Update 09/06/24

Writing progress:

Since the last blog post I have edited five more chapters. After today I'll have five more short-ish chapters to edit, and two short-ish chapters to write. I'm going to do a run through of my short story which should take about a week, and then dive immediately back into the novel so I can make sure it's ready for my beta readers.

I've been trying to give myself some grace on my timeline for everything. Having less focus on blog posts, marketing, and using less of my brain power on social media in general has helped, but things are still just taking a while.  

If you haven't bought my book or haven't left a review, here is a handy link to get you where you need to go for that.

As always, do make sure you sign up for my email list at mjlindemann.com if you haven't, in order to get your free copies of my short stories!

What I've been up to:

TV

Rings of Power - We're watching the second season and I'm really liking it. I honestly liked the first season, too, but saying that on the internet is dangerous because every lore nerd on the planet seems to crawl out of the cracks to yell at people for liking things. Online discourse surrounding geeky franchises is so fraught now. Anyway, I like Rings of Power. I think it's an excellent edition to the on screen middle earth stories. 

Only Murders in the Building - The first two episodes were great this season. I could watch this show forever, and I hope they keep doing it for at least another couple seasons. Maybe even get a spinoff. I love a good murder mystery series.

The Dragon Prince - We watched the most recent season and it's great! My only complaint is that the seasons are so short and it seems like very little gets done per season. I want to keep watching it to give them the ratings they deserve, but I can't help but think this show would be better if binged.

Books

A Prayer for the Crown-Shy - Phenomenal so far. I've been taking it slowly with this book and savoring it for multiple reasons. 1.) Because each chapter is like a little treat. It's SO relaxing to read. 2.) I've been busy with other media lately (video games). 

Games

Still playing a significant amount of Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail and enjoying my time.

Infinitode 2 - This is a very simple tower defense game with a lot of depth. It's extremely cheap and can be played on PC and a phone, and they can be synced. So I've been doing a lot of this in my downtime.

Visions of Mana - I'm about 7 hours in and really enjoying my time with it. I can't decide if hard mode is hard or just frustrating right now. The AI companions die very quickly to monsters, and normal monsters (right now at least) hit like a truck. The visuals in the game are great. I love the oversaturated color palette, and I love the character designs. I think the story so far has been a strong point. A strong theme in all of the Mana games is sacrifice and they are embracing that whole heartedly. The premise is that every 4 years each elementally aligned village must sacrifice a chosen individual to the Mana Tree so that the spirits can continue to protect their respective villages from ruin. I can't stress enough how much the Mana Tree is definitely NOT the bad guy (it never is), though I'm sure there will be more to that world building than meets the eye. The characters all seem not just ready to give up their lives to save their villages, but actually quite excited to do so (to the point of begging the Mana Tree's faerie for the job). I'm SURE there will be a heel turn where they all start contemplating their own mortality, but for now, they are all joking around and having a great time on their "adventure"... which is a very interesting and unsettling juxtaposition that I think kind of works. I think the player is *supposed* to feel taken aback at how fervently excited these people are to throw their lives away. Anyway, undoubtedly more updates to come on this game.

Want to chat? Comment here or email me at mjlindemann@mjlindemann.com. I try to respond to everyone :)

Update 08/16/24

Forgive me dear readers for I have sinned. It has been nigh on a month since my last blog post.

The reason for that is nothing special. I've just been busy: last week I was on my yearly week-long trip to a lake with friends, and the week prior we were preparing for the week-long trip, and the week prior to that I was on my "biweekly" schedule with a week off. I still plan to do these biweekly, but as I said in a previous post. These updates are less meaningful than what they used to be because *not a lot is happening*. I'm just plugging away at editing which is fun and meaningful to me, but not super engaging or interesting for a blog post. And I can't exactly TELL you what I'm editing about since, ya know, spoilers. So anyway... on to the post!

Writing progress:

Since the last blog post I have edited four more chapters. I'm into the back half of the book now, but I have a new chapter to write and some hefty editing to do for the last few chapters. I'll then be doing another run through the book (though that should be markedly faster). 

I've submitted to the fact that this book will probably be out beginning of next year *at the soonest*. I may surprise myself, but we shall see!

If you haven't bought my book or haven't left a review, here is a handy link to get you where you need to go for that.

As always, do make sure you sign up for my email list at mjlindemann.com if you haven't, in order to get your free copies of my short stories!

What I've been up to:

TV

Extraordinary - We're watching the second season. The show is a quirky superpower show where everyone on the planet has powers except the main character who hasn't manifested anything yet. It's an extremely fun (and pretty raunchy) comedy that does an excellent job of executing on its premise.

The Boys - We finished the most recent season, and I thought they stuck the landing even though I maintain that the show is floundering a bit. I think it's a very good thing the show is ending next season. I think it would be a great spot to lay these characters to rest. Re: the Frenchie MM romance that was happening, I wasn't super pleased with that aspect of the show. Not because they did a poor job with the relationship, but because I thought the twist/secret Frenchie had was never built up at all. A lot of the season had that treatment. Everyone suddenly had Things come up that had never been mentioned or referenced before, except in extremely vague terms. Once said Things were established, though, I think the show did a fine job with it. I still love the show. Homelander still scares the piss out of me, and so does Butcher for that matter.

Books

A Crown of Swords - I read a huge amount of this at the lake and finished it this last weekend. I actually ended up really liking it. It's up there as one of my favorites in the series. There was a lot of progress with the different MCs arcs, and a pretty satisfying conclusion. I do wish there wasn't so many chapters focused on *not* main characters, but that's just something I have to accept with this series. 

Psalm for the Wild-Built - Words cannot describe how excellent this little book is. It's about a restless tea monk who chances into an encounter with a sentient robot. It's charming, heartfelt, silly, and like a hot cup of tea, calming. I loved it. I can't wait to read the sequel.

Games

Still not much to report here. Just playing Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail and I've been having a really good time. 

Want to chat? Comment here or email me at mjlindemann@mjlindemann.com. I try to respond to everyone :)

Update 07/19/24

Weekly writing progress: 

Of course I simply MUST put my new book at the top of the blog post. You can buy it here!

Not too much to report on book 3 progress. Things are still trucking along. I've got about 4 chapters edited since last posting. I've had a pretty stressful couple of weeks with private crap (nothing serious, it just doesn't take much to up my anxiety), so I ended up not updating last week. As time marches on, there is less book stuff for me to update on. It's going to just be "I'm editing" followed by "I'm still editing" - so I'm going to probably drop down the amount of updates to biweekly unless there is something I want to talk about in particular. 

As always, do make sure you sign up for my email list at mjlindemann.com if you haven't in order to get your free copies of my short stories!

What I've been up to:

TV

Acolyte finale was excellent. I love, love, love this show. Great acting. Great directing. Great usage of the IP to tell a story that, while it's not completely unique, was told in a fresh way. And the lightsaber battles made the child in me scream with joy. So cool.

Invincible - We finished the second season and I really, really liked it. I will say that Invincible coming around on his father after he murdered just SOOOOO many people is not my favorite, but who am I to judge? I like getting hints at the Viltrumite politics/structure. I loved the episode dedicated to Eve. I loved the twists and the shocking deaths. Lot of fun.

The Boys - I've loved this show since season 1, and I still love it. I think it's starting to flounder a bit, but we are only two episodes in. I like that Frenchie has gotten a boyfriend, though I don't love the idea of yet another doomed gay romance on a big budget TV show, so we'll see how that goes. The Boys is equal opportunity with its deaths and gore, so I'd never accuse it of the "bury your gays" trope, but (and I could be wrong about this), isn't this the first MM romance on the show? I can't think of another one. Regardless! I've been having a good time with the episodes we've watched. 

Books

A Crown of Swords - I've still only read a couple more chapters since last posting. Every chapter I read, I like, but I've been getting to bed later and that's when I read (before bed), so I just haven't been making as much progress as usual. 

Games

Not much to report here. I've been playing the hell out of Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail and I've been having a really good time. 

Want to chat? Comment here or email me at mjlindemann@mjlindemann.com. I try to respond to everyone :)

Weekly Update 07/05/24

 Weekly writing progress: 

THE DAY IS HERE!

An Eager God is now available for purchase!

Buy it here!

I'm so excited for people to read this! Make sure you read the second short story before you dive in. :)

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Alright, not too much to report on the third book. I got three chapters edited this last week which I'm quite pleased about. 

As always, do make sure you sign up for my email list at mjlindemann.com if you haven't in order to get your free copies of my short stories!

What I've been up to:

TV

Delicious in Dungeon - Finished the first season this morning and while it wasn't exactly what I'd call a "finale", I was still very pleased with it. Looking forward to the next season!

Acolyte continues to be very good. I like what they're doing with the two siblings and the light/dark sides of the force from their respective mentors. The show is just excellent.

Invincible - we are almost done with the second season and I, for one, am very happy with it. Only one more episode to go, and it looks like it's going to be a pretty big one. 

Books

A Crown of Swords - I've only read a couple more chapters. Books and video games are often in competition for my time, and this last week video games won handily. I'm still enjoying my time with it, and I'm sure my pace will pick up. As a side note, it's kind of funny just how much shorter this book is compared to the last one in the series. I feel like I've barely made progress and I'm already almost 15% of the way through. 

Games

I finished Nine Sols, and it was an absolutely wonderful little game. I'll be watching what these developers do in the future, because they knocked it out of the park with this one.

The majority of my time has been spent on Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail - and... I'm not going to lie, I'm a bit underwhelmed by the story. This game is usually talked about for it's narrative, and for most of the prior expansions, I tend to agree that the writers do an excellent job, but this time around it's lacking a lot of the magic that made the prior expansions so memorable. 

All of the "main" party members are sidelined for a new character who has the energy of a golden retriever. "But that sounds great..." you might think. You'd be wrong. Imagine being unable to escape this golden retriever. Imagine if the golden retriever was the only thing you got to interact with for hours and hours and hours without a break. Imagine a golden retriever crawling inside your clothes, sticking its face in yours, and then licking you for actual days at a time. Every time you take a breath, it continues licking and sticks its tongue inside your mouth. You try to spit the tongue out but it just keeps... on... licking. Your face is covered in saliva, you can't get away because it's inside your clothes. You wonder if you're in hell. What did you do to deserve this?

Anyway, THAT'S what I'm feeling after playing through the story for a couple days. It's suffocating. I even quite like this character, and I like the premise of the expansion (helping her win the contest for a throne). In practice, though, the writers made the expansion 100% about her. The writing in FFXIV has never been what I would consider clean. It's always had way too many words to say far too little, but I was able to look past that before, but with this character the dialogue is just SO tiresome. I'll still finish it because most of my fun is had with the game mechanics and not its story, but it's still a little disappointing. The music and art is phenomenal though, as always. So that's good! 

Want to chat? Comment here or email me at mjlindemann@mjlindemann.com. I try to respond to everyone :)

Weekly Update 06/28/24

Weekly writing progress: 

NEW BOOK NEXT WEEK!

The release of An Eager God is one week from TODAY! Pre-order the ebook or watch for the paperback to release on July 5th! Link is here. 

The Will of the World ebook is still on sale through the weekend!

We're in the last week on the promo for LGBT+ books! Take a look at them here and feel free to share that link as much as possible!

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Alright, progress on the third book is speeding up slightly. I've gotten 2.5 more chapters edited. I can feel my pace picking up again as I go, so that's good. There's still gonna be a couple weeks in the future where progress seems to stop (because I'm writing a couple more chapters), but feel free to call me Stella because I think I'm getting my groove back.

As always, do make sure you sign up for my email list at mjlindemann.com if you haven't in order to get your free copies of my short stories!

What I've been up to:

TV

Delicious in Dungeon - Not much to report. Is good. Is VERY good. I'm almost finished with the first season and then I'll be moving on to Scavenger's Reign which I'm told by many people is great!

Holy shit, Acolyte is SO good. I'm not going to spoil, but the fight sequences in the show are absolutely fantastic, and I cannot BELIEVE how bold this series is. I'm loving it.

We started the newest season of Invincible this week and it's also VERY good. We're having a great week of television in this here household.

Books

A Crown of Swords - I haven't made TOO much progress in it because... well, you'll see when you get to the "games" portion. But what I HAVE read I've enjoyed. Lots of Perrin in the book so far which is fine. I'll say that I do hate that Robert Jordan never seems to let characters say the obvious thing they SHOULD say, but that's so rampant in these books it's hardly something to complain about. It's more something you just have to accept in order to read them.

Games

I think I'm finished with Granblue Fantasy: Relink for a while unless they add some more content. Still playing some Overwatch 2 as well, but most of my focus has been on:

Nine Sols

A metroidvania with "Sekiro" style combat (which means it focuses heavily on timing and parries). It's pretty difficult, but I've managed to almost beat it within a week of purchasing it, so clearly it's not difficult enough to turn me off. There's a "rest hub" in the form of a house where a few NPC friends stay, and the characters are fleshed out through small little story moments as you bring back gifts to them. As the game progresses, the extremely clean home turns into a mess as the child you save in the beginning of the game plasters his artwork everywhere, which is VERY charming. The game is brutal and beautiful and I strongly recommend it to anyone who likes metroidvania games. My only gripe is that the translation is a little off at times, and SOMETIMES the story bits take a bit too long. A very small complaint for a stellar game. 

I'm also starting Final Fantasy XIV up again, so I can play through the new expansion. On top of that, I'm dabbling in Monster Hunter Rise with a friend. So... big week in games for me lol.

Want to chat? Comment here or email me at mjlindemann@mjlindemann.com. I try to respond to everyone :)

Weekly Update 06/21/24

Weekly writing progress: 

2 more chapters edited. This pace is plodding, but it's consistent, so I'm just gonna ride it out. 

INDIE BOOKS! INDIE BOOKS! Only two weeks left on this promo for LGBT+ books here and feel free to share that link as much as possible!

An Eager God preorder is here. The release date is set to July 5th.

The Will of the World ebook will be going on sale for half off starting June 23rd! 1.99 for an entire novel! What a deal! I would die of happiness if you could encourage new readers to check out my little book/series. Look for it here.

As always, do make sure you sign up for my email list at mjlindemann.com if you haven't in order to get your free copies of my short stories!

What I've been up to:

TV

Delicious in Dungeon - Like the mccockatrice sandwich off the dollar menu, I'm still lovin' it. 

We finished X-Men '97 and WOW what a great show. Hot damn. So many good moments and awesome twists. I think the ONLY gripe I could make (and it's very small) is that it can be a bit hard to follow for people who aren't that familiar with X-Men. My husband, bless his simple upbringing, did not froth at the mouth on Saturday mornings in front of the TV waiting for the next episode like the rest of us. I say "us", because I know you were just like me. Weren't you? Glued to the tv on your morning off from school just after eating your Cinnamon Toast Crunch, vibrating in anticipation for all the mutant badassery. Anyway, my husband was a PBS kid, so I had to pause every once in a while and point at characters, name them, and give him a bit of back story. He still managed to quite like the show regardless, and I can't wait for the second season! 

Hey, guess what? We started watching Acolyte, and all the hyper conservative anti-woke babies complaining about it were predictably full of shit. Acolyte's first four episodes have been extremely fun, filled with cool fight scenes, and lots of interesting world building. I think Star Wars fans just hate Star Wars once they realize it's always been "woke". Anyway, without diving into the current online culture BS trend where right wing extremists are finally, FINALLY, realizing they are the bad guys in every show, I'll just say that Acolyte has been delightful. 

Books

I got about 50% of the way through You're Gonna Die Alone (& Other Excellent News) and had to stop. It's very good, very well written, I love the message, it's just not for me or where my headspace is at right now. I think I just need fiction at this moment in time. I do, however, have a friend that will eat it up, and I plan on gifting it to them the next time I see them. 

With that, I'm diving back into The Wheel of Time, I would have stayed away longer, but I don't have any standalones I was super looking forward to at the moment, and I don't want to read a series while I'm in the middle of another series. So I'm diving face first into "the slog", starting with A Crown of Swords. The prologue has been pretty entertaining so far. 

Games

Granblue Fantasy: Relink and Overwatch 2 are the only things I've been playing. It's been a pretty chill week.

Want to chat? Comment here or email me at mjlindemann@mjlindemann.com. I try to respond to everyone :)

Weekly Update 06/14/24

This is gonna be a quick one this week. Very little has changed in my life in the last seven days :)

Weekly writing progress: 

2 more chapters edited! Again, I'm not going to win awards for speed, but I'm plunking away at it.

I'm gonna beat this indie book pride drum as much as I can until the end of June! Check out a ton of LGBT+ books here and feel free to share that link as much as possible!

Book 2 preorder is here. The release date is set to July 5th.

And as always, do make sure you sign up for my email list at mjlindemann.com if you haven't in order to get your free copies of my short stories!

What I've been up to:

TV

Delicious in Dungeon - still delicious and still dungeoning. For a moment the show seemed like it was winding down, but nope! Our team is still on a mission to eat all the tasty monsters.

X-Men '97 is phenomenal and everyone should watch it. I was initially put off by the extreme pace, but I'm kind of in love with it now. We're on the last episode, and have a wealth of options up next. I think we'll probably watch Acolyte to give it ratings. 

I've heard from a lot of people that it's really good and a lot of people whose opinions I can't stand that it's real bad... which means it's probably really good but has black people in it, so I'm gonna watch it. It's also during the high republic area if I recall? And I cannot even TELL you how excited I am to watch something that ISN'T Skywalker and the "current" timeline. I'm so sick of the republic/empire conflict. 

Books

This is How You Lose the Time War is one of the most beautiful books I've ever read. I finished it last night and simply could not have been happier with it. The writing is just so SO pretty.

I'll be starting You're Gonna Die Alone (& Other Excellent News) next. It was a recommendation from a staff member (who is also my friend's cousin) that works at a local indie bookstore when we went out for Indie Bookstore day.

Games

Granblue Fantasy: Relink is all I've really played in the last week. It's imperfect (way too much random chance with loot drops), but it's a ton of fun to play despite its imperfections.

Want to chat? Comment here or email me at mjlindemann@mjlindemann.com. I try to respond to everyone :)