CM Simpson: Writer & Gamer

The cover for the second volume of short stories and poems from 2013 is now complete. Here's what it looks like. The Year Just Gone is scheduled for release on 28 June 2014.

So, this week I learned why four nights of midnight in a row were not good for you – even when you sleep an hour or two later than usual, and especially when you get up at 5 a.m. the next day for your day job. Let’s just say that doing that is a bad idea, and doing it while still recovering from the flu is an even worse idea. In order to avoid falling completely over with the flu – again, I had to go to bed earlier all week. And I had to study for a couple of mini-tests. Not a lot of writing got done this week, and none of it made it onto the computer, so I have a little bit of notebook work to go through, and some ideas that are crying out for development. On the up side, I am feeling a lot better, although still run-down and still with some flu symptoms. The study is almost back under control, and I’m looking to getting my writing flowing smoothly—no catch-up until mid-semester break. Overview New words produced: 0 Old words revised: 0 Works completed: 0 Works r...

This is the new cover for the first volume of this year's collection of works created or prepared for publication in 2013. Rather than just repeat the covers of the published short stories for a quilt-like effect (as I did last year), I decided I wanted a background and just a few of the elements from the other covers, and to do that, I needed a background that would allow me to tie the covers of the two volumes together. Usually, I go to Dreamstime, but I had seen a photograph on Facebook by Greta van der Rol . It encapsulated what I had in mind. My only regret is that I couldn't show more of it, but you can find the whole photograph, here . Covers from the short stories incorporated in this collection are as follows. As you can see, not every story could be represented.

I created the following covers in April 2014: To be released: 21 June 2014 To be released: 28 June 2014 To be released 4 October 2014

In addition to the sulphur-crested cockatoos, we had a flock of galahs come to enjoy the fruit on the backyard trees. It makes a change from seeing them grazing on grass seeds. Of course, not everyone had the hang of landing. Those trees can be tricky to perch on, don't ya know? Even when you manage to get set down, there's still the delicate balancing act. Before the serious business of feeding and grooming can be undertaken.

Keeping tabs on the industry is very important. Watching trends and garnering opinion and advice with with to feed our own decisions is vital to making a living at this profession. As such, I made a specific effort to actually do some reading this month. Here are the blogs I found helpful or articles I found inspirational. Craft of Writing http://jakonrath.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/guest-post-by-chris-eboch.html http://project-middle-grade-mayhem.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/middle-grade-plot-maps-by-lee-wardlaw.html http://project-middle-grade-mayhem.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/revision-technique-book-mapping-by.html http://mollyblaisdell.blogspot.com.au/2013/05/blooming-plot.html Publishing http://kriswrites.com/2014/04/16/the-business-rusch-generational-divide/ https://twitter.com/ChuckWendig/status/456809435353350144 http://jakonrath.blogspot.com.au/2014/04/guest-post-by-dale-t-phillips-and-vlad-v.html http://jakonrath.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/no-one-knows.html http://jakonr...

This week, we’re looking at yet another form of cinquain—the Garland Cinquain. Again, it uses either a Crapsey Form 1 or a Crapsey Form 2 as a base, but this time it consists of six separate cinquain verses. The first five verses stand alone, but are linked by the poetical theme. The sixth verse is made up of lines from the verses that came before it, usually taking its first line from the first verse, the second line from the second verse, the third line from the third verse and so on. For those of you who are new to this series, a cinquain is a five-line poem that has a set number of syllables (or word types) per line. Sometimes the title of a cinquain acts as a sixth line. Cinquains were invented by Adelaide Crapsey was an American poet who was inspired by the rules of Japanese poetry to create her own poetical form, the cinquain. Here’s an example, originally written for a poetry collection set to come out later this year: Death of Dreaming Written on April...