Good morning, Readers!

Well, here we are again.  Me, sitting at my desk, shaking my head at myself and grumbling.  Sugar, gripping my stomach like a vice, controlling my mind, making me its bitch.

Okay, that's not entirely accurate.  But I do have a problem with sugar.

I have always had a colossal sweet tooth.  That, coupled with my inability/fear of playing sports (fear of being teased for being terrible at them.  Which I was (both teased and terrible at sports)) as a teen led to my issues with weight.  Before you all get angry at me, I'm not saying I'm a fat, hideous toadie.  I am being honest, though, when I say I'm on the chubby side, and I really could stand to lose a little of it.

Enter a few years ago, when I cut out processed sugar entirely from my diet.  I permitted myself sugar from fruits and veggies, and alcohol ('cause... c'mon).  A few years ago, it was not so hard to do.  It was pretty easy, actually.

Now... not so much.  I've tried repeatedly over the past month to replicate the efforts of the past to no avail.  I've not been able to keep away from processed sugar for more than three days.

And worse, I've given up on the early morning workouts as well.  Now, granted, I am injured - my right foot is wrecked and my left shoulder has spent the past three weeks with limited mobility and pain when I push anything.  So... no benching, or push ups, or most exercises.  I've been trying to be patient with my body, hoping it'll heal.  But I'm quickly losing patience.

It aggravates me because I've lost so much time to my injuries.  I have goals I'm trying to reach, and it seems that the universe is determined to make sure I stay a chubby lump.  Every time I try to make a change, something happens - injury mostly, and then I'm stuck.  I've been stuck here for a month, and I'm so done with it.

I have been doing things, still.  I swim roughly three days a week.  It's easy on the shoulder and foot, and it gets me out of the office and active (if not actually working out).  I still go to martial arts training Tuesday and Thursday evenings.  I can walk okay, and as long as I don't strike with my foot, kicking is still doable.  Punching is less so, but as long as I don't go as hard as I'm used to (again, frustrating), I'm fine.

Since I can't train as hard as I'd like, I have to be super careful about what I eat now.  Which means it's time to try and cut processed sugar from my diet again.  That means no more ice cream, chocolate bars or any of that stuff.  I've tried this entire week.  I have failed.

I mean, I had an entire pint of coffee ice cream for dinner last night.

It was delicious.

I figure that if I say it out loud to all of you, I will be better about rejecting the stuff that's bad for me.  Hopefully.

So, in the spirit of keeping myself accountable, I will try and have a 'days without sugar' counter somewhere here.  And don't flip out.  I mean processed sugar.  Sweets.  I'm still allowed sugar from fruits and veggies.  And alcohol.  'Cause c'mon.

And hopefully I mill heal soon, and will be able to get back to my usual workout schedule.  Being prevented from reaching my goals is really pissing me off.

And that's where I'm at on personal health stuff currently.  I have videos to edit and eNewsletters to write, so I'll go and do that now.

​Ciao!

Good morning, Readers!

The edits for Skylark are all done. I undoubtedly missed a few things, because I always miss a few things, but hopefully they're not big things.

I was expected far more edits than I got, but the editor did catch a few big-ish things that were missed before, and that's awesome.  They've been fixed, I hope, and now I can get back to my regular life.  Which is to say, back to video editing and beta reading.  I have so many videos left to edit.  I have much beta reading left to do.

So this is going to be a super short post, as I have a lot to do.

You're going to have to entertain yourselves, I'm afraid.  I have to get to video editing.

Ciao!

Good morning, Readers!

There is a certain loop I've noticed that so many people get stuck in.  That loop is this:

I will start at the beginning of the day/week/month/year.  Then, when they miss that 9:00am start or Monday, or the 1st of the month or year, they'll say... "Well, next beginning of the day/week/month/year."

And that, ladles and jellyspoons, is utter horseshit.

It's excuse-making.

I blame new year's resolutions, myself.  It's a new day!  It's a new week!  It's a new month!  It's a new year!  Let's start it off right!  Oh... we missed it.  Oh well.  Let's just give up until the next new whatever.

Stop right there, you.  Yes.  You.

You don't need it to be a Monday for you to start doing what you need to do to achieve your goals.  Tuesday works too.  So does Wednesday.  Hell, any day works.  This arbitrary threshold of "Monday" is nonsense.

There is no "one day."  There is only today.  Grab it and go.

The hardest part of anything is the first step.  This mysterious myth of beginning something at the beginning of a totally unrelated thing must go.  If you are going to achieve your dreams, you have to start now.  This minute.

Take that step, and the rest will following more easily, until you are sprinting headlong.

So, stop reading this post.  Take a deep breath, lift your foot and stride out.

You've got this.

Good morning, Readers!

Today I was going to talk about the myth of Monday.  Ironically, I will have to do that tomorrow (the irony will become clear tomorrow), as I woke up to edits for Skylark returned from my publisher.  So I'm dropping literally everything to get those looked over and fixed up.  I expect it'll take most of this week, though hopefully it'll be done sooner rather than later, and I can return to catching up on everything I fell behind on and also back to my beta reading duties quickly.

Also, I'm glowing a little bit, as the editor had some lovely things to say about it.  So I might be grinning like the Cheshire cat for the rest of the day.

Oh, and while I'm here, let me take the time to thank everyone who came to the 5th anniversary of Renaissance Press.  It was a lovely event, with a really lovely crowd.  It was so gratifying to see.  Thank you all for making it genuinely special.  You all rock.

Since I'm anxious to get all this done, I'll leave you all here and get stuck in.

Hope you had a lovely weekend.

I'll see you soon.

​Ciao!

I.  Loved.  It.

This game is really heavy, though, and I had a few moments when I was left in a puddle of tears.  The added threat of actual, real permadeath made the moments in game so much more tense and terrifying.  And can I just gush about the combat for a moment?  It felt real, it looked amazing, and it was honestly one of my favourite things about this game.  It was just so good!

This is where the sass dies, I'm afraid.

Senua, from a physical perspective looks good.  Really good.  The designers took great care to include aspects of actual descriptions of the Celts of Northern Britain (and Celts in general, there is a scene near a tree that got me super excited because they had actual round houses in the picture).  It's not just the woad war paint, but the hair (described as being "matted with lye").  I loved how Senua looked.

I also loved that she looked the part of a swordswoman.

That is wonderful.

Also, I would add, given the subject matter, it would be really stupidly jarring if they did make Senua all about player titillation.

Senua is also the only character in the game that is fully realised.  Other characters come through, her druid father, her beloved, and the madman she met in the woods, but these are  seen in wavering, flickering remembrances throughout the game.  This is Senua's story through and through.

So, instead let's talk about how awesome the monster design is.

Or, you know, let's not.

They gave me nightmares.

So... uh... good job, Ninja Theory.  I think.

As to the character of Senua herself, I have fallen in love with her as a character.  She suffers from severe mental illness.  She hears voices, has another personality that pops up all scary every so often, sees things... And man, did they ever do a great job of portraying this.

I do not suffer from psychosis.  I don't hear voices, have other personalities that pop up (to the best of my knowledge), or have visual hallucinations.  But I do have depression, and it skews everything.  Everything.  People having a conversation that laugh when you pass by?  Well, they're laughing at you.  They think so little of you, they're laughing in your face.

It's not true.  But depression will convince you it is.  I cannot count the number of times I have cried because people having their own conversations laughed just as I walked past, and depression convinced me that they were laughing at me, because I'm awful/ugly/fat/insert favourite trigger here.

So Senua immediately became incredibly relatable, even though I don't have the same mental illness she does.  I have my own darkness chasing me.

What made me love Senua most, however, was how determined she was.  How brave.  How strong.  In the face of the terrors thrown at her as part of this game, she presses on, through trials that would have shattered me long ago.  There are few things I admire as much as courage, and Senua has it in spades.

​I love her.

The story is absolutely brilliant; fraught and terrifying, and so very beautiful right at the end.  It was so beautiful, that I sobbed like an idiot.  During my live stream.  Yup.

So... uh... good job, Ninja Theory.  I think.

The story is, on the surface, about Senua taking on a vision quest to save the soul of her beloved from Helheim after her village was attacked by Vikings and he was sacrificed to their gods.  But that's not what the story is really about.  That's what Senua is doing, but that's not the story is about.

The story is about Senua coming to terms with the horrors thrust upon her by others, namely her father, because of her mental illness, coming to terms with the loss of her beloved, the one ray of light in her dark world, and the rejection of the narrative of her as monster, accepting herself as she is, and facing the world again, whole and sure.

At the end of the game, Senua releases the seat of her beloved's soul (his head), stands and invites you to go with them.  Them.  Plural.  Her, and all the voices in her head.  They are part of her.  She is a them.  And that is alright.  She knows now that she is not the monster her father claimed her to be.  And they have other stories to tell.

Goddamn.

That was such a powerful message that I started sobbing.  I tried to keep it quiet because I was live, but I was in a state, let me tell you.

Terrifying, stressful, awful and, ultimately beautiful, this is a story so very worth the telling.  I loved it so much.

GAH!  SO GOOD!

Okay, the combat was incredible.  I honestly feel like if I had a chance to practice, I would be a fucking pro at the combat.  It was so good, and intuitive.  It played so smoothly.  Honestly, if I could get a game with just facing monsters with this combat system, I would play for hours.  I really, really, really loved the combat.

This game was a really fantastic mix of puzzles, combat and flat-out terror.  Those of you who know, know that I adore puzzles.  Myst is one of my favourite game series, and I really want a VR version for my console, because that would be dooooooope.  Anyway, the puzzle elements were fantastic.  They were enough of a puzzle to make me occasionally frustrated, particularly when I struck upon the solution, which, in hindsight, was so damned obvious.

The horror elements were absolutely terrifying, made even more so by the threat of permadeath hovering over every single interaction.  The fear was absolutely real.  The number of times my heart rate peaked was insane.  They managed to create moments of extreme tension, and bounced moods between depressing, to horrifying, to suspenseful to straight up terror, to, finally, beautiful and affirming.

It was expertly done.

As much as I hated spending my time afraid while gaming, I loved the game play in this.

I am so glad I played this game.  Despite the crying.  Despite the terror.

The story was amazing, and beautiful, and touching.  The world was thoroughly researched and beautifully portrayed.  The game play was fun - particularly the combat.  This game was so, so good.

I'm still a little sensitive from the first play through, though, because I would peg its replayability as extremely low.  I have one more trophy left to collect, so I will probably replay it.  In a couple of years.  Maybe.

Fantastic job, Ninja Theory.  You really did deserve those five BAFTA's.

Good morning, Readers!

I have some thoughts about writers groups, and what they should and should not do.

I generally recommend that writers should find a group.  It helps with motivation and keeps writers honest.  It's really easy to get carried away by delusions of genius (there are some writers... oh boy) or squashed by the crushing lie of inadequacy.

That said, it's wildly important to find the right group of people to form a group with.  You're there to help each other become better writers, to motivate one another and provide support.

So, you don't want a group of writers who stare down their noses at your stuff and deem it wholly unworthy of their time or consideration.

This also does not mean you want to surround yourself with sycophantic supporters who only fawn over your stuff (either in fear of reprisal or they're expecting the same of you, and you better fawn damn it).  That would be as wrong as the dickheads in the first group.

The point is to improve yourself and your writing.  Not to read something for unmitigated praise, to read something so that you and your writers' group can workshop on how to improve it, make it stronger or identify and fix something that isn't working.

In short, if you're going to be part of a writers' group, you must expect and be prepared for constructive criticism.  The key here is constructive, by the way.  If you're a reader, and you are unprepared for people to make critical comments on what you've written, you're not ready to read it.

Constructive criticism can range from repetitions of words or phrases, wrong word usage and grammatical errors, to timeline confusions, inexplicable character trait changes, incongruous character actions, plot holes etc.  Everything is under the microscope during these sessions.

This requires those who are not reading to pay attention, and to listen with a critical ear.  You're not there to be entertained.  If you are going to be part of a writers' group, be prepared to show up and do the work.  The work is not just reading.  It's listening.  It's putting your mind to work while others are reading to help them become the best writer they can be.

Note that I said "they can be."  This isn't about telling the writer what you'd have done with their story.  It's about the reader, their work.  It's important to be aware of and sensitive to their individual voices and intentions and preserve those.

If you can't hack constructive criticism, you are not ready to be part of a writers' group.

If you're unwilling to work while being read to, you are not ready to be part of a writers' group.

Personally, I signed up to be pushed, challenged and forged into the best writer I can be.  I need the criticism and tend to get suspicious and frustrated when I receive none.  Nothing is ever perfect.  There is always room for improvement.

And I want to be good, better, best.

Putting your work out there for others to pick at is terrifying, and can be traumatising if you're with the wrong people.  But it is a really good way to strengthen your writing, and it's also a great place to find your own personal cheer squad, to be inspired, motivated, and improved.

So, if you think you can hack it, get thyself a writers' group.

You'll be better for it.

Good morning, Readers!

Right, well, yesterday was a wash.  I got exactly one of the two things I absolutely needed to do yesterday done.  The rest of the day was spent gaming.

I really needed to shut out the world and game for a bit.  Some people when they veg-out watch television all day.  I do one of two things. I read, or I game.  Yesterday, I gamed.

Honestly, I'm irritated at myself for not doing everything I needed to, but I am feeling so much better after many, many hours of sneaking around and killing fictional people.  That sounds psychotic.  It probably is.  The point is, gaming, like reading, keeps my mind active.  I'm continually strategising, re-calibrating, responding, failing and succeeding. My mind is always active when I'm gaming.

That's not the case for watching television.  Sure, it might look scarily similar, but though both require sitting down, staring at a television, don't let the slack jaws of gamers fool you.  They're not tuned out.  They're concentrating really hard.  They're brains are fully engaged.

In any case, I gamed yesterday.  A lot.

And though I got little else done, I am feeling really, really relaxed.  Part of it, I think, was that I didn't listen to the news.  That did wonders for my nerves.  It's really important to unplug, and diving headfirst into several different kinds of afterlife in ancient Egypt did wonders for me.

For the record, I am a Goa'uld killing badass.

Also, the fart jokes were hilarious.

I am twelve.

Today, though, it's back to the real world, and I have a lot on my plate.  Today, I have to continue my catch-up of video edits, AND begin the beta read for a friend and fellow writer on her second book.  I am also working as a sensitivity editor for asexual characters - something that I feel ill-prepared for, since I can only speak for myself and not asexuals everywhere.  Still, I'll give it a shot.

So, for now, though, I have to get this video editing done, and then to beta reading.

Perhaps, by the time I've finished beta reading and the mountains for videos I have to produce, there will be editing to do on either Skylark or the WIP that needs a better title than the one it's got.

Right, I must get to work.

​Ciao!