Sunday 'fess up...Anni's week has been okay

Before I start my 'fess up, I want to bring something to your attention.  Rachel - aka Go Go Rach - needs help.  She's in a very rough spot.  I know how it is.  I've been there.  There's a donate button up at the top of her blog.  She's not into begging, but she really does need some help right now.  I'm broke until next Friday, when - as long as I have bills paid - I'm hoping to be able to help her out with something.  In the mean time, go help her.  She's helped a lot of people, is on the threshold of helping so many more - but now it's time for others to help the lady warrior that is Rachel (@gogorach).

In writing, I broke 220 pages in Only A Name for revisions.  Only about 100 or so more to go, and a number of scenes to cut and/or rewrite.  But I'm making progress.

Had a couple of new characters wander in.  First is a mostly deaf empathic visionary named Kimberly Anne Fairchild.  An 'empathic visionary' is one who sees through the emotional residue left behind when something big happens (like a murder, a huge party, etc.).  The other is named Amelia.  Amelia is a lady in a sci fi world kind of reminiscent of Dune - kind of a medival society in a sci fi universe type thing.  I know she's kicked out of her home by her father, has an older sister named Damaris, and ends up as the wife/queen of a group of space pirates.  How she gets there I don't know.  I also know Kimberly has overbearing parents who ignored her hearing loss and tried to make her behave like a "normal" child, hates asking them for help, and is extremely independent.  Both of these ladies are on hold until I get Only A Name done though, as I need to finish the revisions before I start yet another round of projects.

Got the vlog done as usual.  I realized today that I've been vlogging now for 10 weeks.  I think my last two vlogs have kind of fallen short of what I set my standard to but I think this newest one is better than the last two.  As always, here's the vlog post I did.

And now a couple of fun videos for the heck of it.

That's it for this week's blog.  The FFF post is on temporary hiatus.  I barely have time right now to do my Wednesday and my Sunday posts.  I'm going to continue with my foreign foods theme eventually, picking up with other Asian foods.  It'll just be a few weeks before I get back to them.

Sunday 'fess up...Anni found a new treasure

Hello to everyone on this cloudy, foggy Sunday morning.

As the title says, I found a new treasure.  I've been wanting a chance to read Knight Errant by K.D. Sarge (@KDSarge on Twitter) for some time - ever since she was kind enough to send me the bookmark advertising her book.  When it went up on Turtleduckpress' website, I read through the first three chapters.  I was hooked.  But I wasn't able to secure a copy for myself, finances being what they are.

Last night, after a particularly horrid day at work, I will admit to being rather cranky and depressed on Twitter.  K.D. offered to let me read and review her e-book version of Knight Errant.  I jumped at the chance.  Now, I am a speed reader so it doesn't take me long to read something.  Especially something that drags me in and holds me down until the story is over.  Knight Errant did that.  By the time I was done, I was giggling insanely and commenting to K.D. about how evil she is...and how awesome she is as a friend and a writer.

Here's the link to Turtleduckpress, where you can go buy her delightful book
Here's one of my reviews, posted to my book review blog

Now, on to the writing.

I found a website called 750words and I've been using it to do some free writing, and to work out some random plot problems.  It's really a very useful website.  It encourages you to write with no inhibitions, no distractions, and no other thought than just to write.  My friend Hawke pointed it out to me and I've been going there every day ever since to get my free writing done.  It's helped immensely.

Revisions are going slowly with Only A Name.  I took a break from the chapter by chapter revisions and read through the whole thing.  Once I did that, I began to doubt whether it'd be ready by June.  I'm still going to try to get it there, but I honestly don't know.  I thought it was a good story when I decided to revise it.

Yes, I'm doubting myself again.  I do that from time to time.

I've put some work into Ashe's world and her story.  There'll be some of that in the next Writing Wednesday.  I've also got a new short that might be going somewhere that I started with one of the days of free writing.  I'll have to figure that one out eventually too.

Still looking for an artist to help me out with cover art for the stories I want to toss up on Smashwords.  Still  revising and editing those too.  Read the style guide for Smashwords.  82 pages...my head hurt when I was done, and I'm still not sure I understand the whole thing.  I'll go over it again when I'm closer to being ready to upload the stories.

And, on a final note, my vlog.  This one isn't as interesting as the others - at least to me.  I'm mostly rambling...but I do introduce you to my new stuffy Lovin' Lion!  I collect teddy bears.  I also collect stuffed animals in general, but mostly teddy bears.  I lost my entire collection except for one little bear when we lost everything last year.  So now I'm rebuilding my collection.  Slowly, but it's started.