Tag Archives: Blogging

Indie Mexican Authors

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Last night I interrupted my book to read another in my native language. Nobody knows, especially in my own country, that independent authors exist in Mexico, too. Hence, as an indie author myself, I thought it would be a good idea to stop reading what I’m reading and get a few books from fellow indie Mexican authors. I believe that there are many books worth reading, and I think there are hidden treasures to be found.Ā 

I am not sure if my posts are going to help any of the authors for two reasons:

NUMBER ONE: My blog is in English, and it would be weird to have a few posts in a different language.

NUMBER TWO: I am going to be honest, like always. I believe honest reviews are more helpful to them AND the readers, but if the critic is “strong,” or maybe just pointing at little details would demotivate them, which is the last thing I want to happen, but sugar-coating it will be like treating them like idiots.

Once I finish reading the book, I will work on a review in English and post it here. Perhaps more Spanish speakers are reading me and may pick their attention? I hope so.

Additional note: this is a scheduled post, so I’ve probably finished the book already and prepared the review!

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2017

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I woke up with good espresso to start the day with full energy. I’ve been thinking about some memories. The year 2017 was the best for me, I had the opportunity and will to travel, and I also went to two amazing concerts. Social Distortion in El Paso, Texas, United States; and Amaral in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. Best memories. Unfortunately, the photos I took at the Social Distortion concert.

Sometimes it’s good to leave the past behind, I know, but I also believe that good memories should remain in our brain. I’m not a fan of taking photos at a concert; I mean, why would I raise the phone the whole show? The point of the concert is to sit (or stand) and watch your favorite bands and singers, listen to their music, and enjoy their playing! Seriously, I can’t wait to see Social Distortion and Amaral again. I can’t wait to revisit Guadalajara or Mexico City. F’ing Pandemic.

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A Morning Blog

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If you love coffee, you already know it’s such an experience to drink it every morning. Before work, before school, or before a well-deserved break on the weekend. Whether you like your coffee from Starbucks or grab the cheapest from the grocery store (like I do), it’s not the wrong thing to say that coffee has been our closest ally every morning to start a day. A fuel that wakes us up and keeps us with energy the rest of the day. Or perhaps it’s just an illusion? Who knows! Does it matter? Not really.

A Morning Coffee is a new section of my blog. Here I’ll focus on having a short thought. Everything shorter than 300 words will have the morning coffee category, which I believe it’s good. Nothing’s better than saying directly without adding any more BS than the BS in the title!

Ready to start the day!

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Black Fields: HIATUS

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This post is a little announcement. It’s been a while, but it is fair to talk about it while I still can, while I feel motivated to say something about it. It’s already on record, so regardless of the number of people that have seen the project journals, I feel responsible for telling you what’s happening to the Black Fields project. It is unfair to keep on record that “I’m still working on it” when in reality, I reached a dead end.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

I know there are times when we have what is called writer’s block. It is normal to lose your inspiration or have a mental wall that won’t let you move forward. It is not the end of the world. I didn’t trash the project; I am just going to pause it. I tried to bite off more than I could chew (was it the correct phrase?) The project started as a novella, but it turned out to have material for a long novel. As I kept writing, the problem was that I found it impossible to tell that story within a single book. To come up with more ideas and more words to add was a challenging task (at least for me), and I don’t want to keep unnecessary fillerā€”this is why I have a blog. Laughs Out Loud

To keep this short: I’ll pause Black Fields for a while; I don’t feel like continuing if there’s not a good idea in my head. That does not necessarily mean it’s not going to happen. I have the whole picture, but not everything that goes in the middle. For now, I will move on to my next project, which I plan to announce very soon. No worries, that one is a little moreā€¦simple? You’ll see why I say it when it happens. I believe it’s not a good thing to talk about that much at the moment. I want to announce it and, of course, add it to the Project journal section of my web.

I’m looking forward to showing it to you! I expect to schedule the post in the following weeks.

It is official: Black Fields goes on hiatus.

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Filler

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I have to start with an apology. I am trying my best to say something, anything. I talked about it in one of my posts; I think it was called A Daily Question. I won’t even bother adding the link because it was so unnecessary that it’s a waste of time for anybody who read it and for me to write it.

For some reason, I was curious to check my “reach” on the feeds. I felt preoccupied because the views were not going accordingly to the number of followers I have. There is a lot of fluctuation on social media and blogs, so I wanted to verify any activity.

Photo by cottonbro on Pexels.com, it does describe the state of my brain while writing the QOTD thing

The problem with this is that I haven’t posted much. My activity ceased for months, and I didn’t say a word about it. Honestly, asking myself why the interactions are decreasing is making me fail in many ways. Even the title of Captain Obvious was getting too big for me. My views dropped, OBVIOUSLY because I didn’t post much. Even with the dumb algorithm’s actions, it is normal to see people leaving or just looking forward to reading different blogs, websites, or perhaps another indie writer with a more positive attitude, and that’s okay! I would have done the same thing, to be honest. I have lost count of how many YouTubers I stopped following because they left for a while or their content changed to something completely different.

A Positive Attitude

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In the end, I’m going to discard what I said in Summarized Rant: Positivism, so I apologize in advance.

Here we go:

Having a positive attitude is seriously weird. There are so many people in your daily life and the internet telling you to be positive, to have a winner behavior, and act like such. Think positive no matter what’s happening in your home.Ā 

Honestly, I am not sure why anyone would do that if everything is crumbling down. Some people assume that having a certain mentality would affect thirds, objects, or situations that are completely out of your control. Even weirder that most of these people have a lot in common: most of them have a privileged life. Not all of them, of course, but there are many that were born without any problem and assume it’s just a matter of mentality.

Personally, I believe they cause more harm. Sometimes I even think they do not care about the words they preach. 

“Just be positive” is just a subtle “Fuck you, I don’t care about your problems” or “Yeah, someone else has bigger problems.” 

I don’t know what would be the best advice to come up with. I don’t feel like the best person to give someone else a bit of advice. I am just an ordinary person writing a blog, sharing thoughts on the issue without a single clue or a solution to a problem.

Unfortunately, I have seen a lot of people minimizing problems, even mental issues as dangerous as depression. Even today, it’s common to see someone ignoring mental health because “this person is probably sad.” Twitter is full of Social Justice Warriors, or people fighting illnesses with hashtags.Ā We know hashtags will fix the world, right? RIGHT???

What is the advice you would give to somebody with inner pain? Being direct could be counterproductive as well. Even the best advice, like seeking professional help, could make the other feel weak. Some people believe that asking someone else for help is a weakness; this is not the truth. Society in general needs to pay more attention to mental health, but how? If the person does not talk about it because he, or she, is too afraid to be ignored or minimized, how could we lend a hand? A lot of teenagers and adults are good liars; they have the warmest of smiles.

Again, I don’t even know what to do or how to act against the issue. I don’t know the answer, but I wish that people today pay more attention to the issue in front of them and not the hashtags on Twitter and other social media.

Should I call this a rant? Should I just call it my thoughts? Just a post made after a long day. Be the judge.

Brandon News

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Brandon news happened yesterday. I will be doing all posts on Wednesdays and Saturdays, but today I feel like posting about something that made me happy. Also, I’ll talk about these short posts very soon; I have scheduled that already, but this particular release forced me to talk about it real quick.

Sunreach, a novella set between Starsight and Cytonic (book two and three of The Skyward Series), will be released on September 28th. The other two novellas are coming out very soon, and I feel so ready for them.

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/708676/sunreach-skyward-flight-novella-1-by-brandon-sanderson-and-janci-patterson/

Of course, I didn’t think twice about placing my pre-order. I am always waiting for a new book to be released. I loved the series, even though I know The Skyward Series has no place in the Cosmere. I still remember when I started Spensa’s journey to becoming a pilot and how I fell in love with the characters. I’m not going to lie; I feel so tempted to interrupt my current reading to start with Skyward and prepare for the novella. Ha ha!

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QOTD #1

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Which band/singer made you get off of your comfort zone to other kinds of music?

I’d like to hear about it from you.

I’ll share first:

I wrote about it a while ago; I don’t remember if it was 2018 or 2019. The band that popped my pop-punk bubble (or happy punk) was Amaral, a duet from Zaragoza, Spain. I was still a kid in middle school, but I still remember when I only liked pop-punk like Blink 182, Sum 41, New Found Glory, and other similar bands. However, it all changed when I heard on television a song by Amaral. It was not a catchy song, but it was so different, so beautiful, that I couldn’t stop listening to it.

From that moment on, I knew there were great musicians that I didn’t know, not only in English-speaking countries but also worldwide. Pop, metal, punk, ballads; everything had something to offer me. Now I know I shouldn’t focus on one genre or language.

Let me know in the comments if you had a similar experience.

A Daily Question

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Perhaps I should not do this, but I really want to know about followers, algorithms, and internet magic that affects interactions in general. It’s not rare to hear about this on YouTube because, let’s face it, YouTube has more potential to gain views than blog entries. Unfortunately, the algorithm attacks anything that is on the internet.

I am not complaining, though; I understand that I should’ve taken the opportunity to blog from the very beginning of the blog era if that is (or was) a thing.

Okay, now that I think about it, it would have been a bad idea to start blogging when I was young. Honestly, I didn’t have much to offer back then, just my love for music and nothing else; perhaps a short story or two? It doesn’t matter now; it didn’t happen. It should be left buried in the past and burn the bridge.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

The thing I want to do starting on Monday 26th is to post a daily question. I want to do this for the sole purpose check activity and, of course, get to know others. Some of these questions may involve your work, channel, or blog, so your responses won’t be considered spam. I don’t mind when people post their own things in the comments below, but I think it’s better to start with a dialogue about it. If anybody posts a link without context, it usually seems suspicious. If it’s a book you’ve published, feel free to post the title and where we can find it! Just make sure it is a response to the actual question.

If I don’t see responses after a month of QOTDs, I guess I’ll stop doing them and keep working on what matters the most. Besides, with the vaccinations and the new normality coming soon, I hope I can start doing my blogs about Juarez and a little bit of El Paso.

Another thing I want to say. This QOTDs does not mean it’s the only thing I’m going to be posting from now on. QOTDs won’t interrupt normal blogging, so you might expect two posts a day from time to time.

New Old Findings

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Goodness. I was not expecting this.

I’ve been doing some cleaning. My home is small, so the space is not big enough to keep what I bought when I was younger. I found some cool stuff I forgot I had, but it is sad to accept that some things have to go away. I might put some of these items on eBay or any other marketplace.

But I found something significant, to me at least. An old notebook where I wrote a lot of short stories in Spanish. What’s so important about it? Easy, it means a lot of stories are coming to this little place. Do not worry, though, that I plan to translate and edit each story properly. I won’t use Google translate, upload, and that’s it; no. I wouldn’t dare to say some of these stories are good or not; I can’t do my own judgment when it comes to creative works. You know that the comment section will always be open for comments, good or bad (except for weird links). I am against censorship, and as long as I’m on the internet, posting stuff publicly, I know I’ll be exposed to criticism, constructive and destructive alike.

I’ve already uploaded old stories, but looking at the very beginning of my humble journey feels good, for some reason. Although I’d be lying if I say some of these aren’t cringy, so I’ll just skip some of the writings that are beyond salvation, haha.

Do you have a diary or random writings you feel proud or ashamed of? I know some internet people and friends had old notebooks or journals where they kept some of these. Now I know first-hand why they’ve kept them. It’s nostalgia. Just like playing a game, watching a movie, or listening to a song you loved when you were a kid, and life was easier and happier. I mentioned in previous posts that nostalgia does not affect me, but finding something I WROTE by my own hand, is a beautiful feeling, good or bad.

I bet this will be interesting to see; me fixing all the mess I had as fiction.

Thank you for reading me,
JD