I’m following in the footsteps of some of my fellow YAB Bootcamp writers and joining in the What’s Up Wednesday blog hop. (I know I just posted my check-in late, but I want to make this a weekly thing, too.) Let me share a bit of what’s up with me right now.
What I’m Reading
A few days ago, I finished Family Magic by Patti Larsen. I’m always a sucker for teen witch stories and this one had the added bonus of being about a family of witches. It was cute and fun, and I may pick up the rest of the series soon. Then in less than two days, I finished Bloody Little Secrets by Karly Kirkpatrick. It was typical vampire fair but very short, and spent a little too much time making fun of Twilight. I know Twilight was bad, but is it required for every vampire story since then to point out that their vampires don’t sparkle? So done with that. (I was particularly disappointed that the last 15% of the book was taken up with previews of other authors’ series, so it ended even sooner than I expected.) I doubt that I would pick up the second book when it comes out.
Now I’m reading The Dragon and the Lotus by Joseph Robert Lewis. I’m only a few chapters in, but so far it’s very interesting because it’s a historical fantasy taking place somewhere other than Western Europe. Yay diversity! (By the way, tomorrow is the start of the #WeNeedDiverseBooks discussion. I’m definitely taking part in that.)
In non-fiction, I’m still working my way through Furies: War in Europe 1450-1700 by Lauro Martines (very interesting, but very gruesome, recommended to me by Tracy Falbe for research on Renaissance mercenaries). And also Venice: A New History by Thomas H. Madden, which is a much lighter and more entertaining read. Yes, I really do read more than one book at a time–it depends on my mood.
What I’m Writing
I’m finishing up Small Town Witch formatting right now, and planning out my next novel, the serial I announced yesterday: The Voyage of The Miscreation. I’m so excited to get started on this. But I’m trying to tie up loose ends in other projects first so I can put all of my concentration on the new novel when I write it.
What Inspires Me Right Now
The serial novel is my project for Holly Lisle’s How To Write a Series live course. So the writing is definitely inspired by Holly’s course materials, and the discussions going on at the class forums right now. Of course, my research on Renaissance Italy is taking a front seat in this novel planning, too. More broadly, I think the heat wave is inspiring me because I would really love to be on a ship in the middle of the ocean right now.
What Else I’ve Been Up To
Lots of stuff! I’m playing Diablo III with my family, which has been a lot of fun. We just beat campaign mode, so we’ve started doing side quests. I love it when we can all play a game cooperatively. Also, Fanime is coming up soon, so there’s cosplay making all over the house. I’m not making any full costumes of my own, but here’s a picture of a hat that I modified for Ariel. I’m still deciding if I’ll wear this with a casual cosplay or if I’ll add it to the full princess dress.
The rest is just the usual life: reading, watching television, trying to get work done with a cat sitting on my lap. We celebrated the last of the family birthdays last weekend (all five birthdays happen in the first four months of the year, so we get a big string of birthdays and then we’re done), so that was fun. We tried a new Japanese restaurant. The omnivores said the fish was delicious and fresh, but I was disappointed by the vegetarian selection. Sadly, our last favorite Japanese restaurant seems to have changed owners and gone down in quality (according to online reviews), so we’re looking for a new regular place. My vote is to keep looking (or drive to Santa Cruz for Mobo’s).
I hope everyone else is having a good week!
