Raven Oak's Blog, page 61

O is for Original

In today’s continuation of the A-Z Challenge, I give you:

O is for Original

It’s a common tale–an oddball child with talents is bullied relentlessly growing up because they are different. Sometimes it’s because the child is smarter than fellow peers, or sometimes it’s because they don’t share the expected religion or cultural identity of the region. Other times it could be because the child identifies as LGBTQIA. For me, it was a mix of many differences.

Being labeled as gifted & talented, I wa...

Flashback Friday: Dragonlance

This week’s Flashback Friday: Dragonlance.

I’m happy to have fellow redditor and author, Chris Fox, here for a guest post on how Dragonlance influenced him as a writer.

I vividly remember the first book I bought. Not the first book I read, mind you. But the one I actually counted out my few tattered dollar bills for. I was eleven years old and by that point, I loved all things fantasy. Most kids at that age spent their money on video games and candy. Not me. I wasn’t your typical kid. While the...

N is for Neil

In today’s continuation of the A-Z Challenge, I give you:

N is for Neil…Gaiman

Unlike most folks in geekdom, I didn’t discover Neil Gaiman through his Sandman comics. In fact, while my high school friends were nose-deep in The Sandman, I was too busy reading and writing novels.

My first encounter with the world of Neil Gaiman was the novel Neverwhere. While published in 1996, I didn’t snag a copy until 1998/1999 when an attendee of the North Texas ToriFest told me I’d be a fool not to read it....

Book Cover Throwback: Sassinak

This week’s Book Cover Throwback: Sassinak by Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Moon. This was the firstElizabeth Moon novel I ever read. In fact, it was the first space opera I ever read as well.

What I Love about This Cover: I love how bad-ass Sassinak looks on this cover.

What I Don’t Love about This Cover: It’s hard to tell if there is any sort of shield across her face, keeping the oxygen in her suit. Oops.

Click here to view other Book Cover Throwbacks.

The post Book Cover Throwback: Sassinak ap...

Hugo Awards

The Hugo Awards are what most writers dream about–our version of the Oscars even. This year was the first year I could nominate and vote as I’m attending WorldCon (I realize I could’ve bought a non-attending membership and thus, nominated before, but I didn’t know that until recently).

I was excited to know I could be part of this, and more excited to know that Amaskan’s Blood was eligible for nomination. (No, I didn’t nominate myself–that’s dishonest.) Then the sad puppy folks entered the pi...

M is for Magic!

In today’s continuation of the A-Z Challenge, I give you:

M is for Magic!

Gaming has been a part of my world since I was a child–back in the day with the King’s Quest series on old 5 1/4″ floppy discs–but it wasn’t until I married my husband that I became a series gamer.

He introduced me to the land of Final Fantasy, Zelda, and Pokemon. This later evolved into a love of board games (aka tabletop games), and eventually Magic: The Gathering.

Gaming together isn’t just fun, it’s amaze-balls. While...

L is for Love

In today’s continuation of the A-Z Challenge, I give you:

L is for Love

Warning!

I’m gonna be fairly sappy here, so if sticky, silly sap isn’t your thing, you may want to read something else on the site. Just a fair warning.

I met my husband back in 1993 in 10th grade. I don’t remember if we met first in computer science class, in Writers’ Guild, or through mutual friends, but all three instances were determined for us to become friends. Before he was ever my husband, he was my friend, and when...

Monday Night Gaming: Scoundrels of Skullport

This week’s Monday Night Gaming: Scoundrels of Skullport, the expansion for the game, The Lords of Waterdeep.

Publisher: Wizards of the Coast

# of Players: 2-6

Best with: 3-4 players

While this post is going live on its normal Monday, we didn’t play this for “Monday Night Gaming” this time. Instead, we played it on Saturday for International Tabletop Day!

I’m a huge fan of The Lords of Waterdeep (you can read my full review here), so I was pretty excited to try out its expansion, Scoundrels of Sku...

K is for Kitties

In today’s continuation of the A-Z Challenge, I give you:

K is for Kitties

I’ve known for 26 years that children weren’t for me. I can tolerate them when I must, but most under the age of twelve, irritate me like broken glass rubbed into my skin. I’ve lucked out that my husband shares these feelings, and for the nineteen years we’ve been together, we’ve shared our time with “furry” children instead.

Scientific discoveries in the past decade have shown that pet owners live longer, healthier live...

Scrivener Saturday: The Wishlist

I’m doing something a tad bit different today forScrivener Saturday as I’m still trying to catch up from back-to-back conventions.

This week’s Scrivener Saturday: The Wishlist–as in my top 5 features I wish Literature & Latte would add to the program.

Blog Support–as in, a way to have a blog template the way you have fiction projects, dissertations, etc. without resorting to a lot of weird hacks to get it to work. Even better if it could work with WordPress’s Post to Your Blog via Email feature...