The Man in White

He walks down the highway. Cars swerve past, honking. His spotless white suit flaps in the wind. He shifts his grip on his brown suitcase, smiles slightly and adjusts his wide-brimmed hat. The gentleman turns, facing the oncoming traffic, and begins to grow, rapidly increasing in mass. Drivers slam on their brakes, cursing loudly as he towers above.

“Remain calm. You will be assisted momentarily. Please remain in your vehicles until my staff has a chance to help you.”

He opens the suitcase. Corpses rain down before the stopped cars. Screams erupt as the dead stand and begin shambling forward.

The Man in White by Tena Kolakowski is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.

This was my first attempt at a "Drabble" type story- one of exactly 100 words. Thoughts?

My Review of Ancestor, by Scott Sigler

Warning: this review *may* contain profanity. Sorry, Mom.

Ancestor: A Novel



I love this book. I cannot stress enough how incredibly plausible this storyline is when you get down to the science of it. Sigler has created a thriller that grips you deep in the primal gut and won't let you go. It's hard to put the book down. The characters are real, either as hateable people you are happy to see die, or likeable people you want to save. There is romance and love without being sappy or corny, and, true to Sigler's MO, there is lots and lots of violence. I seemed to remember M...more I love this book. I cannot stress enough how incredibly plausible this storyline is when you get down to the science of it. Sigler has created a thriller that grips you deep in the primal gut and won't let you go. It's hard to put the book down. The characters are real, either as hateable people you are happy to see die, or likeable people you want to save. There is romance and love without being sappy or corny, and, true to Sigler's MO, there is lots and lots of violence. I seemed to remember Magnus as being more of a self-cutting psychopath, but that may have been something that changed between the original podcast novel and this version. If you have even an inkling of interest in biology, evolution, or horrifying possibilities, you must read this book.

Oh, and that black and white animal laying on the ground behind those rocks? It sure as fuck ain't no cow. 

Stuff and More Stuff

Wow, I wrote 1800 words tonight on The Novel, bringing it to almost 6000 total! I am pretty darn proud of myself. My method has so far been to just sort of write what wants to be written and I will piece it together later. I have a (loose) time line that's got some huge gaps in it, but that's all been since I started the first little piecemeal part. I still have several pages of handwritten notes that I could type up, but I am really just keeping those in mind as part of my end goal for this whole thing. I am interested to see where it all goes. So far I haven't had to reign in anything or make any huge changes from my original plan. The whole idea of writing a 75,000 word novel is pretty daunting, though. I feel like I can do it but at the same time I'm afraid that I will fall short, or that I'll tell the whole story in 20,000 words or something, and I want this to be a real novel, not just another long short story. I've got to create some kind of journey of sorts for my characters, but I'm not really sure how to do that yet. It's definitely a learning experience for me! I need to stop writing for tonight, since my domestic chores have fallen by the wayside and I have to get up at the asscrack of dawn tomorrow. Balancing writing with family and work sucks, but that is also a learning experience.

I was going to review a book tonight, but it's going to have to wait until tomorrow. I am one sleepy lady with chores to do, and the husband will be home from work in an hour. I had planned to be in bed about an hour ago. Ah well.

For what it's worth, I have completely given up on TAW for now. Sad but true. I simply don't have it in me to do it right now, let alone 12 weeks of it. Maybe this summer I'll be able to devote more attention to it and actually get something out of it. For the moment, though, I just can't put in the necessary effort.

This Writing Thing is Addictive

Notice that I did NOT say "addicting" because that is not a word. Anyone who uses that word deserves to have their brain pulled out through their nose and then be strangled with said brain.

Also, more work on the Novel tonight! Yay!! I only did 700ish words, but hey, that's still decent and almost 3 pages. I am making progress on the research front as well, though I think I need to talk to some nurses before I am able to develop one of the characters too much. If you happen to be a nurse, and don't mind me asking questions, can you leave a comment here with your info? Or tweet me @simplytena. Thanks! Same goes if you have any favorite mythology books that you'd recommend that deal with trickster and/or creator gods.

I think I need to quit playing Farmville. I was reading a recent post by a "real" author (see the Lakeshore link to the right) and realized that like him, the "need" to write is diminished when I play lots of computer games. I want the writing addiction, and I need to nurture that rather than worry about feeding some stupid computer dog or harvesting some not-real crops. Hm. Yeah. That also goes along with the philosophy in this house that once a game isn't fun anymore, then you should quit playing it.

Writing: Just DO It.

I worked on The Novel tonight!! I added 1000 words, and in my humble opinion they are even worthwhile words that contribute positively to the storyline. YAY! I really just need to sit and make myself write. I can always type it up later, the important thing is the writing. It's easy when I just do it, really. Even with a headache. I am feeling rather proud of myself now, actually.

Falling off the Wagon in a BIG Way

Yeah...TAW has totally gone by the wayside. I started (in my head) week 1 about 2 weeks ago, and then the shit hit the fan. I am in a position at work where I may not actually have a job in a couple months so finding a new position has been my priority. That plus my existing full time job plus being a wife and a mother? Holy hell, I don't know how to do this. I am really trying to make myself write but it's just not happened. Someone please hit me with a "get your act together" stick. If you happen to have access to that nifty time-doubling hourglass from Harry Potter that would be awesome too.

The Artist's Way-Day 1

I did my morning pages tonight! Whee! So I guess that makes them evening pages. It was really quite nice. I don't think it hurts anything for me to do them in the evening, since I'm sure not getting up earlier than I already have to in order to do them in the morning. This was my first day of doing them. I'm going to keep myself honest and make myself report here if I ever *don't* do them over the next 12 weeks. Eek. That's a long time. Hm. Also, wine makes writing 3 pages of non-stuff more relaxing.