Tag: Blogging

A Week in the Writing Life, 29 July 2023: Dubious writing productivity

[PHOTO NOTE: Me out and about at Mainframe Studios in Des Moines this week, where I talked with John Busbee for his The Culture Buzz program at KFMG 98.9.]

Hello, and welcome. Way too hot of a week this week, but I’m hopeful we’ll get some relief in the next couple of days. Let’s talk a little writing.

Home Front Stuff

Pretty much the only interesting bit of news personally is the whole family is getting together tomorrow and the next weekend to help my daughter Madeline move to a new apartment in Iowa City. It will be her new base of operations for her senior year at the University of Iowa as she continues to study chemical engineering. Thankfully, it appears it will not be as hot as it was earlier this week.

Otherwise, it’s coming to the end of July, and now I’m starting to get a bit antsy as I tend to do once it rolls around to August 1. That’s the official time when I start wondering and thinking about the new school year and new classes.

This coming school year will be my third at this school district. It will be a bit different this year since during my first year, I was half special education and half general education (English) and my second year, I was all English, and now I will be all special education, which was my hope. I’m cautiously optimistic about the upcoming school year.

What I’ve Been Writing

…not much.

I am in the midst of a pretty long dry spot – maybe one of the longer ones I’ve had for a long time. I think I’m at this point because recently I was writing and planning something quite a bit exciting for me to some previously begun works that just seem more like work to me.

This is a mentality that I’ve gotten to recognize in my writing habits. However, I’ve found some ways to overcome them and get past them, which I really need to start putting into gear. For example, if I’m writing a scene that seems to have turned into a chore, or just seems like work, sometimes I delay writing the scene and move on to another scene. Other options include radically reordering or rearranging some of the events in the scene, drastically reducing the length of the scene, or simply cutting the scene altogether.

I find the last option often can be the best for eliminating unnecessary scenes and speeding along the story. If I’m finding it boring, I have a good feeling people will thumb right past it.

So, I am hoping one or more of these techniques starts getting me out of the slump I’ve been in this week. It won’t be happening this weekend, with me trying to get out this week’s newsletter and moving my daughter out of her old place. Hope springs eternal.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

I was busy this week with an appearance with

John Busbee on The Culture Buzz in Des Moines on Wednesday and an appearance at Beaverdale Books in Des Moines the same day, one of three Iowa independent bookstores where you can find The Yank Striker in stock. I’ve set up links to recordings of both events on a new section of the front page’s sidebar called Interviews. Go ahead and click on the links if you wanted to hear me in person.

I don’t have many things coming up recently, but there are a few events I’ll be at this coming fall when I’ll have to be more of the “weekend warrior” than I have been this summer. So far:

  • From 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 9, I’ll be at the Groundswell Cafe, 201 3rd Ave. SW, Cedar Rapids, for an Indie Author Book Expo.
  • From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 14, at MERGE, 136 Dubuque St., Iowa City, I’ll be participating in the book fair as part of the Iowa City Book Festival that week.
  • And from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 4, I will be at the Elwell Building at the Iowa State Fairgrounds as part of the 8th Annual Indie Author Book Expo.

I hope to see some of you either there or around, and I’ll put any other events up as I confirm them.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

This week, I learned two writers/journalists I’ve long admired have joined the Substack community.

Even though Dan Rather might still be somewhat beyond introduction several years into retirement from his run as a CBS news correspondent and anchorman, but I’ve appreciated his writing ever since rediscovering him on Facebook. On his new page Steady , he keeps writing up good stuff like this observation on events in the Donal Trump classified documents case.

Lucian K. Truscott IV is an author I’ve followed for a long time. I’ve long been a fan of his novels like Dress Grey and Army Blue, and in recent years I’ve appreciated his journalism in various publications such as The Village Voice. I was hyped to see him on Substack, with such articles as this one explaining the difference between the political world and the judicial world when it comes to the Trump situation.

I’ll really need to do another string of recommendations for Substack Notes when I get a free minute.

Writing Advice for This Week

As promised, some writing advice based on my reactions to the writing advice of others. I’ve decided to try this method for two reasons. First, it can be quite difficult generating new and novel writing advice on a regular basis. At least, this is the case for me. And second, except for a very few obvious examples (always capitalize the start of sentences, use proper punctuation), I am of the opinion there are always exceptions to many “tenets” of writing.

For starters, I’ll mention two this week, selected from the editorial staff of Custom-Writing.org’s “11 Basic Writing Rules – Common Mistakes & Fixes.”

The first rule it mentions is “Keep Your Sentences Short and Simple.” The reasoning for this rule is as follows:


To leave your readers satisfied and give them what they came for, you need to act fast. You don’t have time to ramble about random things, so your sentences should be short and straightforward.The golden rules are: You need to be able to fit up to 35 words in it. The main focus should be on verbs and nouns.

Right, let’s dive into this. To start with, I would hope when you are putting together sentences you are focused on verbs and nouns, because there’s no such thing as sentences without them.

But also, sticking to an arbitrary limit of 35 words is not always advisable. In a short journalism piece of only a few paragraphs, sticking to several short sentences might be the best policy. However, the longer a writer’s text becomes, the more those short sentences become monotonous to read and kills reader interest. In these circumstances, you should use a wide variety of sentence lengths. It is all right to use short sentences, long sentences, and sentences in between, just as long as you don’t use them all the time.

The third rule on its list is “Include Simple Words and Word Combinations.”

[…] what’s the point of having short sentences when they’re filled with words that a regular person would rarely use in everyday life?No one will ever want to look up the meaning of a certain word in the dictionary. […] Especially when quickly scanning through an article.It isn’t a grammar rule per se, but it can save you much trouble.

Again, keeping things simple by using these simple word combinations is not an inherently bad idea, but sometimes you have to wander outside that comfort zone for you and your reader for specific reasons. Maybe you want to insert some obscure words into a certain character’s dialogue to show they are a sophisticated, well-read person (or are desperate to make people believe this). Or, like in my short story “Into the Cave” I mentioned a bit ago above, maybe I want to not only use the somewhat obscure word “kayfabe” but also explain its definition because I wanted to give readers insight into the specific culture it relates to (professional wrestling).

As with this and the previous rule, you always need to take the writing situation under consideration before you make choices based on those rules.

Writing Quote of the Week

Decided to go a bit further back in time than normal this week with a quote from one of the greats about the purpose of storytelling.

I have claimed that Escape is one of the main functions of fairy-stories, and since I do not disapprove of them, it is plain that I do not accept the tone of scorn or pity with which ‘Escape’ is now so often used. Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls?

J.R.R. Tolkien

Final Thoughts

Would you be interested in me doing some book reviews? I’m always interested in trying something new, although if I did, I’d probably post those as separate from the regular newsletter.

If you have any questions, concerns, advice, let me know in the comments or email me. Any feedback you have would be valued, especially all of you fellow writers on WordPress or Substack.

And that’s a wrap. As always, check the sidebar and author page links for my work, and I’d love you to leave a review of my books as well wherever you get them. Thanks.

– 30 –

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.
Subscribe to my Substack here.
Subscribe to my Substack here.

A Week in the Writing Life, 22 July 2023: A big announcement regarding The Yank Striker

[PHOTO NOTE: My backyard which won’t be habitable next week because it will be too darn hot.]

Welcome, everybody. A lot has been happening this week and the week to come.

Home Front Stuff

Late last week, I learned of the death of my brother-in-law, Rick. I never had brothers or sisters growing up, but when I first started dating my future wife Laura, I immediately came into a family of four sisters, of whom my wife was the youngest. Rick was married to Laura’s sister Kelly.

It seems so strange thinking I knew him for such a short time, but when I check the calendar I realize we knew each other for more than 30 years. Time is starting to play tricks on me.

He was actually more of my father’s generation, serving in Vietnam before returning home to work as a millwright. I’m not going to get into a full obituary here, but he was a good guy who loved his wife and kids and was always generous with me and especially my own kids. He will be missed and cancer is a stupid disease.

What I’ve Been Writing

I’ve actually been busy with several items this past week. Earlier in the week, I was finishing up a short story called “Into the Cave,” which I plan to post tomorrow as a paid subscriber exclusive piece. I consider it to be a prologue, test story, whatever you want to call it, regarding this new idea I have for a fiction series. I’ve been thinking of the idea to start putting the story together online and later publishing all of it or some of it in book format later. The whole idea of trying to build a series and showing off the creative process on Substack in real time is something very intriguing to me. It’s an opportunity for you the reader, to see the creative process as not something sacred and mysterious, but something that takes work, thought, and can evolve greatly over time.

So, that will be forthcoming tomorrow. I just want to remind any readers who sign up for a paid subscription get an automatic 7-day free trial. Sunday would be a good day to give it a try.

As for other projects, I need to get back into the groove with The Yank Striker 2, still in the rough draft mode. There are two scenes I have to get through and complete. Afterward, I think I might have some more freedom to hit and run. By this, I mean start writing scenes out of order to better speed along the writing process. When I have used this in the past, eventually it has had the good effect of prompting me not to write several scenes I thought were necessary to the story but I reconsidered when I realized I was too bored to write them, then it would make sense those passages would be too boring to read. It also helps to keep the story moving along.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

BIG NEWS ALERT – My book The Yank Striker: A Footballer’s Beginning is now on Kindle! If you have a Kindle Unlimited subscription, you can just hoover that bad boy up into your library at no cost – otherwise, it’s just $4.95. Go to the link in this paragraph or in the link to my Amazon page on the front page or the My Works page here on Liegois Media to get to it. I’m super psyched.

There might be some more opportunities to see me out and about, perhaps later in the summer or beyond, but there is one event coming up very soon… I’ve already plugged it here on the past couple of newsletters, but if you’ll indulge me, I wanted to plug it just one more time.

I’ll be having my first “Meet the Author” event at 6:30 p.m. next Wednesday at Beaverdale Books, one of three Iowa bookstores where you can find The Yank Striker in stock. We’ll talk about the book and series, as well as writing in general.

Also, that same day I’ll be having my first ever radio interview with John Busbee and his show The Culture Buzz on KMFG 98.9. The interview should air the day of the event during his regular slot (11 a.m. – 1 p.m.). Hope you can give it a listen.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

Earlier this week I listed several different recommendations for stuff to read on Substack over in my Substack Notes feed. I try to list most of them there because otherwise it’s really going to clog up the newsletter. (Don’t even get me started at trying to keep up with my ever-churning Substack inbox.)

One thing I do want to was recommend

Brian Reindel 👾⚔️ as a pretty good writer who, like me, is trying to get things going here on this platform. I noticed this note he recently posted announcing a link group of fellow writers he created on his homepage. It’s a cool thing to see writers here trying to create their own communities and cooperative groups together.

Sadly, I have not yet had the chance to create or join such a group yet, although I certainly am open to it. If and when that happens, I will have to recreate the old Andre the Giant meme (“Andre the Giant has a Posse,” etc.).

Writing Advice for This Week

While I like to consider myself a relatively creative fiction writer, I have to say I don’t consider myself to be creative when giving writing advice. I’ve been thinking about why that’s the case, when I suddenly had the realization coming up with writing advice is a lot like trying to come up with creating your own teaching materials for a class, and that’s something I struggle with all the time. Take it from me when I say the type of creativity needed to write fiction and the type of creativity needed to write lesson plans are two totally different things. Just because you are good at one form of creativity does not mean you are as skilled or practiced at another.

So, while I do think there’s value in trying to offer a quick bit of advice on here, I believe I’m going to try and change tactics. Starting next week, I’m going to be taking a look at pieces of writing advice I’ve found in various places and evaluate them. As I mentioned during my last newsletter, I’m more of a mind of keeping to general, broad principles rather than a long checklist of rules. So, I’m going to take a look at some of these checklists and give you my opinions on them.

Writing Quote(s) of the Week

Let’s go for two this week. First, there’s Dorothy Parker admitting writing is work:

I hate writing, I love having written.

Dorothy Parker

And then, our old pal and writing icon Steve with the real reason for writing:

Writing isn’t about making money, getting famous, getting dates, getting laid, or making friends. In the end, it’s about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own life, as well. It’s about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy.

Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

Final Thoughts

That’s it for this week. Again, check out this post regarding a new sale I’m having for paid subscriptions on this site. Also, check back here at noon Central Time tomorrow for my latest paid subscriber exclusive fiction, based on my most recent possible fiction project and series.

As always, check the links in the sidebar and on my author page if you’re looking to buy one of my books. If you buy one, I’d absolutely love it if you could leave a review on Amazon or wherever you get it, because that would be very helpful.

– 30 –

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.
Subscribe to my Substack here.

A Week in the Writing Life, 13 May 2023

[PHOTO NOTE: I gave you a look at my previous hometown last week, so this is a look at someplace near my present home. This is Red Haw State Park just outside Chariton, Iowa. There’s a few more pics below.]

I’m getting the newsletter out a bit later on Saturday than usual (I thought it was going to be 5 p.m., but it’s more like 5:30.

/Insert shrugging emoji here.

I’ve been busy with last-minute school year stuff and other items. We can talk now, though. 🙂

Home Front Stuff

From the photos accompanying this newsletter, you can probably tell that we are well into the transition from spring into summer and the air conditioning is now in operation. Red Haw State Park is one of the lesser-known nature spots in Iowa, but I’ve really come to love it in my few years living in Chariton. It’s even got a little beach, and there’s some camping and boating facilities, as well. It finally fully opened back up recently after cleaning up from a tornado.

I’m also looking forward to summer vacation starting in a week. Although the teaching year was not as bad as I had initially feared, I am increasingly glad that my teaching duties will be almost exclusively special education next year. I think it is the educational work I feel most comfortable with. Even though I might not be teaching writing full-time next year, I’m finding that doing my own writing is more than making up for not being a writing teacher.

My daughter’s visiting us the weekend after my classes are done. I’m quite looking forward to that.

What I’ve Been Writing

I do believe the last round of revisions and edits for The Yank Striker are now in the books. Now, I’m waiting for my publisher to move on their end. They have a lot of other projects they are trying to get finished, but I’m hoping I can get a release date for sometime this summer. That would obviously be an advantage for me, as I would be more available for promotional appearances, etc.

I’ve been doing more work with planning and drafting what I’m going to refer to as The Yank Striker 2. I have a better idea of what that is going to look like and the size of that project. I’m hoping that I can have it done as a rough draft by the end of the year and be ready to publish it during Summer 2024. I used to go years between writing projects in my procrastination days, so this is all new to me. I’ve got 16,000-plus words all set to go and I’d like at least another 70,000 for a modest-sized book. Like Tolkien and other fantasy writers know, why write a massive book when you can have a series?

I submitted that essay for the Writers on the Avenue collection I discussed last week, after a bit of revision on portions of the rough draft I’ve been compiling on a memoir project I accidentally started working on over the course of blogging about my past experiences with writing over my life. Whenever they publish that, I’ll announce it here. The collection is going to feature a lot of great Iowa writers and friends like Mike Bayless, Misty Urban, Mica Rossi, and my former high school classmate Juan Fourneau.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

Reformatting posts on Substack is going slowly. I did do a slight design revamp of the Substack page now that there are more design options available. I decided on a purple and gold color scheme in honor of my old hometown school, Muscatine High School. I’m quite happy with the result. If I’ve got some time later this month, I might look and see if the WordPress site might need a design refresh as well.

Once I have a release date for The Yank Striker, of course, I will have to start firing up my promotional machine (or lack of it) to preview the book. I’ve got some ideas for this, and I might want to begin that promotion even if I don’t have a clear date yet. You might be seeing some excerpts from The Yank Striker on these pages soon.

If you want to check me out when I post Substack Notes, here’s where you can find me.

Writing Advice for the Week

Use active verbs in your sentences as much as possible instead of passive verb sentences.

A passive verb sentence has something happening to the subject of the sentence.

(Example: “The body was dragged by Sam and Dean Winchester into the living room.” The body is the subject of the sentence, and has something done to it, so that makes it a passive sentence.)

An active verb sentence has the subject of the sentence doing something.

(Example: “Sam and Dean Winchester dragged the body into the living room.” Now the brothers Winchester are the subject of the sentence, and they are doing something, so that makes it an active sentence.)

Note the directness of the active verb sentence as opposed to the passive verb sentence. Also note the passive verb sentence takes more words to say the same thing.

You won’t always be able to avoid using passive verb sentences based on the writing circumstances. However, you should always at least see if rewriting a sentence into active voice is a good option.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

Art Cullen has a good look at what’s been going on in the Iowa Legislature and with Gov. Kim Reynolds.

If I’m interested in writing books fully online and on Substack, this might be a way to do it. It seems a bit intimidating to do it all on my own, but it seems to have promise.

I like it when writers, especially those who write about politics, are able to self-reflect when they get it wrong. It is a skill greatly lacking in national news journalists and non-existent among certain opinion writers. Dave Busiek is definitely self-reflective in this piece about the CNN town hall earlier this week. Give it a read.

It goes without saying I’ll be reading and rereading this piece about how to sell a book on Substack. Thank you, On Substack.

Next week, I’ll try to post some WordPress stuff I’ve been reading, as well.

Writing Quote(s) of the Week

Here’s two that seem to fit my mood as I begin this new writing project.

There is something delicious about writing the first words of a story. You never quite know where they’ll take you.

Beatrix Potter

Tomorrow may be hell, but today was a good writing day, and on the good writing days nothing else matters.

Neil Gaiman

Final Thoughts

How about this? My first Substack subscriber over the age of 18 to email me at jason.liegois@liegois.media gets an autographed copy of The Holy Fool. Make sure to include your name, mailing address, and any requests for the inscription. The inbox is open, everyone.

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While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.

A Week in the Writing Life, 6 May 2023

[PHOTO NOTE: Since part of this newsletter will talk about me participating in a project with my old writing group in Muscatine, I thought I’d include a random picture of Tom Bruner Field, which has hosted amateur, college, and semi-pro baseball in town since 1910. It’s a nice bit of history.]

This week has been a busy week for me when it comes to real life and odd and ends, but not when it comes to writing, perhaps. I have been doing a few things, though[1].

Home Front Stuff

It’s finally beginning to get warmer here in South Central Iowa, although today is a quite comfortable sixtyish degree day. These are still in-between days, like I remember as a kid going to school with my coat on and leaving school with it wrapped around my waist. We didn’t have a massive heat wave last year around here, so I hope we get lucky again. My wife knows that this is absolutely the farthest south that I’d ever want to live[2].

I’ve gotten more solid confirmation that I will be teaching close to 100 percent high school special education next year, and I’m pretty happy with that and the district. I’ve had a chance to meet some of the new incoming teachers for our district, and I’m looking forward to working with them. Although not a lot is going well for education at times, I am glad that I work for a good district with good colleagues.

It’s also the end of the football (AKA soccer) season in Europe. My beloved Liverpool might have a chance at European football after a long hard season, Wrexham got promoted to the Football League after years of struggle, and Napoli won Serie A (the Italian top-league) for the first time in 33 years, the third time in its history, and the only time without the great Diego Armondo Maradona in their lineup[3].

What I’ve Been Writing

I am still in the third round of “final” revisions on The Yank Striker. In my first review of the book and the changes that were made on the second round, I’ve found only a couple errors to note for my publisher. I’m going to undertake a read-through just to look for any remaining proofreading errors. Hopefully, I will not find any others, and this book will begin the final steps of the publishing process and I’ll have a book ready to sell by this summer.

Not to go into word count here in detail, but it has been down for the past two weeks. A big reason is that I have been busy with revising The Yank Striker one more time.

The other reason is that I’ve been putting together an essay for a collection by Writers on the Avenue, the group of writers I belonged to in Muscatine and I really do credit for encouraging me to get back into writing on a regular basis. The essay is an excerpt/refashioning of a memoir project I accidentally started working on over the course of blogging about my past experiences with writing over my life.

When they finally publish the collection my essay should be in, I’ll let you know. WOTA has a lot of very talented, experienced writers that I learned a lot from.

With all of that, I’ve only had a little time for original writing except for a few paragraphs. I’m hoping this next week goes better. I won’t be publishing a paid-subscriber exclusive or another post this weekend, but I am hopeful that I will be getting something ready for next weekend. I have to say that I have been impressed that I have been blogging more consistently than I have since I started my WordPress blog back in 2017.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

All quiet on the Western Front, as they would say. Updating some of the old posts I imported from WordPress to Substack and WordPress itself are at a standstill, but I’m hoping to restart that soon. Part of the problem is that I’m trying to get grading done for the end of the year and more than a few students have late assignments.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

I’ve mentioned them before but the

Iowa Writers Collaborative is a great group of writers here in this state doing a fantastic job of letting their subscribers know what’s going on in Iowa. Their weekly roundups are a must-read.

I might have also mentioned this place somewhere, but The Library will probably be one of my first contacts once my new book is out. I’m always loving to see new resources for writers out there.

Writing Quote(s) of the Week

I referred to it last week, so here’s Stevie King’s Rule #1 and #2 of writing.

If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot.

  • Stephen King

But, there’s this quote to consider if you ever think that you’ve learned everything there is to know about writing.

There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.

  • W. Somerset Maugham

Final Thoughts

It’s been great to see that I’ve been slowly gaining some subscribers, and I hope you have been getting something from my newsletter. If there is something you want to see more of, or you are liking something that I put out here, please let me know. I’m trying to see how I can be of the best possible benefit for my readers.

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Footnotes:

  1. I really am writing this at the last minute, so I’m hoping I get it out by noon today [EDIT: Nope lol].
  2. South toward the Equator, that is. Moving to New Zealand or southern Argentina doesn’t sound like a bad idea.
  3. Yes, there is a definite reason I decided to write a dramatic book series based in the world of football.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.

A Week in the Writing Life, 29 April 2023

[PHOTO NOTE: Since I’m on the road this weekend, I decided a picture of a road (Iowa Highway 14) might be appropriate. Ignore the fact it’s a winter picture.]

It’s been another week for me. Let’s talk about it.

Home Front Stuff

Can’t say I have any complaints about the weather this week in Iowa – relatively dry (except for Friday) and temperatures right in the 60’s. It only gets a bit awkward at work when you don’t have good control of the furnace and you have to turn on the AC in the afternoon or else everyone gets sweating to death and nobody wants that while people are trying to teach and learn.

I had a chance to get out of town for a day so I went trekking back to Muscatine for my dad’s birthday. Since it’s even tough for me to get together with my kids, if I can find a time to do that with my parents, I want to try and take it. Nowadays, I treasure every chance I get to see them, because you never know when I’ll get the next chance to see them[1].

In other professional news, it looks like I will be teaching again next year at my current school district. This year was a bit of a strange one for me, because it was the first time in a decade when I was teaching 100 percent language arts to both middle and high schoolers. All indications are that I will likely be doing all or nearly all special education next year. I’m starting to find that I seem to prefer the special education field better than the general education field, so I’m looking forward to what will come next year.

What I’ve Been Writing

I am now in the third round of “final” revisions on The Yank Striker. My hope is for a considerable amount of close reading and a bare minimum of changes. I would like this to be the last round of changes made before my publisher and I make the book available for publication.

What’s frustrating me about this and the sequel to the book I am now writing is I’m having to try and do some more planning for the sequel rather than straight writing. As much as some writers like to write by the seat of their pants (“Pantsers,” as some of the fellow members of my Iowa Writers’ Corner put it), I never could feel comfortable with not planning where my stories are going to go. This especially seems to make sense to me, given this will be part of a series and I believe that I will need a solidly secure world-build and background for it. I’m well-ahead on that score, but I still feel like I need to do more, and I need to relax and get that planning done while not being so paranoid about my word count. I can be productive even if I’m not putting a massive amount of words on paper.

One thing I sorted out that will feature in the next book is this: I’ve managed to come up with a club anthem for my fictional East End of London club. I took an old East End pub tune, worked around the lyrics, and voila, a new club anthem. Many different clubs have their anthems, like “You’ll Never Walk Alone” for Liverpool and “I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles” for West Ham United, and I thought it would be appropriate for my fictional team to have its own song. I had initially thought of some reworkings of rock tunes[2], but to absolutely make sure to avoid any copyright issues, I decided on a public domain tune with roots in the East End. I might give some of my paid subscribers a look at that tune sometime soon, or another type of paid subscriber post, but due to my traveling this week, that might be not quite in the cards. We’ll have to see.

Again, I am trying to avoid a slump in about three weeks when I go on summer vacation. I have suffered through some similar slumps during the past two years, but I think that with my awareness of this tendency, I have a better chance of fighting against it. I’m not going to post the numbers here on Substack, but I’ll probably mention in the weekly newsletter if I beat the slump. If you are desperate to find out my weekly word-count numbers, check out this section of my Worpress blog Liegois Media.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

Not much changing here. I’m trying to make a note to try and look through more Substacks during the weekend and midweek, and make some more Substack Notes. I think they are good for short notes, announcements, and shouting out other authors.

Earlier this week, for example, I announced that all my subscribers had been entered into a giveaway for my first book, The Holy Fool, as part of my anticipatory celebrations for the next book coming out. I’ll announce the winner of the contest next week on Substack Notes, but I’ll reach out to the winner beforehand. Said winner will receive an autographed hardcopy of the book from me. Good luck, everyone.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

This was a good review of a writing and planning tool called Obsidian by the author of Occam’s Lab . Check it out.

This was Parker Molloy ‘s great look at the closing of Buzzfeed news and its consequences.

Writing Quote(s) of the Week

This is the real reason why you need to follow Stephen King’s admonition that to be a good writer, you need to read a lot as well as write a lot.

Read, read, read. Read everything — trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You’ll absorb it. Then write. If it’s good, you’ll find out. If it’s not, throw it out of the window.

William Faulkner

Final Thoughts

I’ve praised the band Fairport Convention recently, and I’m a big fan of their English folk and rock blend; essentially, it’s the English equivalent to the Byrds of the 1960’s (and around the same era, too). I start thinking of some good fantasy adventures like Lord of the Rings when I hear it.

Here’s another one of their better songs to wrap this up. Take care.

-30-

– 30 –

Footnotes:

  1. So, if you are wondering why this particular newsletter might be a bit shorter than some of my others, that’s the reason.
  2. “C’mon Feel the Noize” seemed to be one of the higher ones on my list, or a similar sing-along from the 1970’s glam rock era.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.

A Week in the Writing Life, 22 April 2023

[Photo Note: An old picture of my hometown of Muscatine sometime around the turn of the 20th Century. It just looked cool; there was no other reason to include it.]

It’s been another week for me. Let’s talk about it.

Home Front Stuff

The weather in southern Iowa has continued to keep weird. It was in the 30’s and actually snowing on Sunday, up into the low 70’s by Wednesday, and then 50’s and rainy by the end of the week. But sure, there’s no such thing as climate change that brings with it unpredictable swings of weather[1].

I managed to meet my son in person when I was up in Des Moines for last Saturday and we had a good time[2]. He had fun telling me some stories about his work at the Iowa Events Center, where he works part time in maintenance when he is not doing his regular heating and air conditioning work. I realize how few times I will continue to see my kids in person now that they are in their twenties and trying to make their own way in the world.

Speaking of kids, my daughter got to go to the University of Missouri in Columbia last weekend with some of her fellow University of Iowa chemical engineering students. It’s great to see her growing and learning new stuff.

What I’ve Been Writing

I have to admit that work on The Yank Striker 2 has not gone as far as I wanted. I feel like I was just waiting for the last little round of revisions for the first book in the series to happen soon, but I’m still waiting on the next step. And now that I’ve gotten the new proof, that can begin. My hope is that I don’t find anything and I tell my publishers that all is good. I can dream, anyway.

So, I feel like I need to review what I’ve already written for the second book before I can start writing more new material, and there’s a bit of a mental paralysis. There’s always fan fiction for some fast productivity, but I don’t want it to be a crutch for running in place when I want to do something productive. I ended up doing some anyway because I wanted to be writing something, at the very least[3].

I think this is just the rehashing of an old argument I’ve had with myself for the past year. I know that whenever I’m more productive, when the numbers are up, I feel psychologically better about myself. I’ve said this before, but I never understood writers who had to be in depressive or chaotic moods to be their most creative. I always do better when I’m in a good place psychologically.

That’s one of the reasons that I’m really attentive of a slump after I go on break next month from school. I have often found myself so exhausted mentally from the end of the experience that my mind basically wants to do nothing for at least four to five weeks.

Getting back to The Yank Striker itself, I get the feeling that I will eventually announce a release date sometime this summer. This would be convenient for me, as I would have more free time to get involved with things like release events, appearances, and the like. We’ll have to see, as I am still waiting on more details as to when this is coming.

With all of that on the horizon, I think, a revisit of my first book, The Holy Fool, and what I think it had to say about the state of journalism in America might be a good topic for a paid-subscriber exclusive item. However I do want to have a book contest giveaway involving The Holy Fool and some of my subscribers. Watch this space – I might do a special May Day giveaway.

I’ve posted a few Substack Notes during the previous week and this week as well. It’s been a great way for me to run into even more writers that have impressed me, so I ended up subscribing to a few of them. If I make that a habit, do I add those notes to my writing totals that I keep track of? The mind reels. As long as I use it in small doses, I think it will go all right.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

I’m continuing to try and clean up the Substack with all of the older or outdated posts that got imported from Liegois Media. That’s still going to take a long time, longer than I had hoped. I wished there was a menu option where you were able to easily access a large number of your past posts to change their status or delete them. Unfortunately, no such feature exists in Substack, so that will take much longer than even I anticipated.

Updating some of the posts in Liegois Media, I expect, might take longer, and will not start until I finish on Substack. Again, it’s going to take a long time, but I have to frankly doubt there is a big demand for people to read all of my old posts without paying for some, or that I would be forgoing a ton of dollars if I didn’t get everything set up right away.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

There have been so many people I have been running into on Substack, WordPress, and Facebook. There have been a lot of good stuff out there.

Reb Brown is an actor who was big in the ’70’s and 80’s. I saw him in films like Uncommon Valor, Space Mutiny, but I knew him best as my first encounter with Captain America. He seems like an honestly sweet dude. This is a pic of him as Cap.

The New Yorker cartoonist Liza Donnelly has a page on Substack. It’s nice to see that not all publications are getting rid of their cartoonists like the Des Moines Register did to Brian Duffy. I like her work, especially this one.

Robert Leonard is a radio man from my neck of south central Iowa who also writes on Substack. He just published something in TIME recently; it’s worth a read.

Writing Quote(s) of the Week

I have to say I absolutely believe in this quote. It’s the same instinct that got me reading fiction as a kid and the same instinct that has me writing.

After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.

Philip Pullman

And I have an extra quote from Louie to get myself motivated because I truly need that this week after the lull in writing that I’ve been facing.

Start writing, no matter what. The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.

Louis L’Amour

Final Thoughts

I was doing some research on my new project and looking into English folk songs for a potential football club anthem (regarding The Yank Striker series) and wound up looking at a page of great American folk songs when I heard this one by the late great Blaze Foley. If there are more perfectly crafted songs, there are not many of them. Take care.

– 30 –

Footnotes:

  1. It’s nuts that I’m starting to talk about the weather all the time? I think it’s because my personal life gets pretty routine, especially with the ins and outs of a typical school year.
  2. And yes, I know that technically makes it the week prior to this week, but we can color outside the lines sometimes, right?
  3. Occasionally, I’ll write some things in these newsletters that are a bit contradictory. I should explain that I typically put this together over the course of several days and my mood (and the circumstances behind them) can change a bit. I have to get started on the process almost as soon as the last newsletter finishes or I wouldn’t ever have it done on time.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.

Substack Notes: A quick take

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A Week in the Writing Life, 15 April 2023

[Photo note: My front porch area this Easter weekend, courtesy of my wife. It’s a nice place to relax in the morning because the sun comes up behind the house from the west.]

Hi, everyone. Let’s get to it.

Home Front Stuff

I decided to include that photo at the top of this newsletter since A., my wife took it, B., it showed her nice work with our back patio, and C., it was a reminder of a fantastic weekend weather-wise. It is the type of spring weather I really look forward to when April comes around.

Unfortunately, this week in southern Iowa has hovered in the 70 to 80 degree Fahrenheit territory, which is entirely too much like early summer weather for my taste. If I lived in a place that was 50-70 degrees year-round, I would be in paradise[1].

Although we were not in the same city, me, my wife, and both our kids had steak for Easter Sunday dinner rather than the traditional ham, with excellent results all around. We might be starting a new family tradition.

What I’ve Been Writing

Due to the volume of corrections/revisions I suggested for the manuscript of The Yank Striker, it took me until this week to get that second revision of the book wrapped up. I’m hoping to get a better idea of when the publishing date for the book will be within the next few weeks. When I know, you will be the first to know.

After an extended hiatus, work on The Yank Striker 2 has resumed this week. Much of this work had been more in the nature of initial revisions and review as I see what I already have and start making plans for what I want to put in the book. I’m a bit frustrated that some of the written notes I could have sworn were stowed away in one of those hand-sized notebooks I have around my house and get half-filled with writings. After a quick check of my existing notebooks, I decided to recreate those notes in another half-used book and solidify my tentative plans for how I want to plot out the project. With more than 15,000 words already down, I want to make sure what I have to tell next will fit a manuscript of about 80,000 words or so, which I think will fit this second part of the series.

I’ve been working on a few ideas for some more paid-subscriber exclusive material, including a continuation of this article I did regarding worldbuilding in fiction, a revisit of my first book, The Holy Fool, and what I think it had to say about the state of journalism in America and elsewhere, and a quick discussion of the new Substack Notes feature on Substack. Keep an eye on this space to see which of those ideas I decide to tackle this weekend.

On a somewhat related note, I’ll likely try and post my first Substack Notes this week as well. We’ll see how that goes. There have been one or two people who are wondering whether it could be an alternative to Twitter. My experience with Twitter was something of an afterthought, so the decline and fall of that platform is not really a concern to me anymore. Hopefully, Substack notes doesn’t end in tears like Twitter did, though I am somewhat optimistic.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

I’m still trying to update my pages and previous posts to account for the new paid subscriber tier. I talked about that a bit during the last newsletter, so I won’t repeat all of that here. I actually think I could have imported my entire WordPress blog to Substack now that I was reading some of the Substack FAQs. Oh, well, I’ll stick to what I have now, I think. I’m about… 35 percent finished with the Substack work, at least? It’s a work in progress.

If all goes according to plan, I’ll be meeting with my Iowa Writers’ Corner writing group right around the time this newsletter gets published. I’m on the program this week with a presentation on revision. I’m glad that I worked up my Google Slides presentation for the meeting at least a week in advance, so I had that going for me this weekend.

Another thing that I need to think about is having a regular reading schedule as well as a writing schedule. There are so many great writers out there on WordPress and Substack and I try to catch them sometimes, but I don’t do it on a consistent basis. I truly believe in Stephen King’s advice that good writers have to both write a lot and read a lot. And, as I’ve mentioned before, I need to be doing constructive writing as well as the fun sort of writing. And, if I expect people to read my work online, I should be willing to do the same. Perhaps I could try and set aside dates (midweek and weekend?) to just tour the writing interwebs for a bit and see what other people are writing. I have been doing at least some reading as you see below, but I need to make it more of a routine. I’ll let you know how that goes.

Free Piece of Writing Advice/Insight for This Week

I do believe I’ve settled on having these short writing advice pieces in the newsletter every other week. I want whatever advice I do give to be something that you typically couldn’t just Google right off or figure out when you use spellcheck/grammar check on your documents. I also want for the advice not to come off as too repetitive, because I am writing this newsletter on a weekly basis. I’ve also re-titled the section “Free Piece of Writing Advice/Insight for This Week” because some of these thoughts might be more observations that precise instructions to readers. Consider yourself warned.

This week, my advice is this: as soon as you can, try to find a writing group. By a writing group, I mean a group of people who are interested in writing, are actively writing, and who are interested in making themselves better writers. Not all groups that call themselves “writing groups” could fit all three of those criteria.

Why is this a good thing? A good writing group helps sustain your interest in writing. It puts you in touch with people who share your interests, can encourage you and provide solid critiques, and be an invaluable resource for you as you seen to improve all aspects of your craft. I credit belonging to writing groups later in my life, when I wanted to restart my interest in writing, as a critical part of my growth and development.

Also, don’t be discouraged if, for example, you live in a smaller community where there might not be enough people to form a strong writing group. There are plenty of opportunities to meet online with writing groups and even attend meetings through Zoom, Google Meets, or other programs. My group has many members who attend virtually (and I count myself among that number sometimes).

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

Although I’ll likely get into a deeper dive into my initial thoughts on Substack Notes in another post, I appreciated this post from the founders of Substack on their vision for the platform. It’s been refreshing to see this idea of growing an online community through reader-first and writer-first policies. Hopefully it stays that way.

Theodora Taylor is another writer out there who is giving some writing advice on Substack through her page The Official Universal Fantasy Substack. I’m starting to dive into her advice, and once I get paid, one of her e-books will likely be on my shelf. Looking forward to it.

Writing Quote of the Week

This week’s quote is absolutely true. Also, if you have several different places where you can stop a story, you have a nice little series on your hands. 🙂

There is no real ending. It’s just the place where you stop the story.

Frank Herbert

Final Thoughts

When I have some time to myself and don’t have anything else going on, like work, family obligations, this blog, or my other writing projects, I’ve begun to think about this big fantasy project I’ve been pondering for the past couple of years. Whenever I do get it started and I start looking for some music to listen to while writing fantasy, I think this song will be on the top of my playlist. Fairport Convention is the real deal.

– 30 –

Footnotes:

  1. Can you guess that I’m living as far south as I ever want to at this point?

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.

A Week in the Writing Life, 8 April 2023

[Photo note: Just visited Muscatine[1][2] last week. This was a mood.]

If you haven’t figured it out already, these weekly newsletters will remain free for all subscribers, regardless of whatever subscription you have from me. I need to make sure I’m providing everyone a value for their time and support, regardless of whatever level that is.

Also, if you haven’t figured it out, it takes more than a day to put all of this together. At this point, I’m starting to write this edition of the newsletter on the day after the last one came out. It’s fine, though. The less I rush this, the more likely it’s going to be a quality offering[3].

So, let’s talk about the week that was.

Home Front Stuff

I managed to get together with both my parents and my kids last weekend, albeit not at the exact same time. However, I did appreciate seeing all of them, especially my parents since I had not seen them in person since at least Christmas. I’m an only child, and the older I get, the more that I want to treasure and nurture my relationship to them since I know how much people treasure their kids now.

I lived in my hometown with my family next to my parents for about 15 years, and I don’t think that I appreciated having my parents as near to me as I did at the time. I am glad that my kids got to experience living next to their grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. I didn’t have the opportunity to do that myself, since we were the only members of my family living in Iowa until I got married and started having kids.

I’m also getting a bit annoyed with starting to see weather in the 70 degrees and higher numbers occasionally here in Iowa. I was promised spring for this year, you know.

What I’ve Been Writing

As of today’s post, I do believe that my second revision of The Yank Striker is now in the books[4]. I will likely have to review this briefly before handing it in to my editors, but I feel grateful that I got it done in the self-imposed time limit that I had set for myself. Goal-setting can work, kids.

My hope is that the back and forth with my editors on any changes calms down and that we can finally have a release date for The Yank Striker. I’m now hoping for a summer release for the book, as that would give me more freedom to promote the book when I am on vacation. But, it is getting increasingly close to being a reality. It even has an ISBN number and everything.

As for the rest, work on The Yank Striker 2, other fiction projects, my memoir, and other items has paused a bit. I’m hoping to restart all of them soon after some of these revisions on The Yank Striker are sorted.

As for the next subscriber-exclusive post I have plans for, I’m thinking about a follow-up to the piece I just wrote on worldbuilding. As it turns out, I have to make a presentation on revising for my writer’s group next week, so it can be difficult to have something ready to go by then. However, I am going to make a big effort to have this ready for you, readers.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

Remember when I said that this whole subscriber exclusive thing was going to be longer than a one-day process? Turns out I was overly optimistic about how fast that process was going to take. 

If this was a large outfit or publishing concern, I’d be talking to my webmaster to step up the process and get it done as soon as possible. Of course, I can’t whip my webmaster into shape to get this done right away, because I’m the webmaster here. My WordPress and Substack sites are essentially a one-man band. Of course, all of the revisions I’ve been trying to fast-track as I mentioned above have been taking away time from this activity.

As I had suspected, since the changeover process is a bit more straightforward with Substack than it is with WordPress, I’ve decided to concentrate on getting most of the work done on the former platform first. There, it is merely a matter of switching over whole posts to subscriber-only status and deleting some blogs that I don’t want to muck around with on Substack (including my Wednesday writing journals and any posts exclusive to the WordPress page. That I might get done in the next couple of weeks.

The WordPress page is going to take a little longer. There, I will have to set up subscriber-only blocks of material that are only available for paid subscribers. So, that involves entering the edit function of a particular post, creating the subscriber block, cutting the section of text and material I want to have subscriber exclusive, paste that material in the subscriber block, and then hit the update button. This is at least a couple of steps more than I would have to do on Substack. One advantage to the work on WordPress, however, is that I won’t be planning on deleting any extra posts, so that will save me some time. However, this will not start until after I have finished my Substack work, and I do not have any estimate for how long the entire process will be. I’ll keep you updated, because I’m always looking to talk about something on these weekly newsletters[5].

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

Roger’s Bacon is a former evolutionary biologist and current high school science teacher (a latter profession where it is very hard to find good candidates, by the way). He has a Substack named Secretorm. I must say, even his links posts are an intriguing read. I’s say check it out.

Substack is rolling out a new feature called Substack Notes that is sort of a short post format similar in size to tweets, but not quite? I still appreciate how Substack is more about people finding other people because they are interested in good writing, not some algorithmic mumbo-jumbo.

Writing Quote of the Week

You know what, this explains how I felt about reading growing up, so I’ll post it.

We live and breathe words. …. It was books that made me feel that perhaps I was not completely alone. They could be honest with me, and I with them. Reading your words, what you wrote, how you were lonely sometimes and afraid, but always brave; the way you saw the world, its colors and textures and sounds, I felt–I felt the way you thought, hoped, felt, dreamt. I felt I was dreaming and thinking and feeling with you. I dreamed what you dreamed, wanted what you wanted–and then I realized that truly I just wanted you.

Cassandra Clare, Clockwork Prince

Final Thoughts

The day before this newsletter got posted, I received word of the death of the German publishing heiress, music promoter, actress, and model Nora Forster. She might be better known for being the wife of Sex Pistols and Public Image Ltd singer John Lydon, and the mother of Ariane Forster, better known as Ari Up, vocalist for the English punk rock band the Slits. I’ve been a fan of Lydon’s music ever since I was a kid, even though some of his recent statements regarding Brexit and other political matters don’t sit well with me.

I had first read about John and Nora’s relationship when I read Lyndon’s 1994 memoir Rotten – No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs[6], and it was a description of a truly wonderful and loving relationship by all accounts. Nora was several years older than John, and she had been suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease for the past five years. John had been her caretaker during that time. Before then he and Nora had served as as the guardian to Ari’s three children when she found herself mentally unable to care for them and, later, after Ari’s death from cancer. Alzheimer’s and dementia are likely the worst diseases anyone can face, and I can only imagine the hardships that John faced seeing his loved one fade away and having to care for her during that time. It’s a hard road for any partners or family of those affected by dementia.

In her and John’s honor, I’m posting this song. As I kid I was more of a Sex Pistols fan, but nowadays I’m an admirer of Public Image Ltd, so this might be my favorite of his. Rest in power to Nora and I hope John has peace.

– 30 –

Footnotes:

  1. For new subscribers, that’s my hometown. Google it to find out more – it’s the only town in the world with that exact name.
  2. The photo shows the Norbert F. Beckey Bridge, which crosses the Mississippi River from Muscatine to the Illinois side of the river.
  3. Of course I say that, then I wind up doing revisions on this newsletter less than an hour or two before publication lol.
  4. When I say second revision, I mean the second major revision since I’ve submitted it to the publisher. I have completed at least three other major revisions and about the same number of minor revisions before that process.
  5. As previously stated, lol.
  6. That is a great read that I would highly recommend.

While I do appreciate you following this blog, I really would like you to subscribe to my Substack page. By subscribing to that page, you’ll not only be receiving my Substack newsletter, The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (the companion blog to this one), but you’ll also be signing up for my email list. Just click the button below.

Subscribe to my Substack here.

A Week in the Writing Life, 1 April 2023

I will say that I am always glad when this day falls on a weekend. You do not want to be in a school on this day, much less teaching there. Any interest that I once in pranks or pranking people left me a long time ago. My personal opinion is that it gives some people permission to be absolute jerks, not that people need much of an excuse nowadays.

Aaaaaand that was enough misanthropy for a while. Let’s get to the writing talk, shall we?

Home Front Stuff

I usually don’t celebrate my birthday publicly, but I decided to do that to see who might actually be willing to support my writing (more on that later). As I hinted last week, I have started to write these more than a few days earlier than it actually runs, because otherwise I’m going to be rushed to get this up at a reasonable time on Saturdays and the quality might be a little bit low.

Anyway, the reason I’m mentioning this is because the plan is that today (1 April) I will be having a joint birthday feast and celebration with my daughter, and my wife and son will be there too, maybe even my parents. I do plan on visiting my parents before that as well. It is rare for us to get together since we now live halfway across the state from each other, and I treasure that time with them. I try to call them on a regular basis because I now know what it’s like to be wondering how my kids are dealing with young adulting and hoping they’re okay. Goodness knows how my mom and dad handled it with me being their only kid, and I last lived full-time with them at least twenty-five years ago.

What I’ve Been Writing

I’m deep into a second revision of The Yank Striker this week. Now that I’ve checked to see that all the first revisions got taken care of (good news, the vast majority of them are done), I’m needing to review for any other major revisions (or minor ones) before we go forward. How many more times through the process we’ll go through, I can’t say, but this is coming closer to reality.

Work on The Yank Striker 2 has paused a bit. I want to make sure that I’m going to be productive with the blog since I’m actually expecting people to pay for reading some portions of it lol. The other issue is that I want to make sure that what I have written looks good enough to match with the first part, so much of that work is going to be revisionist in nature rather than new writing, at least at first. As of right now, I already have 15,000-plus words in the rough draft, so that’s a little progress. (I’m not expecting the second book to be much longer than 80,000 words.)

I’m also planning to write my new piece on worldbuilding locations, with some of the experiences that I’ve had with both The Yank Striker series and my first book, The Holy Fool. The plan is to make that the first ever subscriber-exclusive piece for Liegois Media and The Writing Life With Jason Liegois. Now, whether I manage to actually write this piece is a totally different situation. Let’s all watch here to see if I make this deadline. (I think I might?)[1]

As for other stuff, I’m still doing dribs and drabs of the fan fiction, usually just to make sure that I’m at least writing something. I’m not as dedicated to it as I was, say, a couple of years ago, but it is something that is a good creative outlet for me. One advantage to it that other outlets don’t have is that I don’t have as much pressure to like promote it or monetize it like other things that I create.

What I’ve Been Doing Having to do With Writing

At this point, the paid subscriptions on Liegois Media (WordPress) and The Writing Life With Jason Liegois (Substack) should be up and running. Whether it is running smoothly or not is another issue. I mentioned before that there might be some technical complications to setting up some of the paid sections. I do not consider myself a webmaster or programmer by any means, but thankfully being online no longer requires you to have a basic knowledge of HTML programming or anything like that to set up a web site. I’m it when it comes to who’s behind everything, everyone.

I am not too concerned about whether everything is totally perfect for this launch or not. I’ve come to believe that it’s better to jump into this rather than try and tinker with everything and try and put together the perfect plan to run a site, which doesn’t exist. Might as well have fun with this and see where it leads.

Free Piece of Writing Advice for the Week

It is going to be very interesting to see if I can make this a a good section of the newsletter and not be repetitive. It might if I keep it quick.

Remember how I said last time that it’s good not to rely on “crutch words,” words that wind up being repetitive filler in your writing? I would also say that you should make sure to not use “crutch punctuation,” as well. For example, I realized after I had one of my more recent works proofread that I was relying waaaay too much on em-dashes (basically, this: – ). I should not have been using them all the time to try and make these big long pauses, or as a replacement for ending a comment. If I really wanted to merge two sentences together, I can use a semicolon every one in a while, or maybe a colon if the second sentence directly explains something in the first sentence.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

I always feel like I want to try to read something I’m going to learn from, even if I’m not sure that it will be a reading experience that I want to return to. It’s a way of challenging myself, which is why I insisted on buying Infinite Jest and The Pale King by David Foster Wallace and insist on trying to read them, even though I couldn’t even get through the first fourth of each book[2]. I get that same feeling reading Brad DeLong, an economics professor at University of California at Berkeley, a deputy assistant secretary for economic policy at the U.S. Treasury during the Clinton Administration and the author of a few books. He wrote this breakdown analysis of the new GPT-4 chatbot soon after it came out, and I’m always interested in hearing about how AI will change things or not. Give him a read.

Paul Krugman is not a writer who needs my hype, but I’m giving it to him anyway. A professor of economics at such places as MIT, Stanford, Yale, and Princeton, among others, he’s the winner of the Nobel Prize of Economics for his theories on international trade theory. He’s also pretty much the only columnist at the New York Times that matters. He knows how economies work. If you have the cash to get a NYT subscription, he’s worth a read.

Writing Quote of the Week

As my next big fiction project (other than The Yank Striker series) will involve fantasy, I figured a quote from one of the first fantasy writers I fell in love with might be appropriate.

Fantasy is hardly an escape from reality. It’s a way of understanding it.

Lloyd Alexander

Final Thoughts

Well, that’s it for now. Hopefully you, the reader, is getting something out of this, and you should be assured that I’m willing to write something even when I’m not trying to promote something. You’ll hear from me sooner rather than later.

– 30 –

Footnotes:

  1. I’ll probably post something quick right after it goes live.
  2. I did pick up a love of footnotes from DFW, so there’s that.

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