Month: October 2024

Unofficial NaNo

~ Kiki Writes ~ 2 Comments

This year, NaNoWriMo is going to look different for me.

Yes, I still intend to write 50,000 words during the month of November. However, I’m not officially participating in NaNoWriMo.

Earlier this year, the folks at NaNoWriMo issued a statement in support of generative AI, which resulted in something of a controversy, as well it should. First of all, the whole point of NaNo is for people to sit down and write a 50,000 word novel. That’s it. It doesn’t matter if you consider yourself a writer. It doesn’t matter if everything you write is absolute garbage (it’s a first draft, so there’s a real good chance of this, actually). The point is that you put your ass in the chair and you write the words. What is the point of having generative AI do that for you? You’re not writing shit. You might as well not even participate. You’d be putting in the same amount of effort. Generative AI goes against the whole point of the entire purpose of NaNo. Having the folks at NaNoWriMo support it is like fucking for chastity here.

But I suppose if you’ve got a couple of AI companies as your sponsors, you’re going to say nice things because money is always in your best interest. Never mind that it comes from people who want to put writers out of business.

The NaNo folks also tried to say that generative AI was like a disability aid for writers, which writers with disabilities quickly shut down. AI isn’t what those writers use or need to write their stories. And if I may be so bold, being unwilling to write that great idea isn’t a disability. The worst writers among us could write better drivel than what generative AI has proven to come up with. You can achieve that dull, mediocrity on your own.

Then there’s the whole thing about how generative AI is based on theft (mining the works of other people without credit or compensation or permission), it costs people jobs, and it destroys the environment. No supporting clarification statements are going to undo that knowledge.

In the end, I cannot in good faith continue to support this organization that was once beneficial and that now has been corrupted by the greed and avarice of late capitalism. It’s difficult to exercise morals in this hellscape, but fuck it, I’ll die on this particular hill.

After twenty NaNos, I really don’t need the crutch of their daily word count graph and the reward of their little gifties in exchange for a donation anymore. It doesn’t need to be November for me to write 50,000 in thirty days anymore. If I’m going to be honest, I don’t even need to write 50,000 words in 30 days anymore. I’ve mastered the art of completing first drafts in a wide range of time spans. NaNo was just something to look forward to every year, a month of unbridled writing for the sake of writing, a guaranteed time to work on and/or complete the draft of a project.

And now it’s not.

So, I’ll make my own.

Read This If–You’re Looking for a Romance with a Halloween Vibe

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Are any of these books actually Halloween romances? No. But they do contain a ghost, a witch, and a not-quite-ghost. That’s close enough for candy corn in this case.

My recommendations, my rules.

A Ghost in Shining Armor by Therese Beharrie–Gemma Daniels has the ability to see ghosts and she likes to help them settle their unfinished business. Which is good because the stranger she kissed on a bet was actually a ghost and her kiss turned him solid. Now Levi has a second chance at life if he helps Gemma reunite with her long-lost sister. Meanwhile, Levi has some sibling issues of his own that Gemma wants to help him work out. And there’s the whole being super attracted to each other business, which is kind of a problem given the whole ghost thing.

I admit that I suffered from a lot of secondhand embarrassment while reading this book. Gemma is not at all logical when it comes to her plans to introduce herself to her long-lost sister, who happens to be an author. There’s a lot of family drama involving adoption, responsibility, and people pleasing. I was hooked on the ride of Gemma and Levi’s romance, trying to figure out how it was going to work out. Because it’s a romance. There has to be a happy ending. Spoiler alert: there is. There’s also some pretty steamy scenes. Who knew ghost sex could be so satisfying?

The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna–Mika Moon is one of few witches in Britain. As a rule, witches aren’t supposed to mingle or be open about their witchy-ness, but Mika likes to post videos of herself pretending to be a witch because she’s sure no one will take her seriously. Until one day, someone does. She’s summoned to Nowhere House to teach three young witches how to control their powers. Breaking the no mingling rule, Mika takes up the task, which moves her into Nowhere House and into the not-so-good-graces of Jamie, the Nowhere House Librarian who is very protective of the girls, which is something they have in common.

This is such a sweet romance. Mika and Jamie are inevitable, but it’s lovely watching them fall for each other, challenging their own hang-ups in the process. The three witches Mika is charged with teaching are feisty and adorable. And the girls’ guardian makes me think of Ian McKellan. There’s a bit of a mystery and an outside threat because we need to have some stakes, but it all ties in beautifully. It’s an enjoyable read.

One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston–August is living her cynical life in New York City, living with weird roommates and working at a 24 hour pancake diner when she has a chance encounter with a gorgeous woman on the subway. Jane isn’t like other girls. Literally. She’s displaced in time and stuck on the subway train. August is determined to help Jane get back to her time, but the more time she and Jane spend with each other, the harder it will be to let her go.

I loved this book so much. It was different and engrossing and I loved all of the characters. There were drag parties and subway sex and tragic histories and punk rock and laugh out loud lines. I wanted to live in this book. With a premise like this, though, it’s hard to see how the happy ending is going to happen, but the conclusion is a satisfying one.

I hope these books fit your spooky season romance vibe. And if they don’t, haunt someone else.

Poem–Magnificent Seven–“Faraday”

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Yes, it’s only been a minute since the last poem, but I’m struggling with my schedule right now. If I have to suffer, so do you.

This was the second to the last poem I wrote for The Magnificent Seven experiment, and I’ll be honest, Faraday is my least favorite of the Seven. Chisholm was last because he brought the Seven together and it seemed appropriate to write everyone else’s poems before his. Faraday, though, I procrastinated. I struggled to tell his story.

I chose deibide baise fri toin as his poetic form, which is an Irish quatrain form. One thing I learned about Irish poetry forms is that they have a lot of rules. The rules of this form are four line stanzas (or the whole poem is four lines), rhyme scheme is aabb, lines one and two rhyme on a two-syllable word, lines three and four rhyme on a monosyllabic word, line one has three syllables, lines two and three have seven syllables, and line four has one syllable.

And this is one of the easier Irish forms.

I can’t say this made writing Farady’s poem easier for me, but I do think it turned out pretty okay and it might not have turned out at all without the stricter rules.

Farady

Home traded
for chips in a life jaded,
finds the good use for his gun
done.

Hopes bolster.
Dynamite in his holster.
All in, throws down his last card
hard.