A Very Merry Yule
It’s time for the mid-winter Yule celebrations, and Alys Kinnear is
determined to see to it that her boyfriend, Ben Donovan, enjoys it as he never has before. Doing so, to Ben’s discomfort, means taking him along on their visit to the new Swindon home of Alys’s parents: her mother, Deirdre, and her step-father (and former teacher) Jonathan Tremane.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on August 1, 2015 in My Writing

 

Tags: , , ,

Why Do I Write?

Why do I write? That’s a really good question.

In his book On Writing, Stephen King wrote “Fiction writers, present company included, don’t understand very much about what they do – not why it works when it’s good, not why it doesn’t when it’s bad.” I think that holds true for why we write, not just how.

So, why do I write? I don’t think there’s a single, simple answer to that.

Partly, it’s the same joy of creation that every artist experiences. There’s something wonderful about telling a story, and hoping that other people will enjoy it as much as you do. About creating characters you love and hope others will too.

And there’s the challenge of it. Anybody who thinks that writing anything (poetry, short stories, novels, you name it) is an easy thing to do – I’ve had people tell me “All you have to do is sit there and type. Anybody can do that.” – needs to have their head examined. Or, better yet, try it. Setting aside how difficult it can be to build the structure of a complete and coherent story, it is incredibly hard to populate a story with characters and events which are engaging and interesting.

Sometimes I write to get something out of my system. Writing can allow me to vent a frustration or fear, or even help me work out a problem that I can’t get off my mind.

Also, frankly, it can be a compulsion. I feel a genuine need to write, to sit and put pen to paper (metaphorically speaking, these days). Whether it turns out to be good or not, I enjoy it. I just hope people enjoy reading it!

But whether they do or not, whether my work finds an audience or not, I love writing. So I’ll keep writing. Even if I don’t completely understand why myself.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on July 3, 2015 in My Writing, Ramblings

 

Tags: ,

Writer’s Toolkit: Music

I love to listen to music while I’m writing. It helps me concentrate and can – perhaps more importantly – help me maintain the right emotional state for the scene I’m working on.

So, what’re my favorite types of music to listen to while writing? That depends on what I’m writing.

For example, when I’m working on Kinnear, I like to listen to Celtic folk music. One piece in particular – an instrumental piece by Loreena McKennit called Between the Shadows – has come to be closely associated with Alys in my mind.

If I’m writing an action sequence, intense music is called for. Amongst my favorites for this task are multiple tracks from the Pacific Rim soundtrack (especially the title track) and from The Mummy (the version with Brendan Fraser). Recently, the entire score for Mad Max: Fury Road has entered into use for getting in the mood for writing action too – it’s an awesome, high-intensity soundtrack.

But in general, I just like to listen to instrumental music while writing. It provides enough background noise to help me focus without distracting me with lyrics. My usual writing playlist is eclectic, containing bits from the soundtracks mentioned above mixed together with everything from classical music (Vivaldi and Gershwin) to modern orchestral (Tim Janis and Danny Elfman) to film composers (Basil Poledouris and John Williams) and some which can defy easy classification (Vangelis).

Music is, of course, extremely good at creating and molding emotion, which makes it a useful addition to any writer’s toolkit.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on June 24, 2015 in My Writing, Ramblings

 

Tags: ,

Josh’s National Novel Writing Month Writer’s Toolkit Roundup

A couple of people have asked what was in my toolkit for NaNoWriMo this year, ranging from what computer I used all the way through to what music did I listen to. So here’s a roundup of what was in my Writer’s Toolkit this year…and what will be staying as I go back to a normal (if such a word can be applied to a writer) writing process.

First, let me note that at no time was my television on while I was writing. There is nothing more destructively distracting than a television. If you’re planning to write, start by turning the TV off! 🙂

Apple 13” Retina MacBook Pro: This replaced my 13” MacBook Air back in August, and is a sturdy, steadfast writing partner. No crashes, no hiccups, no slowdowns. I’ve had a few little issues since upgrading to Yosemite (OS 10.10), but nothing that rebooting and a few third-party programs didn’t fix. The Retina display is a bigger deal than I thought it would be…after hours of staring at the screen, my eyes aren’t nearly as tired on the Retina display as they are with a normal monitor, so the high-resolution screen definitely makes a big difference.

Scrivener: (https://www.literatureandlatte.com/) For a few years now, Scrivener has been my go-to tool for organizing all of my notes about a novel as I’m writing. Whether I’m doing research (it can import and store web pages, images, PDFs, and almost every document format), creating characters, outlining, storyboarding, or keeping track of draft revisions, Scrivener is flat out the best tool for the job. Each book gets its own Scrivener file, into which all of the material for that book – including the book itself – goes, making it a fantastic top-level organizational tool as well.

Scrivener comes in both Mac and Windows flavors, and its format is cross-platform. They’ve been talking about an iPad version for a couple of years now, but don’t plan to release it until its feature-set matches the desktop version. At $45 (often on sale), it’s a bargain.

FocusWriter: (http://gottcode.org/focuswriter/) FocusWriter is a new addition to my toolkit this year, and will be staying in it for the forseeable future. After trying a huge variety of the new “Distration Free Writing Solutions” (including iA Writer, OmmWriter, WriteRoom, and Byword, amongst others), I settled on FocusWriter for several reasons:

First, it’s Donationware. Which is nice, since I got to try it out without having to pay for it, and when I found myself at home with it, I made a nice donation to the programmer to help support it. I like this business model, because I don’t get fleeced up front for a product I’ll never use again (I’m looking at you, iA Writer and Byword).

Second, I like the fact that it’s distraction free, not feature free. I do not like Markdown, which has become the go-to tool for so-called “distraction free” word processors…it feels like programming, and distracts me from the creative process of writing. FocusWriter is a traditional Rich Text (RTF, though it can also save as ODT and DOCX) editor with a hidden and minimalized user interface…so I can write with nothing between me and the words, without losing basic and critical formatting options like italics and bold.

Finally, it has a customizable writing environment, and I love the old-school green text on black interface option it comes with. It’s surprising how easy it is on the eyes.

Microsoft Word for Mac 2011: Unfortunately still the industry standard for word processing. I don’t say unfortunately because it’s not useful, but because it’s been almost five years since Microsoft’s last serious update to Word for Mac, and it’s spectacularly long in the tooth. However, its collaborative tools are unparalleled, and I will happily continue using it with my editors to make it easier for them to make corrections and comments.

Apple Pages 5: For several years, I felt that Pages had the potential to be a major competitor for Microsoft Word. Unfortunately, the most recent version is a disaster. Apple stripped out major features, crippled the user interface, and made the collaborative tools difficult to use effectively – all in an attempt to match the feature set with the iPad version. The previous version still runs well enough in Yosemite that it’s still useful for compiling the book into various formats – including the easiest ePub conversion on the market – but for actual editing, Microsoft Word crushes it.

Microsoft Sculpt Ergononic Keyboard: (http://www.amazon.com/Microsoft-Ergonomic-Keyboard-Business-5KV-00001/dp/B00CYX26BC) Anyone who’s spent enough time around me knows that I have a tendency to replace my keyboard on a regular basis. I’m very hard on keyboards, and have a long-standing tendency (thanks to having learned to type on old manual typewriters) to pound on the keys. For years, I’ve been relying on Apple’s low-profile keyboards and a variety of Logitech keyboards to provide me with comfortable and reliable typing experiences.

This year, I decided to try out the Microsoft Sculpt Ergonomic Keyboard, because my hands have been bothering me lately, and writing 50,000 words in a month is guaranteed to cause wear and tear on both computer hardware and on your hands.

After a month and almost 60,000 words (not counting email and chat), I’m pleased to say that this keyboard was an excellent investment. My hands feel better than they did before I started, and the keyboard has performed admirably. It’s comfortable to type on for long periods of time, and being wireless is easy to place precisely where it’s most comfortable for you. The detached numeric keypad makes it even easier to lay out well – I find that putting on the left side of the keyboard actually makes it more comfortable to use.

I highly recommend the keyboard. In fact, I plan to buy a spare for when this one inevitably fails. 🙂

Music: What to listen to while writing is a highly subjective and wildly variable thing. This year, Jazz appeared to be the order of the day. Fortunately, iTunes’ Internet Radio provides easy access to a wide variety of options, including a full range of JazzRadio.com’s stations. My favorites are their Piano Jazz, Saxophone Jazz and Trumpet Jazz channels.

Other music included my usual bizarre range of music from movie soundtracks (Jerry Goldsmith’s score for the 1999 version of The Mummy and Basil Poledouris’ score from Conan the Barbarian were popular this year) to Japanese pop music. Whatever gets the creative juices flowing.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on November 26, 2014 in My Writing, Ramblings

 

Tags: ,

Ask Alys – 6/15/14

Mandy asks: What do you like to do in your spare time? It seems that you are on cases, learning or training a lot. In the last book, you went on a few dates with Ben…but other than that, what interests you that isn’t in a way related to your work?

Alys: I’m studying to be a professional wizard. That has a tendency to eat up time like you wouldn’t believe. The end result is not having much spare time for hobbies.

Athena: Or sleep, sometimes.

Alys: Too true. That said…the best thing about studying to be a wizard is how spectacularly multidisciplinary a field it is. Since I began my apprenticeship with Jonathan Tremane, I’ve studied – in addition to the Art of spellcasting – an incredibly wide variety of subjects, including psychology and sociology, comparative religion and mythology, chemistry, physics, woodworking and metalsmithing, law and history.

Jonathan assures me that if I decided to sit for exams at Oxford or Cambridge, I could get degrees in at least half of those. Frankly, I don’t doubt it…while my peers were in grammar school, I was already studying college-level material.

Unfortunately, that means that the worst thing about studying to be a wizard is that everything you do is eventually related to your work in some way or another. Whether you mean it to be, want it to be, or not. For example: I’ve been playing the Celtic Flute (a wooden flute with a lovely, rich sound) since I was a little girl. At first, I did it because I thought that learning an instrument of some sort would help me be accepted by the other kids. I stuck with it because I enjoy the discipline of it, and because it’s very relaxing to let myself go in the music.

I’m not professionally good, but I get by without making people wince.

Imagine my surprise when I learned that some species of supernatural predators can be calmed and lulled into sleep through the proper application of music. I have no doubt that sooner or later, playing the flute will come in handy in my work. In the meantime, it’s a lovely hobby.

What else? I read voraciously (obviously), and I have a fondness for Breton poetry (the works of T.S. Elliot and Robert Browning are amongst my favorites) and mysteries. Conan Doyle is a special favorite.

I also love going to the theater, be it for concerts, musicals or plays. And I’ve been known to go to the occasional film, though I find the tendency of movie theater owners to turn up the sound to deafening levels rather annoying.

Athena and Ben have been conspiring recently to get me out of the house as often as possible, and not just for work. But we lead busy, active lives, and our schedules don’t always mesh. Fortunately, I love what I’m doing…and as the saying goes, if you love what you’re doing, it doesn’t feel like work.

 
1 Comment

Posted by on June 15, 2014 in Ask Alys, My Writing

 

Tags: , ,