I’m officially lodging a protest to how quickly this year is passing. July, folks. July. Sheesh. At any rate, feel free to peruse my list of entertainment consumed, and tell me what you consumed yourself. Got any recommendations? Lay them on me!
house of cards
Culture Consumption: April 2014
It’s that time again! Amazing how fast the time flies, but once more, it’s time for another Culture Consumption. As always, I’ll post a list of what I’ve read/watched over the past month, and in some cases, provide some commentary. If there’s anything you’re interested in or curious about, don’t hesitate to ask me in the comments, and I’ll be happy to talk further!
April, I will say, was a bad reading month. As I’ve mentioned before, it takes me longer and longer to get through a book, even if I love what I’m reading. But some of that is balanced out by the fact I did some major catch-up of comic book reading in April, and as well as all the shows that were wrapping up this spring.
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It’s a Matter of Focus
So lately, I’ve been having trouble focusing. Not in all areas, mind you: I’m doing well keeping up with the elliptical and my daily walks. My daily installment of Hellblazer is coming along without much fuss. The husband and I have dropped both DirecTV and our land line, and we’ve been using Netflix like it’s going out of style — I’m just now getting to watch Arrested Development for the first time, and we’re working through House of Cards too. Great stuff. Also, movies: World War Z was this past weekend, and Man of Steel the weekend before.
So it’s not like I don’t have plenty to do outside of my day job. But I haven’t been able to focus on reading. I read a page or two, get distracted and do something else. Even if I’m wanting to read the book, my brain is still churning a million miles an hour, thinking of other things.
Namely writing. But instead of THINKING about writing, my brain is pre-writing: in the past week-and-a-half my brain has been swimming in the world-building of Telepathic Soulmates***, working out details for future fixes of that draft while also trying to find the real story in the sequel, Prison Planet, for which I now have a promising arc for, thanks to my good friend Michele. And lastly, I’m writing (yes, writing) a page-a-day, but it’s what I’m calling Not a Prequel Novel. Because I’m not going into it with any sort of real STORY in mind. Rather, I want to take two characters who are supporting characters in Telepathic Soulmates and tell their story. Their story takes place chronologically before Telepathic Soulmates, so it gives me the opportunity I need and want to really explore the world-building in ways I won’t get to do in revision. So it’s fun. I think.
It is funny: when I’m REALLY into whatever I’m writing, I don’t have much brainpower for reading. Which goes a long way in explaining how, when I was book-blogging and reading all the time, I didn’t have any brainpower for writing. The book blog has been closed for month now, and I’m just now able to pore my energies into creating my own fiction instead of absorbing the fiction of others.
Don’t get me wrong: writers have to do both. I’m just trying to find the balance.
*** = as always, these titles are actually aliases for the novels I’m working on, not their REAL titles. Except for Not a Prequel Novel, because it doesn’t have a title and what I would call it would make no sense to anyone who hasn’t read Telepathic Soulmates
Calico Writes 