Two New Experiences

I was able to finish chapter 6 of "Avaria book 2: The Aftermath" and I'm very excited about where things are headed. It is so fun to imagine something and see it come to life through the words you are writing. When I write, I generally have a very rough outline of the book (meaning I have an idea of what the ending will be and some of the details on the way to that ending). However, a lot of the plot gets made up along the way, and sometimes the things I come up with can drastically change what is going to come later. But, that is the fun of the process to me. The book evolves as it goes and becomes something even better than my initial vision. I am having a lot of fun with the characters in book two. In some ways I'm liking it even more than book one.

Beyond my writing, though, I wanted to talk about two things that really touched me yesterday. I experienced two things that really stuck with me and are two of my new favorite things. The first is the album "Lover's End" by Moon Safari. I love music, it is a great passion of mine. I received the latest Moon Safari album yesterday and immediately had my first listen. It was incredible! This is the music of my soul. The band manages to combine jaw-dropping vocal harmonies with extremely fun progressive rock. They are like if a world class acapella group suddenly decided to start a prog band. Acapella music is one of my favorite things, and to put it to a symphonic prog background just puts it on a whole new level. This album is practically perfect and is going to give Spock's Beard's X a run for it's money in the race for my favorite album of the year. I just couldn't believe the feelings of pure joy I had as I listened to the music. I haven't felt that way since Transatlantic's "The Whirlwind."

The other experience I had was going to the midnight showing of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows." Me and my sisters went about two hours before midnight and managed to get great seats. Going to a midnight showing is fun because the crowd gets really into it and it makes the whole experience more exciting. I think the book "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" is one of my favorite books. It astounds me how JK Rowling was able to end such an epic series with a perfect ending that wraps up everything in a satisfying way. I feel the movie really captured the feel of the book. These aren't kids having magical adventures in a fun grade school setting anymore. These are young adults who are figuring out their place in a very scary world. They are learning more about their relationships with each other and about themselves as they face impossible odds. The three main characters are all classic characters and it is a joy seeing them on screen, interacting with each other. I think the actors play them perfectly. I can't wait for part 2 in July! It is going to be epic!

And, I suppose that is it for now. I strongly recommend both "Lover's End" by Moon Safari and "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Part 1." They are both excellent.

A New Beginning

It has been a while since I have written in this blog, and I feel bad about it. My plan originally was to try to write on a weekly basis, updating everybody on the major events of my life. Well, as can clearly be seen, I haven't written since the beginning of August. So, I'm recommitting myself to write in this blog more regularly. And, not only that, but I'm going to change the method in which I write in this blog. Instead of weekly entries, I want to write a little bit more frequently. The entries may not be particularly lengthy, but I think it is important that I get my thoughts out in some way. One reason for this change is that I've decided I'd like to use this blog to track progress with my writing. I am trying hard to get into a good routine with my writing and I feel that tracking my progress through this blog will be a good motivator.

So, on the top right hand side of this page there will be progress bars with an approximation of the percentage of work I've accomplished on my current writing projects. At this time, I am working on two writing projects. The first project is a second draft of my first novel, tentatively called "Avaria Book One: The Sacrifice." The second project is the first draft of the sequel to that novel, which is tentatively called "Avaria Book Two: The Aftermath." As I complete work on these projects, I will update the progress bars accordingly. When I start up a new writing project, I will add a new progress bar. It should be a fun way to track my progress, and hopefully it'll motivate me since I won't want to keep the progress bars stalled at the same percentage for a long period of time.

Since there may be some who read this blog and aren't familiar with my writing, I thought I would briefly describe the plot of my first book (without giving too much away, of course). The novel takes place in a mystical land called Avaria located in an alternate universe. In Avaria, there were originally two races, the humans and the Ginerists. The Ginerists are supremely intelligent beings with the power of telepathy and mind control. Because of their mental superiority and strong inclination towards peace, the Ginerists were set up as the leaders of Avaria, with a supreme king in charge of all of Avaria. Throughout time, the humans have argued and fought to such a large degree that the Ginerists felt it would be wise to separate them into different sections of Avaria. The Ginerists also took away all technology and magical development since they were being used for destructive purposes by the humans. The humans developed in their own way in accordance with the environments they lived in, and formed into four seperate races, labeled as Men, Dwarves, Elves and Aquarians.

For the first time in the history of Avaria, the supreme king has been assassinated and his young son, Kydanis, must step up to this leadership position. As an idealist, this young Ginerist, now supreme ruler of an entire world, decides that the only way Avaria can exist in complete peace is if the separate races come together so that everybody can exist together in harmony. What he didn't expect, however, was that this act would be the impetus to a rebellion fueled by years of the people's freedoms being taken away at the hands of Ginerists.

This novel follows three people. It follows Kydanis, the newly appointed king of Avaria, as he attempts to bring the world together in peace, but is seemingly thwarted at his every attempt. It also follows Dak, a leader in the rebellion that is mounting, who believes that the Ginerists have unjustly taken away the people's freedoms. The novel also follows a young boy, named Goodwin, who somehow ends up in the middle of a war between the Ginerists and the rest of the inhabitants of Avaria.

This description really does not do the novel justice. It is hard for me to succinctly describe my novel in just a few paragraphs. It is definitely something I need to work on. But, hopefully it is somewhat intriguing based on this short description.

So, from now on I'm going to try to post more often. When I first started blogging, I tried to create several different blogs, each of which discussed a different side of my interests. In order to write more frequently, I've decided to use this blog to write about all of my interests. So, one day you might read an entry about a particular event in my life, then another day I might talk about an album that has been particularly moving to me, and then, I might talk about the latest progress on my writing. In this way, I hope that this blog will stay varied and interesting, and beyond that, regularly updated. The common thread for this blog is simply me and my life. Anything of particular interest to me is fair game to be discussed here.

I hope from this point forward there will be many more entries and that they will be interesting for others to read. I thank anyone who regularly (or even just occasionally) reads my blog! There will be more to come shortly!