PJL's Write Life

I don't know if it's just my family, but big things always seem to happen right at the start of the year. My brother died in January. My dad had his heart attack in February during a snow storm. I had my surgery in February. My father-in-law died in March. And now... Hubby and I have bought a house! We closed February 28th and there was a winter storm that day with bad winds. Not quite sure if it was before or after close, but we discovered this happened. Luckily, it didn't hit the house and was close enough to the road to be the city's problem. We were also without a fridge up until yesterday thanks to the previous one dying about two weeks ago. I've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off to get everything set up and get moved. We still have some furniture to get and a dining room table, but I want to say we are about 80% there. Despite this big upheaval in my life, I am happy to report I have still written something. Not a lot, but I've opened

I've been hanging a lot on Substack's Notes. There's a vibrant fiction community there and people share writing prompts and micro fiction. A recent friend I made, Miguel , has been posting daily prompts with 50 word stories. Lots of people join in, myself included. The other week, Miguel posted a story. Something about the lines where the character lost just punched me in the feels. I couldn't stop thinking about it. A week later, it was still on my mind, and I restacked it and said the story was living rent-free in my head. I wanted this fictional character to have a happy ending. Miguel, after some prompting with an awkward stare gif, delivered a new ending for the character. I lost my shit. That new ended hit me in the feels harder. Don't get me wrong, I was happy for the ending, but I was also bawling like a baby at it. And I was asking, Why? Why did this story affect me so much? Lately, I've been grappling with the feel of being a failure. Made more poignan

Decided to  keep all IWSG posts here instead of Substack. You know me, I'm wishy-washy and change my mind like I change my socks. *** February 7 question: What turns you off when visiting an author's website/blog? Lack of information? A drone of negativity? Little mention of author's books? Constant mention of books? Too much clutter and bad design. Please make things easy to navigate and read, and for the love of all that is holy, do not use white text on a black background. That burns my eyes. (I'm not kidding. I can't read it because it causes discomfort.) *** I'm back to the anniversary of my surgery . This is probably going to be something I write about on the date of because of how much it affected my life. While the physical pain is gone, there is still a bit of mental anguish lingering. One of those is FOMO. Fear of missing out. Now that I'm pain free, it's hard for me not to feel a pressure to catch up. To not miss out on getting stuff done beca

It's IWSG day and I'm kinda sorta not doing it. Over on Substack , it's my one year anniversary, so I wrote something about that over there. I didn't want to let the day go by unnoticed though. Or feel like I'm starting 2024 off on the wrong foot. After the way 2023 went, I have serious reserves about 2024 and have repeatedly said I don't trust it already. Yet, I do not want to start the year on negative energy. But I'm not feeling comfortable to flat out say 2024 will rock either. Rock, meet Hard Place. I think my best course of action is to refuse to predict what 2024 will hold. Instead, I'll take it day by day. I have goals and plans, but I'll roll with any punches thrown my way so I can bounce up easier and get back to what I want to achieve. Totally doable, right? Today's post was part of the Insecure Writer's Support Group . Kinda. Created by the ninja captain, Alex J. Cavanaugh, it's a group for writers struggling with writing ins

December 6th question: Book reviews are for the readers. When you leave a book reviews do you review for the Reader or the Author? Is it about what you liked and enjoyed about your reading experience, or do you critique the author? I don’t really think about it as it’s more a matter of “Do I feel like trying to type on my phone?” because I tend to read in bed at night so when I finish a book, I’m in bed and I can’t type on my phone’s screen to save my life. First off, I want to thank everyone for the suggestions on writing tactics last month . There was a good variety of advice in the comments. Will any of it work for me? We shall see. But probably not until next year. It’s the holiday months, so writing gets sidelined a bit for me. And can I just say I’m not really looking forward to the holidays? I’d rather skip to April (and skip winter while we’re at it.) I’m lacking the energy to deal with Christmas and it’s positivity. About the only thing I want to see is Christmas lights. But I

November 1st question: November is National Novel Writing Month. Have you ever participated? If not, why not? I tried once and my brain thought it would be utterly hilarious to not write a single word to spite NaNo. True story. My brain is a dick. I feel the uncertainty of the future again. Lately, hubby and I have been discussing houses. By the time this goes out, we’ll have looked at least one, and I went through the process with our bank to pre-approved a loan. We’re both terrified because houses aren’t cheap. But our apartment is getting a little too small for us. Hubby’s job as a software developer pays well, so we’re both confident we can buy a house on his income. Still, I don’t want that burden to solely fall on him. We’re a team, after all. A job with more hours than my crossing job might be in my future. What does that mean for my writing? That’s the million dollar question. I know writers who carved out bits of writing here and there. I know someone who wrote their book in 1

October 4th question: The topic of AI writing has been heavily debated across the world. According to various sources, generative AI will assist writers, not replace them. What are your thoughts? Photo by Igor Omilaev on Unsplash Like everyone else on the internet, I have thoughts on AI. I won’t get into my thoughts of AI art because, as an artist, I might get ranty. Overall, AI is a tool. It can be used to make your life easier. The main problem is how have the AI tools been trained? A lot of the training seems to be done on stuff people did not consent to be used and without compensation. That is just not cool. As I said, I have strong thoughts on AI “art” but I don’t begrudge people who want to make cool pictures with it. People should be able to do that. But the creators of these AI tools should be seeking permission and compensating the people whose stuff is being used to train. ESPECIALLY if those AI tool creators are going to make money of their tool. If what you do is worth ma