Camp NaNoWriMo July 2014

So, Camp NaNoWriMo is coming up and I hope to God that it won't be a failure on my part like last month. Ugh. I was torn between finishing a book or a starting a book on Camp NaNoWriMo but voted into starting a book. It's the one I've talked about a couple of days ago, the one that came to me in a dream (but then again all my books came from a dream). 

This is the book where the main character will be a boy (fingers crossed!). His name is Seth Matthews and he has two siblings, Jonah and Lesley and they live with their uncle James Warner (uncle from their mother's side). All three teenagers will have superpowers mostly something to do with ghosts while their uncle is as ordinary as everyone else in the world. 

Poor uncle James will have his hands full. 

As I said before, this will be the first time that I'll be writing a story with a boy MC so...wish me luck. Oh, and I haven't figured out a title yet. I'm going for my fall back title for now: Something Wicked This Way Comes

Summary

Seth Matthews and his two siblings has a knack for finding trouble, or as they often protested, trouble has a way of finding them. 

Having three teenagers in one house you expect a certain amount of trouble, but their Uncle James Warner, was so not prepared for their kind of trouble. 

When other parents have to worry about drugs, curfew, alcohol, and safe sex, James has to worry about noises in the night, things moving on their own and exorcism.

When other parents have to buy frozen pizza and soda in bulk, James is buying salt, occult books and fashioning iron bits into jewelry.

When other parents go to PTA meetings, James has a network of respected and dubious occult experts. 

It's hard to take care of three teenagers, it's even harder to take care of three teenagers with supernatural powers.

Excerpt:

If he was any other kind of guy, Seth would probably be delighted waking up to see two girls fighting over who would have his body.

If he was any other kind of guy, Seth would probably be screaming his lungs out when he figured out that he could actually see through both girls.

But he wasn't any other kind of guy, he was Seth, so when he saw the two girl-ghosts smacking the hell out of each other, he reacted like Seth would do: he blinked, yawn, scratched and thought about breakfast.

Snippet of something I'm working on.

So, I had this dream last night and I just had to write down.

Surprisingly, the main character is a boy. This is my first attempt on writing a boy as an MC. Pray for me. Will need to hit several of my boys for keeping the character in...well, character.

If he was any other kind of guy, Seth would probably be delighted waking up to see two girls fighting over who would have his body.

If he was any other kind of guy, Seth would probably be screaming his lungs out when he figured out that he could actually see through both girls.

But he wasn't any other kind of guy, he was Seth, so when he saw the two girl-ghosts smacking the hell out of each other, he reacted like Seth would do: he blinked, yawn, scratched and thought about breakfast. 

Copyright © 2014 by D.F. Jules

Touched #2: The Saint snippet

SNIPPETS!

Touched: The Sword

Here's the blurb that I've been working on:

My name is Leah Curran and my life sucks.
While other people inherit boxes of junk from their relatives, my family inherits powers. And not even cool powers. I have the ability to sense Angels, Demons and most importantly the Touched; people who are graced and cursed with the power of Angels and Demons,  responsible for keeping the balance between Good and Evil. When it came to them, my mother only had one rule; avoid them at all cost. I broke that rule and lost my mother because of it.
Now I try to live a quiet, careful life with my uncle’s family and my best friend, Gabe. But once in a while the universe likes to kick you in the face just to remind you that you are small and insignificant. The Touched are gathering in my small little town of nowhere, and some of them know me and know what I can do. Some of them want to hurt me, some of them want to use me, and so little few want to protect me. Avoiding them is no longer an option.
I will finally have the chance to do something that I have been hopelessly wishing for since the night my mother disappeared; a chance to fight back.
I have been waiting for this, I have trained for this. It’s time to do or die.

Artwork for DreamWalkers

On a whim I made my own artwork for DreamWalkers, just simple things, images that I had in my had as I write.

I'll probably do more to accompany each chapter as I post.

Original Novel: Touched

Since  the publishing of Touched: The Sword is coming closer, I thought I'd renew the Touched blog with some snippets and song mixes.

Original Novel: How To (Not) Be Popular

“Popularity is like those heels you wear.
At first glance, it looks good. At first try, it feels comfortable.
—but you’ll never be able to move as fast as you want, as free as you want. One wrong move, and you’ll fall.
And the longer you wear it, the more painful it will feel.”

—

Nikolas Brahma

Copyright © 2011 by D.F. Jules

COVER NEWS!!!

So, the story is, editor reread final manuscript of The Sword and felt that the original cover--

--which is this one:

--suits Leah perfectly.

And, of course, I agreed with her, so it's decided that we're going to use the original covers:

Wolf At The Door: Short story: Werewolf Tea Party

For all of you who had nagged at me for writing something about ConnorxMey before he was Lycaon and she was Waerloga. Enjoy this short story. And more will come!!

Wolf At The Door: Short story: Werewolf Tea Party: Connor eyed the eight year old girl who looked dainty and delicate in her white lace dress; looking as fresh and innocent as a n...

Publishing News and Reminders

I thought since Touched is in the publishing process that I update on the news I got from publishes about where you can get Touched. Like I mentioned before, the trilogy will be first available as ebooks, with an epub format. We will also be searching for foreign publishers so we can get it on print. Meanwhile, agent have ideas about translating it into Indonesian for the purpose of Indonesian market.

Anyway, editor mentioned that Digital Mizan, my publisher has some ebookstore partners: Qbaca by Telkom on Android/google play platform, wayang force on appstore, scoop on android and appstore, indobooks on android, also we are on negotiation process with http://smartebook.com , and some ebookstore in thailand and Vietnam. They are also considering and reviewing the terms from Amazon.

Hardcopy of manuscript has finally arrived in my editor's hands and now I'm waiting for news about the covers. 

Since we're waiting, I thought I'll refresh your memory (and mine) with the early chapters of the book and dreamcasts. I will also upload some snippets along with a playlist. 

NEW STORY BLOG

Since #GoV is still such a mess, I'm going to share you the other story that came to me. Here there be snippet, title is FATELESS! It's a story about the ficklness of fate (obviously), desert pirates, riches, betrayal, love, friendship,swordfights, political intrigue, and most of all magic. 

My My My

It's been a while since I've posted anything in any of my blogs. Sorry blogs, I've been busy. 

I'm still writing, though progress is slow but I'm getting to the 50K NaNoWriMo word count. Either than, I have been spending time with my friends and my cousin and her family.

This is probably the handful of times that I had a chance to be alone. But hey, Editor said contract will be sent today, God willing. 

Today, will be meeting my friends Zie and Dhee for a little girl bonding. And I also want to buy Gail Carriger's Soulless, since I can't seem to find Sarah Rees Brennan's Unspoken. Grrr.

Am sending final draft of Touched-edited manuscript to publisher, am freaked that I missed a word/a typo. My brain often skips through them and just fill in the blanks by itself so I never notice them until someone points it out. And since publishing something in English is a new thing for my publisher, they don't have someone who can proofread in English, and I seriously need one...and a Grammar Nazi to point out my stupidity.

Other than that, I'm good. Still feeling a little nauseated about family drama and I really want to avoid going home for as long as I could but--

...oh well. *shrugs*

Oh and hey, new story idea which is aweeeeeesome!!! I really like the female character in this new idea of mine, and the rapid-fire sass between her and the main male character. Funnily, I got this idea when I was channel surfing and my attention was caught by the 2011 version of Conan the Barbarian.

It'll be another fantasy of course, and I already kind of know the main plot, and I know there'll be sword fights and magic, and strange destinies, humor and most of all angst. I can practically taste the angst.

The female character would be different from most of my female characters who are mainly easy going, she's going to be rigid and kind of a tight ass about her rules since she was raised in a sort of magic nunnery. She upholds goodness and kindness and compassion on a pedestal but is jaded enough to be practical when the occasion calls for it.

Since she was little she was forcefed by the high priest and priestesses that she has some sort of special destiny that she has to fulfill no matter what the price. She's not all that sheltered, but she's sheltered enough to feel aghast when she runs into a group of desert pirates, one of them being the male character.

The male character is uber-practical, as one would be when one is born into a tribe of desert travellers. He's practically royalty since his tribe is a big and prosperous one, highly sucessful in finding and trading things with countries that general people have never even heard of. But one day, his whole tribe was massacered because they were accused of hiding a traitor of the nation etc. A small number of them, him and his brother and his friends survived and they became what they are now: desert pirates, living day by day in hiding and always up for a brawl and misbehaving, especially when there is the Sultan's gold involved.

It's a clash of black and white and shades of grey really. The story promises to be a fun one. And I'm excited about writing it....

I just realize how "promises to be a fun one" is not something that I should be saying, in fact I should be saying "it's going to be a lot of fun" you know, like I'm certain that it will.

But you know what? This is how I write, I discover the story rather than making it up. My stories are usually already there inside my head, I just have to pick one and march on, following each thread of the story as I write.

Updates of NaNo's Novel

*sigh* I changed the trilogy title again.. From The Three Kingdoms, to The Three Cities, to the Three Kingdoms again. Anyway, compiled a few images into background ideas about the Kingdoms!! Enjoy!!!

FAQ

Since I'm getting ready for NaNo I thought I'll answer some questions from readers, simultaneously doing an analysis of my characters so far.

Q:  Why are your MCs Asians or half Asian?

A: Um, probably because I'm Asian?

Q: Don't you think that Leah and Lei are frighteningly similar?

A: Huh. Actually, this has never occurred to me because to me the differences between them are pretty clear cut. Leah, my character from Touched is damaged by the disappearance of her mother and her part in causing that. She's spent her life containing herself, practicing self-disciplined and controlling her every reaction and her feelings. She does her very best to not attract attention, ever. Leah doesn't have a social life, she rarely goes out and more often spends her time trapped inside her home out of necessity. Outside of her family and Gabe, she doesn't have a social life. Leah is very prickly, very cynical, and no matter how much she tries to control her emotions, she is very honest with it; she gets angry when she's angry, and sad when she gets sad and tends to be very explosive with expressing her feelings. She handles violence in a very practical way and it is possible that her morals are somewhat skewed. 

There's not a lot of things in her life that she can control, even her own body, so Leah is very strict with herself and in her martial arts training. 

Lei much from WATD has a happy childhood, especially once she met the Lyall boys. She has a quick wit and has this steadiness to her that people gravitates to. She is ever polite and watchful and careful. She's also loyal and protective. Family and Pack is everything to her and she would do anything to protect it. She has a straight view of justice and right or wrong when it comes to her friends and family and Pack Protocal but when it is about herself, Lei is pretty chaotic and careless.

Her artistic bent often makes Lei the observer in every situation she was in, and raised under the tutelage of her mother, and the Alpha Pair, she can also get very cagey and manipulative although it is not in her nature. 

As the only human in a wolf pack, she has her insecurities, but she handles them pretty well. She is fairly tolerant but is able to easily adapt to every situation that comes her way. 

When Leah often fights her way to acceptance, Lei bends naturally....just as long as she could see an advantage in there somewhere. When Leah often mouths off, Lei watches and listens. When Leah uses her fist, Lei uses her words and her delicate looks. 

Both of them are intelligent and strong and fighters, but they have different strengths to them. 

Q: Why do your female MCs always knows martial arts? Do you equate their ability to kick ass to strength?

A: My MCs know martial arts because I LOVE martials, because I want my characters, being in constant danger, to be smart enough to learn some skills in order to protect themselves.

But both Leah and Lei has very different views about martial arts. For Leah,  it is her way of having control, to vent her anger and to fight the feeling of helplessness that often washes over her. It is also her way of bonding with her family and with Gabe. For her martial arts is power and a way of life. It's a mental thing for her.

For Lei, at first martial arts is just something that she had to do, it was the condition that Cana and Caleb gave, if she wanted to hang out with her, she should know how to defend herself. Then as she grew up and learn the way of the blade from Cana, she begins to like it, it was something between her and Cana, something that she could do alone, something that sets her apart from the boys. Something that gave her confidence because she was good at it. 

But, that's pretty much it. 

Update on The Three Cities dreamcast

Finally added to the dreamcast, this time it's the lead male character: Arista Dasciano.

Updates!!!

Hi ya folks. Good news!!! Agreement for Touched is almost done so, we can start on the publishing (thank God). And I am also almost done with with editing and reviewing WATD; was going to write only 2 chapters for the ending but then decided on 3, then hey, decided to just merge 2 chapters into one so ended up with 2 chapters for the ending yet again.

I plan to add more angst for the last chapter especially the part where Kai and Lei says goodbye. I know, all of you are going to hate me.

Anyway, have updated the dreamcast on WATD, and will later on add more to the dreamcast.

Still undecided about how the plot is going to go for Guardians of Volk, but am excited to do it for NaNo!!! Wish me luck!!!!

Have been experiencing vertigo lately, my blood pressure must be crashing down, down, down. Am also fixing sleeping habits.

My corner of Indonesia has been so hot and buggy lately, so I get sweaty a lot and when I sweat, I often get itchy and my skin gets rashes and not to mention my allergies act up.

At least it rained today, so I'm hoping that it would clear up some of the damp heat. Urgh. Still means that I shower three times a day though. Ha. 

Background ideas for The Three Cities series

Found some artwork in deviantart that fits with some of what I imagined of the three cities to look like, and some background for the first book: Guardians of Volk!

You can read all about it here!!!

So,

I was re-reading WATD before I revise and edit and at the end, at a scene where Lei and Kai talked this song played out of the speakers and ooof, it got me right at the heart. Especially when Jason Reeves and Chelsea Lee harmonizes "Baby, I'm letting you go."

The Three Cities news!!!

Tuesday, 09 October 2012

Peeps, The Three Cities Blog is LIVE.

Blogs Moved

This is my laziness talking, since I'm starting a new story for NaNoWriMo; The Three Cities Series, and it is my habit to upload a chapter into a blog, I realized, hell, why so many blogs when I can just put it in one? Duh.

So, this is my attempt on being more organized. I can sense the impending migraine a month away. Wish me luck!!

To those who wonder why I name this blog Inside MadHatter's Hat, well, I often call the inside of my head as my very own Wonderland where I skip-a-long inside my very own world not unlike Alice...but I relate more to Mad Hatter than the blond, blue eyed girl. *shrug*