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This is MJ, I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer.

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You can find all my work at MJMunoz.com.

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So I am here because I have something to say.

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I got announcements, I got news, and I have updates, I guess?

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I don't know.

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I'll start with the announcements, news, and updates.

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Wait, that's everything I said I had?

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Hmm, okay.

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Well, let me slow down a bit.

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I'm going to tell you this is episode 44 of Story Over Everything, and it's going to

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be called something like, Can I Be the Master of Middle Grade?

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And that might be a pretentious, ostentatious, overdramatic title slash question slash prompt

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for the episode, but I promise I'm going to deliver on that.

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At least for the episode.

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In real life, we'll see how things go.

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So here we go.

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My first announcement, or a little bit of news, is that I'm back.

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Story Over Everything, the long hiatus is over.

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It's done.

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I think I'm going to keep pretty consistent on here.

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I preference everything going back to MJMunoz.com.

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So everything's going up in the blog.

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And what do I mean by everything?

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I mean that every day I'm doing my best to make sure I take 10 minutes to draw, 10 minutes

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to write, I take about five more minutes to read or play that back and record some sort

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of commentary over that, and I'm taking maybe five to 10 more minutes over that.

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So really it's like an hour a day with stack.

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If you take both and multiply everything out, it's about an hour a day of writing and drawing

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and getting it packaged and processed and posted online.

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So where am I doing it?

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I'm doing it on my website mainly, but I'm also doing it on TikTok, which allows up to

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10 minute long videos.

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So I try to keep them under that link and they're going to YouTube as well.

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But I've also decided that I'm going to start publishing them on the RSS feed as well.

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So again, the preference is the blog.

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The secondary place I want you going is subscribing to the podcast.

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And the third place I want you going is to YouTube and TikTok, I guess.

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That's third and fourth.

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They're tied for three and four because I don't really feel strongly about either one

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of them.

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Yeah, I don't feel very strongly about either one of them.

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So excuse me.

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That's that's kind of the way I think structured for myself.

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And I to finish things off, I mean to say that with all that content I'm producing,

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by the way, I have I don't know, maybe 100 videos that I have saved and processed like

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this that are not lost.

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I know where they are, but I'm not going to take the time to publish them right now because

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I don't have an as the as the refrain goes on this show, I don't have a lot of time and

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I don't have a lot of money.

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And I pray that'll change soon.

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And I'll be able to say I do have a lot of time.

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I do have a lot of money in this time using it and being a blessing to other people.

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So anyway, I'm still still doing my best to bless now.

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But that's that's a story for another time.

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But what my point is, is that you can now tune in and subscribe to the RSS feed for

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the audio only version of the podcast and you can get my commentary from my writing

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and from my drawn.

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Now, the commentary for the writing, I'm actually reading back what I wrote and then I'm making

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some sort of commentary on it.

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Excuse me.

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Getting over a little cold in the midst of it.

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I'm at the tail end of a cold.

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So bear with me, please.

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And for the drawing, yeah, you're not going to be able to see it, but you're going to

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be able to hear my commentary on it.

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And I will provide links in the show notes of the audio podcast that take you back to

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MGMooners.com.

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Yes, you know exactly where I'm going with this.

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Anyway, everything leads you back there so that you can go check out all that good stuff,

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see the images, maybe even pop over and see the video if you want to, or maybe if you're

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not that excited by the, you know, less than three minute process for me to draw.

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And actually when you, I can speed it up times eight.

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And when I do that, excuse me, my throat's hurting.

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You know, they say that they say, whoever they are, that Benjamin Franklin said that

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beer is proof that God exists and who loves us.

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And I'm going to agree with that and say coffee is the same thing.

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Coffee hot drinks.

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It's amazing how good a hot drink can feel in your throat when you're parched, when you're

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thirsty, when you got a little bit of cough or a sore throat.

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It's stellar.

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It's amazing.

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It's miraculous.

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We live with miracles every day.

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Anyway, getting back on track.

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My point is that, you know what?

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I actually lost the thread here.

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I'm so excited and I'm so in a frenzy that I'm having a little bit of a hard time.

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So please excuse me.

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I think my overall point is that now instead of just having YouTube and Tik Tok videos

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going up, encapsulating my 10 minute writing and my 10 minute drawing videos, which you

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can't see the drawing video.

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Oh, here we go.

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You can't see the drawing video in obviously the audio format, but the audio format links

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you to the website so that you can see the finished picture.

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Oh yeah, that's what I was going to say.

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When I record for 10 minutes my self drawing and I multiply by eight, which is the fastest

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that my video recording software is able to utilize at this time, it basically shrinks

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the video down to about a minute and 20 seconds, I think.

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Then I have other stuff on there.

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It's too long for an actual YouTube short, which at this point is one minute long.

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Oh boy.

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And it's an okay length for a Tik Tok or for like just a short YouTube video, but I'm also

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using it as a, I'm also turning it into audio because I think I'm, you know, I'm offering

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value in that audio.

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So you know, I don't feel like I'm cheating.

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I'm just putting my content out in like a smart way, which I think is a good thing.

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And it makes it so that basically seven days a week I am having posts go up on mgmwimius.com.

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Seven days a week I'm having stuff go up on Tik Tok.

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Seven days a week I'm having stuff go up on YouTube and seven days a week I'm having something

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go into the audio podcast RSS feed.

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So I've now gotten to the point, this is the news I guess, I've now gotten to the point

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where I figured out a workflow and God willing I'll be able to keep this going where I have

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content coming out every single day.

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And I'm very happy about that.

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And it's something I've wanted to do for a long time.

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Now it is all focused on my writing, which is a good thing, but there's other things

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I love to podcast about and other things I'd love to work on.

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But honestly, my writing is the most important thing to me.

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And it's crucial that I turn my writing into a career and the way I think I will be able

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to do that is by treating it like a career, giving it dedicated time every day, putting

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effort into it every day, and striving to make myself better every day.

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And also, the great thing with how I'm doing things is I'm making content, yes, but I'm

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also actually writing my books and I'm sharing that with you.

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I'm being open and transparent chronicling my journey as an author, artist, and analyzer

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to show you how I tweak my designs when I'm drawing, to show you how I improve in my drawing

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craft over time, and also to show you my books as they're coming together so you can see

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the mistakes.

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If you look closely at the videos, you can watch as I erase things or reject things or

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I have whole sections that I say, you know, I'm going to throw this out and I'm going

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to write over this.

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I'm going to completely delete this or trash it for now and instead I'm going to write

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this and then you get to see that.

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And I'm going to be talking about that in the process as well and it won't be to the

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point where you could stitch together all my stuff and get my books.

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I mean you'd get a really inferior version of them because I'm going to go through and

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edit them and rewrite them as well but that's something I plan to document as well as I

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go through.

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So anyway, yeah, I would love to do other stuff but I really think I need to be focusing

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on my writing which I'm doing and everything I'm drawing isn't it's not just random stuff.

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I'm drawing things that are pertinent to the stuff that I'm writing.

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So what I'm drawing right now currently as of February 26 2024 is a series of drawings

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to figure out these monster characters for a story I want to write in the future.

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So yeah, I'm not writing grow bugs or I'm not drawing grow bugs.

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I'm not drawing critter bots which maybe I should be doing for synergy instead of drawing

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stuff for another project but I'm okay with that for now.

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So yeah, that's what I'm doing and I'm happy to be doing that.

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And yeah, so my updates and my news are that I'm moving forward vehemently.

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I'm getting daily content out even in the short form which is fine and I'm writing actual

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stuff and drawing actual stuff which I plan to use for future storytelling in well in

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the future.

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And my current project is it's a grow bug tale and that is one of the it's one of many

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grow bug tales in the grow bug tale series overall and I won't go much into it right

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now although I will tell you yeah I'm starting on chapter 15 of grow bug tales.

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I'm documenting and sharing that right now as I bring back the podcast for season two

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of story over everything and that's that's just something you're gonna have to be okay

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with.

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There's there's lost stuff there's gaps there's hidden things.

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Maybe if I get a Patreon going and I get people giving me a certain amount of money per month

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for that I can say yeah you know I'll charge you know thirty dollars an hour to you know

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set aside the effort and you know go comb through my archives and get all this stuff

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up and I'll give it to the patrons first and then give to other people later.

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I don't know I may or may not do something like that just a thought.

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That is to say a thought I had spur of the moment and decided to share because of being

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overly transparent and speaking of being overly transparent I accidentally shut off my recording

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as I was finishing up what I was saying but it reminded me I need to get back on focus

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because it's been about 10 minutes where I'm talking about stuff other than the premise

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of the episode that I promised to talk about which is me making myself the master of middle

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grade.

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What does that mean?

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How dare I say that and how can I accomplish that?

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Well here's the thing I want to write so many things and I want to be involved in so much

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storytelling in different forms.

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I'd love to make comics or manga, anime, movies, whatever.

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To me because the story is prime, story is over everything, I want to focus on just writing

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good stories and I do understand that depending on what your medium is you need to change

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the way that you tell your stories because stories are told in different ways depending

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on how they are consumed by the audience and that's fine.

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However, you still need to have a compelling story for you to be successful in telling

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your story to people whether it's over a campfire, over a VR headset, through a video game or

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audio drama or anything else.

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That's important.

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That's definitely important and that's something that's important and that's something I understand

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and something I acknowledge and yet it's not something I have to fully address at this

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time.

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So getting back to it.

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It turns out that the longer I'm writing the more it seems like I'm turning myself into

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or it looks like I'm moving towards being a middle grade book writer for that age bracket

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even though as an adult I and other people have read middle grade books and enjoyed them.

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There's been middle grade Star Wars books from the High Republic Initiative that they

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did a few years back.

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I only read one middle grade and a couple of the adult novels.

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I think a middle grade of YA and an adult novel or whatever.

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I had my thoughts on those.

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I talked about them if you want to look through my archives of fully operational you can find

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that stuff.

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Again if you go to MJBunnyers.com you can look it up and find me talking about those

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Star Wars books.

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Probably if you type in Star Wars in books you'll find something.

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Anyway so yeah I think like for adults I want to be a pulp writer.

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What does that mean?

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That means I want to write certain types of stories and I want them to be at like a 60,000

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word limit.

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Because of who I am my pulp novels they won't be lurid.

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They won't be necessarily well anyway they won't be lurid or like exploitational I guess

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you could say.

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They will be exciting and dramatic and have interesting characters in crazy scenarios

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and you know dramatic high stakes and pulse pounding pulp action.

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Like that's definitely going to be a part of it.

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But who I am I'm not going to write well I'm not going to write certain types of things

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and that's fine.

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I figure the pulp formula the pulp model can be delivered to lots of different audiences

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and the fact that there aren't scantily clad women on my book covers and the fact that

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there aren't you know hard boiled grimm detectives who change women like they're changing their

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cigarettes or go through women like they're going through cigarettes that's fine.

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And I don't know for a fact that a lot of the hard boiled detectives are like James

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Bond where there's a new woman every story.

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Yeah in fact I don't know that so I'm just kind of making a presumption there.

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But that's not the kind of thing you're going to get in my pulpy novels.

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They'll definitely be super heroic and they'll have other elements to them and I do want

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romance and other things but it's not going to be it's going to be suited for my audience

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which I really want to write all ages type stuff but just tailor it towards what if you

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like superheroes you're going to like this.

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My wife for example doesn't like superhero stuff but yeah she doesn't like superhero

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stuff and I don't anticipate she'd be interested in reading any of my books that I'm going

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to make any of my pulp novels but I've talked to her about some of the subplots and some

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of the different ideas I want.

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I have one character who I want to have.

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I have this whole like a life story planned out for her and a whole romance and family

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life for her and my wife says yeah that sounds pretty cool like I still don't think I want

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to read it but like you know I get where you're going with that and that sounds cool like

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if you dialed up the romance and the relationship stuff and dialed down the superhero super

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heroics I'd be interested and I told her well that's fine but you know you can go read that

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book right there and you know leave my books alone.

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So you know we have an understanding.

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We have an understanding.

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But before I get to writing my pulps I want to develop my performance as a writer and

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my style as a writer and just my career as a writer because I think that would be wise

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and because I'm not interested in writing lurid sensational wildly inappropriate stuff

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I figure and since I'm into superheroics and fantasy I figure I might be able to write

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for a child audience and I in my efforts to write the grow bug tales or kid in the grow

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bug picture books I realized I'm writing I'm having a hard time constraining myself to

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what the modern market is for children's books and that's part of the reason I want to self

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publish my children's books get them fully illustrated and all that good stuff which

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is going to take time and money.

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I'm more concerned about the money that it'll take them the time because I figure well I

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just need to pay for it and it'll take the artist the time and those books are all written.

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But as I was thinking things through and realizing how many stories I have that are suitable

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for a child audience or a kid audience I thought well maybe I should just shift my expectations

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of myself and go ahead and write middle grade books and I don't say that to insult middle

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grade.

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I don't say that as a dig against middle grade books.

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I think they're important.

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I think they're good.

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I think I mean like as a genre I believe middle grade is more of a marketing thing as most

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genres are just so people know where to put things.

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But I say that because the kinds of books that I like and the kinds of books that I

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prefer are not well I'm not even going to try to read that read Diary of a Wimpy Kid

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or Captain Underpants which I think is a those are novels right like middle grade not they're

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not comics like Dogman.

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Dave Filkey did Captain Underpants and Dogman is that correct?

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I think that's right.

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Anyway but like that's not my style like I don't want goofy zany written at kids kind

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of books.

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I believe it I believe that The Hobbit is categorized as a middle grade book or definitely

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could be categorized as a middle grade book.

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I went through a process to search out what middle grade books are and I found a good

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collection of them.

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I also think while it is zany and kooky like James and the Giant Peach and is it Willy

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Wonka or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?

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I can't remember one of those two.

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I believe the book is Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

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I believe those Roald Dahl books Matilda as well are all considered middle grade books

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even though they kind of predate the categorization of middle grade which is fine.

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But more to my point the existence of things like that one proves that or supports the

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idea that you know middle grade is a kind of an artificial categorization that was created

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at some point and it also supports my notion that I want to write books that are good for

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everybody but that are targeted at children.

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And what does that mean?

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That means the content will fall within a certain within certain parameters as far as

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what is allowed to happen in the books.

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How those things will be framed and I think the books will be written in a more simple

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style.

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Now I would I'm just thinking right now I don't I would assume that at this point in

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my career as a writer because I've written so little that I wouldn't be able to necessarily

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with ease and reliably and consistently write something that is a middle grade book and

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then switch over to writing a pulp novel you know a superhero pulp novel meant for teenagers

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adults or whoever but that is also accessible to a kid.

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I don't necessarily think I'd be able to do that right now I would like to hone my

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writing so that I'm able to do those things but like I said as of now I don't think I

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have that skill.

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The expectations of middle grade books are a shorter length even than the 60k that I'm

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looking for for my pulp novels.

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Okay so I had an interruption there on multiple levels and now I just want to sharpen my point

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and say that I think in order to level up myself as a writer I want to set myself more

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realistic goal or the more realistic goal of writing several middle grade books and

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having that be my project for the next couple years and by that I mean exclusively writing

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middle grade books and after I'm done with those then I can move on.

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I'm not saying I will entirely abandon those series if they're lucrative and I still feel

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like writing them then I will continue to pour more work into them and maybe just you

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know continue them on whatever schedule I determine works for me while I'm switching

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over to doing my pulp superhero novels but then again I may be able to do both especially

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the more success I gain as an author the more time I'll be able to put into writing and

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the more and more I would treat writing as a job instead of you know 10 minutes a day

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goal of writing I would give myself a you know half hour then an hour then two hours

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three hours four hours and really push myself to during that time be productive and write

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book after book after book and that's my preference I like ongoing series I like you know longish

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narratives but I also like for there to be a fine point where I get to see the beginning

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middle end of a story I get to see an arc for a character or for I guess events in the

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character's life and then get to see the adventure continue as the character progresses you know

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somewhat slowly and I think having the more narrow focus of a middle grade and getting

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more finished books under my belt that'll all help me in my goal becoming a better writer

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because I imagine that everything I finish will have a positive cumulative effect as

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long as I'm reflecting and thinking about things as I go along I can do that so is

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me writing books going to make me the master of middle grade no not necessarily I think

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it's important to know your audience and to know your market so I've decided that I will

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over the over the course of 2024 read and review a series of middle grade books when

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I talk about Chronicles of Narnia Diary of a Wimpy Kid no of course not not Wimpy Kid

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I'm that's that does not seem like it would appeal to me and frankly I don't want to

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give it a chance and I think that's okay so what I've decided to do is I've done some

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research I've looked into things and I've made a list I've made two lists one is classic

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middle grade books so to speak and the other is modern middle grade books and classic I'm

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going as late as the 80s 1980s 1990s I believe and middle grade or modern I'm going as early

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as the you know 1990s 2000s I believe that's how I ever broken down and what I've done

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is I'm going to basically read these books in chronological order and I will rotate I

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will start because I have a an aversion to the modern stuff just because I like classic

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things so much more because I have an aversion to the modern stuff I figure I'm going to

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push myself out of my comfort zone and whatever the earliest modern middle grade book is on

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my list I will read and review that first and then I will excuse me and then I will

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read and review a classic and about once a week I'll be releasing a special skimming

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leaves episode slash something else story or everything episode where I will be doing

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a casual book chat on each one of those and talking about whether or not I think the books

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are worthy whether or not they're quality and yeah I'll be ranking the books basically

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and saying where I think they belong and I think that'll be good I think that'll give

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me some authority having sampled so much children's fiction so much middle grade fiction for you

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know to make the term broad from the past to the present so I don't know that I have

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anything from 2024 in there but I definitely have stuff from the 2020s and you know all

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in between there so I think I'll get a really interesting cross section of books and I I've

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spread out the genres basically I mean so it'll be you know there will be fantasy there

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will be more modern stuff things I'm not really interested in reading other than the fact

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that I want to do this kind of challenge for myself and establish myself and I don't anticipate

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that I will hate those books I just think that you know while they may not be my preference

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they're very well maybe merit in them I may enjoy them a lot who knows I'm not going to

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say that I will not like wonder it seems weird to me and I've seen that book different places

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pop up and I thought huh I don't know what this is about and I feel like the author doesn't

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or the published the author or the publisher excuse me doesn't really want me to know what

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this is about wants me to guess and I don't like that because I just want to know what

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the book is so I can determine whether or not I'm interested in it and then read it

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but I feel like you're trying to trick me and I like that but then I'll go ahead and

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talk about it so I think I haven't decided the format 100% I kind of think I'll say like

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this is my first impression of this book based on the title based on the author what I know

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about the author and then I'll say here it is I'm going to read this book and these are

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the things I liked didn't like this is you know well it'll be a casual book chat you

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know how those go if you've been around and if not that's basically how it goes I just

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talk about the book in kind of an unstructured loose way and I'll be doing this series while

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I'm doing everything else and it'll all be released on the podcast meet on story over

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everything and actually I had kind of started a middle grade series actually two so I was

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reading Skoll Charleston's Terra Valley series and there's one more book scheduled to come

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out so I'll be listening I'll be yeah I'll be reading slash listening to that and sharing

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my thoughts on it probably interviewing squall as I've done with the other two books and

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then I actually have the four more Harry Potter books to release a episode about a casual

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book chat about and I am I one of them I worked on today I'm going to publish it after this

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or I'm going to process it after this and then the others I have basically ready to

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go I need to do some modifications them and they get those released so I'm very much prepared

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to do that and I'll get those released hopefully in rapid succession before March the start

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tonight in doing my research I found out there's something called middle grade March and I

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don't know all the details of it it seems a little funny to me a little gimmicky but

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that's okay gimmicks gimmicks are good sometimes and I may include some of my own gimmicks

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and talking about middle grade books but basically the first week of March I should be releasing

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the first of my middle grade things so I'm kind of hitching my myself to that middle

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grade March thing effort whatever and that could be kind of interesting I'll see what

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happens with that especially with well I'll be curious to see how people perceive my take

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on middle grade and then who knows maybe since I want to be in the middle grade world I might

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just keep tabs on in like 2025 we're all still here keep working on middle grade stuff as

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well reviewing it you know writing it and reviewing it and I don't know we'll see they'll

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be interesting to see I might keep that as like a monthly feature or something like that

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where I talk about a middle grade book a month and yeah I think that would be interesting

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so that's my plan and that's my update that's my plan that's my announcement that's everything

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that I have going for this episode and I just ask that you stick around and you look forward

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to everything I have coming down the pike and I think it'll be good stuff entertaining

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and fun for us all and I'm really excited about some of these books and I'm really interested

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to see how I will receive everything I read because there's a lot there it'll fill up

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2024 if I do one a week and it'll be really interesting to see what middle grade feels

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like to me after going through all these books and yeah I'm really curious to see how people

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react to my reactions to a lot of these books new and old new and old anyway I believe that's

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it for now so I'm gonna thank you for listening and I'm gonna go ahead and get out of here

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this is MJ signing out I hope you enjoyed that go to MJMunoz.com to leave any questions

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comments or other feedback you might have there you can find all of my analysis art

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and fiction I cover books tokusatsu comic books anime and more look around you're sure

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to find something else that you'll enjoy as well this has been a story over everything

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production