March 2020 | A.S. Akkalon - Fantasy Author

What we all need right now: pictures of cute animals

We’re living through a momentous time in history, which means that right now life is scary and it sucks. I know you don’t want to hear more about the coronapocalypse, so here are some cute animals to brighten your day.

I wanted to write a blog post to reach out to people who are having a hard time in the pandemic–and that’s a lot of people–but the last thing most people want to hear is more about coronavirus. And that’s a problem, because right now coronavirus is all I can think about.

Finally I figured out a solution: cute animal pictures.

You’re welcome.

What you can learn from a thousand times

I believe you can become awesome at the stomping unicorn backhand–or many other things–in just one day. Here’s how.

I heard a great story once.

The story

A visiting instructor once gave a two-day seminar at my tennis** club, and he told us about a similar seminar he’d given at a different club.

** The sport has been changed to protect the identities of the innocent. I don’t know tennis from snail polo.

On the first day, he’d taught the class a move called the stomping unicorn backhand. Most of the more advanced students were familiar with the stomping unicorn, but it was sparkling new for the less experienced students.

The kind of book I love to read and want to write

I describe my ideal book–a high fantasy novel that takes me on an emotional journey–and offer to beta read for you if you wrote it. Or if you’re nice.

When friends in real life ask me what kind of books I write, I tell them “fantasy with dragons”. This has the benefit of being a) true and b) uninformative.

What? Not all books have dragons?

The short answer is that I write the kinds of books I most like to read. (Doesn’t everyone?)

Here’s the long answer about what I love to read and try to write.

The glorious driveway from hell strikes again

I explain why for three months I’ve been walking nearly a km between my house and my car each day. The driveway did it.

November was an exciting month.

An electrical storm knocked out our power for two days, broke our internet for a month, and washed out our driveway.

You remember the driveway. Eight hundred metres winding up a hill through native bush, home to quail, glow worms, New Zealand freshwater crayfish, and a rabbit called Nicholas Augustus.

But I was talking about November.