Naruto 623

So, we're still in the thick of the 1st Hokage's flashback, but, unlike last week's rather uneventful chapter, this week Kishi gave us some pretty great stuff.  The evolving relationship between Hashirama and Madara as children is really starting to get interesting. It's almost portrayed as though this is how Naruto and Sasuke would have ended up if it weren't for all of the crap that transpired with the Uchiha clan.

Hashirama and Madara continue their rivalry, both trying to outdo the other and show their superiority as a shinobi, while maintaining an aura of secrecy with their clan names. We find out that the grove where the two have been for the past two chapters is in fact the future site of the Village Hidden in the Leaves. Not really that surprising, but it's always fun to see the foundations of things.

The best part of the chapter comes from the intervention of Hashirama's father and Tobirama. Having been ordered to follow Madara back to the Uchiha clan in order to find the clan's secret base, Hashirama instead arrives at their grove with a message hidden in his skipping stone. Madara exchanges his own skipping stone with Hashirama and both are surprised to see that the opposing clan has followed them, intending to attack.

It sucks that Naruto 624 won't be out next week, because the thought of Madara's father and Izuna vs. Hashirama's father and Tobirama is too good to wait for. But alas...we must.

Christopher Nolan- Godfather of DC

So, if this story actually holds up, the world is in for a real treat.

We already heard some early reviews regarding the new Superman movie Man of Steel that were out of this world. According to JoBlo, Man of Steel is not only an incredible movie that makes Superman relevant again, it's the best movie of the year. The reviewer goes on to say:

"- Imagine a Nolan story with Snyder effects/action.
- It's the best movie of the year.
- There's TONS of action with Superman kicking all kinds of ass in his suit.
- The cape is CG'd most of the time so it can look awesome.
- They have intentionally left out most of the the Super action in trailers to save it.
- It's not nearly as dour and serious as the trailers suggest.
- The movie is complete, minus the 3D post-conversion, which is currently taking place"

Now, on the heels of incredible early reviews, sources are reporting that Warner Brothers has entered a contract with Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight Trilogy, Memento, Inception) to act as the godfather of the DC Cinematic Universe. This is a move that was originally instituted by Marvel studios when they hired Joss Whedon (Firefly, Buffy, Dollhouse, Avengers) to oversee the production of their "Second Phase" of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which includes Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World, Captain America: Winter Soldier, Avengers 2, and the recently announced ABC show SHIELD).

Nolan would oversee any and all DC Comic cinematic interpretations, ultimately leading up to a long rumored and awaited Justice League movie. That's not the best part of this story though. The same sources are also reporting that WB is in talks with Christian Bale to reprise his role as Bruce Wayne/Batman in the potential Justice League team up. I just hope that they use the Arrow version of Oliver Queen in this team-up...

I suppose that time will tell on whether this is fact or fiction (these things tend to be vetted fairly quickly), but color me excited!

 

Aaaaaaaaand I'm back.

Okay, so it's been a while since the last time I posted. Honestly, I never knew how fraking difficult it is to actually maintain a blog, but with that said, from this point forward I'll be making at least four posts a week. One on Sunday, one on Tuesday, one on Thursday, and one on Saturday. I'm going to do my best to tailor each day towards a specific topic and here's what I'll be going off of for the foreseeable future:

Sunday-

Sunday will be devoted to all things literary. I'll be talking about the latest trends and developments in the publishing world, critical thoughts on queries, manuscripts and character building, and telling you how to hook a reader and make your book stand out from some of the crap that's out there

Tuesday-

Every Tuesday I'll be reviewing a new book! I'm actually really exciting about this, because it's going to force me to read more. My hope is to actually collaborate with other authors and aspiring writers on this and I'll read some stories from some incredible up and coming authors, as well as established crazy awesome authors.

Thursday-

Thursdays will be all about the rumor mill. I'll be diving into the latest rumors and developments related to TV, books, Movies, Video Games, and whatever else I think is relevant. I'll put spoiler warnings up if it's necessary, but I think that people love to speculate, so this should be fun.

Saturday-

This will be my weekly roundup of TV and possibly a rant day. We'll just go with this one and see what happens.

ANYWAY. Look out for my first book review on Tuesday for Ready Player One!

This is what life is about

Things like this show you why life is worth all of the crap.  Amazing.

Happy Labor Day Weekend

All of the things...ALL OF THEM

Can we just stop and reflect on something for a second?  In the last week:

1. Snookie had a baby
2. Michael Bay's Alien Ninja Turtles became an undeniable embarassment
• Cyborg turtles, Shredder and The Foot being the US military, and 18 year old exes April and Casey...WTF 
3. A hurricane that intensified AFTER it hit land
4. MORE SHOOTINGS
• Seriously, what is wrong with people
5.  Some guy dressed up as Bigfoot and got hit by a car and died
•  Kind of funny and his own fault

End of the world? You decide.

This week has been pretty nuts for me.

My girlfriend is still dying from her tonsillectomy, which progressively seems to be getting more painful for her everyday and makes me feel bad.  She just needs to get better soon, because Renn Faire is calling our name and I want some Turkey on a stick.  On a side note though, she can talk perfectly well, which I found to be quite surprising.  I always thought that when you had your tonsils taken out, your voice would be messed up until it healed.  Not the first time I've been wrong.

I had lunch with the lovely, and always awesome, Madeline Reynolds on Monday.  Catching up with her is almost a religious experience.  Every time that we go our separate ways again, we each say how much better we feel having caught up.  This time was great, because I got to hear all of her NYC stories and about her Indie film, Backwards, that's coming out in select cities on September 21st (Trailer here: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrf8xoQJ5Ms)).  I'm actually really happy that she's back home now, because that means that I can start filming some stuff again and use her AND my friend Cori (also an actress and five kinds of awesome). 

CPA review stuff started last night.  Surprisingly, I really enjoy the class.  It's four hours long, so it's kind of hard to just sit there that whole time, but the interactive aspect is helping me retain the information a lot better than I've been able to do on my own in the past.  God willing, I'll have this damn thing done by March.

Writing has been taking up most of my time.  This second draft of the novel has been a rush to work on.  I've changed so many elements of the story and improved upon what I already had to the point where I'm excited every time I start typing.  Once I cut about ten thousand words I started to get worried...but I've since added 13,000 words and I feel like there's going to be some more to add to that total.  I'm currently at 83,489 words.  I was at 81,323 in my first draft.  I'm only on Chapter 6 of 20.  This could end up being close to 90,000 words.  It's writing itself though and that's my favorite aspect of this.  It was alive before, but now it's really living.  If you haven't already, check out the excerpt on the Book of The Chosen page.

I really hope that the world isn't ending...because I'm so close to seeing this to fruition!!

Eating Crap, Editing, and Flavor Flave? Must be Saturday

So, it's 12:30am,  I'm sitting in my Aunt's basement doing some editing on my manuscript, eating McDonald's, and watching Doctor Who specials...and I get a message that Flavor Flave is now following me on Twitter.  THE Flavor Flave.  I'm taking this as a sign that I'm going in the right direction with this whole putting myself out there thing.  AWESOME.

My day was pretty laid back.  Since my girlfriend just had a tonsillectomy, I spent all day at her place helping her feel better.  I got some editing done, played some games, watched some TV, but was mostly mauled by her dog while I kept saying squirrel...it apparently makes him go nuts and I thought it was funny.

Anyway, I just wanted to note that Flavor Flave is now following me on Twitter (and you can too! https://twitter.com/AJS_BABELs).  Time for bed!

Oh the places you will go...

Life has been annoying lately.  I could list all of the things that I have found bothersome in the past month or so (and I will later on), but for now I just want to rant a little bit.  As an aspiring author, there are obviously always going to be hurdles to overcome in order to share my stories with the world.  Agents are bombarded by thousands and thousands of queries every week and they have to make judgement calls based on a finite amount of information.  That’s totally fine.  I’ve only gotten four rejection letters so far with about twenty outstanding.  Should I be discouraged?  Of course not!  Some authors are rejected hundreds of times before they finally find someone willing to look at their work a little bit deeper.  When that time comes, I’ll be able to smile with pride, knowing this was the right person for me.

What annoys me is how drivel like Fifty Shades of Gray and Twilight gets published and receives commercial success from unsuspecting and impressionable tweens and horny/lonely housewives.  Who decided that those were publishable?  That actually keeps me up at night on occasion.  If crap like that can be published, certainly my stories can be...right?

Chances are that if you’re reading this...you’re one of my friends or someone in my family. Of course, there is the possibility that my blog is being read by those I don’t know (which is honestly my ultimate goal), to which I say, “Hello!!!”  I have to say this, because, if you do know me, you probably have heard me talk about the story in my first novel at one point or another.  If you’re new to the life and adventures of Andrew Simone, then it’s time to fill you in on exactly what my story is about.

I came up with the general story behind The Book of The Chosen way back when I was 10 years old.  It started out as a nightmare, but evolved over the years into something SO much more.  It initially centers around three friends who have just graduated high school, but quickly becomes an ensemble piece comprised of dozens of characters from a diverse array of backgrounds and places.  I’m not going to go into specifics with this particular post, but here is the basic premise.  

The story initially follows three friends after graduating high school.  Jay Meade is a strong willed prodigy who is often plagued by bad luck.  His girlfriend Kim is a quiet mousey girl, who may come off as shy and meek, but if provoked, she’ll go apeshit on your ass.  Then there is Tom, an emo, pessimistic asshole who is broken and traumatized by the tragic death of his parents.  The three are quickly thrown into an ancient war between God and Lucifer and are forced into a fight to prevent the prophesized apocalypse that was foretold at the dawn of human civilization.

I’ll be throwing excerpts and stuff onto the blog in the future, but I want to get back to what I was saying before.  Twilight sucks.  Fifty Shades of Gray is fan fiction and sucks too.  They both suck...but they’re successful...and that’s all that matters.  If they can do it, I sure as hell can too!!

So, this is the point in the blog where I list the things that have been annoying me lately (like I said I would):

Job

-          I’ve been trying to move into a new role at my job for about 3 months now.  I was initially promised a job, but it had to go through an approval process and it still hasn’t been finalized.  By mid-July, I got tired of waiting and started applying for other internal jobs at my firm.  I found one that REALLY seemed up my alley and I’m still in the process of interviewing for it.  I started that process the last week of July...Basically, my firm has very long and in-depth interview procedures. Lol.  Hopefully, it will all be situated soon.  There’s another job that is on the table within the firm, but I’m waiting on that too.  Lé sigh...

Living arrangement

-          After college, I moved back home to save up some money with my family while I worked.  It definitely had its ups...but I think it inhibited my growth as an adult.  I still haven’t truly lived on my own and I have been in desperate need of that.  In July, my family moved and sold our house.  I stayed there by myself until the closing date, but when the first week of August came...I moved in with my aunt and am sleeping on her couch in the basement now (by choice people...she did offer a bed).  In anticipation of this happening, I started looking around the area for houses to buy.  I have found that the house hunting process is incredibly long and stressful.  Now, I’ve deferred finalizing any purchase of a house (which I think I’ve found!) until my job situation has been determined.

The future

-          Pretty much a combination of 1 and 2.  I just would like to know where my job will take me, where I’ll be living six months from now, and when/if my book will ever be published (and when/if it is, how successful will it be?).  These are things that I just have to ride out and take everything in along the way.

Ian on Big Brother

-          Dude screwed EVERYONE this week and was responsible for getting my man Mike Boogie kicked out.  Shit is cray.

That’s all I have for now.  I’m going to go buy a book and start reading something new.  BOOM.