Hello Friends and Enemies,
It has been awhile since we spoke, July to be in fact. Of course I posted the first instalment of the Midnite Market of Malevolence (which you can read HERE). But the Midnite Gazette has been quiet. We are now back though due to this issues sponsor, Random Actor who pops up in things but you can never remember his name. He always gives a good performance and always shows up as the most random of characters in a slew of projects but for some reason you never remember his name even though you checked IMDB the last time he popped up because your friend asked you who he was. You saw his name then but have since forgotten it. So thank you to Random Actor who pops up in things but you can never remember his name for sponsoring this issue! Maybe this time we’ll remember your name, but probably not.
Updates:
It’s been awhile so there was some updates to bring. What was I doing over the two months since the last newsletter? Living life and writing, which is the dream. My dream anyway. I went to Toulouse with my partner Pam in August. It was class, really sunny and relaxing. We didn’t do anything touristy and would just get up whenever we woke up (instead of really early to go on some tour), go get a coffee and a pastry for breakfast then go to the supermarket to get food and drink for the pool then we’d lay by the pool for the day before getting ready and heading into the city centre in the evening. It was exactly what I needed and I had a great time, I got some reading done reading the book The City & The City which is easily one of the best books I’ve ever read which doesn’t surprise me since it inspired one of my favourite games of all time Disco Elysium. I also did some writing while over there, getting a short story started and finished while also being inspired for another story due to the amount of bug bites I got. It was great, here are some random pics, including the first pic which is absolutely going to be my new author pic.
Speaking of France… I have recently watched both of Julia Ducournau’s - the immensely talented French body-horror director. Her movies are Raw and Titane and both of them blew me away. She has quickly shot up my list of favourite directors and both movies inspired me a lot to get weirder and more creative with my stories. The previously mentioned bug bite inspired story was also inspired by Raw and Titane. Both movies are amazing, if you love horror especially body-horror then make sure to give them a watch, I could be here all day talking about them so I’ll stop myself and just say you should watch them. My full reviews for both are on my Letterboxd. I’ve watched plenty of other movies which are listed on my Letterboxd but out of what I’ve watched the ones I would recommend the most are; Barbie, Oppenheimer, Blue Beetle, The Omen (original), and Kate.
I also watched a video by YouTuber Nexpo about indie horror games. The reason I’m recommending this is two-fold. 1. I liked it a lot, it’s really well made and 2. He covers two games by my good friend Jamie. Check it out HERE, Jamie’s two games are covered at around 44 minutes in.
Emerald Fearscape:
What is this Emerald Fearscape being mentioned in the title? Well, if you’d stop asking questions and listen for once I can tell you. Always yapping you are…
For ThoughtBubble this year my initial plan was to get a book of short stories published and bring them along for the convention. I was planning to use some of the short stories I posted on Reddit when I first started writing short stories and then maybe add some stories I’ve written for publications but never got picked up. That was the plan but when I started on that I noticed that I had some ideas for short stories I wanted to do, and also a lot of my current stories would need a lot of editing. I essentially saw this as a project I was rushing through and to get it done properly I would need to take my time and do it well as the project would be something I would be judged on and I shouldn’t rush through something like that. So instead I’ve decided I’m going to write a short story collection containing completely new stories. I’m planning for around ten to twelve stories. These stories would all be horror stories that take place in Ireland which led me to the name Emerald Fearscape.
The other interesting thing about this book is that I’m planning to self-publish it. Which is something I’ve never done but I’ve always wanted to do and I’ve always wanted to challenge myself to see if I could do it. Short story collections are (supposedly) difficult to sell to a publisher as a first book so I thought this would be the perfect project to try self-publishing with. I’m both excited and terrified to be doing something like this, but I want to push myself to see what I can pull off. I have most of the stories planned out and I’m hoping I can push through the stories and get the project out either early or mid-2024. I’ll update the progress of the project here whenever I have relevant updates. The first story titled Snow Globes and CRT TVs is finished (I wrote it in a notepad so I’m typing it up). The next story planned will be the bug bite story titled Mosquito. This will probably be the weirdest story I’ve written but it has the potential to be my favourite story I’ve written. If I’m going to self-publish then I need to challenge myself to get more creative and get a lot weirder.
I’m excited for this and I hope you are too. Anyone with self-publishing experience don’t be afraid to reach out as I’d love to get the help where I can.
That’s it for this issue. I hope you enjoyed it and I hope you have a good week. Remember to stay healthy, stay hydrated and keep it sexy x
Cheers,
Andy
Hi Andy,
Sounds like you had a lovely trip!
Here's a piece by John Sundman on his experience with self-publishing over the last 23 years: https://janefriedman.com/lessons-from-23-years-as-a-self-publishing-novelist/
Figured you might be interested.
You can find his substack linked in the article too. John is great, do check him out.
Cheers,
Fargo.