@beecycling@romancelandia.club
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

beecycling

@beecycling@romancelandia.club

Writer, Geordie, crone, Friend of DeSoto, Anarcho-curious

Interests: Writing , Sci-Fi, Stoicism, Atheism, Humanism, Science, Star Trek, Crochet, Anarchism, Red Pandas, Cats, PokemonGo, Fountain Pens, Journaling, Active Travel, Solarpunk, Minimalism, Tea, Revolution

Born at 322ppm

Avatar is a red panda. Header shows hot tea being poured into a cup, as steam rises, with golden light behind it.

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Today I learned that the famed landscape gardener "Capability" Brown was given his nickname not as a description of him being very capable, but because he often told clients their grounds had "great capabilities." I also learned that his actual first name was Lancelot.

::record scratch::

Yes, Lancelot. A grand name for a lad of fairly humble origins.

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

14: Do you have a sense of how much plot you need for how long a manuscript?

What works for me is seeing how many scenes I've got. If I'm trying to reach a specific word count, like 50k for NaNoWriMo, 60k for a paperback release with my publisher, then at some point I'll just make a big list of all the scenes/events. The magic number is 30, (assuming an average of 2k words per scene) where I think, yeah, that's enough material to start building an outline on.

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

My next release is available for pre-order on JMS Books now. And there's a Mother's Day sale this weekend, with 45% off all ebooks. Just sayin'

It's called Three Times Elspeth Harris Rode to Town. It's a historical Western Sapphic novella, which is not my usual wheelhouse, but came from a prompt for a submission call and once the idea grabbed me, it wasn't letting go.

https://www.jms-books.com/becky-black-c-224_306/three-times-elspeth-harris-rode-to-town-p-5092.html

dickrubin716, to bookstodon
@dickrubin716@bookstodon.com avatar

I would love to get your thoughts and feedback on my from my latest book, The Challenges of Being Me. Do you like it? Does it capture your attention? Without knowing anything about the book, what genre would you say this cover best fits? @bookstodon

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

@dickrubin716
It's not really eye-catching. I'd assume it's a memoir, but then there's a disconnect between the woman in the picture and the author name, so that would confuse me on that score.

Have you tried using Canva for making covers? They've got plenty of free pre-made ones, that you can tweak and customise in many ways.
@bookstodon

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Remember that time a fox queued up for the ATM? Britain, where even the wildlife respects a queue.

Jennifer, to scifi
@Jennifer@bookstodon.com avatar

I need some new science fiction to read, who has some suggestions? I don't like military sci-fi. For reference, my favorite series is the Expanse, I also enjoyed Scalzi's Collapsing Empire, I love Robert Charles Wilson's books. I mostly enjoy space operas and unique stories about technology, for example I really liked the recent book Mountain in the Sea about AI and intelligent octopus. Suggestions from the awesome Bookstodon community? @bookstodon

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

@LordWoolamaloo @Jennifer @bookstodon Seconding that. Adrian Tchaikovsky is amazing - and you won't run out of books very quickly, because darn that man is prolific!

Have you read the Bobiverse series, by Denis E Taylor? Starts with We Are Legion.

And Nathan Lowell's Ishmael Wang books, which is a kind of space competency porn. Nobody can make you glued to small details like Nathan Lowell. Starts with Quarter Share.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

@LordWoolamaloo @Jennifer @bookstodon I've been following the Ishmael Wang books since they were coming out serialised on the Podiobooks website many moons ago, narrated by the author. They're still going. The newest one just came out in audio, though they have a new narrator these days. I get the audiobooks, since that's how I started the series, but they're on ebook and paper too. They tend to come out in trilogies, apart from three more stand alone ones after the first triliogy.

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

"That tail! So bushy, so fluffy."
"Fabulous, darling."
:redpanda2:

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Awww this takes me back! What has been the most important in your life?

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

@RickiTarr In recent years, books, specifically audiobooks. I've always liked them. When I was a kid I had an abridged version of H.G. Wells The Time Machine on tape that I played until it wore out. But books on tape were either abridged or needed a LOT of tapes, and were expensive.

So I was happy to have them go digital, especially in the past 5 years or so, when menopause totally effed up my concentration, making it hard for me to sit down with a book and read.

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Took advantage of the first nice day for ages to have a trip to the coast. Took a walk down from Whitley Bay to Tynemouth, a favourite walk of mine. There may have been a Pokémon Go related reason to go to the beach, but it's always nice to go anyway and get the cobwebs blown away. It's still plenty windy along there.

Here's the magnificent Longsands looking towards Tynemouth.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

The very pointy St George's Church on the seafront at Cullercoats.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Look at all this golden sand! Our beaches on the north east coast are some of the best in the UK. I took a walk along the sands.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

There weren't loads of people on Longsands - it's a weekday in term time. But there were some folks taking advantage of the combination of sunshine and wind to do some kitesurfing.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Stopped off for coffee and cake at Cruesoe's before heading back up to the promenade and into Tynemouth.

A beach side café bar, with outdoor tables, called Crusoe's.

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Fun fact for the day. If you're a Brit of a certain vintage like me, you probably recall a man named Percy Edwards, who was on TV in the 1970s and 80s, famed for his imitations of birds and animals. (He was also a legit ornithologist.) He played the voices of animal characters in various productions over the years, including Alien.
:: record scratch ::
What, Alien, like the big scary thing harassing Sigourney Weaver alien?

Yes, Percy Edwards did the voices of the Xenomorph and the face hugger.

KydiaMusic, to random
@KydiaMusic@mastodon.social avatar

"To some, the prospect of collaborating with the sum average of all artists is[...]an attractive prospect. Maybe you feel you are below average in some areas and the A.I. will therefore raise the quality of those areas. But every percent that you hand over to the A.I. is a percent less of your unique voice, perspective, and intention. And for folks who use A.I. generations wholesale, that comes out to a 100% loss of anything personal or unique that they might bring."

https://www.muddycolors.com/2024/04/the-a-i-lie/

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

@KydiaMusic It's definitely a tool for grifters.

There are lots of people out there selling supposed crochet patterns, for pieces that are AI generated images. The patterns are also AI generated and often just gibberish. Folks on r\crochet keep getting requests from friends who see some supposed elaborate piece of crochet on Facebook or whatever, saying "could you make this for me?" The answer is no, because it's not bloody real!

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

No words drafted today, because I needed to do some website updating, some bloggery and some miscellaneous Goodreads and Storygraph updating of book editions. And that stuff always takes 3 times longer than you think it will!

Blog post in a couple of days for a couple of new backlist rereleases and a tease about my next new release.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Right, now to eat, clear up and snuggle in to watch this week's episode of and episode 3 of Fallout.

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Thinking of writing a story where humans discover definite evidence of aliens having visited ancient Egypt, and later we explore space and meet these aliens and they've got a bunch of pyramids on their world. So we go "ah ha! So you did tell the Egyptians how to build the pyramids!" And they're all "oh no, we visited them, and we were so impressed by the pyramids we came home and built our own. Aren't they cool?!"

hypnogoria, to random
@hypnogoria@ohai.social avatar

Good morning!

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

@hypnogoria Morning, Jim, and thanks for add to my reading list with that Microgoroa review of All the Fiends of Hell. I'll be checking that out.

And I think you accidentally published Midnight Express twice on From the Great Library of Dreams. Episodes 103 and 104 are both Midnight Express. No sign of The Waxwork.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

@hypnogoria Ooh, that was a really fun story!

beecycling, to random
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Settling down to the second half of Return of the King. Time for the arachnophobes in the audience to hide their eyes. 🕷️

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Denethor continuing to display the same level of mental stability as a monkey in a sack of wasps.

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

Woohoo. The Rohirrim are here. Theoden once again stealing the movie. "DEATH!"

beecycling,
@beecycling@romancelandia.club avatar

According to the behind the scenes stuff, if you had a horse and could get to the location with it, you'd get to be in this movie. Lots of the horse "men" are women, disguised under false beards

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • provamag3
  • kavyap
  • ngwrru68w68
  • GTA5RPClips
  • magazineikmin
  • InstantRegret
  • DreamBathrooms
  • Youngstown
  • Durango
  • slotface
  • modclub
  • osvaldo12
  • khanakhh
  • rosin
  • megavids
  • mdbf
  • everett
  • cubers
  • ethstaker
  • normalnudes
  • Leos
  • tacticalgear
  • thenastyranch
  • vwfavf
  • tester
  • anitta
  • cisconetworking
  • JUstTest
  • All magazines
    •