Books – Page 2 – By Autumn Rain

The Importance of Self-Expression in Writing

April 19, 2025 Autumn

I went and gussied up some of the old posts I made about my writing process that I’m still proud of.

It wasn’t exactly the most exciting thing to do, but those AI features made it much easier, and even gave me a chuckle with some of the quirky generated images. Will it matter at all? Heck if I know. I barely know what SEO even is, and I’m not all that convinced that it will do anything to boost my blog stats. But, at the very least, it makes me feel like a more attentive blogger,

And attentive bloggers blog more often. So there.

I want to write about myself more, and think about myself more. I feel like I’ve spent years listening to someone go on and on about himself, and every time I said anything like, “I have a dream too!” I was instantly shut down. “Whoa there. Getting full of yourself, aren’t you?”

But it isn’t egotistical to have dreams about where I want my life to go. Maybe I won’t end up in a big house on the bench of the mountain, but I can still watch the sunset glint off those enormous windows as I drive by and wonder what it would be like to live there. It’s not wrong to feel inspired to pursue success for myself.

It’s not wrong to believe that I have skills and talents. It’s not wrong to think about how I can use those skills and talents to make my way in the world. The Universe didn’t designate me to sit in the dark as a permanent audience member — I have a passion for writing that I want to share with the world, and I genuinely believe that I can offer something that others would enjoy.

And it’s not wrong for me to exist as a real person writing about my real experiences. “Dear diary, today I went with the kids to the park. The breeze was cold but the sun was hot, and the public restrooms are finally open for the season.” My thoughts and perceptions are valid, and I want the freedom to express them without wondering who might disagree with them.

I still have my own opinions and philosophies about writing, and I still want to write about them. Maybe soon enough, I’ll be able to take those old posts and rewrite them — expound on them — and compile something that could even be published as a “how to” type book. ~Writing With Autumn Rain~ Forward by ChatGPT

And maybe I’ll finally figure out why SEO matters.

About Me

Overcoming Writer’s Process: Navigating Life’s Challenges

November 12, 2024 Autumn

One of those big and glaringly obvious things about trying to make a living as an indie author is that you have to, you know, write books to make it happen.

Ha ha, yeah, I’ll get around to it.

Currently my actual progress with novel writing is quite small. Currently my mind is a little too preoccupied with the real world to think that much about my fictional ones. I wouldn’t say, “writer’s block”, but I’m definitely still deep in “writer’s process.” And while I’m kinda wishing that I was more of an escapist sort, I need to get a real-world foundation built under me before I can start dreaming.

There is a slightly pragmatic element to me.

So instead of thinking about Malachi and Lyra, running around and doing things in Runemaster, I’m thinking about boring adult things like my credit score. I’m figuring out how to structure my day so that I can have time for everything that needs to be done. I’m trying to remember to stay hydrated and get some fresh air and sunshine. I’m adjusting to a major life change. I’m stopping a four-year-old and a two-year-old from spitting at each other across the room, because despite how cute and little they are, it’s also kinda gross.

What I need is time. I wish that life came with a pause button that I could smack every time I needed a moment to think and process, but the sun continues to rise and fall the same way that it always has and always will. I don’t know if I’m counting down the days to a deadline, or if I’ll have all the time I need. And it’s easy to get caught up in the stress.

So I remind myself not to make any decisions based on fear. I can be logical. I can follow what my heart truly wants. But I won’t let myself succumb to fear; that’s not how I want to live the rest of my life. I know deep in my heart that writing is the only thing that I have any real ambition for, so that’s where I’m throwing all my energy.

However, I’m not going to lie: having a fire tickling my behind is also proving itself to be great motivation. I might not be deep into writing yet, but I’m thinking a lot about the marketing aspect and learning new skills.

Speaking of marketing, that whole “SEO optimization” makes me feel awkward. There’s nothing poetic about it, and it’s definitely not natural to my way of thinking.

“Calls to action” are also something that are currently uncomfortable. Should I really end my blog posts with, “Now that I’ve shared how my life is a train wreck, tell me about your own train wrecks in the comments below!” Is that appropriate?

But what the hey, let’s commiserate a little bit. What are you struggling with in your life right now?

Books

The Beauty and the Beast

January 4, 2022January 4, 2022 Autumn

I decided to read The Beauty and the Beast by Madame de Villeneuve, originally published in 1740.

I suppose my background is different than average for my age, because instead of growing up on Disney movies, I had a complete collection of fairy tales by Hans Christian Andersen, and I spent a lot of time pouring over the book and rereading my favorites. They were a far bigger influence on me than any movie.

Heck, one of the reasons why I hate Disney so much is because they took these wonderful, complex stories, and turned them into shallow caricatures with a marketing scheme that led most people to believe they were the original source. Nowadays when people say “fairy tales,” they’re referring to the Disney movies, not the original texts.

Ugh.

Anyway, The Beauty and the Beast is one that I’ve never read before, so I figured, “Why not?” Call it research.

The initial characterization of Beauty is charming. She belonged to a large and wealthy family, but after some spectacularly bad luck, they end up losing everything — Beauty is the only one who handles the change in fortune with grace, and she is clearly intended to be just as beautiful on the inside as she is on the outside.

Then, her father travels in an attempt to regain some of his lost wealth, discovers that it was a fruitless expedition, and is caught in a nasty blizzard while returning home. He stumbles across the Beast’s enchanted palace, and consequently gets himself in trouble after picking a rose from the garden. Beauty sacrifices herself to save her father’s life, and goes to live in the Beast’s palace instead.

In my opinion, this was the weakest part of the story. The descriptions of the sheer materialistic opulence of Beauty’s life in the enchanted palace really cheapened her character. I can’t help but wonder if it’s a difference in generations, given that this was originally published in the 1700’s, but c’mon … surely there was more to life fulfillment than clothing and jewelry, even back then?

The part that I outright hated was when Beauty went back to visit her family, and the suitors of her five older sisters were all immediately smitten with her and promptly abandoned their original girlfriends. I couldn’t help but feel sympathetic towards the jilted sisters, while Beauty was reduced down to nothing more than a Mary-Sue.

Then, as we all know, Beauty breaks the curse on the Beast by professing her love for him, and he turns back into a handsome prince.

Interestingly enough, this happens only halfway through the book, despite the fact that this is where all the movie versions of the story end.

The second half was the part that I genuinely enjoyed the most, and definitely made the book worth reading. I can’t help but feel like I’ve been let in on a little secret, since even wikipedia failed to summarize the second half. Tee hee, how fun.

And by the way, the Disney version doesn’t even come close.

art

Marking Fabric and Debunking Misinformation

December 6, 2021 Autumn

I learned most of what I know about crafting through books that I picked up from thrift stores, usually published in the 70s and 80s. That probably makes me a major weirdo for my age group, but since I was living in a vehicle at the time I started, I didn’t have constant access to a computer or money … so yeah, major weirdo.

In 2017, I bought a book that had been freshly published, mostly out of morbid curiosity, and I found it to be a major disappointment. For starters, the title was grossly misleading. Secondly, the author left out a huge amount of relevant information, but went into an excessive description about how a-may-zing the purple disappearing pens are for marking fabric, followed up with demonizing the blue water-soluble pens as the most useless invention ever.

Everything the author said was accurate enough for where she lived in the deep South, where it’s humid. But where I live in the arid West, it was thoroughly horrible advice. On dry days, I have used the purple pens then watched the marks disappear in a matter of minutes. I only use them when I need to mark something immediately before cutting or sewing it, because the marks aren’t guaranteed to be there ten minutes later. Blue pens are by far the better option for the climate I live in. So far, I haven’t seen any modern creators mention that local weather patterns can have an effect on tools and fabric.

Books from the 70s are a priceless resource for learning how to accurately mark fabrics when neither pen is an option, especially because they don’t assume that you’re too lazy to spend five minutes on doing a good job.

The sewing and embroidery community has since decided that “heat erase” pens are the greatest thing ever, but I strongly recommend against them — on the grounds that they don’t actually erase. It’s color changing technology, and heat makes the ink turn from dark to white. The ink is permanent, you run the risk of bleaching the marks into fabric that isn’t white, and if there’s any chance of the project being exposed to cold (mailing a Christmas gift?), those marks are going to come right back in all their hideous glory and make a bad first impression. So please, save the heat erase pens for design sketches and notes, and don’t use them on your fabric.

I’ve been thinking about this lately because of the growing popularity of debunking videos. I know that crafting is a little too niche and nowhere near as dramatic as, “THIS WILL EXPLODE ALL OVER YOUR FACE AND KILL YOU!”, so the chances of it getting the same analysis are fairly null. But frankly, it was the misinformation spreading through blogs that killed my interest in using the internet and contemporary books as a learning resource years ago. I still preferentially turn to decades-old books to figure out what the heck I’m doing (and don’t get me started on youtube; slogging through a 20-minute video to get five seconds of clarification is a painful waste of time, and I don’t like your personality enough to want to simply watch you exist).

So, here are my two cents on marking fabric:
Purple air erase pens – good for humid climates
Blue water soluble pens – good for dry climates; rinse thoroughly with cold water before washing with soap to prevent residue
Chalk pencils – good for dark fabrics, may stain pale shades
Heat-erase pens – pls don’t go there

I recommend Sewline products, and heavily use the pens, mechanical pencils, and glue sticks myself.

I can’t help but wonder, are people are ever going to get sick of exploitative clickbait, and cry out to know reality instead? The debunking videos still don’t get anywhere near as much attention as the “hacks” do.

Alice and the Warden, Books

Alice and the Warden Pre-order

August 23, 2021August 23, 2021 Autumn

Coming September 22nd!

Available for pre-order from:

Amazon
Smashwords
Barnes & Noble
Apple
And more!

Act now and don’t miss out!

Because after September, this story will be dead to me.

At least until it’s time to write the sequel. I’m one of those sorts.

About Me, About Writing

Whining

June 2, 2021 Autumn

The air conditioner broke. ‘Tis the season of dead appliances, apparently…

And the weather forecast is promising a heat wave for the next few days. This matters because we have to order the part in for repair. Ha ha.

It might be better for me to spend the afternoons out on the patio, where I can turn on the misters to cool down. I have terrible heat tolerance.

Anyway, that’s enough whining for now.

…

Actually, no, it isn’t!

I don’t have any sort of aptitude for marketing. In fact, it’s such a foreign way of thinking for me, that it leaves me so drained and cranky that I end up completely nonfunctional for the rest of the day, then lose all ability to “follow through” afterwards.

I made some queries about how to effectively advertise over the past couple of days, and currently I have e-mails sitting in my inbox that I just don’t have the energy to open. I badly want to retreat to the kitchen to bake something sugary, and forget about the whole subject.

So I’m going to pull back for now. I learned one important lesson about Kindle keywords (use phrases instead of words) that will henceforth be applied to everything I publish, but I’m not going to sacrifice my soul for this. Heck, part of my long term “marketing” strategy was to publish a novel every year, and that ain’t gonna happen if I kill my creative energy.

Not to mention, no one enjoys a cranky mama.

I’ll probably make no-bake cookies to avoid turning on the oven while the air conditioner is broken. Seems prudent.

Anyway, I haven’t finished polishing up Alice and the Warden for official publication yet, and I particularly wanted to fix up the final few chapters where I was *obviously* fatigued when I wrote them.

And I’m working on The Scion Suit MULTIVERSE edition, lol.

I need to stick with what works for me emotionally, since I’m kind of a finicky hyper-sensitive sort that burns out easily. Patience is a virtue, and all that.

About Writing

Writing Exercise – Trashy Blurbs

October 6, 2020October 5, 2020 Autumn

Describing my stories is significantly harder than writing them.

It’s kind of funny, really, how when I strip out all of the characterization and spoilers, it’s pretty easy to end up with some generic and boring blurb. Which, naturally, as someone who takes pride in their work, is kind of upsetting. Here I am, trying so hard to be grammatically correct and all that jazz, putting off potential readers because I can’t come up with an awesome enough summary. Le sigh.

I’ve decided that as a writing exercise, I’m going to go ahead and write the crappiest/trashiest descriptions I can think of, just to get it out of my system. Woohoo!

In chronological order:

Alice and the Warden – A troubled young woman finds herself pregnant and in prison, then begins a scandalous relationship with the warden.

The Black Magus – A powerful assassin falls in love with the daughter of his next target, and finds himself torn between his job and his heart.

The Scion Suit – A mousey woman unexpectedly becomes the pilot of a mecha suit in the military, and learns a lesson in building confidence.

Light Eternal – A young woman battles dissociation and soul loss with the help of a mysterious man who can change reality at will.

The Black Magus

Quote from The Black Magus

March 8, 2020February 17, 2020 Autumn

Elias couldn’t shake the strange sensation that was overtaking him, the feeling that the future was shaping itself in that moment

-The Black Magus, by Autumn Rain

Alice and the Warden

Alice and the Warden – 3

February 24, 2020March 7, 2020 Autumn

Alice had met Damon when she was sixteen-years-old, and he had talked her into bed with him that night. Shortly afterwards, she dropped out of school to run away with him on his motorcycle, and somewhere along the road she lost her sense of self.

When Damon asked her to have sex with a friend to repay a favor, she did it. When he wanted leverage over someone, she became a seductress on his behalf. He taught her to steal, chose her clothing for her, and pushed her into drugs and alcohol. After four years, Alice had disappeared completely underneath Damon, to the point that when he asked her to confess to murder, she did it without hesitation.

Until the moment Alice found herself alone in the stall of a public restroom, staring down at the two lines of a nicked pregnancy test, too numb to feel her heart beat. It was then that the word ‘dignity’ had risen up sharply in her mind, spoken by that stupid, impotent warden she had vowed to hate just three weeks prior.

Dignity.

She still didn’t know what it meant, but she knew that if she told Damon he would insist on an abortion, and she wouldn’t argue against him. That wasn’t what she wanted, and she knew that it wasn’t dignified to be so blindly obedient to someone like Damon. There was no doubt that he was the father, but she couldn’t trust him with her baby.

She never told him.

A couple weeks later, they checked into a motel where Damon began to undress her as usual, but Alice didn’t have it in her to go through with it. She was more tired than she had thought possible, slightly nauseated from the pregnancy, and angry at Damon for using her too much. For the first time ever, she snapped at him to ‘fuck off,’ then for a terrifying second afterward thought that he was going to hit her in response.

Instead, he grabbed his bag and left.

When dawn broke in the morning, Alice awoke with the realization that he hadn’t returned. She waited, staring at the clock until the motel staff chased her out to prepare the room for the next guest, and she drifted to a nearby diner to continue her wait, knowing full well that he wasn’t coming back for her.

She had a $20 hidden in her bra, so she ordered blueberry pancakes with whipped cream to help make up for skimping on dinner the night before, and she ate slowly as she wondered about what she was going to do. Her mom wasn’t going to want her back in the state she was in – especially after four years of estrangement – and everyone she knew was exactly like Damon. She didn’t have any resources, but she couldn’t live in the gutter with a baby growing inside of her.

By chance, the small TV in the corner of the diner showed a mugshot of her with the words, “Wanted for questioning.” Alice stared, seeing herself for the first time. That girl, glowering at the camera with flamingo pink hair and far too much eyeliner really looked like the sort of person who would be involved in murder, even though Alice had never felt that way on the inside – she didn’t want to hurt anyone.

She dialed the phone number provided on the screen with her cellphone, then put her $20 on the table before slipping outside.

With nowhere to go, Alice turned herself in.