A Life of Consequence

It’s the end of the year and it usually brings an overabundance of introspection and reflection and for me it’s not just “what did I accomplish this year” but I find I’m looking at the big picture.  Is my life shaping up the way I want it to?  Am I having an impact on things that matter to me?  Am I positioning myself to be able to influence things that are important to me?  I’m approaching the big 5 0 and that may have something to do with it.

I can remember being a fresh-faced lieutenant and looking at what seemed an endless dark tunnel of training and hoop jumping to get where I wanted to be.  It was great to finally get through that tunnel and into the daylight again.  It took years of hard work and dedication to see the light at the end, but I made it through.  The thing is, once I got over the fact that I had achieved my initial goals, I found that I was sitting on a knoll looking down at several more tunnel entrances.  It had opened up possibilities and I had choices but I was going to have to go through more training and learning if I chose to come down off the knoll.   It was nice sitting there for awhile, basking in the sunlight, but eventually you want more challenges.  You find that you are not fulfilled for whatever reason.  Maybe you aren’t doing what will really make you happy or have the impact that you want.  You have to choose a new tunnel and start the process all over.

Slacking and Star Wars and Merry Christmas!

I've been slack this week in doing a blog post but I've been enjoying the Christmas holidays and taking a little break.  I also got into the early beta and then early release of Star Wars: The Old Republic and have spent way too much time playing it.  It is absolutely what Star War Galaxies should have been.  The writing is fantastic, the voice acting is great and every quest has at least one cutscene.  The graphics are beautiful and the gameplay seems mostly balanced but the jury is still out on that one.  Overall I think Bioware hit a homerun with it.  The best part is my family is playing and we are doing battles together!  Five out of six of us are playing.

Calling all cars ... err... beta readers!

I am mere weeks away from having my novel ready for Beta Readers.   My excitement is palpable.  I wasn’t this excited when I finished the 1^st draft, but the thought that I can actually start the agent/publisher search for real is something I’ve looked forward to for a long time.  Before that happens I’d like to get the book into the hands of a few more seasoned readers that know my genres.   If you like vampires and Sci Fi adventure then this book may be up your alley.  It’s a character driven story, though, not a Michael Bey movie.   I would like to get some readers that like science fiction and can give constructive feedback.  I’m actually still looking for one more writing partner if anyone is interested in swapping some comprehensive edits.   Hiring an editor for a comprehensive edit will run about a grand and that’s nothing to sneeze at.

The Spark of Searching for Extraterrestrial Life

Charlie Stross pointed out an article and commentary that peaked my interest, dealing with SETI and the Fermi Paradox. The article was The Fermi Paradox, Self-Replicating Probes, and the Interstellar Transportation Bandwidth by Keith Wiley. Wiley's article was to do with the likelihood of Intelligent Aliens or lack thereof. 

If you aren't familiar with the Fermi Paradox, it basically states that the likelihood of intelligent life in the galaxy is high, given the huge number of stars and therefore planets in our galaxy, that intelligent extraterrestrial life should have been to visit us by now or at least left their evidence and yet we haven't found clue one.  There are lots of theories as to why and these essays delve into those arguments.

Hero Shmero

Is it too much to ask that something great happen in our lives?   I mean monumental.   I think that most of us went through that phase in our early teens when we KNEW we were destined for great things.   We were handpicked to lead lives of consequence.   As I approach midlife and realize that the likelihood is lessening, I still find myself drawn to themes of greatness.

I can remember being a teenager and reading Lord of the Rings and learning the elvish alphabet.  My friends and I developed these back stories about our elvish character selves.  We felt like we had a secret knowledge that we were really going to be something special someday.  Of course it was fantasy, but I wonder if that is something that fades with time or is it that thing that draws us to stories of the same theme, whether it’s a movie or a book or an old wives tale.

Happy Thanksgiving ..er..Christmas?

It's Thanksgiving morning and I just got off work.  I love Thanksgiving morning, my wife and I have turned it into a tradition that we work together to get the feast ready together. I cut the celery and the green onions while she fixed some cinnamon muffins, then she preps the dressing while I prep the bird, then we stuff the turkey and put in the oven and clean up together.  This meal is really not a bad one to do, we do much more complicated meals.   After the turkey is in the oven we have several hours to relax and do some fun stuff, like read or write or play video games or call home.  We don't normally travel on Thanksgiving, deciding a long time ago to make the tradition for our children here.  4 sets of parents to visit becomes a logistical nightmare so we just stopped and hope they will visit us occasionally.  

5 Things That Will Make Me Drop Your Book Like a Hot Potato

I read Chuck Wendig’s 25 things that will make me keep reading your story and it made me think, I have WAAAAAYYY more things that will make me STOP reading your story (Okay, I might have overstated that, it's ony 5 things).  And of course he posts about that very thing this morning.  ARRRRGGH!   Anyway, not to copy, but I had this idea in my head, so I’m going with it.

If I see a blurb that I like or a nice cover or get a recommendation from one of my friends, I will pick up your book and give it a fair shake.  Unlike Chuck, I'm not standing in the doorway with a gun in your face waiting to not like it.  If I‘ve gotten as far as cracking the cover and reading the first page I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt.  I’ll have the gun tucked into my belt, in back under my shirt, so you can’t see it.  I want to like it.  But there are a few things that will make me pull that gun out and blow your face clean off!

NaNo Fail Whale

NaNoWriMo is never a waste of time in my humble opinion. I’m not going to hit the target this year of 50k words in 30 days, but the endeavor has its own rewards.

Last year I had a great idea and I think it will become my Master’s thesis and I had no trouble moving along. It was a simple idea but very open and I knew where it was going ultimately. I‘ve got stuff on the back burning and a backlog of ideas I want to explore but for this year I decided to try my hand at something completely outside of my comfort zone. The original idea was to try my hand at a YA tie- in to my current novel. But once I conceived of the idea it started to develop its own life. I thought it was just going to be in the same vein as my adult fiction, just from a different perspective, but as the idea started to coalesce it began to morph into more of a substantial piece, and basically even though the setting is several hundred years in the future it is not classic SF. It’s actually literary fiction, which is a completely different animal.