Well, that’s what I’ve going on this weekend. I officially typed THE END to my latest novel, Burning Roads, Book one of the Car Warriors Autoduel Chronicles series that Steve Jackson Games has given us the opportunity to write in.
I’m working my way back through for my main edit run, and will be turning it over to the editors this week so they can open a few arteries and bleed all over it.
Around the house
Other than that, we’ve been getting things around here ready for the spring planting season, and Pepper, one of our newest hens has been a broody thing lately. After tossing one of the eggs she’d ejected from the coop into the compost, I found it had an unhatched chick inside. So we’re hoping that of the other few dozen eggs that Pepper and Sugar laid in the first two weeks after we got them were also fertile an we’ll have a few chicks running around very soon.
We’ve also started the renovation of the old garage into the family game room. The floor has been primed and painted, the old window opening that goes under the stoop has been sealed off and the next step will be to put a coat of elastomeric sealer on the block walls.
The overall plan is to do a Fallout-themed game room and make it look similar to a Fallout shelter or mini bunker.
New games
While on a weekend writing retreat with my buddy Chris Woods at The Groler lake house, we managed a few rounds of Settlers of Catan and Terraforming Mars during our lunch breaks. Both games were amazing resource management strategy games. Well worth the time spent to learn, and I’ve already ordered my own copy of Catan. The deluxe box set for Terraforming Mars was quite a bit more expensive, so I’ll have to wait to get exactly what I want with that one, but for anyone looking to try out a new game, either are well worth the time and money.
Cooking adventures
Since it’s been a long while since we had soup beans and cornbread, we made a batch the other day that just never misses to hit the spot for me.
The soup beans are stupid easy. Soak a bag of pintos overnight. The next morning, dump the water and wash out the beans. This seems to help reduce some of the gas from the beans. drop them in the crock pot on high and let them cook all day long.
Salt and pepper to taste, one diced onion into the pot to cook with the beans, few slices of ham, spam, bacon slices, or whatever pork product you happen to have left over from a previous meal for flavoring. You can even add a dab of bacon grease if you don’t have any meat to toss in the pot. By the time you get home from work, the beans will be ready.
Normally we’d make a pan of cornbread in the cast iron skillet, but this time I felt like making a batch of Cherokee Corn Pones. Which are basically cornbread pancakes when you really get down to it. They are just as easy to make as pancakes and make easy serving sizes. The recipe I used actually called for them to be baked in the oven, but I just poured a bit of olive oil in the frying pan and fried them like you would a pancake. The worst part of making them is getting the timing right to flip them, or they want to fall apart. Just something that takes a bit of practice.
Something else that I hadn’t made in a while was candied oranges.
I’d seen them done on one of those foods around the world kinda documentaries about China that we binge-watched one weekend while we were sick and I fell in love with the recipe when I tried them the first time.
Basically, if we end up with oranges that are right at the end of their life and nearing time to go to the compost bin, then that’s when I give them a little extra life.
Get a saucepan of water boiling, add 1-2 cups of sugar, depending on how many oranges you are going to candy, drop in a cinnamon stick, some cloves, or any other spice flavors that you think will be good and once you get the sugar dissolved and the mixture boiling, slice the oranges like you see in the pic and drop them into the pot, squishing them down slightly in the process.
Now, besides making a tasty treat, you’ve also managed to make an orange-flavored simple syrup that you can use on other things if you have any left over. They work well on pancakes or even for mixing drinks.
What have I been reading/listening to?
To start with, I’ve been reading my way through the first Car Warriors novel, The Square Deal, written by David Drake and published by TOR books back in the early 90’s.
This one is partially for enjoyment and partially for research. Being able to see how Drake brought the Car Wars universe to life has helped me develop my characters and the scenario quite a bit as well, especially the combat scenes.
It’s strange following in the footsteps of such an amazing author and a prolific publishing house. I can’t wait to see what Steve Jackson thinks about the story that I’ve come up with in my novel. I can only hope that it hits the marks for both the old-school Car Wars fans and new alike, not to mention I really hope that Steve and the fans enjoy the story.
Listening wise has been threefold recently. During the morning drive dropping off kids and grandkids at school, we’ve been listening our way through book one of the Kildash series by Lee Ellis.
In an ancient civilization where adventurers use magic to explore distant planets, a lowly deckhand becomes possessed by a powerful wizard from ages past. Old feuds, forgotten legacies and undying love consume a young man’s quest for purpose.
Then, after I get the kids dropped, I’ve been listening to BattleField Earth on the way back to the house. The prose were a bit too dry for the kids, so we switched it up and started Kildash instead for them.
So far I’m really enjoying Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard. The writing is solid, the story premise is good and the feel of the writing is right there with Heinlein, Asimov, or Silverberg. I get that the movie that came out around 2000 kinda bombed, but the book itself, especially the audiobook has had me hooked on the story and left me wanting to keep listening.
Honestly, I don’t get why folks give this title such a bad rap. I’m enjoying it and it has honestly been inspiring new ideas of my own.
Here’s the blurb from amazon.
Sadistic Aliens……Man is an endangered species. Is it the end of the world or the rebirth of a new one? In the year A.D. 3000, Earth is a dystopian wasteland. The great cities stand crumbling as a brutal reminder of what we once were. When the Psychlos invaded, all the world’s armies mustered little resistance against the advanced alien weapons. Now, the man-animals serve one purpose. Do the Psychlos’ bidding or face extinction. One man, Jonnie Goodboy Tyler, has a plan. They must learn about the Psychlos and their weapons. He needs the other humans to follow him. And that may not be enough. Can he outwit his Psychlo captor, Terl? The fate of the Galaxy lies on the Battlefield of Earth.
Now, between doing everything else, I’ve been listening to the Writers of the Future anthology Volume 34, half for enjoyment and half for research.
One of the best ways to know what to write for any contest, magazine, etc, is to read what they publish. If you read/listen to what they are putting out then you’ll have an idea of what sort of story, content-wise, feel, or the genre they prefer to publish. This also has a bit to do with the publication’s lead editor, so getting a feel for what they like also helps.
I’m nearly done with this antho, and so far my personal favorites have been “Illusion” by Jody Lynn Nye and “What Lies Beneath” by Cole Hehr.
“What Lies Beneath” is a good solid Sword and Sorcery type story in first person that just sucks you in from the get-go and takes you on an adventure of intrigue that ends with a twist that I never saw coming and it left me stopping the audio with a “holy shit, did he just do that?” and I backed up the audio to make sure I hadn’t misheard the story. If for no other reason, this collection is worth getting just for this Cole Hehr’s story.
Maybe one of these days I’ll get lucky enough to cross paths with him and thank him for the awesome adventure.