Alexandra Penn's Blog: The Scratch Library, page 2

Release Day: The Second Quarto

...Or rather, day-after-release day, since yesterday was a little crazy.

I've been hyping up the Second Quarto for months now: I am still very much in the honeymoon phase. It's beautiful and amazing and an absolute work of art, it's going to win awards and make me millions, and five months from now I won't be able to read it without going into months of existential angst. So I won't bore you guys again with that roller coaster.

Instead I'm gonna talk about the actual process of releasing someth...

Release Day: The Counterfeit Alphabet

The Letter Mage #8: The Counterfeit Alphabet is now out and available for Patrons to read! If you're not a Patron yet, it's not too late--new Patrons have access to all previously-published installments.

I am so, so excited about this one!  The past seven installments have been setup--introducing characters, inciting conflict, raising questions. Now Aleph's starting to take charge of things. His personality gets to shine a little brighter--kid's snarky when he lets himself be.

For those of you...

Release Day: The Chain Of Life

The Letter Mage #7: The Chain of Life is now out and available for Patrons to read! If you're not a Patron yet, it's not too late--new Patrons have access to all previously-published installments.

This was a tough one to write. Not because the story itself is particularly complicated (this is actually a shorter installment in preparation for the March 1st release, which is going to be longer than usual), but because I was utterly inspired by the wonderful Wendy Delsol this weekend at an Iowa W...

New Year's 2018

I've already done my "looking back on the year" post: 2017 was a great one, at least for The Letter Mage.  So now, on the first of January, it's time to look forward.

There's so much going on.

First things first, events: I'll be at the IOWA signing on July 21! This is an amazing Iowa-local writers' event. There'll be signings, readings, and tons of local authors. I'll have copies of both the first and second Quarto with me.

Speaking of which...

The seventh installment of our crazy journey will be announced sometime next week, once I'm back in Iowa. I'll have the next Flash Interlude out later today. And (drumroll please) The Letter Mage: Second Quarto is coming out in March!

The Second Quarto will include Installments 5-8, all previously-released and several new Flash Interludes, all back matter, and will be available in both paperback and e-book form.  Keep an eye out for the cover reveal: it's coming soon!

Finally, this year I'm ramping up a service I've been offering for a while: editing.  Most of you are familiar with with the Violet Realm, where the wonderful Erin Casey and I run sessions on fantasy and sci-fi writing! But I also offer one-on-one developmental editing, copyediting, proofreading, and even query help.  More info on my site if you're interested.

 

A quick shout-out...

This year I've had the fortune of befriending some incredible authors! I wanted to give a quick shout-out to some wonderful storytellers who deserve your attention on Patreon...

Erin Casey: My partner in crime when it comes to The Writers' Rooms, and one of my beta readers for The Letter Mage.  She writes medieval and urban fantasy, and her Patreon publishes one short story a month. 

Leslie Kung: One of our concierges for The Writers' Rooms. She writes variety fiction and is incredibly talented at gritty fantasy. 

Shakyra Dunn: Awesome local author who writes fantasy! Was just a semifinalist in the Golden Book Award Contest.

Dylan Moonfire: Runs Broken Typewriter Press, and a truly talented worldbuilder. In-depth fantasy/scifi. 

Sebastian Malloy: His intro on his Patreon page speaks for itself. Just read it.

I'm sure I'm missing people! Follow me on Twitter (@AlexPenname) if you want to know more about the Iowa Creative Corridor writing community. We're full of talent.

 

On a personal note...

This has been a great year, and I'm starting off the new one perfectly.  We spent Christmas with my dad and his partner (who is an incredibly kind woman), got to see my family, and ate just truly insane amounts of Christmas cookies. 

For New Year's, my aunts let us stay at their cabin in Maryland. It's close to where my dad lives, so we just met up with my mom. It's snowy and gorgeous and cozy as heck. It's also cold--nowhere near as cold as our little Iowa apartment, but I still feel like I've been basically writing ON the Prismatic Moon.

It really shouldn't be a surprise, but come this time of year I'm always blown away by how amazing my family and friends are.  The support and love I feel around the people who mean the most to me is just overwhelming. 

Patrons, every single one of you is a part of this.

I couldn't do this without you.  I hope you have a wonderful upcoming year: every single one of you deserves the best world we can make.  So let's make it happen.

Here's to 2018. 

Death by Yarn

For those of you who know me well,  you know I love crochet.  It's a hobby that lets me bleed off nervous energy while still getting to sit and binge-watch TV. It forces me to relax while I still feel like I'm accomplishing something.

Except for once a year.

Once a year, I get it into my head that I don't need to spend money on Christmas presents! I'll just make them! I'm a fast worker and it's so much cheaper!

I fall for it every damn time.  Send help. I'm only halfway done. 

December Giveaway Update

We have reached a TON of goals over the past few weeks, so it's high time to start rewarding you for it. 

First, we FLEW by the sales goal I set for the First Quarto last month--I almost blinked and missed it.  You're freaking amazing.  

So as a thank you, I set up my biggest giveaway yet: two e-books, a signed paperback First Quarto, and a T-shirt will go out to four lucky winners! Patrons, anyone who ups their pledge, and signs up as a new Patron will get extra entries, and anyone who leaves a review on any medium will get TWO extra entries. The giveaway drawing will be on New Year's Day, and anyone who likes me on Facebook will be eligible.

Second, the Prismatic Moon story arc will be finishing up with Prismatic Men: Part Two, so I've got some fun stuff lined up: starting tomorrow, I'm going to be releasing the Flash Interludes from the First Quarto to the public.  I'll be putting out one a week, culminating in an unreleased Flash Interlude that comes after Prismatic Men. 

It's a huge teaser for the end of the Second Quarto (coming out in March or so) so don't miss it.

Third! I'm aiming to release the next installment (aforementioned Prismatic Men: Part Two) on December 15th, but due to various holidaymaking requirements with my beta readers it may be a Christmas present instead. 

Finally, I'll be bugging you all with some fun appearances and extras stuff this weekend, and then I promise I'll lay off the e-mails. 

You're all amazing. Thank you so much.  If there's one thing I can be grateful for this year, it's you guys. 

--

You can view this post in its original on my Patreon account.

NaNoNoMo

Well, it's November 29th, and after a month of hard work, tons of research, and furious writing...

I totally bombed NaNoWriMo. Tapped out at 20k, although my wordcount on the site is even less than that.

I've actually only ever won once, in 2014, because it was the worst year of my life. I wrote a wandering, fun, easy story about a bookstore that gets abducted by aliens (one which I'm still editing) and juuust slipped in under the deadline. Usually I'm a little over-ambitious, which was the case here: Antikythera required WAY more research than I'd initially expected. I'm apparently at the point in my Classical education where I know enough to know I know absolutely nothing.

Never fear, of course! The Letter Mage was my NaNoWriMo failure of 2016, and Antikythera is very much not going anywhere. The plot is wonderful, I love the main character (as violent as she is), and I cannot wait to see where the novel goes.

Hope everyone out there who celebrates has had a wonderful NaNoWriMo and Thanksgiving. Here's to the end of the year--December's going to be great.

Reflecting October

October is sort of a hard month for me.

Mostly this is due to anniversaries.  October 13th has been dubbed "International Anti-Bitch Day" by myself and my girlfriend because it's my anniversary with not one but two weird exes, one of whom was a legitimately abusive woman.  Later in the month is the anniversary of my grandfather's death: he went out in a room filled with laughter and love, so it's not a bad memory. But it's a hard one. 

And that same week is the anniversary of the day my nuclear family disintegrated. I call it Broken Bone Week: there were a lot of things that came to a head at once, and my life kind of... reset.  My parents divorced. That needed to happen--three years later they're both infinitely happier and I've never had better relationships with either of them.  But my best friend at the time, who was living in our home, pretty much dropped a nuclear bomb on what would have otherwise been a stressful-but-necessary situation.

He told me we didn't really have anything without him benefiting from my family. He moved in with my aunts for six months and lied to them about what an awful person I was.  We'd been planning on becoming roommates, and he accused me of using him to move out of the house. My family, when I asked for help, had no idea what to make of the situation. It was treated like high school drama.

Or like I was making a big deal out of nothing, because I kept my parents' confidence on their divorce: no one believed me when I told them there was more to the situation. In retrospect he was a pretty awful friend and frankly a terrible person (he once told me not to leave a cheating partner because "I wouldn't find anyone better"), but I still called him my brother.

Every year, I write about it.  Not because I haven't moved on--I have, mostly, although I'm still figuring out new ways that screwed up my perception of friendships--but because it's a big milestone in my life.

Sometimes when a bone gets broken, it heals wrong.  At a weird angle, or slightly off-center. It might be functional, but it's not whole.  The doctors have to break it again and set it properly to get it to heal the right way.  I went through some trauma when I was little, which is another journal entry in itself, and it took me a long time to figure out friendship after that. I had no concept of people liking me, or connecting with me. It just didn't make sense.

You might understand why I call it Broken Bone Week.

Relationships are complicated. They just are--no one in the world naturally has healthy ones, honestly. They take a ridiculous amount of hard work.  But every October, I look back at where I was and realize how far I've come.  The mistakes I've made: multitudes, but never as bad as calling a toxic person my brother for ten years.  The progress I've made: my healthy friendships, the old ones I've rekindled.  The family in my life: my parents, who are so much happier, and the strong relationships I have with my extended family.

I've learned so much.  That's worth a couple broken bones.

October is a hard month, but it's my favorite month. The leaves change, tea takes on a distinct warmth in the chilly air, we get to plan out new novels and wear ridiculous costumes, the sweaters come back out for the winter. I'm lucky in that all the hard anniversaries are centered around a time when self-care is easy for me. I love the fall.

And the seasons keep getting easier. 

October Updates and November Plans

Well, this has been one hell of a month.

I kicked off October with ICON42, my second ICON and first convention as an actual author.  I sold most of my paperbacks--I have more on order for the signing on November 3rd, don't worry--and spoke on a truly alarming number of panels.  Also my dad came to visit and help out, which was absolutely wonderful. He lives across the country and I hadn't seen him in months. 

Both the paperback and Kindle versions of the First Quarto were released this month.  Got amazing feedback on both those and The Viridian Boy, which is Installment #4.

I'm going to try and have The Prismatic Men, Part One out on Halloween, but I'm not sure I'll make it. We'll see how that goes.  Part Two will be out one month after Part One (yep, two-parter) so keep an eye out for that.

Finally, November's going to be amazing.  Antikythera, which I've been researching for the past few months, is my November project: feel free to follow my progress on the ! I'm always open to writing buddies.  For November we'll have The Writers' Rooms as an open writing space as well, so if you're in Iowa City feel free to stop by and join us. 

In Which Alexandra Procrastinates

I have a question for all the language nerds out there: did any of you, while studying Latin in middle school, read through the Cambridge books? Where you start out with these cute little readings about a banker and his family and his dog, and you learn about festivals and slaves and artists and stuff...

...And then Mt. Vesuvius erupts and literally EVERYONE dies? 

Because I just found my old copy.

Yes, yes, I know I'm supposed to be getting my timeline and tech tree together for Antikythera next month, and I owe you guys The Letter Mage #5, but apparently my time today is going to be spent reminiscing over Caecilius' petrified corpse. We'll get TLM edited tomorrow afternoon. 

Latin is... close to Classical Greek, right? Only off by a couple extremely volatile centuries!