Greetings!

Food Holiday is over! I hope everyone loaded up and then promptly slept like lions. Then came the blackest of black Fridays where humans stampede over each other in a time honored ritual of consumerism. 

Now, as we continue our march of metal holidays into the land of illuminated trees, impractically wide candles, and finally putting 2016 in it’s grave--there is one more holiday that needs to be highlighted: 

Krampus Day.

St. Nick’s counterpart. The Half-Goat Half-Demon comes on December 5th and his soul purpose is to give children who misbehaved the gift of murder. That, or coal. You see, right before St. Nick’s day on December 6th, Krampus comes out on the night before hand and rather than reward children, he gives terrible presents instead as a reminder. 

If you are curious at just how awesome Krampus day can be over in Europe, check out this video of a parade. (I am going to try some embedded HTML code below and I don’t know if it will work. There is no preview feature on these updates)

;;

Happy Week of Days With Descriptors!

We are nearly at the end of said days, but as the focus of today is "Giving" it is the perfect time to remind everyone of my raffle. I have six Audible codes for the An Unattractive Vampire audio book and if you give money to an at-risk cause, your name will be entered in to win one of them. If you need more information, visit my website or see my last update. There are lots of lists out there of groups who need help. Groups like Trans Relief Project, CeaseFire Illinois, Doctors Without Borders, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, and more. 

Once you’ve donated (and you did donate, didn’t you? *Guilt stare*) tell me you did. You can respond here with a comment (don’t just like the post, that doesn’t actually tell me anything) or find me on twitter or e-mail me at anunattractiveemail@gmail.com. Your name will be entered into the contest which ends December 15th.

Look it’s win/win. You win because you get to feel good about yourself AND might win a free audiobook. They win because they get the money and resources to help people who desperately need it. And humanity wins because the entropic decay of the universe will be put off a little longer. EVERYBODY WINS!

Except for the cannibal Futurekind. They don’t win.

This is just a quick heads up about the status of LandFall.

During the week LandFall was moved out of ’The List’ and placed over in the LaunchPad contest. This is an error. I’m hoping it’ll be resolved soon.

I’ve done some looking and I think I have a pretty good idea as to what’s happened, but until I know for sure, I can’t say what the outcome of that resolution will be. For now though, I’ve put a hold on working on the story until I know what’s happening.

I wanted to be transparent about the situation and will continue to be so going forward. Stay tuned, when I know, you’ll know.

Keep an eye on that horizon.

Okay, update time. A short-ish one.

No calendar chart today, mainly because there was nothing new to put on it over last weeks.

Everything was rather disrupted again this week, must be the time of year. One thing I did find the time to do however, was to listen to the entirety of my book over a couple of days.

Yes. Listen.

Now it may have been with my Mac’s automatic text-to-speech through Scrivener, but it was overall a pretty good experience. The most surprising part of it all was that I actually found myself entertained by my own writing. There were small comedy moments that I’d forgotten I’d written that I actually laughed at. So I think that’s encouraging? Right?

I also realised that structurally, I’m really solidly pleased with the second half of the book. There are a few kinks to work out on the front end, but overall there’s not as much hardcore editing/rewriting to do as I thought. Which is good.

Work is back to focusing on Ghosts again this week, LandFall has hit a bit of a snag which has it in a form of limbo. Hopefully, it will get sorted soon.

Until next time.

You will not believe this... 

I have never typed “The Animal in Man” into any search engine. Not during the Sword & Laser sequel campaign. Not during the ten months finishing the draft. Not during the last two months of ‘rest’ I’ve enjoyed. Not once.

Until today. I’m pleased to say that your favorite philosophical fantasy-science-fiction novel featuring animals that walk, talk, and brutalize one another came up as the third result from the top. And who was above me? This:

I cannot believe this... I had forgotten all about this song. Listening to it this afternoon, on repeat, has been surreal. My older brother used to crank the volume of this very song when we drove to high school in the morning. And now… Now I remember. Give “The Animal in Man” a listen. Let the Dead Prez tell you, in 3 minutes 19 seconds, the same type of story that mine attempts to tell you in [roughly] 500 pages. (Original credit, of course, to George Orwell as well.)

...Just don’t let the song discourage you from a pre-order, if you haven’t made one already. Don’t assume these talented rappers or George Orwell himself get to have the last word about what does or doesn’t separate man from his bestial nature. Consider a third perspective. Thanks very much, my dear animal.