Being Productive as an Artist

I have my book back from the copy editor and will be accepting the changes and making small revisions over the next week before formatting it for paperback and kindle. Which got me thinking about all of my creative friends. One of the reasons I STILL enjoy Facebook is the hundreds of creative people I follow on that platform. Authors, actors, musicians and artists. SO, here are three who have recently released their work. Take a look and maybe be a patron of their art. Musician Daniel Anderson, Author Eric Hanberg and Artist Kathy Traxler Anderson. Tarantula Tapes - Released today. I was lucky enough to get an advance digital album of Tarantula Tapes from Daniel Anderson. It is an instrumental album of a genre that I was not able to pinpoint and I spent a half an hour talking to him about. Some of the cuts reminded me of the Twin Peaks theme, some reminded me of what would happen if bluegrass and smooth jazz had a baby, a few made me think about driving through the Utah National Parks. It is eclectic, hypnotic and absolutely thematic. He did use the phrase lo-fi hip-hop about one, and I have no idea what that is. What I do know that the guitar work is infinitely cool, and it has been a perfect complement to my taking walks around Tacoma and while grading homework. You may know Daniel from his days as part of the alternative rock duo Idiot Pilot or his recent Glowbug We may be sheltered in place but the amount of creativity and productivity is inspiring. Semi/Human - This YA sci-fi heist thriller is the latest release by author and all around good guy Erik Hanberg. I have known Erik for many years including several where we would gather as pat of a writers group to encourage each other. I read all of his mystery books, which were the first fiction that he published and this is the latest sci-fi work since he completed The Lattice Trilogy in 2018. As Kirkus Reviews recently stated "Hanberg deftly combines convincing high-tech (plus some surprising low-tech) touches with believable, sympathetic characters. " I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and his interpretation of the effects of A.I. on the workers in a dystopian society. He puts the auto in workforce automation. (a semi really but I wanted the pun). "Hope Grows Here" Project - There is so much good will and great art being spread by the Hope Grows Herebeing spread by the Hope Grows Hereope Grows Here project and much of that is exemplified by the sevent rather large pieces that were done by Kathy Traxler Anderson. I have loved watching these pieces develop both on Facebook and on instragram. Right now on her Instagram page is a great shot that gives a perspective shot of a piece being drawn.

The Rorschach Test and Other Stories

I have made quite a bit of progress since the end of NaNoWriMo.

The event ended with my crushing the low bar of 30,000 words that I set (the official site wouldn't let me adjust anyway) and I finished with 53,000 words written.

This equated to 18 first drafts of short suspense, horror and/or supernatural stories.  Since then I have dropped one but written two more for a total of 19 titles.

My next effort is concentrating on piecing them together into a full collection under the title:

The Rorschach Test - and other tales of suspense, horror and the supernatural

It may be tough going for me, as they are different lengths, and some decidedly different tones in some cases. You might jump from a ghost story, to a gruesome tale to a comedic piece.

My hope is that they will still hold together as a collection.

The next step for me is to collect them all together in one document and list out all the stories, though the order in which they are presented is subject to change. The book cover is just an idea so far but I have a mock up using some tweaked graphic that I found online. The final cover will be an original piece.

I am happy to have made progress beyond the original challenge and hope to publish before the end of August this year.