Some recent ‘events’ led me to think about the emotions created by stories, in any form. Be it a book, a movie, or even a video game; a good story should probably create some emotions in those who ‘consume’ it. But, is there a thing like going too far?
Tag Archives: Books
Book review: The White Song
After taking a two-week break from reading, I finally returned to the fifth and final book in ‘Chronicles of the Black Gate’ series. The grand finale. So, without much fumbling around, I go for the review.
Writing: choosing a sample
As I mentioned before, I am getting ready to get to beta with my fantasy story. There’s some more editing and fluff removal to be done. What I’m thinking about these moments is something I’d use as a sample people could freely have a look at and decide whether my story is something they should give a try.
It’s quite a difficult decision.
Book review: The siege of Abythos
The third book in the series started by The Path of Flames, it picks up pretty much where the second book left off, the morning after the battle for Mythgrafen hold besieged by the demons. The stories of different characters will start getting complicated and more complex as the situation escalates.
As with the second book, the third follows several threads of the main story. Many of them will eventually converge by the end.
By the book’s half, it very visible that it’s all going down and that it’s not so much about who might win but about how big mess it’ll be – which helps the pace for a book that’s slightly longer than the previous two.
Fantasy thoughts: battle scars
I am back with another jumble of thoughts about something that is part of any violent story, not only limited to fantasy though it’s fantasy I read the most so my prevalent point of view will be for that genre.
Heroes and villains will both go through much and not everyone is lucky to emerge without at least a token of remembrance for the perils endured. And based on several factors, how the character and those around him perceive battle scars can vary.
Something about TBR and series
A friend once said: “the larger an HDD is, the faster it gets filled”. I realized that I could say the same about my ‘to be read’ list – it can grow faster than I can reduce it by reading the books listed there.
At this point, the excel file with potential TBRs is 70 items long and most of them are in series, ranging in length usually between 3 and 6 books. If I average it at 4 and add to it some classics that I don’t bother to put there, it gets me somewhere to potentially 300+ books. That is without counting books that will continue existing series (as I don’t put those to that file). Even if some might not make it out of the TBR list, the choice is still quite large and I keep discovering new TBR candidates every now and then.
So, I’ll go into some factors I have for choosing a book to read as well as to factors about adding them to the TBR list.
The first steps into self-publishing community
Even though I am still some time and work away from finishing my story, apart from writing, I am trying to make progress elsewhere.
Since I am active Goodreads user (though so far as a reader) I was slowly trying to see if fellow readers and writers alike could help my efforts even without any specificity. Plus, it’s where I’ll most likely start my search for beta readers later next month.
So, I’ve been increasing my activity there. I joined a large and quite active group focused on SF and Fantasy some time ago (half a year maybe) and since then I am doing my best to participate in discussions when I have something to say on the topic.
