Wot Chris Done, May 2024

Ahoy.

It’s been a while since I maintained an actual schedule of updates and stuff, but it’s probably about time I started trying to, uh, do that.

So here’s what I hope will be the first regular monthly update on what I’m writing, but also what I’ve been reading, watching, listening to, playing, and so on!

Wot I Wrote

I’ve been working on a couple of things that I hope will come to fruition soon – there are two really exciting things in the works that I’m not sure I can talk about in too much detail yet, but watch this space. I’ve just finished dev editing on one of them and the other’s in the weeds of that now, so with any luck it won’t be too long before there’s something to show.

This month I’ve started writing something new, and I’m having some of the most fun I’ve had in a while. My reading for the last few months has mostly been what I’d categorise as easy, fun reads – not necessarily great literature, but I think I got a bit tired of reading things I had to really think about. Don’t get me wrong, I love that stuff, but I just felt like switching to something that would be more of an enjoyable way to switch off from everything else rather than something requiring effort.

So I’ve started writing something in the LitRPG genre, with the intention of making it available as a free serialised release eventually. Something that’s been a bit of a game-changer with this is that I’ve embraced writing on my phone, which I never thought I’d do. I think I had this notion that it wasn’t proper writing, but I’m also now reading on the Kindle app on my phone for the pure convenience and it means I get, y’know, five minutes here, five minutes there, and it adds up. Plus I’m not wasting as much time just scrolling, so it’s kind of working for me.

I also created a new section on this very site for writing tips and resources! I’m not a professional writer or teacher, but I have picked up a few things over the years, so I thought it might be fun to start putting them all in one place. I’ll try to do a blog post or two spotlighting some of those tips and exercises soon.

Wot I Enjoyed

My wife and I have been rewatching Dexter, which I will maintain is a genuinely brilliant show up to a certain point in its run. Even after that, I don’t think it’s as bad as it sometimes gets a rap for (although it certainly has bad moments), it’s just not as good as the early seasons. (I really do think its final episode airing the same week as the end of Breaking Bad did not help the perception of Dexter‘s last moments as irredeemably terrible.)

I’m also trying to keep up with watching Delicious in Dungeon, which shouldn’t be that hard given it’s airing one 25-minute episode a week, yet somehow I’m not managing it! Still, I really like what I have seen of it, so the next time I get a bit of TV time, that’ll be what goes on. It straddles the line really neatly between being this initially comforting experience and having some genuine darkness beneath – but not just darkness for the sake of shock value.

Meanwhile, my two-year-old daughter has progressed from watching Peppa Pig (which has been her obsession since she was about 13 months, I think, and which I can’t say I’m sad she might be moving on from – that pig never learns to be nicer to anyone!) to Paw Patrol. If you’re not familiar with Paw Patrol, it’s a show about a bunch of dogs who work with a boy named Ryder to solve problems by driving high-tech vehicles and deploying voice-controlled gadgets in a very Inspector Gadget sort of way and stuff. It provokes a lot of questions: what are the labour laws surrounding human-level-intelligent dogs? Are they being fairly paid? Are they also minors (they have the personalities of maybe eight- or nine-year old children, I’d guess)? Are they actually just exploiting Ryder’s bizarre level of access to extraordinary technology and resources? Are they being funded by the government? (Are there even any publicly funded services in this place?!) Why can none of the adults in the town, including the mayor, solve a single problem for themselves? Frankly, I think the show owes it to its audience of, erm, children to answer each and every one of these questions in exacting legalese.

There’s also the irritating fact that the squad only has one female member, and she’s the smallest and always mentioned last despite having arguably the most specialist skillset (she can fly planes and helicopters and stuff). The show did add a second female pup a bit later, but she doesn’t seem to be an official member of the team – they just call her if there’s snow involved, leaving another highly specialist professional to be used as a freelance resource rather than have to pay her what she’s worth. I assume.

Anyway. Rant about children’s television over.

My reading right now is Azarinth Healer, one of the aforementioned LitRPGs that have become my go-to comfort read. It just gives me a constant dopamine hit with all the levelling up and stuff, so there’s something… I don’t know, almost reassuring about it.

In gaming, I’m currently playing Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age, which at my current rate is probably going to take me at least three or four months to finish. It’s interesting going back to a game I really loved as a teenager and rediscovering what was great about it, as well as actually feeling an emotional connection to some of its quirks and flaws. Like, the audio quality for the dialogue is atrocious. Most of it sounds like it was recorded into a toaster that had a bunch of ball bearings rattling around inside, and I love it. (I think it had something to do with the limitations of the PS2 disc’s storage space – it’s such a massive game that something had to be compressed to high hell to fit in there.) I can’t think of a game that’s managed to recapture the experience of the gambit system, which surprises me: at the time, it felt like the sort of thing that was sure to set a trend.

And in musical listening bits, I’ve been checking out a bit of Cassyette. There’s something that just makes me want to move around in a sort of vaguely angry but highly entertaining way when you combine pop-sensibility songwriting with distorted riffs straight out of metalcore and a healthy dose of electronic beepy-boopy woop-woop.

Other Bits Wot I Done

This month, I did my first ever physical in-person event as an author, and it was awesome!

My local library’s Fantasy Con is only a little event, and I only had a small table, but it was genuinely really great. I did sell one or two books, which was nice, but the best part about it was getting to meet other local creatives. The internet’s incredible in many ways, not least how it lets you connect with people all around the world to discuss and collaborate on creative endeavours, but there’s something weirdly reassuring about discovering that there are people making cool stuff just down the road from you.

With stalls right next to me were author and illustrator J.R. Leach (I’ve picked up a copy of his book The Farmer and the Fald), D&D actual play creators Channel Devonity, and illustrator Aria Azure. Plus photographer Zachary Sampbell was wandering around taking shots of the various costumed people, creators, fan clubs, and general fantasy enthusiasts.

All in all, a good day! Support your local library, yeah?

And… that’s it, I think. More from me next time!

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Oh, one more thing: if you sign up for my mailing list, I’ll send you five completely free short stories you can’t read anywhere else. So do!