Jim’s Brain Online

Posted by Jim at January 14th, 2008

As the title says, this is going to be one of posts where I write about all the things I ought to have written about if I’d been writing much of anything in the past few weeks.

The thing that sucks is that I’m not going to devote an appropriate amount of time to any of them.

Without further preamble:
1. I went to Florida around Christmas, visiting my younger brother and his wife and son. Also visited Disney World with my parents and sister while I was there. Saw an alligator from a distance. This is the best way to see an alligator.

2. Have been viewing season one of Heroes on DVD. I missed it while it was running. It is incredible. Hopefully it will survive the bad reviews of the first half of the second season and the WGA strike.

3. I’ve been writing a web fiction blog, currently devoted to a superhero web serial. It has actually attracted a few readers that I don’t know–which is cool. It’s also cool that a few people I do know are reading it.

4. The Michigan presidential primary is tomorrow. Thanks to our brilliant leaders’ attempt to beat New Hampshire and Iowa this year, the Democratic leadership will not allow the primary’s results to count. The state’s leadership claims that the Michigan delegates will ultimately be counted, but I’m not holding my breath. On the bright side (for Ed), this gives Kucinich the best chance he’s got to win an early primary.

To be honest, I’m not sure who I like most on the Democratic end of things at the moment. I have things I like and dislike about each candidate.

The Republican party does not appear to be punishing its people for disobedience and as such their primary does count. I’m tempted to vote in it. We’ll see. Given the choice, I’d prefer McCain to anyone else on the Republican side of the fence. If I thought of myself as Democrat, I might think it inappropriate, but as an independent I don’t have to feel guilty about voting in the Republican primary at all.

Posted by Jim at November 17th, 2007

Just mentioning inmydaydreams.com again. The second chapter of the superhero serial I’m writing is up.

For what it’s worth, though I’m not using any sort of particularly experimental literary techniques, I am using a technique that is experimental to me… I pretty much never write in the first person when I’m doing fiction and so this serial is entirely written in the first person. I’m also trying to have the main tension of the story being character based rather than plot based.

We’ll see whether I’m successful at that. Again, I mostly do plot driven stories, so I might not be.

I’m thinking that the the next story might be a mystery set in an urban fantasy setting.

Actually, should you feel the urge to read the current story (or any story) and tell me what works (or doesn’t work) for you, I’ll be interested to hear about it.

Posted by Jim at November 10th, 2007

Just letting people know that inmydaydreams.com is up and contains a piece of a story.

I’m not claiming it has literary merit. Essentially, the current series can be best viewed as a webcomic minus the drawing portion of the comic.

I’ll be updating it every Thursday.

Posted by Jim at October 20th, 2007

So some people might remember a post in which I wrote about considering posting stories online. I’ve pretty much decided to do it.

“Pretty much” in this sense means that I’ve bought a domain and given myself hosting (I host web sites for small businesses), but, I haven’t bothered to put anything up yet.

Mind you, I’ve written stuff. Provided I go with my current plan of once/week updates, I’ve currently got a small buffer.

The URL will be inmydaydreams.com, but it’s not currently worth the bother of looking. It might be in a couple days though.

Posted by Jim at September 16th, 2007

I’ve been reading stories online lately.

I’m thinking specifically of Banter Latte, but I’ve noticed other* places** that are doing the same sort of thing.

By the “same sort of thing,” I mean putting original fiction online–not fan-fiction or slash.

Sometimes I think it would be fun to post some stories myself. It would certainly be easier than starting a web comic. For one thing, I wouldn’t be limited by either a) the fact that I can’t draw or b) finding an artist that would be willing to draw what I write without pay.

There would, of course, be some things to consider. For example, the fact that I’d have zero chance of publishing whatever I post. Publishers want the right to publish things for the first time and web sites count.

Thus I’d have to come up with a concept that is simultaneously cool enough to want to spend time on but also unpublishable. That way I only gain in that whatever I write has the potential to create interest in my writing while not losing whatever (small?) chance it had of appearing in a book or magazine.

Another thing to think about though, is that the speed at which I write is pretty slow. Thus, writing much of anything and publishing it on my blog would probably take time away from my novel–something I’m not enthusiastic about.

Another possibility? Just serializing my novel and password protecting it. That way friends of mine who want to read and comment on it can and it wouldn’t officially be published. Plus I’d get feedback on what works for people and what doesn’t.

On the other hand, I’d also lose the benefit of posting online in the first place in that people couldn’t randomly come upon a story of mine, like it, and stick around.

Of course, I could do both…

So anyway, there’s something for me to think about. With any luck, I actually will.

* Star Harbor Nights is superhero fiction and partly responsible for my current urge to play superhero games. Banter Latte can be blamed for the other half of that urge.

** Tales of MU, though interesting and well-written, includes more sex than I’m really comfortable with. I guess that makes me a prude.

Posted by Jim at September 7th, 2007

Madeleine L’Engle died yesterday.

I’d write about her significance but I’m sure others have done it better. Still, I remember reading her books as a child and teenager, and, even as an adult. Despite being mostly categorized as books for children and “young adults,” her books are simply good books.

My personal favorites are “The Arm of the Starfish” and “The Young Unicorns.”

Interestingly, she attended my church on at least one occasion. I didn’t meet her at the time. I only know this because someone took a picture and they kept it up in the church for years.

The New York Times Obituary
NPR’s Obituary

Posted by Jim at July 21st, 2007

Started: Just after noon when the UPS truck arrived.
Finished: Around midnight–read close to straight through–with interruptions like making meals, going to the grocery store a couple times, and putting kids to bed.

Worth it? Yes.

More later.

Posted by Jim at July 20th, 2007

There’s already a summary of the plot of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows up on Wikipedia.

I haven’t read it. I’m mostly immune to being bothered by spoilers, but the plot summary is so long that I’m afraid that it will blow every surprise in the book.

Thus, I’m skipping it for the moment.

Posted by Jim at July 18th, 2007

So I decided in June that rather than re-read the entire Harry Potter series in preparation for the new book that I would just read the sixth book and be done with it. So I did. I re-read “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” in June.

It is now July and “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” will come out this Saturday. Abandoning my sensible policy of last month, I decided I would re-read “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.”

Not stopping there, I continued through almost all of them and am now re-reading the fifth book (”Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”). If I am wise, I won’t re-read the sixth book a second time in two months.

On the other hand, why should I start being wise now?

Posted by Jim at July 2nd, 2007

Critics can be valuable. When you’re talking about something that you might pay for (like a book, movie, or CD), critics can warn you away from something that looks great in the advertisements, but pretty much sucks in reality.

They can also be valuable to the artist if the critic points out real flaws in the work.

On the other hand there are also critics whose stuff I read and think, “This is criticism for the sake of criticism.” I’m talking here about criticism that is over the top negative and (for example) calls the author a pedophile and suggests that he “die in a fire.” To me, it feels like the critic is going nasty because people find nasty reviews entertaining–not because the object of criticism is as bad as they say.

That’s not to say that that sort of thing can’t be funny. It can even still be valuable stuff despite the tone.

Bearing that in mind, I’d just like to point out that people doing exactly those sort of reviews have come to web comics. I give you:
Your Webcomic is Bad and You Should Feel Bad

So far as I can tell, it gives no good reviews and specializes in demolishing comics. I find it amusing that someone would bother to review web comics in this way in that
1) The critic is not saving anyone any money since most web comics are free.
2) Despite the fact that most web comic authors will actually read a review, the critic is giving up any chance of influencing them by writing as if they were the source of unrelenting evil instead of writing a lousy comic.

I agree with the author’s criticisms about some comics, but I’ve got to admit that he goes considerably farther than I would. Am I planning on reading it further? No. Not when stuff like Websnark exists.

There’s no denying that bad web comics are out there, but I don’t feel compelled to wallow in them.