Trey Stone's Blog, page 37

Book Review: The Last Wish: The Witcher #1

I’ve wanted to read the books for a while now, and I’ve finally managed to get through this first one. My fascination with The Witcher goes back to when I played the second video game, back in 2011. I never actually liked the game, but the story stuck with me. And since the release of The Witcher III in 2015, I’ve been hooked. I’m still playing that.

Anyway – if you’re not familiar with The Witcher series, in either book or game form (there’s going to be a Netflix adaption as well, with Henry Cavill, and there’s already been some movies and other series), it’s all in the name. We follow, The Witcher – or one of them at least – Geralt of Rivia. A Witcher is a sort of monster hunter, a mercenary you can hire to kill monsters for you – and believe me – in the world of Witchers, there’s a lot of monsters.

Witchers such as Geralt come about through a lot of hard training from a very young age, as well as mutations. The mutations are what really grant Witchers their powers, such as increased strength, speed, and agility, as well as cat-like eyes that are yellow and can see in the dark, and their unusual white hair.

The Last Wish is the first book in the series, and as so very many ‘first books in series’ it’s a collection of several shorter stories. They’re all told as flashbacks, or recalled, by Geralt as he rests in a temple. I won’t go into detail about the plot of the stories, they’re all great, they’re all worth it, but I felt maybe the last one fell a bit short.

Something that surprised me about this book is how much it all reminded me of old fairtytales I used to hear as a kid. It’s a different brand of fantasy, I’m not sure how to explain it, but it feels older in a sense, with more wonder, more imagination.

Though I loved this book, I feel like I haven’t quite gotten to know Geralt yet. I want to see more of his adventures, more of his monster-slaying, and more of the trouble he gets himself in. Because that’s what being a Witcher is all about, and seeing as I know quite a bit about the Witcher-lore already, I know how much better it’s going to get (hopefully). So I’m looking forward to another, preferably longer continuing story about The Witcher. But this books serves exactly it’s purpose, to set up various characters, to showcase Geralt, The Witcher and what he does for a living, and to introduce us to the world.

The Witcher series is also known for being quite sexy, at times. Geralt is as much of a lady killer as he is a monster killer, so don’t go buying this to your young son who’s enjoying the Hobbit.

I loved this book, and I’m looking forward to getting on with the next one, I plan on reading them all.

Book Review: The Agony Of An Age by J.W. Barlament

This fantasy epic is a three-in-one novel, with three separate stories following different characters on three different adventures. The stories are, in short:

First – Rahdain, an immortal soldier is reluctantly forced to lead a final charge as the head of an army, together with Seivar the Deathless.

Second – King Hallmund, after losing his Queen, also loses his city to an uprising and must flee. We follow him on his journey to retake his throne and topple the rebellion.

Third – Reolus and his family are fleeing for their lives from Tamerssan, the vicious and psychotic leader of a crazed warband. As they flee through the forest they team up with a group of hunters, and Reolus must do anything in his power to save his wife and three children.

All these stories happen in the same universe, referring to the same kingdoms, the same people, and the same gods. But other than that, they are disconnected. There are no living characters that cross over, as far as I noticed at least, and these stories are separate. Though I do love short stories (although I’m not sure these three stories can be considered short), I would love to have seen more of a cross-over, of consequence and events bleeding over between the separate stories.

Barlament has made a huge effort to create a vast world, and I don’t say that lightly, because this book is long. The language is beautiful and well-written, but I felt like I didn’t manage to connect to well with the characters.

Of the three stories, the third was my favorite, because in this one I could really understand what was at stake – I could understand the worry, the danger, the hopelessness. In the first two, though I grasped the story, I’d liked to have seen more. Maybe if there had been some continuation between the stories, or if the book had only been one longer story, I’d have time to get fully invested. I felt like when I finally got to understand the characters, the story was over and we were on to something new – there wasn’t time for me to get truly invested.

But don’t misunderstand, Barlament has created a massive fantasy epic in The Agony Of An Age, one that I’m sure fantasy lovers will come to enjoy.

Why You Should Probably Edit On Paper

Okay, let me rephrase that – because I don’t like telling people what to do. This is why you should probably try editing on paper. If you’ve tried it, don’t like it, and don’t want to do it again – that’s fine. You do you.

I’m used to the screen. Hell, I practically grew up on a screen, being a millennial I’m used to that burning sensation of blue light scratching my retinas, and I like it that way. Every waking moment I’m locked onto a screen, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the robot overlords made sure I am at night as well.

Anyway – my point is – I like working on my screen. I draft on the screen, and I usually edit on the screen. It’s fast, it’s more organized. No funky handwriting I need to decode (because believe me, it is very funky), and I have everything saved in the same place. People say you working with hard copies help them catch other mistakes they don’t see on the screen, but I fix that by reading out loud. (You don’t really realize how many spelling mistakes you’re even able to cook up, until you read out loud).

But I’m the kind of guy who’ll try anything twice. So I printed out my latest manuscript, and went in to edit by hand.

It’s awful. Let me say it right here right now. It’s slow, it’s annoying, it’s disorganized. I couldn’t find good ways to sit, I couldn’t get comfortable, and I was suddenly made aware of the fact that paper isn’t backlit.

It was super annoying.

But I just finished my edits today, and here’s my conclusion: it feels much more effective. I’m not saying it’s more efficient, because it took bloody ages. But it feels more thorough. When I edit – I can quite remember which number draft I was on at the point when I printed it out – but I usually make very many passes. Very, many. I can go through my whole MS only caring about one thing, and then I’ll save it as “Draft no# (next number)” and then I’ll do it all again. And again. And again. It’s kind of like sanding wood, taking a little bit of the top at a time.

But on paper I felt like it was much easier to do huge chunks of work at the same time. Going through my manuscript now (the one I’ve printed out), it feels like I’ve solved so much more than what I usually do on the screen. And now, I haven’t gotten this far yet, but I imagine putting all these things to work on the screen will be easier as well, because I have this huge stack of notes next to me.

(Oh, there’s another thing: working on paper made much more inclined to just pick up a few pages and edit, during time when I probably wouldn’t have bothered turning on my laptop. So there’s that).

Again, I’m not going to tell you what to do. If you’re my generation and as comfortable as I am on a screen, I think that’ll do just fine. But from now on, I’m doing both. Several, quick rounds on screen and then at least one gargantuan pass on paper. It works.

The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass

This book, number 4 in the series, continue right from where number 3 left off. If you haven’t read my previous reviews, you can find them here, for book 1, book 2, and book 3.

After walking around for a short while, Roland and his companion stop to make camp, and this is kind of where the book really begins. You see, nearly all of book 4, excluding parts at the beginning and end, is a story told by Roland to the Eddie, Susannah, and Jake. It’s a story from Roland’s childhood and before I get into it I want to say this:

I didn’t like it.

The story Roland tells us is complex and there’s no way I can explain all of it. It’s about him and his friends: Cuthbert Allgood and Alain Johns, and follows their travels away from Gilead to Mejis, shortly after Roland has become a gunslinger. It’s a story about adventure, friendship, love, loss… I could go on. I’m not going to, but you get it.

It’s a beautiful backdrop to Roland’s past, lots of world- and character building. It really paints a vivid picture of how things used to be.

But I didn’t like it. Not because it wasn’t interesting, it just wasn’t interesting enough. I always wanted for the story to end, so we could go back to Jake, Eddie, and Susannah. Hearing about young Roland was fun, just… not fun enough.

Of course, I finished the book. Even though I didn’t like it, I wasn’t stupid enough to think that all of this storytelling was for nothing. Oh no. But I noticed I wasn’t particularly gripped by the story of young Roland. I could probably do with reading it again, because I got to admit, there are big chunks I don’t even remember already now. They just, didn’t stick with me, do you know what I mean?

By the end, I was super excited to get back to the ‘present’. I wanted Roland and his Ka’tet to get up, to keep moving, to go look for the tower. And of course, they did. And at this point Roland’s story of childhood, became very relevant. Let me say that again: veeeeeery relevant.

I knew it would be, of course I did. And I’m not saying I didn’t like the book as a whole. But I felt like Roland’s story could have been much shorter, and I’ve got to say, this is probably my least favorite Dark Tower book so far.

Very excited about the next, though. Can’t wait.

Reading Once Or Twice?

A little while back, I tweeted about the fact that I rarely ever re-read books. I have done it in the past, especially when I was really young, but it just doesn’t happen anymore. A lot of people shared my experience, in that they usually always wanted to go on to reading something else, and a lot of people said they loved going back to those old favorites.

The original tweet went like this:

I hardly ever read a book more than once, and the last time I did it was years ago. How do people find the time to read a book 5-10 times?? Have you seen the amount of books out there?! We’re responsible for them getting read, step up

I’d like to point out that though I meant every word, this was also an attempt at humor. Also, I need to highlight that this isn’t something I do on purpose. I don’t actively decide that I’m never reading this book again. I like books, I have a lot of books. It just kind of… doesn’t happen.

But then something interesting happened, because someone actually challenged my view. This isn’t a direct quote, but basically they said that:

You miss things by only reading once. You need to go back and revisit stories to truly grasp them, to truly understand. It’s not enough to only read once.

This sparked an interesting discussion, because it went beyond simply saying that reading twice is fun. The person in question is a teacher of literature, as far as I could gauge, and likely dives deeper than most of us when it comes to reading. They pick things apart, annotates, really studies the writing, and obviously therefore thinks you miss out if you don’t do those things.

Like me, who only read books once.

As the discussion moved on, the person also made a good point about how we read:

Reading shouldn’t be a chore. You don’t have to rush through a book just to finish. If you don’t like it, put it away. Read what you want, how often you want, and as many as you want.

Again, this isn’t a direct quote. But you get the gist, as do I. Of course reading should be a pleasure. It should be a reward, something you truly enjoy, something you can hide away and do when you really need some quality time alone.

But then again, I like to read a lot. And yeah, maybe I plow through a bit, especially if I’m not completely gripped by the plot. Because that’s another thing, I very rarely don’t finish a book. I just can’t do it. I need to see it to the end, unless it’s completely unreadable. Which means that maybe I skim some boring parts.

The pleasure for me is to keep reading, to experience new stories, new worlds, new characters. So I want to read many things, and obviously I can’t argue for how it feels to read a book many times (since I don’t do it), but haven’t we both read the same story even if I’ve only read it once and you’ve read it seven times?

Won’t the story be the same?

This is the idea that made this so very interesting for me, and also why I’m writing this. If I was to re-read something, what would it be? The way people spoke about it, was as if they absolutely had to re-read their favorites. When I try to think of which books I’d like to re-read, the list is either too long, or it’s empty. There are no definite must-read-again titles that pop into my head.

My wife brought to my attention that this might have more to do with who I am as a person. I don’t really have any favorites when it comes to anything. No favorite movie, song, band, place, and I don’t get excited about a lot of things. (What she really meant is that I’m passive and boring.)

But I think it’s all about what we like to do as people. My aunt and her family goes on holiday to the same country, same place, every year. They’ve done that for twelve years, because it’s easy, safe, and familiar. I could never do that, I’d go insane from boredom.

Like I said, I don’t know a book as well as someone who’s read it 6 times. But I’ve read 5 other books.

What’s more worth to me? What’s more worth to you?

I’m going to revisit an old favorite, because I’m intrigued by how people talk about it. It sounds exciting to revisit an old story and “come home,” as a few people put it. I haven’t decided what it will be yet, I tried thinking back 15 years to see if I could remember what I’d read, but I couldn’t think of anything.

As of now, it’ll probably be the first Harry Potter or The Hobbit, and I’ll write about my experience when I’m done. I’m looking forward to it.

I’m excited to go back.

Editing: Paper VS Screen

I’m in the process of editing my second book, for – I have no idea, the plentyeth time. I’ve printed the whole thing out this time, a hug slab of papers, piled up on my desk.

The plan is to go through everything by hand, then combined with my editors notes, and a whole bunch of feedback from beta readers, go through whole thing one last time, implementing everything. One huge slow burn. Then, (hopefully), there’s just proof reading left.

Many people will swear by editing on paper. Print the stuff out, they’ll say. It helps. I’m not so sure. I prefer the screen, as long as you read out loud, I don’t really buy into the whole “you pick up more stuff on paper”. It’s easier on the screen, you won’t lose a page, it’s easier to read your notes, it’s simpler really.

But one thing that I’ve realized is much easier with paper, is how easy it is to do. How easy it is to just sit down, edit a few pages, whenever you want. That’s a big pro right there, at least for me, because it makes it easier to go through it all. You can take five pages here, ten pages there, or just one every now and then. Not having to boot my laptop and find all my files makes me more eager to work, often.

But still, I can’t wait until I’m through this pile, so I can go back to making my pretty, pretty draft, prettier.

What do you think? How do you work best? What works for you? Any secret tips and tricks to share?

Book Review: An American Family by Jackson Paul Baer

Isaac, father of two-Carter and Olivia-has his whole life turned upside down when his wife Ramie disappears one night. The FBI conclude that the case is pretty clear: she was taken by a serial killer and they’ll probably never find her body. The rest of the family find it hard to adjust, as Isaac turns to drinking and his teenage children turn to other vices, all of them trying to keep the little of family they have left, together.

This is my third Baer book, and yet again, Baer writes with elegance and momentum. This book his quite fast paced to begin with, and then dials it down – way down. I could argue that the book is slow, that there isn’t much plot there in the middle. But that’s where Baer’s writing shines, in the small details, the delicate nuances. The family that is left between the three people, the livest they try to cling to. It’s captivating.

The ending both surprised me and was exactly as I thought – I won’t spoil it but I’ll say there is a sequel to this book. I kind of wish that more of the mystery and the dark and gritty of it all (with the disappearance and serial killer) will be dealt with in the next book, because I didn’t feel like it was focused enough upon in this one. But once again, that’s not what it’s about. It’s not about those who were taken away, it’s about those remained.

Not my favorite Baer book, but I’m still a fan. He writes with passion, and it shows.

You can find more on Baer and his work here – go check it out.

I Wrote A Book – In A Week

Last week I did something a bit crazy. I had a week off. And it’s NaNoWriMo, so I decided to catch up. I did my very best to try and write 50k words in a week (7 days), and I did it – or well kind of. I managed 43,900 in 6 days, which is when I decided that draft 1 was finished.

If you want to read more about the process and everything before hand, you can find that here. This post will serve kind of has a conclusion, I suppose – summarizing how it felt, how it went, and what I learned.

I’ll give you some short practical background: I had the entire week off and I don’t have any kids. I literally did nothing but write, eat, and go to the gym in the evenings. I even slept in late almost every morning, because I’m a fucking slob. Also, I got quite ill toward the weekend, but even then, I managed. (This is not supposed to show how great I am – more how surprisingly well this went).

How it went: I’m a pantser, not a plotter, which means I just sit down and write. I feel like it made this kind of easy to me. I think my “outline” (if I can even call it that), was 150 words or something. Just some very basic ideas about what the story was about, but before I started I didn’t have a single character name, hardly any idea what was going to happen, and no clue how it would end. The majority of my outline was where the plot happened and the role of my protagonist.

To make 50k in a week I had to do 7142 words minimum every day. I started the first day off with doing more than, and I managed to maintain the extra words until the sixth day (when I was 10k words short, instead of 14k). I ended up only writing about 3,5k on the sixth day, which is when I realized that the book was done. Or at least the first draft was.

It was surprisingly easy to write 7-8k words a day (remember, I had nothing else to do). To be honest, I didn’t think I’d be able to make it, I thought I’d be stuck, become unfocused (which I was at times), but most of all I expected myself to quit.



But I didn’t. As soon as I learned to just let go of my thoughts and write, it went super fast. That was the only thing really slowing me down – thinking. I noticed as soon as I started to think about what I wanted to say or how I wanted to say it, I came to an abrupt halt. When I didn’t think of it, I could do 1500-1800 words an hour.

On top of all of that, I was also surprised at how well the story came out. I actually really like it, I think it’s clever, unique, something I might actually put out there at some point. It’s just a first draft, of course, but it’s a very strong foundation for a story. That surprised me a lot, I was very afraid it would be useless garbage that wouldn’t make sense, but each day it kept getting better and better.

This was all an experiment, to begin with. I’ve never done NaNoWriMo properly, and I asked around on Twitter why people did it (personally I don’t see the appeal because it takes time away from my regular writing). But people said they liked the challenge, so that’s what I did – made it a real challenge.

Even though I didn’t make 50k, I’d say I succeeded. Now, am I going to write future novels in a week? Or should you? I don’t think I’d recommend it, unless you’re already a full-time writer, and have the opportunity to sit and write ALL day (which is awesome by the way, I loved being at home writing).

But it’s very exhausting. As I neared the weekend I looked forward to getting it done, but then again, maybe if I did this all the time, every week, I’d treat it differently.

One thing that I’m happy I learned though, was to draft faster. That ability to just let go of your thoughts and make words appear is amazing – and it’s not as bad as you think! I feel like I’ve come away with a very useful skill in that sense, so maybe you should try it, just to see if it can help you in a similar way? Not that there’s a need to write super fast, but it’s more the ability to free myself, to stop hindering myself that appeals to me.

Writing A Book In A Week

Short story: I was supposed to go on holiday for a week in November, but it’s been cancelled. So I’m sitting here, a week off work with nothing to do, and everyone’s doing NaNoWriMo. So I figured I’ll try to catch up.

My Goal: I’m going to write a novel in a week.  Since NaNo is 50.000 words, that’s what I’m going for. (If you don’t know what NaNoWriMo is, go check it out here.) I’ve never done it officially, but this week I’ll try to join in my own special way.

Methodology: I’m starting on  Monday (November 12), ending on Sunday (November 18). I need to write an average of 7148 words a day, to make it. I’m not doing much else this week, so I’m going to treat it as a day job.

What am I writing: I always have, at all times, multiple future projects lined up. I’m not a plotter anyway, so any of those could work, but I do tend to stop and do a bit of research here and there as I’m going. So I’ve chosen a project that I think is going to be easy to work a lot on, quickly. I don’t want to be caught up in having to solve plot issues or work out whats happening (even if it’s just a 1st draft).

I’m writing a thriller-horror thing, set in a run down hotel (cue all The Shining references). There’s going to be only on major character, a man who’s checking in to the hotel, and a few side characters, the people who live and work there. I have a bit more planned than that, but I don’t want to give too much away, it’s probably going to chance a lot anyway. Currently, I have 74 words in the outline for this project. Yes, this is how I work.

Expectations: I’ll be honest and objective about this: I don’t think I’ll be successful. I’ll be happy if I even reach half the word count at 25k, but I’ll try my best. My biggest challenge is trying to not be too distracted and actually putting the work down, even if I’ve sat down to write.  But we’ll see.

Day-to-day Updates: I’ll be adding notes, thoughts, and word counts per day below. This is an exciting project both because I might have a book at the end, but it’s also a challenge for myself to see if it’s a sustainable work method. I’m curious to see how it will go.

Monday (12th):

Tuesday (13th):

Wednesday (14th):

Thursday (15th):

Friday (16th):

Saturday (17th):

Sunday (18th):

Book Review: 720 Heartbeats by Jaka Tomc

“A thought-provoking mystery, thrilling to the end.”

In Tomc’s 720 Heartbeats, we follow Slovenian police detective, Rok, through a thrilling mystery as his best friend and partner, Boris gets shot. Boris survives but his wife who’s also shot, doesn’t. A tragic and unexplainable event in and of itself, but the weirdest part is that Rok already knew it would happen. It was written down as a diary entry on his laptop, one Rok of course ignored, not only because of the insane, unbelievable event that was detailed there, but because it  was written a day into the future.

As Rok tries to wrap his head around the supernatural mystery of how the diary entries – seemingly written by his future self – are appearing on his laptop, he’s also trying to investigate the shooting of his friend, all the while dealing with his personal and social life, in a haze of cigarettes, wine, and whiskey.

It’s hard to describe this book. It’s a thriller, a mystery, a supernatural-something, but at the same time it’s deeply philosophical. Tomc’s writing makes you wrap your head around a lot of big subjects, making you think about life, the world, and a lot of things. In addition to Tomc’s great writing, the book is not too long, very well paced, and overall just a joy to read.

I love books who can lead me on, make me try to figure out what’s going on, but all the while have me stumble just a few steps behind. This one does that. It drags you in and keeps you coming, always setting the pace just high enough for you to not fall off.

There’s obviously two separate case–mysteries even–going on here, and we’re constantly waiting for them to be intertwined, waiting for the threads to mingle. The mystery kept me on my toes through out the whole novel, and I’m still not quite sure what I think of the end. I’m not sure I ever will be.

A joy to read, I’d recommend this to anyone looking for a good thought-provoking mystery. Check it and Jaka Tomc out here.