Skip to main content

Star Wars and Writing and stuff...

My regular blogging schedule has been a bit erratic lately. Surely you all know that there was a new Star Wars movie released. That probably has a lot to do with it. I've been distracted by that, and then got hit with a sinus infection, which made things even more challenging for my schedule. But I'm getting back in the swing and the first thing I thought I'd do would be to post an update.

My writing of prose has slowed down considerably. I'm down to only a few hundred words a day, which is lousy of me. I really need to get back in the swing. It's just so hard to get up in the morning when you're sick. Or when I'm sick.

I'll get there, though. I've got some time off for the holiday, but I need to keep pushing myself. I still want to try to get this manuscript done before the end of the year and there's only about 8,000 words left before I get there. It's doable. I just need to work harder.

As for my work that's come out in the last couple of weeks, there has actually been a LOT.

I began writing for Howstuffworks and a ton of material came out for them (all of it Star Wars related.) The first one even made their list of most-read articles on the site.


I also had a new piece come up on StarWars.Com: The cinema behind Star Wars: John Carter. It's a movie I love a lot and a story that influenced Star Wars in ways people probably don't realize.

I've got much more coming, too, both in the world of prose and non-fiction, so make sure you keep an eye out.

As a reminder: The Aeronaut and Escape Vector are still out and still need your purchases and reviews. If nothing else, they can use you telling people about them. If you want signed copies, visit the shop here on this page.

Then, The Serpent's Head and Operation: Montauk are both in a Storybundle until the end of the month. The cost is "name your price," and they're packaged with a whole slew of other books worth checking out. Go ahead and snag them here. 

Also! here's a list of "rules and guidelines" I've been collecting over my years of studying writing advice and process. There are links to dozens of essays I've written about each individual bullet point and I think some people find it helpful.

As far as my work outside of all this: There's a lot of great stuff on Big Shiny Robot! and Full of Sith for you. 

And please, please, please don't forget to check out any of my books, drop reviews of them on Amazon or Goodreads, and follow me on twitter and Facebook!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Missed Opportunities of Days Gone By

“Hello?” I said into the phone, accepting the call from a number I didn’t recognize. “Hey,” the feminine voice on the other replied, as though I should know the sound of her voice. At a loss, I said, “Can I help you?” “It’s Brooke.” Her name stopped me. It couldn’t possibly be her. We hadn’t spoken in years, a decade perhaps. “Brooke?” “Yeah, Brooke Baker. This is Mark, right?” Jesus Christ. It was her. “Yeah, it is Mark. Brooke. Wow. How are you? It’s been a long time since… well… since anything.” “I know.” “So, how are you doing?” “Okay, I suppose…” Her voice belied her words, though. Something was up. “I… It’s just been so long and I guess I wanted to hear your voice.” “I don’t think I had a number for you. Ever. I offered a couple of times, but…” “I was a brat back then.” And that’s how a random phone call turned into a two-and-a-half hour catch-up session. We spoke of everything under the sun: people we still knew, how different we were, h

Anatomy of a Scene: The Third Man

It's time again to break down a classic scene. One that's well-written and, in my view, a fine example of excellent craft. I've done some of these articles from books (like The End of the Affair   and Starship Troopers ) and other movies (like Citizen Kane , City Lights , Raiders of the Lost Ark , and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ), but now it's time to take a look at a scene from The Third Man . It blends the best of Orson Welles (as he's in the film and drives this scene) and Graham Greene, who wrote this particular screenplay. Before we get to the scene, we need some context. The Third Man is a tale of the black market in Vienna, just after World War II. It's about a cheap, dime-store Western novelist named Holly Martins (played by Joseph Cotton) and his friend Harry Lime (Orson Welles.) Lime offered Martins a job in Vienna, so Martins leaves America and arrives, only to find that Harry Lime is dead. Penniless, without a friend or reason to be

Anatomy of a Scene: All the President's Men

All the President's Men is one of those perfect movies. Based on a stunning true story with a brilliant screenplay from William Goldman (we've already gone through one of his scenes here with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ), it's a movie that brings all of the elements of character, plot, and drama together in a way that makes me really love and admire it.  The scene I want to go through is one that comes during a particularly trying time in the film. For those unaware, this film tells the tale of Woodward and Bernstein, the Washington Post reporters who cracked the Watergate story. And now, looking back on it, it all feels like one big victory, but it was marked by a number of defeats.  This is them reporting to their skeptical editor, Ben Bradlee (played brilliantly by Jason Robards) about where their investigation is at. Immediately preceding Woodward and Bernstein walking in, a salesman is trying to sell Bradlee on features his papers doe