About Journaling

"Bluesky Threads"

Trying to find the month and year I bought a journal before I begin writing in it... Yeah, definitely NOT neurotypical.

I have general journals for regular notes I take while watching certain YouTube videos. I have separate journals- 1 for my sci-fi and 1 for my fantasy. I ain't doin' that no more! Fantasy and science fiction can share a journal. They’re thicker than the journals I used to buy.

Also, the comic, Summer to Winter, has its own library. It used to share with other stories, but I quickly learned to give it its own journal "series."

A New Journey Begins...

I'm struggling to find the conflict and who/what the "antagonist" is/are in my latest sci-fi wip. This is why I find fantasy easier to write. I struggle to write sci-fi. And yet, I dearly love both genres as a fan, consumer, and creator. 

Also, I struggle to write full romance prose, but I found I can draft romantic comedy in comic form... 

My writing plans for 2024

Was just replying to a response about not enough stories showing the side effects of overusing ones magic or powers. In my own near-future sci-fi short story series, my MC shape-shifting alien couldn't rest because his human partner was sleeping over. He finally lost control and nearly destroyed his highrise apartment. 

I intend to self-publish this series and other sci-fi and fantasy I have in mind. Even a few genre-blend ideas.

Ages when I "discovered" my favorite authors

Andre Norton 

Age 10-11 "Warlock of the Witchworld"

My oldest big brother brought home a coverless used paperback copy. My introduction to adult Fantasy. Magic as personal, unique, familial legacy, and frightening. The rest is history... 

Lois Duncan

Age 12 "A Gift of Magic"

I lost a lot of Summertime as a kid because I was always stuck in Summer School(which is also a favorite 80s movie of mine. My first film showing a pregnant teen and the storyline NOT punishing her for that). I found this book on the school library spinner rack(found so many favorites over the years on the spinner rack). The cover was a touched-up photograph of an eerie-looking pre-teen white girl. Her eyes aglow while she sat crouched in an easy chair, her fingers digging into its arms while she stared at the viewer. Behind her was another photo of a younger girl seemingly floating in shades of blue. The story was as surreal and real as a story could get about a regular girl inheriting her matriarchal line's ability to telepathy, telekinesis, and prescience.

Anne McCaffrey 

Age 20 "The Rowan"

Now in the realm of far-future SF with a psychic woman protagonist(thanks to A Gift of Magic) I started to relish reading about. This title was the first in a family drama/space opera series. The protagonist is in blue clothing and seat on a seat likened to a throne, appearing as regal as any queen. An orphan, she is considered one of the most powerful psychics in human-inhabited space. She sits straight with her ankles crossed, her arms straight with her fingertips on her seat's arms. She is flanked by a smallish(serval-size?) snow leopard-like domesticated cat. More psychic abilities and alien-implied invasions of the galaxy. The first story where the protagonist and her intended get together, she gets pregnant, and they don't immediately marry(they marry in the second book when she's pregnant with their third child). That blew my mind and I appreciated this subplot point. 

Ursula K. le Guin

Age 23(?) "Catwings Returns"

I know I read this story late in my local library, not even realizing it was a series. It had cats with bird wings born to a regular black cat mama. The cats flying through a city felt very real to me and delighted me that another writer could make a story about a cat character that could fly. Disclaimer: My first character I made up as a kid was a brown and white cat with bat wings I called Cat the Bat.😊😄 I worked as a substitute teacher at the time.

"Catching Feels" drops on Feb 1st 2020! All details to purchase as eBook and Print in post

My SF short story "CATCHING FEELS" drops on February 1, 2020! 
It will appear in Kyanite Press Speculative Fiction Journal Volume 2, Issue 2 - Amazing Journeys and Exotic Destinations

[Official Kyanite Publishing promotional tweet]
COMING FEB 1st! Volume 2, Issue 2 Amazing Journeys and Exotic Destinations Preorder now!
Direct from the publisher:
https://kyanitepublishing.com/product/kyanite-press-vol-2-issue-2-winter-2020/…
On Amazon.com
https://amazon.com/Kyanite-Press-WINTER-B-K-Bass-ebook/dp/B083F6KN52/…
On Barnes and Noble.com
https://barnesandnoble.com/w/kyanite-press-bk-bass/1135918289?ean=9781949645972…
On Kobo
https://kobo.com/us/en/ebook/kyanite-press-8…
[End of promotional tweet]

Book Covers As Art Galleries - The Sequel!

About a year ago, (whoa!) I spoke about a nice memory on a favorite book. It was a science fiction trilogy that later became a series, and what struck me was its front cover.

Again, the cover is by Romas and it's with the Rowan's daughter, and not even the eldests but the youngest child. I'm the baby in my family and this story struck me harder than I thought it would. 

Look at Afra, the man in the starry background. He is the family friend and will become VERY important to events in the story. 

The red panda that sits with Damia on her throne (all the head psychics who help with communications across the galaxy have their special seats/thrones). This is very much a science fiction story with elements of the epic fantasy. 

Yes, Anne McCaffrey's books may be dated and some elements not so polite, but her books have heart, wonder, and the ability to inspire. And that's what speculative fiction should be about. 

Dreaming into Work or The Muse Doesn't Do Your Work

Another writer asked how important dreams are to one's work-in-progress.

I've gotten a couple of stories from my dreams.

If I'm not stressed out and sleep well, my dreams are often sequential, full color, with a cast of characters.

I find this crazy. Some may find this manah from Heaven. It probably isn't in that the work of putting together a viable writing project is still involved.

I have two comic WIPs, a SF novelette, and a Fantasy novella strictly from dreams alone. And still working out each and every one of them to this day.

I've gotten a couple of stories from dreams. If I'm not stressed out and sleep well, my dreams are often sequential, full color, with a cast of characters. It's crazy.

Well, we were asked what was one's craziest dream. I have plenty, as Disney's Ariel would say.

One in which I was chased by robotic dogs.
Another, I witnessed a naiad (I think that's a freshwater nymph?) carried off from her swampland lake by her love interest, a centaur.

Both yielded two story drafts and their accompanying artwork. There's more but that will be for other posts.

I Won July Camp NaNo 2019

I WON CAMP NANOWRIMO.

I needed to complete another story project, so for this July Camp NaNo, I decided to work on two stories simultaneously: a continuation of the April Camp NaNo story project and the start and hopefully completion of the second story.

I set my sights on 9,000 words, just as I did for April, and made it to 9,099 words!
Now to work on revising and editing both projects. During July Camp, I also added more to my online world-building encyclopedic blog.

I also did a video series of coloring a sketch on some of the characters and uploading to Instagram. Though I kept tight notes on the videos, they still ended up out of sequence. I'm really exhausted that I did this to myself. But... I won and that means I beat my record from last time. While being distracted with other projects such as the world-builder blog and art-process videos.

And no, I'm not posting to YouTube. It's already been suggested. I have my reasons. I don't need to be on so many social media platforms. I work in several genres and need to get my projects and acts together, and, right now, I use events such as NaNoWriMo and Inktober to get those ideas off the ground. I mean what I say. Social media is work in and of itself, and right now, I'm at a tolerable level.

Thank you. And as always, when I have something new posted or upcoming assignment, I will let you know the details, my Dear Readers.

Links to purchase my SF story and others!

Kyanite Press: JUL/AUG 2019 - My SF story "The Human Network" (C.F. Welsh)  

AVAILABLE on 

Kyanite Publishing
https://t.co/OZT8ZGSJhX
https://t.co/blWQTTvzpO

Barnes & Noble.com 

[Paperback & NOOK]
https://m.barnesandnoble.com/w/kyanite-press-b-k-bass/1132077009?ean=9781949645781

Amazon.com

[Kindle]
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07T32QD1V/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_apa_i_Yl9iDbFB82RMS

[Paperback]
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1949645789/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_apa_i_cUMjDb7GRT6V6

Spec-fic Journal Available for Pre-order!

The Kyanite Press: Volume 1 | Issue 6 is up for pre-order (Available in print & ebook on B&N and Amazon)!
MY SCIFI SHORT STORY DROPS TODAY朗 "The Human Network" by C.F. Welsh

My Contributor Interview Is Live!

My scifi story has been accepted for the July month! Kyanite Publishing posts its contributors' profiles and interview questions online!

You can read mine on the following link:Kyanite Press Contributors Page 3

I like that I'm not the only 'W'. Many times, I'm usually the only one or in that rare occasion that someone may have a surname with X, Y, Z, which is almost astronomical! There's several other contributors with W surnames, so I don't quite feel alone. 

Aside from that peeve of mine, I am QUITE EXCITED to be included in such a line-up! A number of these authors I either communicate and/or network with on social media, or, they are close friends and guild members! And they have a number of incredible writings and stories out!

This has been a dream come true, to finally publish a SF story. I was introduced to Science Fiction before Fantasy and have often felt the greater desire to create it, to give honor to those authors whose stories fostered me. I hope I'm doing those that have passed on homage, and to finally feel the part: a writer who can straddle multiple genres. 

So, head on over to Kyanite Publishing and check out my interview (as well as the other contributors)! You may just find other writers for your next summer or lifetime read!

Also, don't forget that Kyanite Press Issue 6 |Volume 1 will have my story The Human Network,  available for online purchase with Barnes & Noble or Amazon.com THIS JULY! 

As soon as more information is given, I'll provide it here on Pretty in Print! 
And, as always, thank you for sticking with me, Dear Readers. This is the Angry-- wait, I mean, SciFi Author Angry Goblin, signing off...

The Art of Plugging Away - for 2019!

I've got this furry short story to write further on. I'm just going to dwell more into dark fantasy, which is the thin slice of genre between fantasy and horror, which is where I can comfortably sit (i.e. I can't do straight horror. I can barely read it, write it, much less, watch it). Let me just say, the dragons in this won't be the scarier elements nor the villains in this piece.

#BW = Hashtag Black Women

I don't know about you, but I'm lovin' all these new stories when otherworldly beings fall in love with wonderfully Black women protagonists! 

Some examples (and please, that means READ THEM. They're GOOOOD): Talia Hibbert's Mating with the Huntress (Novel-BW/Werewolf) 

Plastic Bottru's Oh My Intern (Webtoon-BW/Demon)

As well as my own take (BW/Alien)

We just weren't the romantic interests in most genres and media, much less when the story is speculative-fiction. If our own kind didn't want us, neither did it seem the men/women from out of myth and space, either.😒 

"Tribes of Kai" micro-review

What an incredible graphic novel...

You were too short a story and I love you.

I first read "Tribes of Kai" while it serialized in the short-lived Frazetta Fantasy Illustrated Magazine back in the 1990s. The same periodical that showed a new ElfQuest story from Wendy Pini!

Tribes of Kai takes place on a prehistoric world. The technology is Stone Age. Belief system is in its nascent stages. Knowledge is passed down orally and language are cave dweller drawings. Anthropomorphic wildcats that have 'centaur' like bodies are the dominant species and the main characters. One such individual thinks differently from the tribe and is exiled. Through lush painted comic panels and a hypnotic narration, the reader wonders: is the protagonist a harbinger of doom? Or a savior?

Tribes of Kai is written by the mesmerizing storyteller Lance Haunrogue (Writer) and each-panel-a-gallery-masterwork Daren Bader (Artist).

Please look for Tribes of Kai where ever books are sold, on eBay, or through Flesk Publications website and you can check out the publisher on Facebook!

I'm ranting again

There's so many reference books I'm enjoying reading now while I'm also writing and scripting. I also have some miniature sketchbooks I've been keeping in my purse so ideas don't escape me while I'm at work or out and about.

Will post some of those books because you all may want to read one or two titles!

Anyhoo, I'm still working on the science fiction short story and have a new feline fantasy short story that's been years in the making. If I can finish that as well as two others, I can feel I'm back in the furry game. I actually feel bad that I have not gotten a new Tabber the Red story published in a minute. I'm actually sad.

The artwork for it is also slow in coming and I don't want to make the excuse it's because I worked on other things but it's the excuse and reason I have to make. Because, while I'm working on one thing, something else gets put aside.

It's the reality of being a creative type and it gets me angry when other people don't understand this. Or even think that I and other types are *gasp* wasting our time/fooling around!

I Didn't Forget!

Still owe my viewers my Inktober 2017 submissions! Especially on my DeviantART profile... Well, before I upload my artwork, I'm going to touch on a few recent things:

I am re-working an old idea. A science fiction series from my childhood. The journal designated for this story is halfway done.

I'm also bringing up that I noticed one of my posts about  multicultural elements in one's writing is popular and keeps popping up on the blog's sidelines.

A notable reaction when I showed Inktober for 2017, people appreciated the fact that a lot of the characters were Black, Brown, South-east Asian, and that they had Caribbean/West Indian backgrounds! Sort of sad that this reaction means that we still haven't reached the level of inclusion and diversity within genre fiction, but, we ARE getting there!

Next post will be the first Inktober 2017 submissions!

World-building shouldn't be this hard... But it is

3 hours ago...
Time to continue my series' bible now that I unearthed my big blue journal! This huge notebook has a special place in my heart. Bought it from Borders Books back in 2002 when there was still a superstore in the next city.

3 hours ago...
Retyping my feline vocabulary from the language I made for my cat characters and putting them into alphabetical order because I'm crazy like that.

1 hour ago...
So those cat languages I wrote down eons ago were three language systems: runes, pictographs, & hieroglyphs... Am researching to re-tool all over again. *Weeping*

50 minutes ago...
Using up my mom's Epson printer ink. Gotta switch off. And why use HER'S? Oh, that's right, because for some STUPID REASON, my HP Officejet 4630 printer no longer has the capabilities of working via wi-fi! Not cool, Hewlett-Packard. Not cool.

Eureka!
These languages were based on Egyptian hieroglyphs, Phoenician alphabet, and Celtic runes... Thank God I remember the actual systems.

8 minutes ago...
Ok... Tired. Last day of work this week. I've jotted my language notes and will begin to craft (or draft?) these words into their written systems, beginning with the vocabulary I have typed so far from series' bible. And I still need to outline some scenes from same feline story! Kill me now.

Story can be a challenge

I had a short story in mind but realized another story within the same world, yet dealing with a different cast, finally started to make sense. I also didn't want to force the characters of another story in the same series for the sake of meeting a themed submission guideline. That routine has hardly worked for me except in this year, when I crafted an article just for a journal and it was accepted! 

Mind you, this is 2017 and I've been trying to write professionally since 1996 with my first publication in 1999-2000!

Since this break in the semester, not only has the novel continued rolling around in my head as it should, but a solution came to a short story within the cat epic fantasy series! I've been on-again-off-again with a particular title within the collection and I realized it proved difficult to write another title because I needed the events of the title I'm STRUGGLING WITH NOW to happen!

EUREKA! Can you believe this? And now, that difficult story is almost writing itself! I'm still jotting down notes, swathes of exposition and setups. The story deals with one of my magic using characters who I believed for years to be a villain, or at best, an antihero. I couldn't be further from the truth! He's not only a nice and generous person, he's lovably sardonic and sarcastic! His sardonic personality was already fixed when he was originally 'conceived' but that was with a villainous character. With this more pleasant personality, my shero/heroine won't seem like such a masochist when she falls for him.

There have also been changes to his back story as well. Actually, I kept his origins but in the nascent conception, I had him move far from those trainings and how he was raised. I also had him a stranger to most of that background. Now I understand he couldn't possibly be who he is while disavowing his origins. He just wouldn't be that person! 

His back story also solves my reasons for the antagonistic relationship he has with another fellow magic user too! It's all making sense now. After HOW long? Sheesh... Well, 'til next time!

8/9/16 - More musing... A rant here and there

Some people don't seem to understand why I write fiction, why I write fantasy, why I work in anthropomorphism, or why do I read SF/F at all.

I don't know what to think. I do know on some level why I do the art that I do. I know there's a lot for me to say and if the characters looked too familiar, readers might shy away. SF/F brings up the ideas and discusses the topics many normally won't talk about. But once dressed in animal or nonhuman, it becomes easier to get away with speaking about taboo subject matters and controversial topics. I can use such devices and literary genres to tell the stories about mundane things.

I often don't want to tell people where I'm published because of their reaction. The statements can be any number of superficial magazines that they think my submissions are better suited for but this advice couldn't be further from the truth. No, I've learned that some of my writings are categorized under sub-genres. I consider them speculative fiction. That means they aren't mainstream and because of this, my works may be found online or purchased directly from the publisher.

Don't look for me in The New Yorker or other such mainstream and coveted titles anytime soon. I also find a number of women's magazines foolish and some men's magazines even worse. Right now, and you can say I'm limiting myself. I've heard it all before, but I'm better off where you may find me: niche, sub-genre, speculative, mixed genres, and mostly nerdy.

Political Atmosphere Brings Out Pop Culture

Remember that I said it first, folks! As the political climate worsens, we all return to pop culture - The modern sacred texts of our times.
Political analysts and the press have used more pop culture references!

How many feel we are living in a Graphic novel? - Joy Reid of "AM Joy"

Here are more examples from her 'round table'!
Darth Vader - Dick Cheney
House of Cards - It's become a biography
Dystopian reality - Current political climate
Batman's Gotham City - Washington, DC
DC Comics' villain - Steve Bannon

ADDENDUMS:
Game of Thrones
Through the Looking Glass