Happy Birthday to me (well, two days ago).

I started this blog one year ago. Well, on the 19th of Janurary was my first post, but I failed to notice it on the 19th.

I’ve been swamped with school the past three weeks which is why there hasn’t been any substantial updates. I made the mistake (mistake?) of taking on three literature classes this term in addition to learning a foreign language. Somehow I have managed to finish three books but have not found the time to post about them just yet. Maybe this weekend.

This term I am taking a Comedy and Satire class which wants me to find time to read 13 books in under ten weeks. Normally not a problem but so far the books have been greek classics like Horace. Those are surprisingly not easy to read. Luckily we have since transition the texts that did not need to be translated. I’m also taking The Bible as Literature which is pretty interesting. Luckily, we are not reading the whole Bible. Lastly, there is the generic sounding English 300 which I am still not quite sure what the topic of the class is other than we are reading Plato.

Anyway, I guess I should get started on my homework. Until next time…

Fellow writers,

do you dream about your characters? I would imagine that this is a pretty common thing. After all, during the writing process they are on the writer’s mind a lot even when there is no writing being done. A few days ago I had a dream where four characters from one of my story ideas were sitting around the table fighting the Reno, Nevada Local Business Bureau. I don’t remember what exactly they were fighting about, but I do know that it was my four characters versus everyone else. What struck me as most odd is that I have not written a single word about these characters. They don’t even have names yet. All they are are an idea that I am not quite sure how it works in to the main story.

Anybody else had dreams related to your own writing?

2008 is over. I managed to read 44 books this past year. Which doesn’t seem like that many. I’ve been reading blogs where people have read up to 75 books this year. I’m willing to bet that they are not full-time college students. Not that I am bother or jealous of people with more free time than me.

I did read some books I really enjoyed this year. Douglas Coupland is on his way to becoming one of my favorite authors, but I need to read a few more of his books to be sure. Some other new authors I discovered this past year were Jonathan Sellwood (The Pinball Theory of Apocalypse), Paul A. Toth (Fishnet), Scott Heim (We Disappear), and Joey Comeau (Lockpick Pornography). I would like to read more of all of their works.

In terms of authors that I have read previously, Marc Acito (Attack of the Theater People) and the Dave Barry-Ridley Pearson combo (Peter and the Shadow Thieves) wrote follow ups to their older books. Both books were better than the first ones in my opinion.

In 2009 I am attempting two reading challenges. The first is the 20 Books in 2009 challenge which now that I think about it, it shouldn’t be that hard. The other other challenge is one I made myself where I plan on reading 10 books that contain pirates. I call it, The Book Pirate Challenge. There might be other challenges that pop up later on this year, but I will worry about those when the time comes.

To wrap things up, Happy 2009.

The Olive Reader posted two more interviews by authors I enjoy. Larry Smith, editor of Not Quite What I Was Planning, and Scott Heim of Mysterious Skin and We Disappear fame.

Merry Happy Christmas Eve and whatnot.

To celebrate, why not curl up with a good book and wait out the snow. If you are lacking in the good book department, why not check these two interviews from two of my favorite authors, Lance Reynald and Josh Kilmer-Purcell, over at The Olive Reader.

Enjoy the holidays. Remember to keep warm.

Finals are finally over. Now I return to my books already in progress:

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers

It has come to my attention that this web site doesn’t function when you view it with Internet Explorer.

Also, it has come to my attention that some people still use Internet Explorer.

I’ll work on fixing this but I probably wont get around to it till next month.

I’m taking a month off from reading any new books. Somehow I found myself in a spot where I was not in the middle of reading any books. Normally I am in the middle of reading one or two books at a time. For November, however, i’m going to be participating in NaNoWriMo (Nation Noval Writing Month). The goal is to write 50,000 words in 30 days which works out to 1,667 words a day. How hard could that be right?

Anyway, I don’t plan on having much time for leisure reading. But I do plan on updating TBP with my various musings on the NaNoWriMo process and the progress of my novel. I also might bug random strangers about the progress of their novel just to keep things interesting. If anybody reading this is participating in NaNoWriMo, I sure would like to hear from you.