Tag: Review

• November 9, 2025

  Inspiration: Sailing Stories

  I am 30,000 words into my NanoWrimo project, “The Day Peter Died,” my Peter Pan retelling, which I described a few weeks ago. The goal is to finish 1000 words each day, from October 12th to November 30th, which adds up to 50,000 words total. It’s been excellent fun, especially because I’ve been writing in…
• September 28, 2025

  Ironsworn

  Roleplaying games are one of my favorite ways to combine creativity, drama, action, nerdy fandoms, and socializing. I often play lesser known table-top roleplaying games (ttrpgs) like Ryuutama, which focuses more on the journey and story and less on the combat, which is what games like Dungeons and Dragons are known for. But as much…
• September 14, 2025

  Inspiration: Vikings

  I love Vikings. Lots of people do, but there have been times when Vikings have gotten a pretty bad rap. Growing up, I wanted to know why some people did not like them. Now, I understand it is because they got their reputation in a similar way to pirates: they were considered an outside threat…
• May 18, 2025

  Inspiration: Guards! Guards!

  Back in October, I shared that I had become a major fan of Terry Pratchett and his absurdist fantasy universe. I have continued to enjoy his books inbetween other reads, and a new favorite has emerged: Guards! Guards! Guards! Guards! cleverly approaches and hilariously twists tropes in the best ways. The premise: some wanna-be wizards…
• April 27, 2025

  Inspiration: Ursula K Le Guin

  Ursula K Le Guin was a rockstar of a writer. She lived from 1929-2018 and wrote 23 novels and change, covering sci-fi, fantasy, and more. I have heard some people praise her as the mother of science fiction, since she invented the idea of the Ansible, and I have heard others claim she was overrated.…
• March 23, 2025

  Inspiration: Nghi Vo

  Nghi Vo has a beautiful way with words. I cannot repeat that enough. It is a pleasure simply to hear her prose when read aloud, and I am sad when I finish each of her stories because I just want them to keep going. One day not so long ago, her Singing Hills Cycle series…
• February 16, 2025

  Feel Good TV

  After a long day of work, I just want to sit on the couch, relax, and not think. There are a million shows I could watch to keep me entertained and kill time before bed, but I prefer ones that make me feel cozy, positive, and ready to sleep. Three shows in particular top my…
• January 19, 2025

  Inspiration: Detective Noir

  Ever since reading The Maltese Falcon in Undergrad, I loved the idea of detective noir. The 1930s novel and its film adaptation with Humphrey Bogart (1941) is often considered the beginning of or at least the solidification of the noir genre. Noir is a work of aesthetics as many genres are and often includes gangsters,…
• November 17, 2024

  Inspiration: Fairy Tale

  During November’s month-long rush to write a 50,000 novel, I often pick a book to read to inspire my writing. Last year it was Patrick Rothfuss. This year is Stephen King’s Fairy Tale. The book was recommended to me because of my interest in the merging of the supernatural and mundane, and since it touches…
• October 20, 2024

  Inspiration: Terry Pratchett

  Leave a surprise for your readers in every paragraph. This writing advice was gifted to me during my undergraduate creative writing fellowship, but I did not understand it until I started reading Terry Pratchett. His writing is brilliant, hilarious, and unique. I originally discovered Pratchett because of Good Omens, a clever and humorous take on…