Writing Update & Preview
It seems I’m finally caught up after I let slip the writing schedule for my debut novel. Somewhat. For this week, I should be finishing the first draft of chapter 19 (of 30) and start on chapter 20, and that’s exactly where I am today!
OK, I might be cheating a bit when I say that. See, I planned to self-edit the first drafts every 3 chapters, and I’m still lagging behind with that. Actually, I’ve only self-edited up until chapter 5. I’m planning to take some time off from work soon to catch up with that as well.
Meanwhile, I’m liking how the story is coming together, and some surprising and interesting plot twists popped up as the characters and the relations between them grew.
I thought it would be nice to give my newsletter readers a sneak preview. What I do before I start writing is that I will jot down some exploratory chapters or short stories, to explore the characters and the settings and give me a bit more feel for the universe I’m writing in. I want to share one of those exploratory pieces with you, where we meet the protagonist of the story roughly eight years before events in the book start.
Book review: Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers
My first dive into solarpunk. This anthology delivers on the premise of a more hopeful future while still providing drama and conflict to keep the reader engaged. There are some true gems in here, some stories that fail to engage and everything in between. I gave it a 4/5 rating on Goodreads. Read full review.
Hack Escape
Al Shield
He was the next step in battlefield technology, the evolution of the cybernetic soldier. But all of a sudden he’s disappeared from a secret military base and the race is on to not only work out who took him away but retrieve him in time before the powers that be learn of this mishap and try to cover things up.
But over the proceeding days the team will discover that there’s far more to this mystery than first thought. With the looming threat of outside awareness, can they claim him back in time or is their most dangerous weapon yet about to bring down their own doom?
Far From Over
Vijay Iyer Sextet
Vijay Iyer is a mathematician, physicist but most of all, he’s a brilliant musician. He’s been playing in various configurations and with a whole lot of musicians. I love his trio albums.
But this album, his only one so far in sextet setting, is something special. I remember the first time I heard this music. It was at the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, in 2018. It was one of the hottest summers in a while (although it has since been superseded by increasingly hot summers). Six unassuming musicians I had not seen before entered the stage in a well-filled stage of the festival complex.
They started to play. The music hit me. It resonated, it moved me, it was truly a spiritual moment. Soon after, I got a hold of the album and it has been high on my list of top albums.
If you dare, have a listen. It’s fierce, it’s complex, it’s pure. It’s not for everyone, I realise that, but it is for me. One hundred percent.
