Apollo Blake's Blog, page 4

Review Banner

 

Review Banner for a reading goal of mine this year :) 

At The Alcatraz Café

 Just a nice aesthetic I made for my new romance novella, which is free to read on Wattpad: https://www.wattpad.com/story/257106440-at-the-alcatraz-caf%C3%A9

Tomb Raider Fans Stay Winning

 We finally got a Lara Croft skin in Fortnite and I. AM. LIVING.

I can't help but hope the fact that they gave us Classic Lara isn't just a way to appease fans and they're going to go back to a more original look for her in the next game. I don't know why the character models for Lara looked so good in the 2013 game and in Rise, and then in Shadow of the Tomb Raider they did her so dirty and made her look like a potato. Lara does not look like that and poor, beautiful Camilla Ludington does not look like that. She earned a better character model to go with her performance. Plus they tried to give us an outfit in that game with the OG turquoise coloring which was a nice idea but it had poor execution. It was kind of fugly.
Also the fact that they gave us a classic Lara model but kept the breast size reduction from more recent games is nice; it proves she can look good in that outfit even with the changes and I hope it triggered those fanboys who whine about her and Tifa Lockheart's cupsize. Leave these poor fictional women alone lmfao.
In all reality I feel super badass in the Tomb Raider skin and I have won my first two solo wins of the season in it. I particularly love the long braid. God, I missed the braid; what an iconic look. If they gave us a variant with her classic red sunglasses I'd lose it, honestly.
I hope they bring back Team Rumble: Vaulted mode this season at some point. I didn't mind Solid Gold mode either but Team Rumble being plain old squads is boring af.
Now I'm going to go hopefully write something worth reading, like maybe the House of Ink rewrite I just promised everyone on Wattpad. Later!

Returning To Roots

 Oh look, it's another instalment in the endless saga of theme changes this blog has been through! Well don't worry, folks. I think this one is here to stay! I really enjoy it. I've neglected this blog for far too long because:

1) I figured Blogger was dying (and it kind of is, I guess, but I don't care anymore).

2) I figured nobody was reading it (which isn't totally true, but it wouldn't be a big deal if it was).

3) I am very intimidated by picking out a blog theme. It's hard. I've seen people call blogs just like mine ugly and clunky, but I don't care. This design/theme makes me nostalgic for a ton of other author blogs I used to follow.

Now I've just accepted this is what my blog looks like and this is what I want it to look like. It's nostalgic. It's retro. It's...very, like, 2009-2011 YA author vibes, and you know what? That's when I was in middle school dreaming of being an author, and the paranormal romance trend was at its peak, and I miss that. Plus I don't really like 'sleek' minimalist blogger themes. I need a good one-column text-based theme for my blog. Simple and clean.

Not, like, the Utada Hikaru song, either, although that is a bop.

My Kingdom Hearts nostalgia might be in overdrive right now because I've been playing through FF7 Remake - thanks, PS Plus! - and loving it. Cloud is such a nerdy twink and everybody is flirting with him, and Aerith is a queen! I figured she might be an overrated character, because I've only ever seen bits and pieces of her so I wasn't sure if she deserved her popularity, but she's so funny and full of personality. I worried she might just be a blank slate 'nice girl' for Cloud to mourn, but she's really cool and has more personality than he does, lol.

Anyway I just wanted to briefly pop in and announce the reasoning behind my reversion to this simple old theme and the black/purple color palette I used to use. It just feels right to me. I think it's nice. Even though it is slightly clunky, but I think that may be part of the charm.

And, since I am going to keep writing on here no matter what, I'll probably try to find a way to direct attention to this site on other social media platforms. My favorite authors all ditched blogger for like, Twitter, but Twitter makes me suicidal. And Instagram is cool but I don't feel like me or my surroundings are pretty enough to post there except on Stories. So I'm determined to make this blog come alive again.

Alexa Donne was saying in one of her newer videos about author branding and marketing and how to avoid burnout with both, that blogs might not be as popular as they used to be, but that the written word is just a more enjoyable format for some people, and I know that rings true for me. For some of us that just won't change.

Plus it's hard coming up with content ideas. I want to explore new mediums of content, but some of them are very intimidating, and you also have to figure out how to make them compatible with social media in order to actually share them and create interaction. So that's intimidating. But I like blogging. I'm good at it. Even if it isn't a hugely popular form of content anymore. I can't be the only one who still enjoys blogs, right?

Another really smart thing Alexa Donne said in that video is that mailing lists are kind of over (because everyone has one and they're all kind of the same and they're pretty much just blog posts in email format anyway) and I'm happy about it because I honestly never figured my mailing list out. Shit's a mess.

Anyway, that's all on my end. If you need me, I will be writing gay stuff, playing Final Fantasy, and eating directly from my shirt pocket which is currently full of a handful of loose jelly beans, because that's what a heathen I've become during this pandemic.

Xoxo, Gossip Girl :D Nah, just kidding...I wish, though.

New Review Banner

 

There Is Nothing But Ice

 It's insane to think that pretty soon it's going to be winter - the leaves all fell so quickly I pretty much missed it. I guess I should look up more. :/

Some insane stuff was happening in my personal life lately, so this blog has been neglected as a result. I didn't forget about it (even though nobody really reads it, or at least very few people do) and I'm not going to abandon it. I mean, I do abandon it for months at a time sometimes, but I always intend to come back.

I mostly just want to keep a log of what I'm working on and when, what my mindset is regarding my books and my writing, etc. It's useful to me when I'm looking back, and it's a nice momento to have for my writing life.

I'm back on Prozac (those aforementioned insane things happening in my personal life demanded I face my demons) so that's slowly been kicking into my system and I'm settling into a new sort of normal. Medicated normal. Which is good, because I need to be. Mental health issues are so easy to ignore and push-off dealing with until it's almost too late, but I got a couple large wake-up calls and I had to rely on my family and my doctor to make the right choice for me.

Prozac worked really well when I was on it back in high school, so I'm hoping revisiting it as an adult is an equal or greater success. I probably shouldn't have stopped taking it, but that's a learning experience, I guess.

Still, stuff will hopefully be better from here on out.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about zombies and dragons, and now I'm working on a project that has both. I have to get them both done before NaNoWriMo, because God Damn, I am going to sit down and hammer out my vampire serial for NaNo if it kills me. And if it does, maybe I'll even get to come back as a sexy fanged goth femboi fiend. :) I bet immortality would be fun. It would have to be that cool X-Men regenerating properties kind of immortality though, because what's the point of living forever if you're not also a super-cool badass?

The first episode of that vampire serial is written, but I don't think I've mentioned it here and I am not naming it until I have more work done on it. I have loose outlines for the first four to five stories. There's going to be six in the first season.

But it doesn't matter, 'cause I have too much to do before thinking about that. No vampires for the next ten days of October; these days are about white blizzards, snow-frosted dragons, and magical artifacts.

I am putting out a pretty new edition of Iceblood soon! Maybe early next month, which seems way too far away even though the dates I'm looking at are like, 12-12 days away, lol. It's not going to have any real changes in it, it's just a new cover to go along with the new sequels and their stunning covers. I love the new cover of Iceblood, though, it's finally just right and it really suits the story more than any of the previous covers. I think Iceblood and Blood of Midnight were the two hardest books to put covers to, for me, which is why they've been through so many.

If I'm being honest, Rage & Frenzy may need new covers soon as well, but I'm not thinking about that right now! Here's a little thumbnail version of the new Iceblood cover for your enjoyment, though:

Books 2 & 3 are going to be called Scoundrel and Catalyst! I hope you guys will really check them all out and enjoy them. And really, I hope enough people buy them that I can afford to get Cyberpunk2077 next month, but that's probably a pipe dream, ha.

More later. Time to write write write! If you guys are doing NaNo next month comment about your plans and motivations below! I'd love to hear about people's preptober activities!

A Day in The Life

All I've done today is stress out, wash dishes, play FortNite, stress out some more, and do a brief blurb for a new book I'm going to start working on. Or I guess I already started working on it. The problem is I'm pretty sure I have a brain tumor, I can't afford an MRI, and I have to make an appointment at a free clinic tomorrow so I can get a referral, which might take months, and in the meantime my head feels inflamed, I've been getting worse and worse cluster headaches for weeks now, and I'm constantly terrified or frustrated about it all. I hope I can actually get into the clinic I have my eye on tomorrow because I don't have a family doctor who can refer me.
I'd ideally like to pay the almost $800 bucks to get a quick MRI done but instead I'll be on a waiting list for like eight weeks which is another whole nightmare because I don't know if I can even survive that long. I keep telling myself a lot of brain tumors (most) I think, are benign, but I have a lot of death anxiety and it isn't helping.
I also have anxiety about the clinic in general, like they won't believe me or will try to give me the runaround, but I'm also reminding myself not to buy into the idea of the worst-case scenario. I'll remember to wear a mask, I'll write a list about my symptoms beforehand, and I'll tell them about previous head-trauma I have in the same area of my skull that could be affecting my current situation. I can do that. It's a simple collection of tasks. But my mind likes to break it all up, make it seem more daunting than it is, and convinces me the entire world is against me, and that it's all coming to an end at every moment.
I tried to distract myself a little this a afternoon by playing video games; I spent a couple bucks I shouldn't have on the Yellowjacket pack on FortNite because I have very little self-control and I know it's a limited time pack before the next bundle replaces it. I got the pink-hooded one from last season, I think it's called Iiris? And Yellowjacket is a better skin, but I wasn't going to buy her until I saw her new all-black style option. It felt like more of a skin I'd wear as a main and I couldn't help it. I do think they'll put out a few more style options for her anyway, especially since she seems to be so popular, so it might be worth it in the long-run. To me she looks weirdly like Selena Gomez, but I might just be imaging things.
I'm going to go and wrestle myself up some dinner, because I have no idea what kind of food we have here. I put out chicken earlier but I probably won't make that until tomorrow, so I might need to make new plans. I've gotta make more healthy choices because my body is like, begging me for some vegetables. I can't keep eating rice, salty noodles, and junk food, that's for sure.
I can hopefully get some work done today on this new project that I truly think is going to do well. I hope. Because I want the money. And the reviews. It's more fun writing when people actually have something to say about it. :)

My Top 5 YA Standalones (Quarantine Reading List Edition!)

I've been eyeing ideas for a couple of different standalone novels recently and it's got me asking myself what I think constitutes a good standalone novel, what makes it more beneficial for a story to be a single piece rather than a series, etc.
In the process I've obviously been revisiting a lot of the standalones I've loved in the past. And I decided a few of them are a little too slept on by the bookish side of the internet.
So, here's my shoutout for my top 5 YA standalones that I think deserve more love. If you're trying to capitalize on your quarantine lockdown time to read more, here's a couple titles your TBR could benefit from meeting.
5: Daughter of Deep Silence by Carrie Ryan

Do you like revenge? Do you like mysteries? Do you like thrilling, dangerous situations involving rich, beautiful people and their shocking, dirty, blood-stained scandals? Do you enjoy a nice Old American lavish murder mystery aesthetic? If the answer to any of these questions is yes or veering in the general territory of yes, then hi! I have a book for you.
Daughter of Deep Silence is by the same author who wrote The Forest of Hands and Teeth, a popular YA zombie series known for being pretty darn brutal. Here she engages us with the tale of a girl named Frances who, after surviving a devastating terrorist massacre on a cruise ship, takes on the role of her dead friend Libby, with the help of Libby's father, in order to expose the cover-up and show the world the truth, while also taking her own revenge on the people responsible for the mass-murder she miraculously survived. After spending years away in Europe, Frances, now living as 'Libby' returns to America in the wake of her adoptive father's death in order to put their long-laid plans for revenge into play, starting with the senator leading the cover up, and his handsome young son, the only boy on their cruise who ever overlooked the glamorous Libby for the plain and shy Frances. Naturally, hard feelings ensue, as 'Libby' lies, sabotages, schemes, and poisons her way into their lives in an insane, desperate attempt to find the truth and avenge her mother and father, and the real Libby, no matter what it costs her...
Sound insane? Sound amazing? Sound like something you binge-read at 3AM with a flashlight while your power is out? It is. Believe me. Been there, done that. And it was so, so worth it. Pick up a copy of this glamorous book ASAP if you can. (Or order it online, because hey, social distancing.)
4: More Than This by Patrick Ness

More Than This is a mystery box of a novel I think it's best if you go into blind, so I won't spoil too much of the plot. Our main character is a teen boy who just died. Now he's woken up in his old neighborhood, although it seems abandoned and damaged, and the memories of his past that haunt him are his only company as he attempts to discover the truth about his current predicament.
Patrick Ness wrote the Dr. Who spin-off BBC's Class, which only got one season. I thought it was superb YA and I only watched it because of him and because of this novel. I'm not a huge WHO fan, but I'm a massive fan of Mr. Ness and his writing, all because of this book. I first read it when I'd been awake for 24-hours, and was planning to go to bed ASAP. I told myself I'd read a single chapter or two at the most, and ended up staying up and reading the whole book in two sittings. I had to put it down halfway through and go on a short walk because I was way too anxious over the plot and characters. Ness builds a ton of dread and tension by expertly unwinding multiple mysteries and narratives all at once, and it's honestly amazing to behold.
The vagueness of this book, the cover, the blurb, the John Green blurb on the cover, etc, all put me off of it for a while, but when I did eventually grab a copy and get into it, I was so glad I hadn't let my original reservations keep me away. This novel is YA gold and should be considered as such.
Also for those of you who like super gay stuff (as do I) it has LGBT+ content, and it's OwnVoices fiction, too, which is always nice! It's always rewarding to see a gay man get praised and be successful for writing gay male characters, since in the YA sphere, it's usually female authors leading the charge with gay/bi male content.
3: Origin by Jessica Khoury

Origin is the story of a girl named Pia who is immortal and impervious to all injury. Created by a group of dedicated scientists situated deep in the Amazon rainforest, she's the result of dubious genetic experiments and is sheltered, her information about the outside world censored, even as she is prepared to become a scientist in her own right and take over control of the laboratory one day. Once she sneaks out of her heavily guarded compound and meets a boy named Eio in the jungle, she begins to bond with him and his exploited indigenous tribe while they work to discover the hidden secrets of Pia's immortality.
Origin is a book that's close to my heart for various reasons, one being that I saw Jessica Khoury's posts on Query Boards back in 2011 or 2012. I knew of this novel before it was agented or published, and I loved watching her journey as an author. It's always nice to see somebody achieve their dreams and share in their excitement and enthusiasm. Another reason would be the happy memories I have attached to the book itself: in 2012 or 2013 just as I was about to start high school, I went school shopping with my mom one day, we took my dad's truck and went clothes and supplies shopping, it was a beautiful spring day and she let me peek inside the bookstore and pick something out for myself. I was immediately drawn to this book as I recognized the cover and I cherish it to this day as part of a fun, sunny memory with my mom. Which I should consider myself lucky for, considering Pia's mom? She's kind of a nightmare.
Pia's story is about rebellion, self-declaration, and loyalty to a cause, no matter what it costs you personally. I find it beautifully written - I know not everybody loves first-person, present-tense, but for me it's always been a personal favorite. From the mysterious compound and their hidden agendas, to the rush of first love between Pia and Eio, to the intense action scenes, I genuinely adore this novel.
Since its publication it's no longer technically a standalone; it has several 'companion' novels, but none of them are direct sequels, simply books set in the same world and genre about completely unrelated scenarios and characters. The sole connecting thread being the 'Corpus' company. Pia's story is just one of several in an anthology, so I think technically it can still be called a standalone, so I'm slapping it on here. It deserves it.
2: Tiger Lily by Jodi Lynn Anderson

It should be a crime to send your child to school like it's any normal old day after they've stayed up late reading this gem of a novel. Or at least that's what I would tell my own parents if they still listened to any of my insane ramblings. I read this in one night back when I was in middle school. No sleep that night, for sure. It was worth it, even though I was comatose the next day.
Tiger Lily is a novel that demands your attention and refuses to yield it until you've read it all. You can not simply 'pace yourself' with this one. It tells the story of Peter Pan and Tiger Lily, from the perspective of the fairy Tinker Bell. It rips out your heart unapologetically and stomps on it for fun, and it expects you to say thank you, and you should. I was hardly expecting a novel like this when I went into it, but Tiger Lily is that rare book that creeps up on you and takes you by surprise. It lives up to any and all hype; it's lyrical and lush, it's enchanting, like all fairy tales should be, and it reveals a dozen new sides to the story of Peter Pan and adds a new dimension to the life of this famous island and its inhabitants, from Hook to the Lost Boys, to Tink herself.
I have read a few other YA re-tellings/sequels/spin-offs of Peter Pan and I usually walk away disappointed. I ask myself why I even still do this and keep opening a can of worms I know is sour and gross as all hell. It's because of books like this, though, the kind there's no accounting for.
I think Anderson also deserves much credit for writing a firsthand account from a character who hardly speaks, can't properly communicate, etc. Tink is truly a silent witness and it's rare to see an author pull off a main character from a first-person POV like that with such grace. She was at the top of her game here, on every last page. We love to see it.
1: The Minnow by Diana Sweeney

The Minnow more than deserves the number one spot on this list. A heartbreaking, mature-skewered dark YA contemporary with lyrical prose and surrealist imagery, it features an orphaned main character whose hometown was the victim of a devastating flood. In the aftermath of this natural disaster she ekes out a living in a new world that she struggles to cope with, while attempting to balance visits with her aging grandmother who lives in a home and grappling with her own unexpected pregnancy by a much older man. A crystal clear glimpse into grief, trauma, small-town poverty, family ties, and the strength of a community, The Minnow is optimistic, but never naively so, and unrelentingly beautiful; a novel that reads like looking at stained glass feels.
I wasn't sure which genre this book was before I went into it initially; I'd received a copy on NetGalley and I figured the cover was lovely so I'd give it a try. I ended up discovering one of my favorite novels of all time.
The Minnow pulls zero punches, and it's best if you make peace with being heartbroken again and again before going in, because that's what you're in for. I can't stress enough how much I love this novel, the vivid world and characters, and the cutting voice Sweeney uses to illustrate the life of her main character. I think it's one of those desperately underrated books that could stand the test of time and become a classic, if only somebody would shine a light on it, so here I am, trying to do just that.
Thus concludes our (my) top-5! Comment below and tell me what your favorite YA standalone is, because I'd love to check out some more incredible books.
If you enjoyed this list you could always check out more of my content, or pick up a copy of my newest story, Faces in Weeds, a horror thriller set in the south! Get it here.

Love & Fear & Maybe More Robots

I'm listening to Karma by Marina again and I keep thinking that this double-album was underappreciated by the fandom. People on Popheads are always trashing it as her worst release but I really don't know. Karma is great, Orange Trees is one of my favorite songs by her, and a lot of people seem to love Handmade Heaven, like even people who dislike the albums agree that song is good. So. I think there's a false verdict on this one.

Anyway I've got this novella to edit and a novel to finish, and I'm sitting here resisting the lure of a new potential WIP. I HAVE WAY TOO MUCH ON THE GO TO START NEW STORIES. So I am holding myself back by the scruff of the neck.
I WILL get to that other story eventually, but yeah, tonight is all about Force. As is every night until I freaking finish it. I'm not playing around any more. I thought I'd have it AND the sequel out by now so I have to pick up slack. I will say, drafting-wise, this year has been very productive for me. But drafting, and editing those raw materials into a publishable product are not the same thing...I want Force to be perfect before I release it, and the same with these other projects. I want them at their full potential.
The thing with Force is, I can't just edit it; I have to edit it AND use it as a tool to set up the rest of the series. All other four novellas have ties to Force and what happens in it. It's the basis for this whole world. So it's a lot of pressure. Book two is going to be a lot more fun, I hope. Force isn't soul-crushing to work on like some other projects I've been dealing with, but it's tough, high-energy work, that's for sure. I am having fun spending time with these characters, though, especially Kacey and Unity.
All I know is that I would like to publish multiple titles this month and I don't know if that's going to be a realistically attainable goal right now. Only time will tell; it's all about patience. Now I'm going to go and add more androids and robots to this book now, because I just realized how crucial to the plot they are but also how few we see in book 1 compared to the others. Ah, the fun of editing.

June 25th, and That's That

Force is coming out on June 25th. Pushing it back eleven days shouldn't feel like such a huge deal, but it is. I have to hunker down and get this novella done. It's so intimidating though. I love editing, because it's magic, but it also feels like ramming my head into a wall sometimes, because it's dense, heavy work and it intimidates me. So much can go wrong. But it usually goes right. And I'm trying to do this thing where I cut off and replace negative thoughts with positive ones, so I'm going to do that and remind myself writing and editing are my hobbies, and they're a lot of fun, so I have to let them be fun and do what I think is right.

Anyway, aside from musing over my own editing insanity, I've been rereading the Shatter Me books; I just finished the first one last night and I'm about seventy pages into book two. It's the one where Juliette acts annoying and hysterical for the entire book, but she has PTSD so you gotta cut her some slack.
It's weird because even though Superhero High and Shatter Me are both dystopian superhero stories, I think mine is both more and less dystopian. In mine people still have cell phones and Spotify and like, Chinese takeout. So it feels more typical and normal. But then you see surveillance drones and propaganda posters and remember it isn't. In Shatter Me the world has really gone to shit. It's like Fallout where everything is rusty and radioactive and just, you know, shitty.
I think half my problem is I would rather be drafting. And I can't. I love it, but right now I need to work on this one project and finish it, and that makes me feel locked down, so all my brain is doing is thinking of new stories and narratives and situations it wants to write to get them down and out of my head, but I can't, because if I keep falling for shiny new ideas, I will never finish any of them! I don't want to fall into that trap. So instead I'm going to go and edit my damn book again. And it's coming out on June 25th, and that's that.