Adan Ramie's Blog, page 46
February 28, 2015
Take Command by Jake Wood | Blogging for Books Review #2
Take Command by Jake Wood
When I agreed to read and review Take Command by Jake Wood for Blogging For Books, I was excited to learn a new business skill. Jake Wood has military training and warexperience, and is the CEO of a nonprofit called Team Rubicon, so I knew he had a lot of worthwhile knowledge to impart. That being said, I’m not sure I read the description of the book well enough when I agreed.
Take Command was dry reading for me.While I love a good action movie, and the author infuses...
February 26, 2015
Productive is a State of Mind | Writer’s Block and Going With the Flow
For the last few weeks, I have been suffering from writer’s block due to burnout, as I wrote about on another post. I tried forcing myself to just sit down and write, but it didn’t work like it normally does. I found myself totally unmotivated to write a single new word. I felt trapped in those blank word processor documents, the margins closing in on me as the bleak realization dawned: I couldn’t write.
Writer’s block can be devastating.
At least, I couldn’t write then. I’m hoping that I’m ove...
February 23, 2015
Review 3 | TBR Pile Challenge | Land of Terror
After a hellish adventure trying to get through the first two books on my TBR Pile Challenge list, I finally got through one that wasn’t an alternate! It was Land of Terror by Edgar Rice Burroughs, and it was published in 1944. It was the sixth in his Pellucidar series. I’ve read none of the others, nor have I ever read his work before, but I grabbed this at a library sale because of its interesting cover.
What can I say about Land of Terror? At first, I found myself bored. Then, a few pages i...
February 21, 2015
The Disincentive of the Author | On Not Writing
Lately I’ve been uninspired. I attribute this lackadaisical treatment of my writing to the trappings of life: school, family, stress. Despite my lack of writing in the last few weeks, I’ve found myself daydreaming on a number of occasions, and I wonder at how I’m unable to translate these waking dreams to paper or the screen of my computer.
Is it burnout? Did the two novels and one novella that I recently created tap me out for now? Have I not replenished my creative stores enough to produce s...
February 19, 2015
Year of the Goat | Flash Fiction
As many of you know, the Chinese New Year is upon us. Some call it the Year of the Sheep, while others call it the Year of the Ram, or the Year of the Goat. I was reading an article at NBC News discussing what is foretold this lunar cycle when I was inspired to write this story. In honor of the date, I’ve simply called itThe Year of the Goat.
Terri put the last dot on the face of the little clay figurine she was painting. The little girl in front of her turned a paint-smeared face up at her in...
February 15, 2015
Meaningful Words | Writing Prompt | A Challenge
Recently, I came across a list of words that really appealed to me and birthed a challenge in my mind. These five words, SET, RUN, GO, TAKE and STAND, have the most meanings in the Oxford English Dictionary.
SET has 464 meanings,
RUN has 396,
GO has 368,
TAKE has 343,
and STAND has 334.
The Challenge:
Pick one or more of these five words. Look them up, pick an uncommon or unfamiliar meaning, and use it as the basis of a piece of flash fiction. If you need a word limit, 250 is a great place to end.
Po...
February 10, 2015
Review 2 | 2015 TBR Pile Challenge | Gone Girl
When I couldn’t get through The Sun Also Rises after a valiant attempt, I read the book my wife kept pushing to the top of my TBR stack: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn.
This was a fast, engaging read. I hated having to put it down, and every time I did, I kept thinking about it. I don’t often agree with all the hype that people dump on certain books or movies, but this one didn’t disappoint. I can see why it has become such a sensation.
I’ve read a few of Gillian Flynn’s other books, and I think Go...
February 7, 2015
Get Off The Internet | A Writer on Procrastination
Procrastinating. It’s fun. It’s easy. And it’s hell on a person’s productivity.
This, my last real semester before my degree, has already been a tough one, and I’m only about three weeks in. Understandably, I haven’t had a lot of time for writing, research, or submissions. And it shows. Somehow I managed to submit exactly zero stories in the first half of January while I was on break. I did write, though, and edited, revised, and tradedbeta reading for several authors.Since I’ve been back in s...
February 5, 2015
Villainous | Five Sentence Fiction
It’s been a while, folks. Sorry about that. Busy days of school and a hastily planned butlong-awaited event kept me from the computer, but I hope to be more regular soon. Until then, I offer this little tale. Lillie McFerrin’s Five Sentence challenge was the perfect prompt for me tonight. Here’s my response to “villainous.”
There’s a unique magic in watching. With all the pieces assembled and placed just so, there are only so many ends to this scene, and you’ve plotted them all in your head. T...
January 30, 2015
2015 TBR Challenge Update | Books Unfinished
So far, I’ve attempted read the first two of the books on my TBR Pile Challenge list. I found that I could finish neither.
The first, Mrs. Dalloway, threw me due to the writing style. I never knew if someone was talking or thinking, or if something was actually happening. There were so many characters all at once that they got all jumbled up
The second, The Sun Also Rises, was promising. About halfway through, though, I just couldn’t get past the racist and homophobic slurs. One paragraph had s...
