Despite a somewhat disappointing Spring Break due to sick kids, a sick wife, and crummy weather, I managed to salvage my time off with some solid productivity.
There was last Sunday’s interview for starters, and shortly after I printed the script to the graphic novel script I’ve been working on and took the pencil to it (never was fond of the red pen). I slimmed it down by several pages, rewrote two scenes and added another, and I think the book will be stronger for it.
I have a novella contract to fulfill, and I finally figured out the right way to handle the plot and came up with a better villain. I finished the outline not long ago and fired it off to the publisher for review. Once it’s approved I’ll be able to start banging away at the prose.
I may not have been able to light up the grill, but I can’t complain about lighting up the keyboard. Sure, I’ve had more productive days, but with everything else that was happening this week, I did pretty good.
I also dropped by Borders today and browsed their art books. I found Andy Schmidt’s The Insider’s Guide To Creating Comics And Graphic Novels and remembered his interview with Indie Pulp, so I took it home. I think it’s a bit too late to learn to draw, but I’ve always wanted to get a better handle on the artists’ side of things while I write scripts, particularly layout and perspective. I already have Eisner’s Comics and Sequential Art
, but hopefully Schmidt’s book will offer a broader take, offering some editorial insight in addition to tips for writers and artists. I learned quite a bit while working with Moonstone and Joe Bucco on Werewolves: Call of the Wild, but I’m still not as comfortable with comics as I am with prose.
Yet.
Tomorrow it’s back to the grind. Yippee. Nothing like a day job to get in the way of writing productivity!
About Mike Oliveri
Mike Oliveri is a writer, martial artist, cigar aficionado, motorcyclist, and family man, but not necessarily in that order. He is currently hard at work on the werewolf noir series The Pack for Evileye Books.