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Showing posts from February, 2016

Feeding the Rage Machine

I am working. Because I am a strong-willed, uneasily distracted author who knows when it's time to put words on the page. Ok, I wish. Mostly I'm trying not to tear my hair out. Rage is finished, and I'm moving onto edits. But I don't think a lot of people are going to love, or even like, this book. Why? It doesn't have a happily ever after. The ending is, if not sad, at least bittersweet. Bleak. It's supposed to work as a standalone, and it does, but Myra as a character isn't done her journey, and she appears in Frenzy after the ending of Rage, and she appears in Maelstrom after the ending of Frenzy. Her story isn't over by the end of this book. I think readers who don't read the other books will be mad about that. But I think people who do read those books will appreciate it for what it is; a glimpse at some of the side characters of this world and at the Big Bad from Maelstrom. So. That's where my head is. I, personally, love the thing....

Grimes is Better Than You

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I'm in love with Grimes' music right now. Also kind of in love with her brain. I ended up listening to Kill V. Maim a few weeks ago, and falling in love with it, so the only thing I could do was listen to Art Angels a million times in a row. That album is amazing. But I was reading a bunch of interviews with Grimes (who is Canadian!) about the making of it, how she creates every inch of the music herself, how she's a producer before she's a singer or an artist, and I was really thrown with her intelligence and how surprisingly self-aware she is. So I went and listened to Visions, too. It also is amazing. The thing I love about her and her art is how honest she is about it; she talks about how some of her work doesn't live up to her expectations, she's true to who she is and what her work is about. I enjoy that. She's also kind of weird, which I like. Genuinely weird people are not appreciated enough. History and language nerds and people wh...

Blogosphere Bullshit (I'd Rather Be a Person Than a Profile)

I'm an artist. And I want room to work on my art. I don't want people interrupting me. I don't want people knocking on my door every fifteen minutes. I don't want advice I didn't ask for, and I don't want to be forced to blog every day because 'it's good advertising' or be forced to try and get fucking Twitter famous because it will get more of my books out. I hate this fame game that everyone is so sucked up in and I hate that all my friends think that lines of text on a computer mean we're communicating because we barely even know each other anymore. I don't want to have to be on social media to connect with them when we never see each other in real life. I want to fucking talk to people and I want to be left the hell alone to make my shit. The thing is, I feel like when I think this shit or feel this stuff it comes off as, like, I'm anti-technology and I don't enjoy all of this progress we've made - I do. The internet is ...

Personal Algorithms of Living With an Artist

We all develop these little habits and patterns like circles worn in rugs that we always follow. It's waking up to writing on the wall and rings of empty mugs around the entire table. Eventually you get used to notes you can't read and poetry written in strewn clothing. You do. It doesn't come easy. There are red knuckles and tears that leave bite marks on shirts. Sometimes, when words are spilling like rain, you wonder if it's not enough just to drown in someone, if all oceans dry up eventually, inevitably, no matter how much they consume. Running in and outside the lines scuffles them up like dust, though. You become a routine in unmarked maps and you become a pair beholding the broken. It's enough.

Improvement

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A few days ago I found one of the first digital art pieces I ever did, bad anatomy, half-assed background and all. So I decided to redraw it. In middle school I went through a big, big vocaloid phase, and I still like a lot of the character designs, so I do still draw miku from time to time, though I don't listen to the music anymore. Anyway, I thought I would share this here. I really still need to improve in the colouring department (I forgot to shade her best because I'm an idiot) but I'm happy with my drawing improvement, so far - not that I want to stop improving, just that I'm on the right track in that direction, so I think I'll focus on my painting style for the time being.

Ghost Squad, Roll Out (I Think My House is Haunted)

Pretty sure my house is haunted. It definitely wasn't, when we moved in, and I've only really been experiencing this stuff in the last month or so, but I keep seeing things moving out of the corner of my eyes, hearing stranger noises, and feeling, well, not alone - when I'm the only one in the house. So. I'm fairly sure that one of us must have manifested something or unknowingly allowed it entrance, and honestly? I'm more annoyed than anything else. Nothing bad or malevolent has happened, and I'm really not too afraid of spirits. I'm more like Brenda, in Scary Movie, beating the shit out of whichever ghostie decides to crawl out of the TV, and I think that's fair, because it's pretty fucking rude to move into someone's place without permission, incorporeal or no. Since the undead bitch hasn't tried to shove my gay ass down the stairs or jump out at me from behind any corners (which would honestly just earn it an earful it would never f...

Instrumental Obligations and Lacking Magic

This past Christmas, I received a guitar. To be clear, I mentioned wanting a guitar once, about seven or eight months before the holiday, as a throwaway thing that I never - never  - expected to get. But I did. And I have to learn it. Why? Because it was expensive and my parents were happy they were able to get me something I asked for, and I feel guilty ever day that passes without me learning it. Back in tenth grade I started to learn as part of a music course I hadn't even passed the pre-req course to get into, and was only in because they had no other place for me that block, but in the end I lost what little I picked up and spent most of the time in the course fooling around. I was never a good student, but it was still one of my favourite classes. I used to have dreams of being able to plop down on the sidewalk uptown and play and be able to earn some quick cash, or being able to romance some musician guy through my sheer instrumental bad-assery. Now I will se...

Things You Can't Calculate (Like The Future)

It would be pointless not to admit that I'm not where I expected to be in my life, at this point. I'm about to turn twenty, so I should probably be excited and happy - especially since I'm starting to publish and follow my career goals - but I'm poor, ridden with mental illness, my living situation is less than ideal, my academic life is a mess, and my personal relationships are all in shambles. And there is no easy fix. It doesn't matter how hard I work, or how much I do, because - and this is something a lot of us refuse to believe - it is possible to do your best, to give something your all, and fail. And that's okay. It's okay to fail and learn a lesson from it. It's okay to do your best and make the choices you think are right and still end up in an unhappy place. I think sometimes when people see me mentioning these things, it can come off as complaining or giving up - and to be clear, I would never give up - but in reality I thinks it's ...

Hear Ye, Hear Ye (Blog Updates and a New Book + Double Cover Reveal!)

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I updated the tabs at the top of the blog, including the contact page. I added info about my next publication - Rage - and updated the info about Things We Saw At Midnight, Frenzy, and added a page for Souls of Salt & Seawater, which is now out! (You can grab it here, and the price is going down to 99 cents within the next few hours!) Aside from that, I have new covers to show you! (Who doesn't love a pretty cover?) And some info about the new book! So, first, the cover for the paperback edition of SOSAS, which will be out in a few weeks: And the cover & blurb for the new book, Rage! Something powerful is festering in the shadows. . . With four months to go until she turns twenty and the beginnings of a promising modeling career forming around her, teenage Harpy Myra Evans should be happy. And she would be. . .if she weren’t in mortal danger. As an extremely rare breed of paranormal, Myra’s powers are highly coveted. When powerful beings begin to ...

Souls of Salt & Seawater is out! (Book Release & Cover Reveal)

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GUYS. SOULS OF SALT AND SEAWATER IS FINALLY PUBLISHED. I've been working on this project for months and I promised as soon as this book was out, I'd be shouting about it from the rooftops, so this is me doing that. The book will be free in the Kindle store on the 19th and 20th! If you want a copy sooner than that, though, you can buy the book here:   http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01BWN5VZW I'm diving into work on other projects now, but I hope you all enjoy SOSAS, and I'll have a paperback info post up in a week or so! Thanks for all the support guys! (*If you're a book blogger/reviewer and would like a copy, feel free to email me - JinxKing@null.net, and I'll shoot you an epub!)

Dropping the Blogging Ball and Stealing It Back

I dropped the ball as far as blogging is concerned this month. It really just has to do with mental health, which is always a struggle. I wish I could say that it was because I was hard at work (and I am) or because I was kidnapped by a handsome foreign prince who now wishes to marry me (I'm still waiting) but in reality it's just because I struggle with my self-identity and caring for myself and sometimes I need to take a step back from the internet and social media and even work, in order to, y'know, not have a breakdown or die. For a while - a while being the last eleven or twelve days - I've been really struggling to keep myself afloat, and working through a lot of difficult things. I'm feeling better now, and a lot has happened in that time that I can't wait to talk about. This post is not about any of that, though. This post is just about the fact that I'm back. And that I got lots of work done, even though I wasn't here talking about it. A...

Two Days.

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Blizzards and Bills (also, Frenzy is Free!)

I haven't been blogging much lately. Why? I have bills to pay and books to write and school to cope with. I had a meeting today, but it got cancelled, so I spent the day outlining a new project. I want to keep going with that for tonight, though I gotta get some editing done on Sosas later. The thing is, between the books and school and learning French and trying to lose weight and deal with mental illness and maintain friendships and do marketing stuff, there's not much time for blogging. I sent some free copies of Frenzy out for review, and it's also free on kindle right now! You can get it here:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01B81HGQ0 Anyway, I'll be posting more once some of this workload is done and out, but for now it could be sporadic. (For now being the month - I'm attempting to blog ever day during March!)

What Am I Doing?

What am I doing? It's four am and I've suddenly become interested in True Blood again (I rewatched the first two seasons and saw the third for the first time this summer) and now I'm finally sitting down to devour the fourth season BECAUSE IT'S A PROBLEM OKAY? I honestly couldn't stop now if I wanted to. And boy, do I want to - because this show is keeping me away from my damn homework. I have six assignments to do today, so once my parents leave for work I'm going to be spending hours sitting here finishing those up and then be able to hand them in tomorrow. I have to go back to school this week, and I don't know which one I'll even be going to or what I'm gonna be taking, so naturally it's fucking me up and I'm trying not to think about it. Which hasn't been working out well for me so far, clearly. I need to finish them, but I keep procrastinating because, you know, that's who I am. I also want to get in a workout today, which...