C.E. Murphy's Blog, page 35

2017: a retrospective / 2018: some goals

2017 wasn’t as personally awful as 2016, but it was still a trash fire. I’m ending it on a high note, though, after a Herculean effort that saw me write 25K in 3 days, 13.2 of that in *one* day (a personal best), to get a project in on time. I succeeded. I’m very tired, but I succeeded.

I wrote two books, neither of which were planned, and a novella (which was planned) this year, and some short stories. I published three books in 2018 (SEAMASTER (a middle grade epic fantasy), BEWITCHING BENED...

progress on the book front

The good news is I hit 90K on the book I’m working on! I was aiming for 90K by Friday, hit it on Saturday, so, y’know, that’s pretty good.

The less good news is this morning I decided I needed to replace two chapters with about five paragaphs, kill somebody, and split the party. (Actually, the party is already split, but I need to split it differently. Better-ly.)

I am *currently* enjoying the delusion that I can haul the whole thing around with a big wrenching effort and not actually go back...

Picoreview: The Last Jedi

Picoreview: The Last Jedi: Eh.

The thing is, someday I’ll stop expecting to love Star Wars movies. They are not for me. I’ve never cared much. I didn’t see the originals until I was more or less an adult, and lack the rose-colored glasses most of my (and subsequent) generations view them with. Rogue One is the only one that’s ever managed to disappoint me because it’s the only one I thought was going to be different, but it was just a Star Wars film, albeit one in which rocks fell and everybo...

in which empirical evidence is on their side

To the vast amusement of the friends in the previous post, I have written…I don’t know. Something in the region of 30,000 words in the past week. #Nanowriweek, another friend said. It was actually intended to be *much* closer to an actual Nanowriweek, except something went Horribly Wrong with SEAMASTER and I spent literally all day yesterday dealing with that and got nothing written at all.

Anyway, I was aiming for 90K & Done by today, but I’m at 82K & Not Done as of this morning. Nor is the...

struggling with a book

I hoped to get this stupid book all written in November, but with one thing and another (those things being 1. lack of a concentrated plot & 2. a 3 week head cold), I didn’t, and I’ve been despairing over finishing in time, although as Friend #2 below said, “Girl, you can fart 3000 words.” Yesterday, a Thursday, I was despairing to somebody who’s known me for some 20-odd (very odd) years, and the following conversation ensued:

Me: I struck 3K+ from this stupid book and have to get another 35K...

Launch Day: Seamaster!

As always, I’ll start with the links, just in case that’s what you’re really here for. :)

iTunes || Kindle || Kobo || Nook

Once upon a time my oldest nephew asked when I was going to write books for little kids. He’s no longer a little kid, and I’ve been working on the Guildmaster Saga for years, handing early drafts over to him and getting the rest ready for the world. I’m SO EXCITED to release this book, which is the kind of thing I’d have been reading from about age eight, and would still...

nano success!

For only the third time in however many times I’ve actually tried it, I have achieved Nanowrimo success. Honestly, I wrote quite a lot more than 50K this month, but I managed to get 50,000 vaguely useable words on this project, which is…slightly more than half…of what I was going for…well, we’ll take what victories we can, wot eh? So now I have to get the other half of it written in the next…week…ideally…o.O…and then for a rarity actually send it to a few beta readers for commentary/insights....

this has not gone well

Yes, well, things have not proceeded apace.

I’ve had a cold for the last three weeks straight. Or, more accurately, I’ve had two, possibly three, colds, for the last three weeks straight. It is very tiring and I am very done with it, except for the part where I’m still sick and therefore not done with it at all. :p Ted’s had a cold about 2/3rds of that time himself, so we’ve been having a lot of fun! :p

Due to general malaise, we decided not to have our big American Thanksgiving this year, a...

nano: halfway mark + gym, tv, & life

I’m supposed to be at 45K on Project One for November. I’m at 29K and have to revise again, but after two days of grim effort I may actually have a plot now, which should help. :P Technically I guess I still really only need 4K a day to make goal by the end of the month, but IDK if I’ll get there.

I haven’t gone back to Project Two yet. Project Three is underway in terms of layout. Waiting on the cover art for it, which is going to be AMAZING and I can’t wait to show it to you. (You all wante...

nano: i missed a day

Yesterday involved the sort of chaos that sometimes erupts when one has a small child, and I was too tired to do my words. It has not, however, thrown me hopelessly off track, mostly because I’ve already finished Project Two, and getting it done was kind of the bit that Not Missing A Day was critical for.

Besides, I’d had to concede on Friday that I’d screwed up Project One and had to go back and delete 7,000 words, so I was off count anyway. I fixed P1 and have recovered the wordcount, so I’...