3-Day Novel Contest

The 3-Day Novel Contest is one of the coolest parts of my writing career. (It took a lot of effort not to put “career” in sarcastic quotation marks.) For those of you who’ve never heard about this awesome contest, it’s basically like running a marathon, just with way less physical exertion.

Every year on Labor Day Weekend, participants write a novel from scratch. They start at midnight on Friday and end at midnight on Monday. Within that time frame, you either finish a half-decent novel or give up in shame. Or option number three: type the same sentence over and over until your wife—played by a young Shelley Duvall—interrupts your writing process and starts screaming “You’re scaring me, Jack!” until you chase her through a hedge maze. It’s crazy-making; it really is.

Anyway, I’ve entered this contest for the last three years, and it’s been awesome. I wrote a haunted house book, a monster book, and (my favorite) a sci-fi fairy tale. Sadly, I wasn't able to enter the contest this year, because I was flying from Russia back to China. But I'm totally going to be entering it this year. And you should too! Go ahead. I dare ya. You’ll thank yourself. (The makers of Red Bull energy drinks will thank you, too.)

And not to toot my own horn or anything (in a blog that’s all about me), but remember that sci-fi fairy tale story from a few sentences back? Well, it was a top-ten finalist for the 2012 contest. It definitely had its problems, but I'm really proud of it, especially the written-in-three-days part. I’m still submitting it to different publishers, so keep your eyes open.

Haunted Zoo!

  

If you’re ever in LA and you have a free afternoon, go to the LA Zoo. And no, I’m not talking about the current zoo. I’m talking about the creepy, abandoned zoo that’s just a few minutes away from the current one. All the cages and enclosures are still standing, but everything is slightly overgrown, glass-strewn, and graffiti-covered.

  

Holy crap, this place was moody. I felt like I just walked into an episode of Scooby Doo. I went with some local friends (not imaginary), and we walked through the cages for a good couple hours. Unfortunately, you couldn’t hear the lonely screams of ghost bears, because there were tons of tourists wandering around. I think we saw three separate movie crews (UCLA students, probably) filming stuff in some of the more cinematic areas. Still, it was an awesome day. And I finally met my spirit animal.

  

She was a tortoise.

science

 

Another marker drawing. This time, I wanted to capture my conflicted feelings about going to the doctor when I was a kid. It was always exciting and a little scary. And every time I had to take some medicine, I always knew that there was the slightest chance that I'd turn green or invisible.

In short, I loved medicine.

gnome and friend

Hands

sprite

pray

wave

mermaid and friend

Scream

happy monster.

FAMILY PORTRAIT

This is my high-school-era experiment with a Sharpee and a ball-point pen.

SHACK

I would be an awful architect.

SCIENTIST

My freshman year science teacher.

CLOUDS

Kids playing in the clouds.

(I had extra strips of tracing paper and this is what I did with them.)

Dinner Time!