It had been a while since I last read The Lord of the Rings—just about four and a half years, to be exact. Same with The Hobbit. And, to be honest, I couldn’t give a timeline on when I last read The Silmarillion; I just know it was sometime in high school. Since I’ve been …
Continue reading Rereading the Tolkien Canon (The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, & The Lord of the Rings)
Okay, given the fact that I’m technically the one who got my brother into Kingdom Hearts because I picked up re:coded for the Nintendo DS all those years ago, the title of this post is a little misleading. However, it is true that I haven’t played all of the Kingdom Hearts games. Just re:coded, Kingdom …
Continue reading Happy 20 Years to Kingdom Hearts, My Favorite Video Game I’ve Never Played…
I love video games, though I’m not a particularly skilled player. My brother and I grew up in the Nintendo DS and Wii era and shared many moments playing together—duking it out in Super Smash Bros. Brawl or Mario Kart.I still feel nostalgic about particular games I played growing up, and during college started to …
I’ll admit, I’ve written more beginnings than endings, to the point that I’m tempted to say that writing the first chapter of a book is significantly harder than writing the last. I don’t necessarily disagree with that statement—I myself struggle most with how to best start a book—yet I do certainly think that a misstep …
Set-backs in writing are…frustrating. And discouraging. I know set-backs are common for writers. Stories not working out, characters falling flat, readers not understanding something in the book, etc. There are always scenes to revise and stories to sort out. And it takes humility to see it, to say, “It’s not ready yet,” and be willing …
Fueled by an explosion of inspiration and angst, I wrote Our Company of Fools at the beginning of January 2016. I’d never written a book of that length that quickly. I’d never written a more personally emotional book. I never wrestled so much with a story through the ebbs and flows of editing and revision. …
Continue reading How Our Company of Fools Changed My Writing
Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and Happy Holidays! 2021 is coming to an end, and that means it’s time to ring in what’s becoming an annual tradition for me: my reading recap of the year! Since I read nearly 40 books this year, I'm only going to go over a few of the highlights. I’ve …
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! Here’s my present to you: a Winter Writing Update! My latest writing update can be summed up in one simple sentence: I’m going all in to the Whitman Court series. While this isn’t necessarily shocking or new, it’s reflective of my state of mind to actually declare the series as …
On September 30, 2021, I hit a special milestone. I finished my 10th original novel. “Finished” used very, very loosely—there’s still a lot of editing to come. The funny thing is...I didn’t expect this book to be No. 10. I’ve been waiting to hit this milestone for nearly three years now, and I never would’ve …
I’ll admit, it’s weird to reach the start of a new academic semester and NOT have homework to do. And...no sugar coating about it, I don’t miss it. It’s SO GOOD to be done with school. Though earlier this summer I thought I’d start up my monthly schedule writing updates again, I’m just going to …
By Madelynn Orion 