Reading
This past week, I finished Grave Peril by Jim Butcher. It’s the third volume in his Dresden Files series. I liked this one. The writing is better than the first two, and the story was pretty creative. The one thing I noticed, having read three of these in the past four months, is that they follow very similar narrative beats. That makes sense because these are noir-ish mysteries with magic. Your classic private eye tale except your private eye is a wizard. This isn’t a criticism, more of an observation. When I start making observations like this, though, I know it’s time for me to take a break from a series. I’ll pick up the next one when I start to get an itch for a mystery.
I read Berserk by Kentarō Miura for the first time. I’m lucky that the Chicago Public Library has all 14 deluxe editions. I started with volume one (of course), and I have some thoughts. I already knew going into this manga that it was dark, violent, and disturbing. Some of the art inside reminds me a bit of Junji Ito, but it’s not as crisp. The art style is more sketchy, with blocks of black ink shadowing a lot of details. The art of the buildings and streetscapes in this medieval-inspired setting are gorgeous. Those were my favorite parts of the manga. Otherwise, I didn’t really jibe with the art, unfortunately. I think I like a little bit more crispness in my manga.
Another thing was the story: I had a hard time caring about the main character whatsoever. We’re thrown right into the action with little character development (which is actually pretty typical for manga considering their serialized nature). That usually isn’t a problem for me, but this time around, the violence seemed directionless, and the art made me gloss over most of the fight scenes.
I know this is an unpopular opinion, since Berserk is one of the most famous and well-loved manga of all time, but I wasn’t a huge fan, though I enjoyed this volume well enough. I think if this was a one-off, or was only a couple of volumes, then I’d like it more. Frankly, I’m not sure if I can read fourteen 700-page volumes of this. We’ll see if I pick it back up in the future.
I’m currently about 55% of the way through The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan. This is my bedside book, and it’s probably going to take quite a while to finish. This is because I will formally be going back to the office at my job for 4 days a week starting next Monday after 8 years of working from home mostly full time. It’s going to be an adjustment for sure, and I think my reading speed will definitely take a hit. Since I will only be able to read physical books at home, progress on my physical TBR pile will be slow. I will still listen to audiobooks during my commute and during quiet spots at the office, but being at the office means that I will have to be more available to my co-workers, so I won’t be speedily getting through books through my headphones either. That’s okay; once I get used to this new arrangement, I’ll speed up my reading once more.
I started Of Empires and Dust by Ryan Cahill, the much-anticipated fourth volume of his The Bound and the Broken series. I read the first three over the last couple of years and really like the characters and plot. This was despite the poor writing and bad editing of the first two books. I forgave this series because it’s self-published, and because the third volume, Of War and Ruin, showed a considerable upgrade from the first two books. Despite Of War and Ruin being a little overly-long, I enjoyed that book the best.
Of Empires and Dust ups the ante even more. This volume is almost 1,700 pages (according to the Kindle store, the ebook being the only copy currently available), so I’m a little concerned about the story dragging in the middle. I’m almost 100 pages in, and I have to say so far so good. The writing is much cleaner. You can tell Mr. Cahill feels more comfortable in his world and more comfortable with himself. This book is longer than some epic fantasy trilogies, so it will take a while to get through, but I anticipate reading this on my phone during my lunch breaks at the office.
Writing
I’ve hit a brick wall. Not just a roadblock, but a solid wall. This has made me write a frantic set of notes and rework my outline. The title of the project, Mythos, might not even apply anymore. It was always a placeholder, but now that placeholder tells you less about the manuscript.
My biggest problem was scope. This novel was intended to be a story about a man who can access an alternate world through his dreams. This puts him in the crosshairs of a dangerous organization that’s intent on using him as a key to unlock the door between worlds. The scope was big, epic, and world-ending. The more I wrote using my characters, the more I found that I was not equipping them or the story with the necessary parts to fulfill this vision. I think an epic scope is a bit too large of a bite for me to chew, narratively speaking.
So I’ve decided to narrow the scope. The characters are remaining largely the same, though their relationships to each other have been tweaked slightly. The secondary world I’ve created hasn’t gotten too far yet, so I can keep building on that, even if I don’t use it all.
I will still keep the counter at the bottom of this blog, though it might fluctuate more erratically in the coming weeks.
MYTHOS – First Draft progress report: 24,880/120,000 – 20.7%
+2,342 up from last week
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What have you been reading and/or writing this week? Let me know in the comments below.
The Night Bulletin 