Brian Hagan's Blog, page 3

Music Monday: Two Steps From Hell – Impossible (feat. Merethe Soltvedt)

It’s probably no surprise to you at all that today’s Music Monday is a piece by Two Steps from Hell. I find their music super inspiring, empowering, and motivating. I listen to their stuff and it makes me want to write! Today’s piece, Impossible, includes a very interesting instrument played by the amazing Merethe Soltvedt. I’m not going to tell you what instrument it is, because all your preconceived notions of what this instrument sounds like are just going to discourage you. I promise, though, that once again Two Steps from Hell has delivered an experience that’s dramatic and beautiful. Give it a listen!

Music Monday: Two Steps From Hell – Strength Of A Thousand Men [Instrumental Core Remix]

Certain songs on my playlist make me thing of certain characters. Today I’m sharing the song that always makes me think of Maggie from The Horrible Plan of Horace Pickle. Enjoy!

Developing Ideas

I just watched the short video from Tested where Adam Savage gets to check out the new gun blasters from Bladerunner 2049. During the video, the Prop Master Doug Harlocker talks about how they went through several iterations of the new blaster design–more than six! It’s common to see this amount of iteration on a film production that aims to be a memorable classic, because often it takes several iterations to refine an idea to that level of perfection (not to be confused with “perfect” which is unobtainable).

Now ask yourself, how much iteration went into your last project? If you’re a writer, how many drafts? How many revisions? Not all projects will require a ton of reworking, but by being conscious of the iterative creative process you can help ensure a successful project. If the possibility of revising your work isn’t even in your mind, then you’re probably missing out on the best way to improve it and yourself.

Anyway, if you haven’t seen the video I’m talking about, you should check it out!

Brian’s Late Review: The Other Wind

Welcome to another of my Late Reviews, where I review something long after it’s left the spotlight and people stopped caring. Today, I’m going to share some quick thoughts about Ursula K Le Guin’s The Other Wind.

The Other Wind is an incredible book that taps a whole cast of characters to tell its tale. While previous stories focused on Ged in some way as he solved some crisis or another, this time the Archmage takes a much smaller role. That’s not to suggest that the problem the characters face is smaller, but rather, it’s so much bigger than Ged has ever tackled and soon a host of the strongest and wisest of Earthsea are stepping up to do what needs done.

The Other Wind makes for such a grand, cumulative, finale to the Earthsea Cycle that I won’t be upset if Le Guin never writes another (but oh, I hope she does!) My only regret is that I waited so long to read it.

You can get a copy of The Other Wind, and help support me and my writing by using the link blow:

If you’re unfamiliar with the Earthsea Cycle (a fantasy series frequently held to be the sole equal to JRR Tolkien’s work) you can get the first book here:

 

Inspiration in a Can (of Olives)

I’m just putzing along Facebook one evening when I see a link shared by a friend. “If you ever wondered why green olives are in jars and black olives are in cans,” she said above the link. Oddly enough, I’ve wondered that exact thing. So, I clicked the link like the fool I am, and read the wonderful story of why black olives are in cans. It was inspiring. I mean, such a little thing that–how many people ask themselves the same question, and just mosey on with their lives? I certainly did. But lo and behold, in 2014 Dan Weissman wasn’t so lazy and he discovered a truly incredible story in an incredibly unlikely place. You can read it here!

Music Mondays: Les Poules Huppées (“Crested Hens”) + Far Away ~ Waltz by Katy Adelson

I haven’t done a Music Monday in a little bit, so here’s a beautiful recording by Katy Adelson. This is, apparently, a combination of two songs. I’m not familiar with either of them, and they blend together so smoothly that I didn’t realize it was two different tunes until I read the description (although I should have realized it from the title, oh well).

This is the sort of song that you can close your eyes to, relax, and sway with the beat. The imagery it summons to me is bittersweet: beautiful landscapes worked by people who toil daily, bearing their hardships, and still go home and smile and laugh with their families. It’s the persistence of the human spirit and the joys that can be had despite how bad things can otherwise be.

Flash Fiction Challenge 2: The Right Thing to Do

Foreword:

Here’s my second entry to the 2017 Flash Fiction Challenge. This time my prompts were Historical Fiction, A Machine Shop, and A Turtle. Now, Historical Fiction is a genre I really enjoy and I certainly enjoy history. Normally it would be a challenge just to decide on what era to set the story, what with 6000 years of written history to draw upon, but the prompt kind of took care of that for me by reducing the range down to the last 150 years (although gears and mechanics were in use much earlier than 1850, the place manufacturing them would more likely be termed a forge, smithy, factory, refinery, or just “workshop” rather than a “machine shop”). I knew I didn’t want to do a ‘modern’ setting, and after some brainstorming I settled on a very specific time & place. I hope you enjoy it!

 

The Right Thing to Do

Charlie leaned over the box next to his table. Inside was a turtle. At present, the two of them were alone in Stoddard Manufacturing Company’s machine shop, and Charlie had mustard greens. He handed a bit down to the turtle, whose slow munching, and the buzzing of their new electric lamps were the only sounds in the shop. Charlie watched the turtle eat under the artificial light, happy that Stoddard Manufacturing decided to mark the turn of the century by installing them in their little bicycle machining department.

“It’s gonna be a slow one tonight, Watson,” Charlie said to the turtle. “Just you, me, and Fred. He should be here soon with our work.” Fred was the foreman and Charlie’s boss, but it was hard to not feel like partners when they worked on building bicycles all day together. More than that, they were good friends almost as soon as Charlie was hired by Stoddard.

Across the shop, a door opened and slammed.

“Charlie, I got it,” a man called. “They actually gave it to me!”

“Speak of the devil,” Charlie said. He dropped the rest of the greens into Watson’s box and got up. “What’s that, Fred?”

Fred walked into the office briskly, carrying a large roll of paper under his arm. His face beamed brightly, like a boy who’s just shot his first squirrel. He threw down the roll of paper and started to take off his jacket.

“You shoulda seen me, Charlie,” he said. “I went into that little shop of theirs and I said to ‘em, ‘look, the past three years you ask me to make these gears and parts for you, and it’s always the same pieces but with slightly different ratios and measurements, yeah? You’re obviously tryin’ to build something, and it obviously ain’t a bicycle, and you can’t get it right. Let me know what you’re buildin’ and maybe I can help you out.’ And I didn’t think they would, but they did.”

“Did what?” Charlie didn’t like drawn out stories. Fred did.

“Tell me what they’re buildin’,” he said excitedly. “In fact they did more than that, they gave me this.”

Fred pushed away Charlie’s few things to make space on the table, and rolled out the paper. They stared at it in silence.

“Good Lord Almighty, that’s what they’ve been working on?” Charlie looked down at the paper. “And we’re going to help them?”

“No, Charlie, we’re not,” Fred said quietly. “We’re going to build it ourselves. You and me.”

“What?” Charlie laughed. “We can’t do that.” He paused, waiting for Fred to agree. He just stared back.

“We have a machine shop. It’s better than theirs,” Fred said. “Of course we can make this.”

“No. They’ll catch us,” Charlie continued. “There’s no way we could build that whole thing without them finding out. Why, they’ll show up in a week for the first batch of parts and they’ll know something’s up when we haven’t got’m!”

Fred shrugged. “So we’ll make them their parts. But make them wrong, just a little, so they won’t notice unless they check real well. And then we’ll make our own parts for us. We’ll be done by the time they sort it out, and by then we’ll have it! Think of it! We could make history!”

Charlie shook his head. “I won’t do it,” he said. He started rolling up the paper. “This is wrong, Fred. I thought I knew you better.”

“Get your hands off that!” Fred pushed Charlie away. “I thought I knew you better,” he shouted, pointing a finger. “I thought you wanted to make something of yourself.”

“Yes, but by myself! I’m no thief!”

As soon as he said it, he realized the implication of his words: Fred, his friend, was a thief. Not a petty thief, either. This was theft on a grander scale than mere possessions. Fred wanted to steal a spot in history. Charlie could share that spot, if he wanted. He could keep his friendship with Fred. It was tempting.

They stood quietly, silently daring each other to say the next thing. Fred wanted to punch him, and Charlie would’ve gladly punched back. Fred inhaled slowly, steeling himself to break the silence.

“You’re fired,” he said. “Take your damn turtle and get out.” He grabbed the half-rolled paper from the table and turned towards the door of their office.

“Don’t do this,” Charlie plead.

“Get out!” Fred yelled so loud the electric lamps vibrated with this voice. “And if you tell anyone about this,” he held up the paper, “You’ll regret it. I’ll make sure of that.”

Charlie waited for a moment after Fred was through the door, hoping that he would come back out. Hoping he would come to his senses. Apologize. The quiet moment dragged out, and Charlie knew there was nothing more he could do here. He looked down in the box beside the table where Watson was still eating. He picked up the turtle, and left.

An hour later, Charlie walked through the night towards the building owned by his uncle-in-law. The lights of the bicycle shop were on despite the late hour, so Charlie knocked on the door. After a moment, it opened and light poured out, making him blink. He cradled Watson under his arm and spoke as evenly as he could.

“Mr. Orville, Mr. Wilbur, I’m Charlie Taylor from Stoddard. I have something very important I must tell you, right away.”

~END~

Interview with Stephanie Ingram

Earlier this month I was interviewed by Stephanie Ingram, a fellow Pittsburgher and Author! Check out the interview on her website and be sure to check out her work!

Author Feature – Brian Hagan

 

Writing Milestone Achieved!

So, I didn’t get much writing done at Pennsic. That was sort of expected. What I didn’t expect was to get much writing done at Steel City Con this past weekend. Not only did I write a lot, I was finally able to work through the last parts of the book. Meaning, the first draft of The Single Deed of Emeril Battles is complete!

The first draft is DONE! #amwriting #novel #ya #superhero @ Monroeville Convention Center https://t.co/BCIA3CHulG

— Brian Hagan (@windsmith) August 12, 2017

That’s such exciting news, and it means that editing can finally begin. The first step was running spell check (I’ll correct spelling in grammar as a write, but I don’t always catch everything). Wow, there were a lot of mistakes that needed fixed. Then, I started writing in parts that got missed or needed details changed. It’s startling how, once you reach the end of a narrative, all these little problems and inconsistencies pop up.

By the end of the weekend at Steel City Con, I had added over a thousand words to the manuscript length after I declared it done. That’s just how editing goes, and will continue to go. Who knows what the final word count will be. For The Horrible Plan of Horace Pickle, I removed about 6,000 words during editing… but then I added in 7,000. No wonder this stage of writing takes so long!

One thing is for certain: I’m feeling a renewed drive to finish this book, and I want to have it out no later than next summer!

Off to Pennsic!

Something I don’t think I’ve mentioned on this blog yet is my participation in the SCA. For those who don’t know what it is, the SCA is a historical recreation organization that focuses on fun, community, and education. There’s a lot of neat stuff to do, and I tend towards historical fencing (with rapiers, longswords, and the like) and music. My wife’s jewelry company (Sinclair Jewelry) specializes in historically inspired jewelry, and so we spend a lot of our time at these events.

Well, coming up next week is the Pennsic War, a two week event and the largest historical reenactment outside of Europe (or possibly anywhere).

I mention all this  because I’ll be there (helping with Sinclair Jewelry) and I’ll have all my books and short stories with me. If you’re a fellow Scadian and attending Pennsic, feel free to come hang out with us and read for a bit! Our merchant booth is #34 on the Street of Dreams and we always have a chair out front!