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So, is anyone else ready for 2016 to be consigned to the fires of history? I sure am. *sigh* At any rate, I live, I write (some), I read - let me tell you about it! Camp Nano word count - 6969 (ouch) July Round-Up: Words written YTD: 36,246  on one and a half projects (Paranormal Investigations novels and a prequel short story that didn't really go where I wanted it to) Things accomplished in fiction: the bookstore date went...poorly. Alison now knows that her coworkers know more about the paranormal than she thought, and one of them is some kind of fae? Maybe? Also, the new coffee blend is probably evil. (Such a Seattle villain, I swear) Writer-ly things accomplished: Re-jiggered my outline for the rest of PII based on the changes to the first book that have come up, making it more like something I think will make sense. Started using mywriteclub.com for weekly challenges, rather than relying on Camp Nano for monthly ones, which has gotten my progress going a little more...

So, confession time: I may have seen the original Ghostbusters movie maybe once, a long time ago. I don't think I've ever seen any of the others. I probably remember more about the Ghostbusters references in a Daffy Duck cartoon than I do the movie itself. Clearly, I'm not really the world's biggest fan. At the same time, I recognize that it's a Big Deal, especially with the new movie coming out. My husband is a huge fan of the original franchise, up to and including the cartoon. (I didn't even know there had been a cartoon until he mentioned it.) So when news about the new movie kept cropping up online, he was concerned. Not because it was an all-female cast, thankfully; he was more concerned that this was being billed as a reboot, rather than a continuation. Still, he remained cautiously optimistic, and we went to see the movie yesterday. Considering our respective histories with the original franchise, our reactions to the new movie were a little surprisi...

Normally, this is where I would give my stats for Camp Nanowrimo, but I haven't actually figured out how much I've written in the last couple of days. I do seem to be falling into a bit of a trap with regards to moving things along. As in, they aren't moving all that quickly. And it's hard to tell if that's because I'm more focused on discovery writing what's going on, or if it's because I've only been writing a couple hundred words here and there, so it feels like I'm not moving very fast. One of the nice things, though, is that I'm learning an awful lot about my characters and the world I've built over the years that I apparently didn't know before. For example, the bookstore that Jonathan loves so much is apparently in something like a knowe? I haven't decided if that means it's actually run by the fae or not, but probably. It's been an interesting couple of weeks, is what I can say. I'm trying not to make this ...

The last week and change have been an example of the worst in humanity. So many people have died, and for what? For the religion they practice, the color of their skin, their chosen profession? For being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and getting caught in the hate that drove someone to decide people needed to be destroyed? These aren't good deaths, noble deaths. These aren't the inevitable deaths of people who have lived good, long lives and are now ready to move beyond them. These are people who are cut down, treated like things, handled like something inconsequential. Each and every one of them was a life - a full, complete person, with people who loved them. With histories. With hopes and fears and plans that didn't include dying in an explosion in a mosque or being shot by the people we expect to protect us. What do we do now? How do we reconcile a world that contains beauty and joy and love with a world that allows this kind of hatred and violence to happen...

Why yes, I am cramming everything into one post! This is what happens when I go to a convention (Westercon, in this case), and forget to get posts up for while I'm gone. July Camp Nano: Current word count: 1,152 Goal word count: 30,000 What's happening: Turns out that Jonathan (love interest) and Jack (partner in the work sense of Veronica) are bros. Also, the paranormal community around the coffee shop is Not Happy about the mystical, magical new coffee blend. Alison wants nothing to do with this - she just wants to go on her date already, dangit. June Round-Up: Words written YTD: 30,429 on one and a half projects (Paranormal Investigations novels and a prequel short story that didn't really go where I wanted it to) Things accomplished in fiction: see above Writer-ly things accomplished: Decided that the short story wasn't going to do what I needed it to do, and that I wasn't in a good place to keep going with it at the moment. Picked up the proverbial...