The journal and sometimes blog of author, Joseph L. Selby.
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The Original Tubes
Sometimes it feels like I watch a lot of TV. I grew up watching a LOT of television. I was a living TV Guide. But I got tired of it and stopped watching for years. We don’t have cable in my house. We stream what we want to watch. Castle, Legend of Korra, Psych, White…
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You Can’t Take It With You
I was reading the sample ebook of READY PLAYER ONE on my nook this morning, and I ran across a phrase you see pretty often. “You can’t take it with you.” A few weeks ago I was editing the crypt scene in PRINCE OF CATS. Traditional royal burial of millennia past where they were given…
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Fuckis
When I was in college, everyone I knew had seen Mallrats. If I said “fuckis,” I didn’t have to explain what that meant. Unfortunately, the fortune teller scene from Mallrats isn’t on YouTube so if you haven’t seen the movie, I can’t explain it to you. Lately, I’ve needed to improve my fuckis. I’m querying…
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The Assistant
Everyone always calls agents the gatekeepers. This is silly. Agents aren’t gatekeepers. Agents’ assistants are gatekeepers. So keep that in mind the next time you think an assistant is beneath you. Okay, really, no one reading my journal right now is a Douchebag McAsshole that would condescend an assistant. But some day I’ll be popular…
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Avengers Sevenfold
Like most geeks, I saw The Avengers opening weekend. Like many geeks, I saw it more than once. Yes, it was that good. I did not know if it was going to be good. I was hesitantly pessimistic, but after 99% glowing reviews from people I know (some of whom I actually trust), I gave…
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Ideas on Stuff
Two ideas that have been bouncing around my head that I wanted to write down. I want to write a city whose nickname is the Ever-Blossoming City. Every time the monarch dies, the core of the city is torn down and rebuilt in a style dictated by the new monarch. In years of plague or…
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No. Do Better.
I am not in between drafts, but I’ve already started to see the critical weaknesses in the draft I’m writing. Perhaps the most challenging thing for a pantser is that so much of the first draft is spent getting to know your characters and your setting. Sometimes you know them right away. Sometimes it takes…
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That’s More Like It
So do you remember back on April 3rd, when I was complaining about how I hadn’t been writing that much? Well, I hadn’t, and it was frustrating. Work was sucking the creativity out of my brain. I worked late. I worked more when I got home. I worked on weekends. That’s how publishing goes. Like…
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The Bell Rings
So unless you live under a log (in which case you have a secret base and I want to come visit), you heard that the Department of Justice sued Apple and 5/6 of the Big Six today (Random House was not included). Of the five publishers, three settled to avoid the legal costs. Two, Macmillain…
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Up for Air
I have a blog? Oh that’s right, I do! And here I am posting to it. Let me tell you, it’s a sign of how much I love you that I’m spending my precious few minutes of free time to say hello. Hello! All my December titles have already turned over. What’s that? It’s April?…
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Po Tay TOOOOOOO!
Before we begin, watch this. You can thank me in the comments. Alright, now that you’ve watched that two or three (or twenty) times, let’s continue, shall we? I have a draft post that I’ve been working on for weeks. This isn’t it. It’s a picture of my bookshelf. When I envisioned that post last…