Hello, ok we’re gonna roll two into one here. I’ll be talking more about Nanowrimo and then I’ll be reviewing HAWG by Steven Shrewsbury.
First another little jolt of NaNoWriMo… it starts this sunday. Yup already coming on fast and believe me I am twitching in anticipation. November is going to be one hell of a crazed and busy month. Not only will i be working full time in RETAIL (Black Friday anyone??) but I’ll be trying to write 50K in my off time… and I’ll be the wikimaster for David Niall Wilson’s NaNo (which means i will be updating his read along website with info about the characters and events unfolding in the book… which is #2 in a series… you all should read along with us @ http://macabreink.com/dragons/ )… and I’ll be taking classes with Michael Knost every monday night as well. KNost is running an online creative writing program, he also teaches Writing in a classroom setting, he’s the Editor of many great books, but anyway you can go to his website for more info and maybe even join me in the classes http://michaelknost.com/ .
So yeah, Work, Nano, Wiki, Classes, and then the holidays themselves. I think I will become a gibbering animal by the end of the month. LOL. One can only hope right? To be honest i think i really need this. I stopped writing after college… mostly while i had this current job. I left for an office job at the end of 07 and while in the office i joined forums, was online all day, and had time to relax think and write again. I stepped back into retail hell at the beginning of this year and I’ve started slowing down on the writing again. So i NEED this challenge to make me write, to get me through the days. I think in dec. I’ll come through with a renewed sense of purpose and the discipline to write more. I have four stories slated for revision in dec. they all have homes i willbe submitting them to. 2010 is the year of the Acceptance. Period.
Alright, enough Nano news… now unto the review.
Hawg by Steven Shrewsbury.
Shrews is well known for his dramatic readings, his horror and fantasy mixes (much like myself)… though he writes in more of a sword and sorcery/ barbarian rage genre. HAwg is about a rural illinois town beset by a beast man, a Pig Man.Hawg, the title character, goes on a rampage, frees himself from his pen and wrecks havoc through out the town of Miller’s Fork. We have bikers, small town sheriffs, factory workers, etc all trying to survive and fight the beast. Some parts are over the top, but in a good way and when the action starts it just goes completely haywire. Berserk.
The first few scenes are quick and dirty but as the book progresses the violence (and description) grows. The last 100 pages or so is all running action. Overall the book is a fun ride with some interesting characters. Its also apparent that Shrews brought his real life job… and maybe some of the people he doesn’t much care for into the book… lets just say Hawg goes rampaging through a factory… taking some good people but mostly destroying all the “Bad Managers” (LOL, believe me i LOVED this scene, while i don’t work in the same environment I could understand a lot of the stress and angst of the workers).
If i had to find one thing to be down about… well its middling… some of Shrews turns of Phrase seemed odd. Just the way he wrote a sentence or two, the order of the words and the words used themselves… and to be honest i think it was just a little local accent coming through. There were several moments were i had to pause and reason out if what i had read was right, when i said it outloud I could hear a bit of the accent and by changing my inflection of the words it made sense tht someone might say it that way. Anywho, fun book with much mutilation and body parts getting torn all to hell. Some of the things Hawg does are just damn gruesome… I quite like it. 
You can pick a copy of the book up in trade paperback from: http://gravesidetales.com/156/preorder-hawg-by-steven-shrewsbury/
Alright, that’s another blog in the can so to speak, onward and upwards right. I hope you all check out the Read Along and Hawg.
