And I'm back again...

Hello Dwellers of A Third Universe,

Apparently me staying consistent on a blog is pretty much impossible...  Not gonna lie, hit a rough patch there. Feeling better now.

So, queries were rejected or ignored, stories were rejected and overall the whole 'let's get me published' vibe was dying...  But, I wrote--everyday--as always. About three weeks ago, I hit my stride again, so that's good. Have some new short pieces about to be edited, a novella in the works and started sending stuff out again.

As of right now:

1 Story submitted to Analog awaiting judgment.
1 Story submitted to Uncanny awaiting judgment.
1 Story entered into L. Ron Hubbard's Writers of the Future for the 4th quarter.
1 Novel submitted to DAW (a Penguin imprint and all around amazing SF/F publisher.) directly with no agent.

So, we're rolling the proverbial dice. (Pray for a natural 20 to whatever God(dess) pleases you!)

My world outside of my writing revolves around work, pain management, Baseball Cards (84K and counting), marrying Stef, and the furry kids. (These are not in order.)

The world outside of my life is scary and full of people hurting each other and then arguing about better ways to stop hurting each other. They seem to think if they can blame one group or another, then everything will be okay. Some people are horrible. It's on the inside. Doesn't matter what they look like, what religion they are or who they voted for. We, as a society, are just making this worse. I will also say, people need to stop pointing out that the people who caused these atrocities had depression. Depression didn't cause this. Millions of people are depressed and don't kill other people.

I don't have the answers. I just know that taking it out on each other is why we're here. Just be kinder to each other...  Is that really so hard?

Anyway, that's as political and in tune with the world as I am willing to publicly get.

Hope all is well out in the Universe. Hopefully, I will have some good news soon.

Joe

More things are happening! QUERY TIME!

I finished A3U:L I.  It's done. No more edits. Done.

So, I have queried my first three agents!  This is exciting and nerve wracking all at once. I went for three that represent some of my favorite authors in hopes that my style will appeal to them. I will probably submit to a few more this week as well.  Can never put too many out there.

The more I try the better my chances, right?

On the other side, two stories are floating out there. The Demon Hunter story is still pending at Strange Horizons and the Sand Master just got rejected by Apex.  Today, I will resubmit the Sand Master elsewhere in hopes of someone thinking it's a good fit.

I have one more in the queue behind it.  Already know where it's going.

Also started a new story. Should be done soon.

Hopefully I have updates and good news soon.

Joe

Florida and more...

I was in Florida last week visiting my dad, my sister and my best friend. Good time overall.

While in Florida, I got the Demon Hunter story submitted to APEX, which if you read the last post, you already know. I also got "The Sand Master" (Named by the amazing Gareth Powell) submitted to Escape Pod.

Now we wait.

In the meantime, I posted "A3U Presents: The Legend of Loincloth the Destructor" on the site under stories, so go check it out when you have a chance.

Hopefully I will be able to meet my goal of having A3U:L I at 100K words by March 22nd. If I can pull that off, then it is highly likely I can start querying before my birthday in April.

Wish me luck.

Joe

Stuff is happening!

Sorry I've been out of touch, but stuff is happening!

So, last night, I submitted my Demon Hunter story to APEX Magazine. They say I should hear something in a week.

Tonight, I should be submitting The Sand Master to Escape Pod. The story behind The Sand Master is crazy. Garth Powell, who is an amazing human being as he offers help to all of us unpublished writers, asked one night if anyone needed anything. This included character names. I asked for a character name for "an unlikely superhero on another planet". He gave me The Sand Master. Paul D. Nolan and I went from there with the brainstorming, which helped me to form the basis of the story. Stef helped me hash out the ending.

Now, it's about ready to go. Hopefully, tonight.

Counting down until the 22nd of March. It's my 3 year anniversary at work. I plan to have the final draft of A3U:L I ready for manuscript formatting by then. Then the real fun begins.

More to follow. Hopefully, good news.

Thanks for hanging in there.
Joe

2019 Week 3 Recap

Week 3 recap

Jan 15th – Jan 21th

This is a short blog update. Worked a lot and tried to rest. I’m still fighting this lingering cold and work has been busy. The sweep of editing has been completed, so it’s on to the expansion. I was slacking on word counts with the editing, which is okay. I’m fine not hitting my 500 a day count if I’m editing. You’re gonna lose words on editing.

The Expansion should bolster that.

Writing:

Day 1 – 211

Day 2 – 34

Day 3 – 52

Day 4 – 139

Day 5 – 137

Day 6 – 65

Day 7 – 12

Weekly Total – 650

Yearly Total – 11,666

11,666 averages to about 556 a day, so I’m still within the yearly goal.

A3U:L I final edit is done. Expansion has begun.

Stuff in the world:

The Yankees picked up Adam Ottavino!  The Bullpen is nasty. I like it.

Discovered the band Chiodos. Hardcore and Pianos. Love it!

Also, if you’ve never listened to The Rocking Horse Winner, you should check them out. They only have two albums and disbanded years ago, but they are still amazing. Jolie Lindholm’s vocals are great.

Watched Solo. I liked it. I know some people really were up in arms about it, but I thought it flowed well. Except for the Maul thing. I had to look that up. I hope they make a second one so they can explain that.

The Oscars are coming. Let’s see who gets offended by the awards this year.

Entertainment:

Books:

In Progress:

Neil Gaiman – Norse Mythology

OJ Lowe – Wild Card

Finished:

Nothing this week. (Still slacking.)

Movies:

Solo: A Star Wars Story

Shows:

The Good Place S1-S2

Ellen: Relatable

The week ahead:

Back to the A3U:L expansion, again.

Should be more on top of it this week. Also the Baseball HOF was announced today, so my thoughts on that will be in next week’s blog.

Have a good week.

Joe

2019 Week 2 Recap

Week 2 recap

Jan 8th – Jan 14th

Intro:

I’ve been sick. So, the mad week of writing that I hoped for was a bust. Did get some stuff done.

Writing:

Day 1 – 1,423

Day 2 – 547

Day 3 – 643

Day 4 – 177

Day 5 – 407

Day 6 – 115

Day 7 – 101

Weekly Total – 3,313

Yearly Total – 11,016

A3U:L I beta read is complete. Now the expansion and final edit has begun.

A3U:LTD is now a Flash Fiction 1^st Draft.

An anti-hero story has begun.

Stuff in the world:

More sad deaths…

In Memorium:

Mel Stottlemyre, Sr.     9/13/1941-1/13/2019

The Legendary Yankees pitching coach died after a long battle with cancer. Sad day for baseball.

Jo Andres     5/21/1954-1/7/2019

Filmmaker, artist, choreographer and Steve Buscemi’s wife. Sad day for all of the entertainment industry and especially for Steve Buscemi and their son.

SFC (R) Earl Francis     10/31/1966-1/12/2019

I saw the posts about him losing the battle with cancer on Sunday afternoon. I had the privilege of serving with Sergeant First Class (Retired) Francis in the 3^rd Infantry Division. He was a great guy, a great leader and just a fantastic human being. Sad day for everyone that knew him and all who never got the chance.

Other Stuff:

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez quoted Alan Moore. I remember when quoting a comic book was considered the stuff of Nerdom. It’s a new, strange world.

Why do people watch Logan Paul? His latest stunt about “going gay for a month” is further proof that he is an abomination and needs to just go away. (If that sounds harsh, remember I am a Combat Veteran. Our filters don’t work.)

Chris Pratt is marrying Katherine Schwarzenegger. That should be interesting.

Watching AGT: Champions makes me realize that Preacher Lawson, Samuel J. Comroe and Tape Face should all have Netflix comedy specials while Vicki Barbolak needs a raunchy Sitcom called Trailer Nasty. Also, Viktor Kee is amazing. Just saying.

DJ LeMahieu is now on the Yankees. This may have stopped the Manny Machado thing, which admittedly makes me happy. Machado’s attitude sucks.

Entertainment:

Books:

In Progress:

Neil Gaiman – Norse Mythology

OJ Lowe – Wild Card

Finished:

Nothing this week. (I know, I’m slacking.)

Movies:

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Shows:

Daredevil S1 (All), S2 (All)

Jessica Jones S1 (All)

Luke Cage S1 EP1

The week ahead:

Back to A3U:L and the expansion.

Me, the couch and Netflix were friends this week. Here’s to hoping for a more productive writing week. :D

Joe

2019 Week 1 Recap

Week 1 recap

Jan 1st – Jan 7th

Going to make this a weekly thing that I post on Tuesdays to talk about the week prior. I will try to keep politics out of this, but pop-culture happenings will be thing. I may also rant about Gaming, Entertainment, Baseball and Baseball Cards. So, there’s that…

Writing:

The first week of this year and I promised to get 500 words or better a day. Let’s see how I did:

Day 1 – 1,452

Day 2 – 1,021

Day 3 – 1,019

Day 4 – 1,058

Day 5 – 1,102

Day 6 – 1,013

Day 7 – 1,038

Weekly Total – 7,703

Not bad…  Most work was on A3U:L III with some deviation to the Source Document, Bird Suit (Short Story) and Demon Hunter (Short Story), which then took over control of everything and is now a First Draft. Editing on A3U:L I will begin soon. Also looking to submit another story in the A3U:L world to one of the online magazines soon.

Stuff in the world:

The year started off with some pretty crappy deaths. I was born in the late 70’s, so the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s TV and music icons are starting to get old, which is scary because it makes me realize I’m in my forties. Threes. Always in threes. These three were born mere months apart and died on the same day. Weird.

In Memorium:

Mean Gene Okerlund (WWF) 12/19/42 -1/2/19

I remember watching the WWF All-Stars on their Saturday Morning cartoon. Mean Gene was the host and the ringside announcer. The voice of the WWF for years! Sad day for Wrestling.

Bob Einstein (Super Dave Osborne) 11/20/42 – 1/2/19

Mostly I remember Super Dave Osborne’s comedy stunts. I especially remember the horrible effects they used like the blatant stunt dummy. He was also on Curb Your Enthusiasm, which I never got into. Sad day for TV.

Daryl Dragon (The Captain from Captain and Tennille) 08/27/42 – 1/2/19

Muskrat Love? Do that to me one more time? Love will keep us together? Whether you know who they are or not, you know the songs. The Captain has passed. Sad day for music.

We also lost former US SECDEF Harold Brown (9/19/27-1/4/19).

Last, but certainly not least, we lost Tyler Trent (9/7/98-1/1/19), the Perdue University super-fan who had been fighting Osteosarcoma for the last 5 years. His story is probably the saddest, but his life was an inspiration. https://www.tylertrentbook.com/

Other Stuff:

Also, in entertainment news, R. Kelly is being recognized as the horrible pedophile monster he is. The story about Aaliyah is one of the worst. That poor girl never even had a chance.

In the world, some of my brethren are being used to build a wall… I refrain from comment as I wish to leave politics off of my personal rants, but damn people…

People are freaking out about Bohemian Rhapsody winning the Golden Globe for best drama. Haven’t seen it yet, so I don’t have a personal opinion on it, but the camps are basically: 1) It was great and 2) It misrepresents Mercury and the gay community. This is further proof to me that we as a people will fight each other over anything.

It was a movie…  One interpretation of what happened…  Right, wrong, other, doesn’t matter… It was just a movie…  Just saying.

I will let you know if I see anything interesting when I finally watch it. (To be clear, I have no stance right now and am not defending or refuting anyone’s views.)

Bethesda says they are announcing the newest ESO DLC on January 15^th. Hopefully, we are opening up Skyrim! That would be awesome and I’m sure anything would be better than the reviews for Fallout 76.

My New York Yankees signed Troy Tulowitski and re-signed Zach Britton, so that’s good.

Speaking of Baseball, I finished the 2017 Topps Update and 2018 Topps Opening Day sets and somehow acquired a 2011 Topps Update Mike Trout rookie. (If you know nothing about baseball cards, then just know that the Trout card is a big deal.) Added nearly 4K cards to my collection and did it in a mostly cheap fashion making some epic dents into some other sets. J

Reading:

In Progress:

Neil Gaiman – Norse Mythology

OJ Lowe – Wild Card

Finished:

Nothing this week.

The week ahead:

I have the week off. Every day except next Monday. Which is awesome for writing and the plethora of Baseball cards I just got that need to be sorted.

I think that’s it.

Hope your week was awesome!

Joe