Tag: Secrets

We’ll Collect The Moments One By One

Andrew has made me a new book cover to go with the recently finished Secrets. It looks wonderful in my opinion. In fact, I think it’s my favourite of the covers that he’s made so far. It’s below if you want to see it. Feel free to comment on it here or go to my facebook page and give your say there.

Secrets is the third (as of yet unpublished) installation in my Jocasta Lizzbeth Moonshadow series. Andrew’s read it so I’ll let you read what he said about it:

“Secrets, the third instalment of the currently-unpublished (somehow) Jocasta Lizzbeth Moonshadow series, continues the storyline of Jocasta, a third-year at a magical high-school, her fellow pupils, her teachers and her enemies, as they set to wage war on each other. The book contains elements of romance, fantasy, horror, drama, and a fantastically written action scene towards the end which brings about the culmination of the aspects of the plot developed specially for this instalment (while furthering aspects such as relationships and other events seen throughout the series as a whole). It was by quite a way the most enjoyable instalment of the series yet, truly saying something considering how well I thought of its predecessors, and was a brilliant showcasing of its writer’s, Rebecca Clare Smith’s, talents.”

– Andrew S.R. McCluskey [Musings]
In other news, I heard my mother downstairs when I got up today. My mum is usually at work at that time. I’ve grown to recognise that whenever she comes home early from work it means that there is something very wrong. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that it frightens me a little bit. She suffers from depression which is brought on by stress at work… It worries me a lot. I don’t like the idea that my mum gets increasingly upset and stressed and can’t talk to me about it; though, I realise that’s unfair as I don’t talk to her about my problems. I have no need to; I know how she’d react to most of them. I just worry about her a lot. I don’t want her to fall apart again.
This is where my younger brother steps in to be his duly unhelpful and nasty self. We wanted to print some business cards off for her jewellery venture (I think this was more her trying to distract herself from how she was feeling) but, of course, the printer needs to be set up to the new network that we’re on. We are not the most electronically able pair. Ergo, we asked my brother to help. What did this produce? Nothing but abusive language, door slamming and my mother getting upset. One day, he and my eldest brother will both get a slap in the face and wake up from their selfish ways. 
(Lyrics in the title are from Mushaboom by Feist)

But You. But You Write Such Pretty Words…

Huzzah!

Which is code for: I finished the last chapter and I’m eating a victory ham sandwich.

Although, if I’m honest, I think the bread has gone off. So, I’ll stop eating. How disgusting. I may have to eat a victory chocolate bar instead. I’m not a calorie counter, but going on size, I’m going to say that it’s healthier for me. Eventually, I’ll figure out that there is something drastically wrong with this theory and that over the course of being victorious I have, indeed, outgrown my house. There are various problems involved with outgrowing one’s house. The first problem is that you then have to wear the house as a form of clothing because until you start wasting away… there’s no way that house is going to let you wriggle out of the biggest window or door. In fact, you may need to take the roof off and live in a circus tent until you’ve dieted… a lot. Secondly, you won’t be able to reach your computer. This means that you’ll have to drag your sorry arse (house attached) to the nearest library and lean in through the window to type. Of course, you won’t be able to press the keys properly and therefore be unable to type any sense whatsoever. If you choose to read to while your time away, you will sadly be unable to turn the pages in your book as your hands will be absolutely massive. You might as well just give up on everything… unless you’re a prankster. In which case, your only use is to pretend that you are actually a house and creep up on groups of people. When they least expect it, attack!

This is guaranteed to terrify everybody you jump out at to death.

I don’t know about you, but if a house-sized, house-wearing person jumped out at me… I’d be pretty damn scared. You also have to make sure that you don’t accidentally jump out onto the people you’re trying to scare. A nice little prank on various family members could turn into a trip to the hospital for your elderly relatives and a trip to the morgue for that hated aunty you stepped in. Stepping in aunts, no matter how hateful, may cause tension with parents and is thus not advised.

I think I must be tired. I only write such bizarre drivel when I’m tired. Don’t let me put you off eating, though. Nothing should put you off eating.

Just don’t become house-sized.

This has to be my most random entry yet. I should probably crack on with talking about something that is actually news. I guess one thing is that I’ve been helping my friend sort out the navigation bar etc for the new site. He’s also successfully iframed this in, which you’ll get to see when he’s completed the site. My formspring has been iframed in as well. The link is still at the side if you want to ask me anything there. Really, I don’t mind. I get bizarre questions anyway.

Something that has annoyed me, however, was my younger brother. He always annoys me. I may blog about how much quite a lot so please feel free to ignore me when I do so. It’s just because I need a release. Anyway, he irritated me this morning because I went to use the bathroom next to my room. I couldn’t. He’d stuffed loads of loo roll in it again and just left it. So I went to use the other one, not realising he was in there faffing about with his hair or whatever he does. I got yelled at about how I was everywhere and he hated me. On the upside, that meant he left and I actually got to use the toilet (I know. This is just thrilling stuff, isn’t it? Be thankful I didn’t go into too much detail). On the downside, he went to his room, cranked up the volume on his stupid screamo music (that was loud anyway) and started singing along. Also loud. So by the time I’d barely been awake five minutes, I’d been yelled at and had a headache. The bit that made me really angry, however, was when I went to get a shower and there was no hot water. So yes, I’ve spent most of the day looking even more like a hobo than usual. Men annoy me. If I knew how to change my internal preferences to women, I would… though I suspect we may be just as problematic.

Also, I may write another piece of flash fiction when I’ve finished writing the Epilogue of Secrets (I bet you’re sick of hearing about it now). This means that, if you have any random sentences you want me to make a piece of flash fiction out of, you should comment below. Thanks and don’t outgrow your house!

(Lyrics in the title are from Lover I Don’t Have To Love by Bright Eyes)

I Found A Boy Who Had A Dream Making Everyone Smile

Today, every attempt to write more of Chapter 23 of Secrets has been thwarted by interruptions.

Firstly (which was not so much an interruption as I said hello to Andrew and discovered he was editing the book cover design he had created me), I helped with my opinions and image searching to edit the book cover of Dark Side of the Moon that my friend designed. It looks even better than it did and I think he’s even more of a genius with graphics. He’s going to be designing the graphics for my new site. Personally, I reckon that this will make the site even more fantastic than I could have originally designed. He has a knack of being able to figure out exactly what I want from the mass of congealed matter that makes up my brain. Anyway, results of today’s editing are below so you can tell me what you think of his lovely design:

Secondly, I’ve had lots of people trying to talk to me about various things… which is fine… but I don’t need the distractions right now. I want to get Secrets finished instead of getting sidetracked (you could probably argue that this is sidetracking me, but I wanted to mention all the stuff I needed to mention so I could continue on with Secrets). I know people don’t mean to distract me, but they always seem to know when I’m on a roll with whatever I’m writing and they just barge in with their hellos. I’m maybe being a little dramatic, but you have to admit that it is frustrating. Other people might say that I should just ignore whoever they are. I would do, but then I feel inordinately mean by not speaking to them. Dreadful, isn’t it?

Nevertheless, a friend instant messaged me and he’s started doing some writing of his own. His introduction to his piece can be found here and I’m sure that if any of you can provide him with feedback, then he’d be really appreciative. Personally, I think it’s an excellent start. His narrative voice is really strong and it draws you in and interests you straight away. To say that it’s not something I would normally pick to read, I’m glad I did. The title doesn’t really make me jump at it, but the actual writing of the piece is engaging and does make me want to read more. The writing is humorous, too, as if you’re listening to your friend describe something that has happened to him or her whilst you wait for the bus to arrive. My point is, I enjoyed it.

He’s also told me that he uses some freeware especially for writers to type in. I’m reliably informed that it’s a useful tool… and also that, if you want it to, you can set it so that it makes typewriter noises whilst you write. I think he finds this particular feature the best. Personally, I wouldn’t use it, but that’s because I’m rather set in the system I have for my writing. Nevertheless, it seems like something that could work for a lot of people so I thought I’d give it a quick mention. It’s called Q10. At first, I thought Didrik was trying to say I needed some skin care for wrinkles (I should hope I don’t have wrinkles. I’m only twenty!), but I had a look for it on the ‘net and it seems to have a number of good features. Despite this, I still don’t want to swap MS Word for it, but everybody is comfortable with different things. I’ve linked to it, anyway, so you can have a gander for yourself. It may or may not suit you. If you’re like my friend Didrik, though, you’ll love it just for the typewriter noises. It seems to work for him anyway.

Something else that I want to mention is my friend’s online magazine. I’ve mentioned it before, but this is Greyson’s second issue of OverByte and it still seems to be doing really well. It looks a lot more professional now and he’s had a lot more support getting the latest issue sorted. It’s primary audience are independent game makers on the internet. I’m not a game maker but I did skim it for the jokes and the ending comic, which were all thoroughly enjoyable. Plus, it’s nice to see how far he’s come along with it. On a private note, I think it’s helped build his confidence a lot too. In a weird way that makes me really proud of him. So, in support of my friend, you can find OverByte at its own site and, if you’re an indie game maker and you’d like to write articles for the next issue, you can register to audition.

(Lyrics in the title are from Oxygen by Colbie Caillat)

A Spider’s Web Is Tangled Up With Me

I need a job. That’s the basics of my life at the moment. 
I need to get a job so I can afford my own car and the doubtless high insurance that will come with it. And then, when I get a job, I can see about sending my manuscript off to an agent. It costs so much to send and I’m so broke that I can’t afford it. Not to mention that my family are broke at the moment too, not that my brother cares nor helps. I seem to be the only one who has all the family problems reported to her and reports none of her own because she doesn’t want to stress anybody else out.
And I’m sick of having to listen to my brother playing his crap music so loudly that even with his door closed and my door closed, plus with the television on in here, I can still hear it… and my room is on the opposite side of the house to his. I’m sick of the way he talks to me and everyone else in this house like we’re something he wiped off the soul of his shoe. I’m sick of the way he stresses everybody out in our family. He gets tonnes of stuff and in return all he gives is grief without even a thank you. 
Sadly, I’m in one of those moods where the only thing that will do is screaming or crying and I can’t do either right now. I wish he would turn his music off, grow up and become somebody halfway decent. There’s no reason for the way he behaves except that he is spoilt and selfish. I want to get down on the floor and cry in a little heap. There are things going on in my head that I can’t discuss here for a change (you’re probably glad – I mean, one less depressing thing for me to whine about, right?) and they’re stressing me out too. I don’t know what I’m going to do about them, but I aim to sort them over this Easter holiday. I’ve done the whole teenage figuring out who I really am thing. I finally know who I am and what I want and what I’m willing to do to get there. I only wish that the people who are supposed to support me had supported me in working that out and hadn’t just hurried me along into decisions I wasn’t ready to make. Luck hasn’t been exactly kind lately, either. There just seems to be too much going on in my head. And there’s the fact that I still wake up thinking of my ex, which I should be over by now, surely.
I think I’m going to try using my melancholy mood to write the final scenes of Book Three, Secrets, of my JLM Series. It needs to be completed. And this kind of mood is the kind that will allow me to concentrate on a different world for hours on end and stay comfortably entrenched there. Who knows? It could even propel me to complete the twenty-third chapter and finish off the epilogue.
In other news, I’m going to put up a poll in regards to what you think of the flash fiction I’ve been writing on here. This is so that if you have an opinion on what I’ve been writing but you don’t necessarily want to leave a comment, then you will have a place to share your thoughts. I’d much prefer you left a comment (especially if you have a random sentence that you think could provoke some really good flash fiction), but I guess less is more. It’s nice to see some feedback on my flash fiction from new people, as well. 
I just want everyone to know that, whilst I may not reply to all comments, I do really appreciate them and thank you for taking the time to read what I’ve written as well as to leave a little something from yourself.
Also, if you want to ask me any questions please do refer to my formspring even though my friend Tim has been trying to make me guess who’s questioning me whilst he pretends he’s an anonymous person. It’s amusing to me, but I appreciate that you might not care to read our weird discussions on furbies, pokemon and other such geeky stuff.

(Lyrics in the title are from Trouble by Coldplay)