What a pitch!

So, just mailed off my latest pitch for Abaddon. It's set in their fantasy world and probably is more political than most of the pitches they get.
And I just realised I didn't mention it is totally non-allegorical to the editor. I can see where a lot of comparisons between it and recent events could be drawn, but it is just a story, based on my reading of their world guidelines.
Ah well.

The next pitch to finish has tombs, monsters, traps and treasure. Your standard fantasy fare, but I think the political one would be more rewarding to write.
Then again, like I keep saying, I'll take anything.

Some forward motion.

So, Emma has put up the cover of The Courier. I really like it, and it's all her, no input from me at all on the cover.
In other comic news, FutureQuake accepted my submission, so that's a few more people who get to see my name in print.

The Matthew Reilly/HP Lovecraft story is progressing at a rate of 500 words a week, which is far too slow. Must do some writing on it.

Still have to type up that hand written Terror Tale, but the acceptance from FQ makes me more positive.

Finally, "The Year of Rob" is gaining momentum.

Inspiration I got, a follow through, I don't.

SO, started a pitch for Abaddon after the double rejection. And I haveno idea where it is going. Plans I had have been ditched without bare consideration to my brain. I'm thinking that I may dump them in an underground tomb with as yet undescribed beasties waiting to break out. The question is, should the wizard be nice and a bastard, or evil and a bastard?

Got going on another pitch, aiming for a Black Hawk Down in fantasy land kind of deal here, and I mean like the book. Films ok, but the book is so much better.

Might have another zombie pitch bubbling away. Zombies as the good guys, can that work?

Wrote up and sent of the revised script for FutueQuake, at long bloody last. Not quite perfect, but I did get it all onto one page, which I think has crammed it slightly.

Been having a bash on the Penny Arcade Auto Assault Beta weekend. Can't make up my mind. It's fun, but would I spend hours playing it, especially as I can't find any kind of in game comms, like the chat in World of Warcraft. Bah, got the entire weekend to piss about with it.

Parents are away, so I should be drunk and writing for the rest of the weekend, I hope. Lots of FA cup action on over the weekend so I may get distracted.

Finally, Jon of Abaddon and rejecting my pitches fame, has said he'd pay money to watch me walk on stage and start a stund up set with "All the wankers in the room, hands up."
I have until march to decide if I have the bottle to do that.

Excuse the spelling mistakes, I'm a tad drunk.

Oh, and I'm waiting on one more page and then The Courier is complete, except for a couple of dialogue changes!

But no-one reads this blog, so only I care. But that is enough.

Denied!

Just checked my mail, to find 2 rejections from Abaddon. I can see the point being made on both of them. Maybe I can re-submit my Pax Britannia one if I iron out some of the inconsistencies I mentioned, or just totally rework it, as I like my main characters. As for the zombie one, perhaps a short-ish story is called for, and as it isn't specific to any world, I can submit that anywhere.

At least it has me working on my Fantasy world pitch, now if only I had a clue where it was going. I changed my mind and now I'm lost. The internal logic so far is good, the characters seem to stand up well, but I don't have a clue where it's going. I was planning on some Indiana Jones type escapades in that world with this, but think that will have to wait for something different.

Pah, at least I'm dealing with the rejection in a positive way, by cracking on with something new.
That is positive, right?

Done and Nearly Dusted.

While in the office yesterday I finished up the major and most dull part of the database. Woo-Wee!
Now all I have to do is a bit of tinkering and make it accessible and usable for anyone else. Which is potentially a bit of a bugger.

Have done nothing today, instead watched the first five episodes of a show called "How I Met Your Mother." Which is funny in a quirky way. However what makes this show a bit odd to me, just like another new show called "Crumbs" is the fact that they both look to have been shot single camera style, like "Scrubs" and "Malcolm In The Middle", but then they added a laughter track to it. To me this seems about as good as the laughter track they added to old Hanna-Barbera cartoons, it just seems out of place.

Hopefully I can get the Terror Tale I found the other day typed up tonight, but I am supposed to be going to the cinema to see Underworld: Evolution with the folks. I can live with not seeing it until DVD, but I haven't been to the flicks in ages.

In other news, Emma has posted up on her news page that she expects to start putting The Courier up for people to look at on Friday. I still haven't seen the last two pages, but based on what I have seen so far, they will be awesome. The front cover she did I love, I think when I get it printed up it will definitely get people interested enough to pick it up and open it.
I wan to make a couple of dialogue changes before printing, but it's looking essentially done, and I couldn't be more chuffed.

Strange visitor

OK, so I've got up late, come downstairs in my PJ's and picked up my copy of 2000ad which the poostman has kindly delivered.
Then there's a ring on the doorbell.
Now, being less than proud of how my half naked body looks these days, I cowered behind the half opened door while answering. It was a sweet looking little old lady.
"I'm here about the new born baby."
Puzzled frown, shake of head, "There's no baby here."
"I'm sure there is, I just spoke to them and confirmed I'd be there in just a minute."
Now I'm looking around wildly for a baby that definitely didn't exist in the house last night when I went to bed.
"Nope, we really don't have a baby here."
"6 ***********?" (I'm not actually prinitng my address here.)
"Yeah, that's us."
"Then I'm here for the baby."
Right, now I'm getting panicky, I'm sure I'm in the right house. At least I was, now there's some thoughts creeping in that the world has gone a bit wonky.
"See, it's 6 *********, Othertown. Ah, missed that."
Sigh of relief, "Yeah, this is 6 *********, Myvillage."
"My mistake. Goodbye."
Close door, shake head. Consider going back to bed and starting the day all over again.

I didn't, but I kinda wish I had.

Treading Water AGAIN!

And once again I am avoiding doing database work by writing here in this blog. I think this post possibly makes this my most written in blog so far, what an honour for it.
SO, no writing done since Friday, 500-some words in an hour that night, slacking since. However, once again re-discovered my bedroom floor on Saturday, and in doing so unearthed my notebook that I wrote some future shock scripts in. Specifically, the Terror Tale I did and have been unsuccessfully trying to re-write ever since. Needs tweaking, but I should get that done on Wednesday and off to Tharg before leaving for work on Thursday (I hope).
Supposed to be going to see Underworld: Evolution tomorrow, hope it lasts longer in the memory than the first one did. Came out after seeing with my mate, we turned to each other and couldn't remember a damn thing that happened in it. It did at least keep us entertained for 2 hours, which is more than other films I've seen have done.
Been working my way through Band of Brothers on the weekends with my Dad. I still think it's one of the best television series ever produced, and it's a shame that with every reality show that costs 10p to make and keeps the masses zombied out, the chance of another show like it really diminishes, especially over here. I want the BBC to stop chasing ratings and make more shows like Doctor Who, more work for scriptwriters and real actors. Y'know, people with actual talent.
Erm, right, rant over, back to the database grind.

A time for Red

So the weeks most unsurprising football story is over, and we've signed Theo Walcott.
Wasn't too sure about having the lad, but after seeing some of his goals on the Championship review last night, I am convinced he can become great, especially if Theirry Henry stays about to pass on his knowledge.
Only thing the lad has to worry about is the point that Arsenal signed Jermaine Pennant when he was young. Yeah, this young talented lad who Wenger nutured was recently playing for Birmingham (and when that's not the worst part of the story you've got to be concerned) while wearing one of those ankle tags so the police knew where he was.

Beyond that, I am sat here, getting ready to consume an entire bottle of red and get down to some work on one of the 2 novels I am going to focus on until I get that call from Abaddon. My kids novel or Matthew Reilly meets HP Lovecraft.
I'm more up for the Reilly/Lovecraft one at the moment.

I think.

[Edit] It's definitely that one. Just found my page of quotes for it, have to get to the point where I can put this in.

Scientist: Violence is not always the answer.
Jackson: But when it is, I'm a f*****g star pupil.

Is this progress?

Here I am, posting when I should be working. That is, real work, looking through magazines for anyone who has advertised but isn't in my database. It is unbelievably boring, especially as I have got myself all worked up over the fact that an eamil this morning told me one of my pitches has been passed on to a series creator. This means one of two things, Jon liked it and thinks it could work in that world, or he enjoyed it but can't make a decision based on his own thougts because he knows me and I have been sneaking in begging notes onto the end of my submission emails.
It would be nice if it is the former, I hoped Jon could stay neutral when he read my submissions, as a friend I would like him to get me a paying gig, as a writer I want to be judged purely on the merits of what I write.
Anyhew, hopefully the guy who came up with the world will like it enough and I can move on to the next stage of the process, a chapter by chapter breakdown, and that actually scares me. So far all my writing has had a broad outline and then things have changed in the actual telling. In my big work-in-progress kids novel, f'r instance, the hero suddenly left the nicely crafted party I had made, met a new character I had to scrabble to find a name for, met another character about 2 chapters before I planned, and gave me the answer to a question I had posed myself.
I don't know how much freedom a chapter breakdown will leave me, but probably not that much. On the other hand, 6 years on and that book is still only half done, so maybe a rigid structure can prevent the stopping times I immerse myself in.
Meh.

Right, back to databases, how I hate them.

...not quite.

So I knuckled down and cranked out the pitch for a zombie story for Abaddon.
Yay for me.
At least that is something productive out of these past few days.
Best get cracking on the next pitch and those scripts tomorrow if I'm not too shagged out.

Another wasted weekend...

It's now Monday, and all those great things I had planned for the weekend have failed to materialise.
Futurequake have asked me to shrink a 5 page Furture Shock into 1 page, in fact they asked before Christmas and I still haven't done it.
Had an idea for a new Terror Tale, didn't even start on it, but I think it probably needs a bit more thinking on because I realised my original plan doesn't quite track.
Finally, writing up one of the 2 pitches I want to make to Jon at Abaddon, total failure. Thought about them, sure, written anything, no.
However I have made some progress in my head on the zombie story today, it's a neat little way to go from 0 - 50000 zombies really quickly. Insta-zombie! Zombies in a tin! Obviously that isn't how I'll do it, but it has that kind of feel to it.
Would have done some toaday, planned to and everything. But sat down to do the work for my actual job, and managed to kncker myself.
This CFS/ME is really putting a pisser on "The Year of Rob."
But I'll get there, see if I don't!

Just a Thought

You can check out one of the character designs for my comic on the artist's website.
http://www.emmaolsen.com
If you vote for her on TopWeb Comics, the link's on the right of the page.
Check out her comic as well.
Then curse because she is only 14! Dammit I can't even get stickmen to look right.

But then, that's why I write, because I can't draw, sing, play a musical instrument or any of the other things you need talent for.

A New Beginning.

A new year, a(nother) new blog, time to begin.

Well today I finally finished and emailed off my pitch for one of the Abaddon worlds. Abaddon is a new imprint from Rebellion, the people currently publishing 2000ad, and they have 4 new worlds in which they will be releasing novels. Mine was done for the steampunk Magna Britannia series.
Hopefully it will get a favourable response, I have 2 others to set down and send before the deadline of March 31st, 1 for the fantasy world and one for a zombie novel. It would be nice to get commisioned to write one, mostly for the money (£3500 - not to be taken lightly when you are as broke as me) and the other because it may kickstart me into actually doing some damn writing!
If it all looks bad I will have to badger the commisioning editor (I know where he lives) until he gives me a story to re-pitch to him guaranteeing success. Not the ideal way, but hey!

The next month or so should see the launch of my website, domain as yet unknown as I don't have the money to buy it at the moment :P
Also, my first comic work should be available on the net within the next 2 weeks. It's a small thing that I will be using as an advert to promote myself, something suggested by Andy Diggle, writer of The Losers for Vertigo - he's a nice bloke as well.

So, until I next do something,

That Is All.