Weekly Update 03/29/24

It's going to be a quick update this week since I've been on vacation the majority of March!

Weekly writing progress: 

By the time this gets posted my ebook should be live! And before I post again the paperback should be live! I'm extremely excited and nervous for the general public to start reading :)

Other than that little bit of news, I have nothing to report. No news on any covers, and I'm only just getting started on proofing and all that stuff to put a bow on book 2.

I've gotten some reviews and feedback from ARCs that has been mostly positive, so that's good!

What I've been up to:

TV

On the plane ride to and from Florida I watched Frieren: Beyond Journey's End the entire time. I love this show. Not much more to comment on that I haven't already said. 

Other than some episodes of drag race season 16, we haven't watched any other TV since coming home. P.s. season 16 is probably my favorite cast since the earlier seasons. It's REAL good. I'll have to eat my words about Plane Jane because I'm actually growing to like her. I still abhor how she treated queens she felt were "bad", but I think the other queens have checked her enough when her ego gets the best of her that she's grown. Speaking of ego, Q *sips tea*. Of course, I know reality television has a lot of "production" in it, but I still love it. 

Books

I finished Nettle & Bone on vacation and wow, what an amazing book. I honestly kind of wanted to just start reading it again, but I like to keep a forward momentum and experience new stories as much as possible without slipping into nostalgia reads even though I've been known in the past to reread/rewatch/replay books/movies/games an extreme amount. There is nothing wrong with that whatsoever, but I've adopted a philosophy that there are too many stories in the world that I want to experience, so unless I REALLY need that nostalgia hit, I just move onward. Regardless, Nettle & Bone is an amazing read that I would readily recommend to anyone that likes fantasy.

I started The Fires of Heaven which is book 5 in The Wheel of Time series. I took a few months off to read other stuff, and now I'm back at it. I've been pleasantly surprised with it. I'm about 30% in (I think) and the pacing has been really good, there's been some dramatic irony, the character work is coming through more. I was worried after The Shadow Rising that I was going to hit a slump, but I've been thoroughly enjoying my time with this one so far. 

Games

Nothing. I'll get back into Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth here, but I just haven't had time since getting back home between unpacking, washing the dogs after picking them up from boarding, catching up on emails, etc. etc. - Domestic stuff.

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

Weekly Update 03/15/24

 Weekly writing progress: 

- The Princess short story is completely done save for the cover which my friend will be doing. We're waiting until the cover for book 2 is done to make sure we can keep things visually consistent.

- Final major edits on book 2 are done. I was hopeful I would get to start on line edits/proofing, but at the time of writing this I'm going on vacation tomorrow and I'm just not in the headspace to focus. I have a few days off when I get back that should help me get a jump start. My timeline is moving back a bit, but I'm hoping to have the line and proofing done in mid March.

- After that I'll be leaping head first into book 3's initial editing pass. When I started all this I was hoping to have the books release within two months of each other, but things just take a while. Book 2 should come out within 2-3 months of book 1, but book 3 may take till December. I do two rounds of beta reads with my books, so the process just takes a while. My goal is still to have book 3 released by the end of the year. 

I'd like to have a more aggressive release schedule going forward, but unless this becomes my full time job it will be about a book a year. (If I release book 3 in December that works out to about 10 months/book) - I feel like 10 months of part time work per year for a personal pursuit outside my primary profession is "enough", and I don't begrudge myself taking time away or "slacking" a bit every now and then in order to focus heavily on a game or a book. I strongly feel I could do 2 books/year at my current skill level if I could put in full time hours and had a dedicated editor instead of doing two rounds of beta reads and scouring my books countless times for typos and grammar errors, but #futuregoals I guess. 

What I've been up to:

TV

Frieren: Beyond Journey's end continues to be an excellent anime. The writing is very, very good. It's proof that I don't need a lot of action to enjoy an anime which is what I thought part of my problem with Pluto was. But no, I just need characters with consistent motivations and real growth. Though there is some action, it's certainly not the primary focus of the show.

Vinland Saga is still good. I've been focusing more on Frieren, so not much to report. 

Abbott Elementary is threading the needle on their main couple relationship better than I expected. I'm still annoyed by it, but I like the characters. I think all of the actors and the writers are getting comfortable with their characters and it shows.

We've been too busy to get our episodes of Tokyo Vice and Shogun in, but when we return from vacation I'm sure we will prioritize them heavily.

Books

Nettle & Bone is amazing. I love how relatable the main character is. I love that her bravery isn't a brash, in-your-face type of bravery. She proves herself not by throwing herself into danger (though she does do that), but by refusing to back down even though she's rightfully terrified. Also, bone dog is cute and special and I love him.

Games

Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth is a lot of fun. If you haven't played the original Final Fantasy 7 feel free to just skip this whole paragraph because you aren't going to care one whit about it. The major criticism for FF7:R is that there is "too much open world stuff to do", and the people that think that are stupid and wrong. The child robot that sends you on quests is a bit obnoxious, but this game expands all of the characters well beyond the original, and all of these short little quests are great opportunities to play as the characters and expand their relationships with each other. Aerith dies in the original game with less than a chapter's worth of dialogue and it's lauded as one of the bravest moves in gaming (for the time), but here I feel like I'm actually getting to know her. Same with Tifa and the rest of the crew. There's some very, very silly dialogue choices and "anime style" slapstick humor that I don't think translates well when they've chosen to go with such a realistic animation style, but for someone like me that's a very easy thing to forgive.

I haven't been playing anything besides FF7: Rebirth and Overwatch 2 lately, so that's it for me. Off to the Caribbean!

See ya in two weeks!

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

Weekly Update 03/08/24

Weekly writing progress: 

- Editing on book 2 is almost done. I have one bit left to do and then it's on to proofing/line editing, then one final FINAL read through before I completely sign off.

- I put in the order for book 2's cover this week. It'll feature the coin of eyes prominently and the main color will be red.

- I'm doing line editing and proofing of the 2nd short story, The Princess, before I do so on book 2 because the cover artist (a friend) wants to read it before designing the cover. So that's my priority right now.

- I posted on another ARC facebook page and have another ARC reader because of it. I'm hopeful Netgalley will yield some more ARC readers as well. My goal is 20ish reviews, but I'm a realist and so if I get any more than 10 I'll be happy. Who knows, though. I feel like I could have done more for promotion, but I'm terrible at promotion on social media. It's a skill that I need to learn.

What I've been up to:

TV

Tokyo Vice season 2's latest episode was a banger. That show did such a good job of setting this episode up and then knocking it out of the park.

We've started Shogun and I'm loving it. All the main actors are doing a great job. Cosmo Jarvis' accent as Blackthorn is bizarre and his version of the character is... well... he's an ass. But it works. It really works for the show. Hiroyuki Sanai and Anna Sawai are amazing as well. I love, love, love the visuals in the show, and the set design, and all the politics. Very good.

Vinland Saga is a passably entertaining gore-fest of an anime with a done-to-death viking story. I will definitely watch it all the way through, but I'm a sucker for violent battle anime so take what I say with a grain of salt. *shrug*

Frieren: Beyond Journey's End is a show with a premise I haven't seen done in a while. A fantasy setting with elves and humans, but the show isn't about the adventuring party. It's about the elf living her life AFTER the party saved the world, and the first episode tugged at the heart strings just right as the main character had to watch all of her friends age. The little bit of combat I've seen is exciting too. This came as a recommendation from a friend, and so I'm looking forward to diving in more.

Books

I finished The Sentence last weekend and I loved it. It was strange having so many locales and events that I have personal experience with being represented in a novel. Truly an exceptional read.

I have started Nettle & Bone and I'm fully engrossed. I already know I'm going to love this book.

Games

I finished Prince of Persia and I loved it, but I was also ready to be done with it. Excellent combat and exploration, but I would have loved some sort of option that let me buy a map to find all the secret areas. I know there is a scramble in the gaming industry right now to incentivize exploration, but genuinely, I have 0 interest in random exploration. I do like being rewarded for poking around, but it's important to me to have some sort of in-game way to streamline the completionist process.

Started Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth and, surprising nobody, I love it. I'm sure I'll talk more about it later, so I'll just leave it at that for now.

The next two weeks I'll be on a cruise! I plan to have a scheduled post for next Friday, and then the next update will be the last one before release. I can't believe how fast the time went!

See ya next week!

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

Weekly Update 03/01/24

  Weekly writing progress: 

- Editing on book 2 is going very smoothly. Better than expected, to be honest. I'm only a week or so away from finishing my editing pass and then I can start line editing and proofing.

- Posted on socials and groups for ARCs and preorders and had a very positive response. Multiple additional ARCs signed up and a number of preorders as well. I'm pleased :) - Again, if anyone happens across this blog and would like to sign up, you can do so here.

- My book is going to be on Netgalley for the month of March to attempt to net more ARC reviews. 

What I've been up to:

TV

I finished Pluto and it turned out exactly as I thought it would. I was hoping for a more nuanced, fresh take on the premise, but it gave me a somber, dry, joyless version of a theme that's already been beaten to death by plenty of other, better stories (Bladerunner, Ghost in the Shell, etc. etc.). I'm also not a huge fan of "and then there were none" plots, so maybe I was doomed not to like this from the beginning.

Tokyo Vice season 2 continues to be amazing.

We watched all of Avatar: The Last Airbender live action in the last week. I could genuinely write 10k words on how I feel about this version of the story, but this isn't a review blog. I'll try to keep it short-ish: The magic of the original eluded this version in myriad ways, but the most egregious changes they made had to do with tone. Part of why I hold the original so close to my heart is that it managed to tackle pretty heavy topics without actually going too dark. I'm confident this is why Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino left production. The darker tone strikes me as studio meddling, and, surprise surprise, it doesn't work. To say nothing of the many, many examples of weak writing in the shows script. I'm sure a lot of people will love it, but it's simply not for me. Again, I could go on, and there are some good things to say about it, but writing up a wall of text critiquing this show is not a good use of my time.

Books

I'm 70% of the way through The Sentence by Louise Erdrich. I've been slacking on reading, but it's not because I haven't been enjoying the book. On the contrary, the book is phenomenal. 

Games

I'll be finishing Prince of Persia today. 9/10. It was an excellent example of the metroidvania genre. My only gripe is that post game clean up (if I had chosen to do it) would have been hell because they do not have any options for purchasing maps to point you where all the left over collectibles are.

Helldivers 2 is the other game I've been playing, and I'm enjoying it immensely. If you have gamer friends I strongly recommend you all buy it and kill some bugs/bots together.

See ya next week!

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