#MayWritingChallenge Final Report.

And we're back for the final report of the May edition of Twitter's Monthly Writing Challenge!

I officially wrapped up the month with writing 3 comic book scripts and ready to roll on to #JuneWritingChallenge with a new hashtag leader (check out the website for more). But I made an unexpected turn in my writing. When I was finishing the third (and supposedly the final chapter) of my comic mini-series, it was turning into a four issue story. As mentioned earlier this month, I broke my story down and reworked it from scratch because of it not being what I expected thanks to the input from my writing group. So for next month I'm going to write the conclusion.

And now for the Week 4 results:

Day 22-Finished the second part of the story with the final word count of 3,628.

Day 23-No writing. I had to take the day off so I can come back to the story with a fresh mind.

Day 24-Started strong with 521 words. Not bad. Not bad at all.

Day 25-Written 776 words in fifteen minutes. Slow start but I won't argue with myself on that number.

Day 26-Pushed it with only an hour and thirty minutes (90 minutes) on the keyboard.

Day 27-1 hour of writing.

Day 28-Wrapped up the writing session with 1,537 words after a 30 minute sprint.

Day 29-Another 90 minute session.

Day 30-The finish line at 2,476 words for comic book #3! Boo-yah, baby!

 The whole month has been fun and unexpected. I made a crucial decision for my story and faced a turnout that came out of the blue. What rewriting the whole book has taught me is that you'll be making tough calls for the sake of art, and to not be afraid to change it to something different if it's not working. As a whole, we artists had to tear down a project to make it work after a number of times it feels like it's not working or it needs something different to put it on the right track. That's a given notion.

All right, I got some plotting and words to write. Check out the Twitter Monthly Writing Challenge for details on how to join on their website. It'll be a fun experience, I'll tell ya what.

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#MayWritingChallenge Weekly Report #3

Good morning and we're back with more #MayWritingChallenge progress by none other than, moi.

 Can you believe the month's almost over?

I can honestly say it's been rather a slow progression for me when I came back to Twitter's Monthly Writing Challenge after four in a half months of college courses. But that's the beauty of it. Progression is what you make of it in the work you do, friends.

All right, now. Let's take a look at my Week 3 results.

Day 15-1,336 words in 35 minutes. I wasted five minutes being distracted by social media and made up for it. Slow but I can't argue with what I put down.

Day 16-Took another 30 minute sprint for improvement. The result was 1,543 words.

Day 17-1,788 in 30 minutes.

Day 18-90 minutes of writing Wednesday night.

Day 19-1 hour & 16 minutes of writing.

Day 20-15 minute sprint. A little slow but I plowed through and finished with 2,447 words a little before midnight.

Day 21-2 hours of writing. I can see the finish line for the second issue of my WIP.

What's the takeaway from the past week? Keep trying those writing sprints. I know I can be a slow writer most of the time, but it's important to keep on to not only carve out a word count, but to improve your speed on the keyboard. Distractions are a given, yes. You just have to push through them with whatever the time you take for writing. For this week I'll take another shot at writing 30 minutes to improve my words per minute and move on to the next comic book script.

That's a wrap for my weekly writing challenge report. I'll catch ya'll cats at the end of the month!

Urban Fantasy 101.

Hello, aspiring writers!

    So you're looking to try your hand at creative fiction. Awesomeness! If you're looking to try out urban fantasy, let's get your feet wet. Urban fantasy is a sub-genre of fantasy that takes place in contemporary times with supernatural elements. But it can take place in the historical, modern, or futuristic periods. The characteristics of the genre are set in a city and may involve alien races, mythological creatures, co-existence between paranormal beings and humans, etc. Bewarned, true believers. These stories may be set in contemporary times but it's not necessary for this characteristic to be labeled urban fantasy as it takes place in the historic period or in the future, real or imagined. Another characteristic to point out is that characters of urban fantasy have A) self-esteem issues or B) tragic pasts.

    As you may know, there's urban fantasy for grown-ups and teens. The grown-up side of urban fantasy is aimed at an adult audience and is told in first-person narrative to third-person narrative, features mystic beings, and female protagonists who operate in the parameters of vigilantism or law enforcement. Seanan McGuire's October Daye novels follows the adventures of a changeling that's born to a human father and a faerie mother moonlighting as a private investigator and knight errant to San Francisco's faerie. The Dresden Files series by Jim Butcher explores a wizard working as an investigator and blends aspects of fantasy with noir themes. Last, but not least, the Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs focuses on a shapeshifter working as a VW mechanic and the paranormals living in the Tri-Cities.

Death's Mistress by Karen Chance

     Now we're covering urban fantasy for teens. Teen urban fantasy explores protagonists that are accidentally drawn into the unknown. They find romance, gain allies, and develop or discover preternatural abilities of their own. An example of this subject is the House of Night series by P.C. and Kristen Cast that follows a school for future vampires. Another example is Alyson Noel's The Immortals series which tells the stories of a girl who gains special abilities after an accident and follows a mysterious new boy at school. In addition, love triangles play a prominent part in these and other UF stories.

*Author Jeanine Holmes pointed out the distinction between urban fantasy and paranormal romance in an online commentary saying:

The two share 90% of their genre DNA. However, the main differences are this: Urban fantasy focuses on an issue outside of a romantic relationship between two characters. Paranormal romance focuses on a romantic relationship between two characters and how outside forces affect that relationship. The best litmus test to determine if a story is urban fantasy or paranormal romance is to ask the following question: 'If the romance between Character A and Character B were removed, would the plot still stand as a viable storyline?' If the answer is 'yes,' chances are good it's urban fantasy. If the answer is 'no,' it's most likely paranormal romance.

And that's urban fantasy, friends. So...who's ready to write some UF action?

*Wikipedia-Urban fantasy  

#MayWritingChallenge Weekly Report #2!

Good morning all!

We are back with Week two progress for #MayWritingChallenge! All my peeps are getting it in with their own thing and they are blazin'!

Alright, here is my progress for the week!

Day 8- 1 hour.

Day 9- 90 minutes.

Day 10- Finished my first comic book issue with the final word count of 2,322!

Day 11- 1 hour & 35 minutes on comic book #2.

Day 12- I did my first 30 minute sprint for the first time in weeks. I was kinda slow but I carved out 739 words.

Day 13- No writing.

Day 14- Another 90 minute session.

I can really feel myself getting back in the groove this month. But I'm not rushing it one bit. The key factor in writing, in my opinion, is patience. Right now, I'm just taking my time with my work as I make my way back to my comics.

That's a wrap for week 2 of #MayWritingChallenge! Keep it locked for next week!

#MayWritingChallenge Weekly Report

I'm baaaack!

Yes, after a busy eight weeks on the community college campus with some writing in the books, I'm getting back in the game during #MayWritingChallenge. But instead of carving the 90 minutes grind like usual I had to take it slow with only writing for an hour because I'm a little rusty. Also I took one of my comic books in progress and did the unthinkable...obliterate it and work from scratch!

Why? I saw what didn't work for my story and I wanted one of the secondary characters to have some more action.

Here's my progress for the first week:

Day 1- 1 hour of editing.

Day 2- 1 hour of editing. After reading the critiques from my writing group I saw that I had to smash it to pieces and write it all over again thanks to Chuck Wendig's "25 ways to Unfuck your Story." Sometimes if it doesn't work...you just have to erase everything and start over.

Day 3- I got back into the writing groove with only 1 hour & 30 minutes which is just the beginning for me honestly. I wasn't in a rush to get it done so I'll just settled for it until next time.

Day 4 & 5- 1 hour of writing.

Day 6- No writing. I earned a day off to check out Captain America: Civil War! Believe me when I say you're in for a treat!

 Day 7- 1 hour & 20 minutes.

And that's my week 1 report for # MayWritingChallenge. Be here next week as I punch in 500 words or more!

When was the last you read a good Book?

I've read my fair share of books growing up. Anything in the school library to (you guessed it) comic books. As you may know, I've read comics by the dozen which played a role in my individual growth but I had to "grow up" and sell my comic book collection. Some time later, my dad begged the question: "When was the last time you've read a good book?"

For starters I read the likes of R.L. Stine to Edgar Allen Poe.*

Being fresh out of high school and retired from comics, I was curious about any authors that are very good. Reading makes you curious in my opinion. Seeing everything in an old Waldenbooks store at the ol' Crossroads Mall I found some books in the genre I'm mostly familiar with which is fantasy and horror, and I've discovered authors that piqued my interest.

Greywalker by Kat Richardson- Of all reasons for picking up this book was the concept and title of Richardson's book. A small-time PI beaten and left for dead for only a couple of minutes and comes back as a gap between our world and the next. Also I'm a fan of gumshoe stories thanks to TV shows like CSI: Miami and Law & Order.

Moon Called by Patricia Briggs-I researched Briggs' writing credentials in 2006 and saw this one. Being curious about how good she is I decided to check it out and the book that followed which is Blood Bound. They both were good and the main character became one of my favorites in the contemporary fantasy genre. I liked the characters and the idea of the series since then.





Nightlife by Rob Thurman-Now when I came across the title, my first impression was a male protagonist that's some kind of otherworldly being dealing with New York's "other" residents. Thurman delivered a superb tale of action with two brothers that's in the spirit of Supernatural. The plot, Cal's voice and his supporting cast kept me all the way to the end. Definitely worth picking up!










Well, that's all the good books I enjoyed. I could go on...but my library's stacked to high heaven with authors I'm waiting to explore.

So friends, when was the last time you read a book that was really good?

*Disclaimer: I didn't know about Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven" until I watched The Simpsons' Treehouse of Horror when I was a kid. The poem was narrated by none other than James Earl Jones. At thirteen I found Poe's collection of poetry and short fiction at the library in middle school.

Why I write for Comics?

A blog from a Writing Challenge compadre gave out a clear definite reason why she writes the genre she loves had got me to thinking about the reasons I'm writing for comics. I've asked myself why for a while and let me tell you there's no easy answer. I felt that everybody's got a reason for writing for the genres they represent as I struggled to find mine. Then I realized they've been a part of me from the very beginning.

I didn't choose comics; comics chose me.

 Comics & graphic novels were an instrumental part of my growth as a person. They showed me the fantastical world of fantasy like any book I've read growing up. Granted it was the artwork of some best names out in the industry like Mark Bagley or Ming Doyle. Recalling The Death of Superman being my "first" comic, I was mostly excited because of the art by Dan Jurgens. Not only that my mom would read it to me whenever I asked her to.

As a boy I even tried to draw like the artists in the comics.

Going into my early teens, I had Spider-Man: Hobgoblin Lives collected as a TPB (trade paperback) and Spider-Man/Kingpin: To the Death before going my lone quest to find any comics store in my area. From middle school to almost throughout high school I collect what came out at the time and back issues until my retirement at 19.

 Sometime in my twenties, I decided to expand my writing to novels and that didn't work out so great because I don't have a handle on prose despite how much I've read it. Basically I didn't have the patience to write 300 pages worth of words to save my life. Once I wrote a graphic novel just out of nowhere, I saw where I can expand myself creatively by writing for comics. Of course it was hard. But nonetheless I had fun creating something of my own imaginative mind. It's all clear that comic books have never left me at all.

Comics are my definition of who I am.