Category: Writing

End of 2025

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
My Tops for 2025

I was happy with the reader response to Entry 79: “Hagfish”—the final entry of the first journal of My Darling Tragedy. They were surprised with how the journal ended. After taking a break to work on the other novel (Forever Candy) I’m doing my best to get caught up with My Darling Tragedy. The first three entries of the second journal have already posted, and I have six more ready. But I need to get to eight in pocket to feel comfortable. I’m on winter recess from work right now, so that gives me more time to write, but because of a project I have due in January, I also must work in the office while everyone else is out on break.

I’ve done a lot of story building already for the second journal, much more than I did at this point with the first journal. I think the second journal will appeal most to readers who, among the trilogy, preferred Scribbling the Eternal. There’s going to be a few storylines going. I’m even writing some of the Yelena/Marcel story which I received requests for as a prequel after The Scribbled Victims was published.

I’ve kept up walking at least 5,000 steps per day. Today’s walk will be 70 days in a row. I’m generally getting between 7,000 and 8,000 steps each day. I see my doctor tomorrow. He’ll be happy. A recent blood test showed dramatic improvements. At this rate, maybe I’ll live long enough to write ten journals.

This is my last blog post of 2025 which means I must mention my favorite reads for the year. Number one would be The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. I had read it in 2014, but it hit me a lot harder this year as I think I paid more attention to the writing than only the story. My runner up read of the year would be The Vagrants by Li Yiyun. This year, I also want to mention the music I listened to. I’m certain my most listened to song was Almond Chocolate by ILLIT; it even appears in Entry 45: “Petals” of My Darling Tragedy. But my Spotify Year-End summary notified me I was the 533 top listener of ILLIT globally. I knew I listened to them a lot (I’m listening right now while writing this), but I had no idea I’d rank that high when they have millions of listeners. That made me happy.

This post makes 2025 sound good, and in some ways, it was, but overall, I think it was a sad year, considering the state of the world—open genocide, wars, famine, wealth inequality—and here at home with the continued dismantling of our democracy and our acceptance of racist policies. I’m hoping 2026 will bring with it some repairs, but I don’t believe a single year can bring enough.

Different Directions

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
For my birthday, an artist drew me.

It took me longer to listen to all the My Darling Tragedy entries from the first journal. It wasn’t because of extensive note taking while listening, it was because I’ve been exhausted and stressed from my day job. But last weekend, I finished writing the first entry of the second journal. I’m five weeks behind in my writing schedule. I’m hoping to shave that down to three weeks behind if I can cram during the Thanksgiving weekend.

Next month, I’m hosting a Zoom meetup for my Patreon patrons to discuss the first journal of MDT. Today, I made a little game for us to play. I’m also holding a contest for my patrons to guess which character name the second journal will begin with. There’s even a prize that I have yet to reveal but have been working on for a couple of weeks.

On Halloween, I spent $50 on candy and didn’t get to pass out a single piece because no one came to the door. On November 5, I turned fifty-three. I don’t feel any wiser. My heart has been hurting a lot lately thinking about poverty and hunger in the world. It feels so unjust, especially when some people have so much. My shrink advises I limit my exposure to the news because of how it affects my mood, but I saw on Bluesky that DOGE was cancelled. I’m hoping this will mean the immediate return of USAID. I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned it in this blog, but earlier this year I began sponsoring a child living in poverty in the Philippines. My shrink says I’m doing more than most people, but it doesn’t feel like enough. Still, she’s very special to me. I sent her a Christmas gift today.

I’ve kept my walking streak going. Yesterday was day 36 of getting at least 5,000 steps, and usually I get around 7,000. The streak is a good motivator, and the new Apple Watch is a good accountability partner. My doctor was happy I’m making efforts.

I wish I had more to report about what I’m writing but it feels like there’s not much going on. But I do believe my readers will be surprised to see some of the different directions where the second journal will venture.

Before I sign off, can I say I’m already obsessed with the new ILLIT song called NOT CUTE ANYMORE that released yesterday. I’ve seen people post the that the song is too short, but I don’t see that as an issue, especially when you can just listen to it on repeat.

Walking Pace

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
My new Apple Watch that I’m hoping will encourage me to exercise.

In my September blog post, I mentioned I was going to take some time off from writing My Darling Tragedy to do a writing sprint of a new novel. I decided to give myself 40 days to write as much as I could of the new novel. The first five days started as a sprint, where I was just trying to get down as many words as possible each day. But I pushed myself so hard on the fourth day, netting 2,339 words, that I felt exhausted and began to dread working at this pace. So, I decided not to push as hard and jog, but after day eleven I realized I was jumping around in the story, writing so many scraps that I began to lose sight of the story’s length and pacing. So, I started over, borrowed from the scraps what I could, and wrote at what felt like my normal walking pace. It’s now day 26 and I have only 5,408 usable words. So, it didn’t turn out to be much of a sprint, but I believe I got something important done—I worked out two of the three POV issues I had when I tried to write this book two times before. I’m also writing in a new style. 

Speaking of walking paces, last week I bought an Apple Watch for the sole purpose of it encouraging me to get steps in. Right now, I’m starting slow, trying to get 5,000 steps in per day for 30 days in a row. It’s only been six days, but I’ve achieved it every day. If I succeed in reaching 30 days, I’ll probably increase it. Since I began writing My Darling Tragedy in April 2024, I’ve gotten nearly no exercise. Now that I’ve taken this MDT writing break, I’m hoping to work exercise into my daily routine.

My 40-day break ends November 9. To be honest, I’m starting to panic about going back to My Darling Tragedy. What is the story arc of the second journal? There are things I know I want to do, but I don’t really have an overarching story, and I don’t want to just meander in Orly’s grief without some kind of structure behind it. I have an app on my phone that reads PDF files aloud. Before I begin writing, I’m going to listen to the first journal all the way through. It’s more effective for me to listen to it than read through it as I’m too accustomed to what the words look like on screen and end up skimming. I’m hoping the listening will spark some new ideas.

I recently got new patrons on the MDT Patreon page. They’re flying through the journal entries, and the comment sections are blowing up. It feels good to see readers engaging with my work. I’m grateful to have them.

Winging It

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
This is the vegan sushi I went out for at Tama Sushi in Huntington Beach after my flight was canceled.

I’m currently writing the final entry of the first journal in My Darling Tragedy. I’ve already been at it for two weeks and will likely need one more week. I had taken some time off work to fly up to San Francisco to get a feel for Crissy Field as I need to write about it, and it’s been years since I’ve been there. On Friday, I was waiting in the airport terminal watching my flight be delayed four times before finally being canceled. So now I’m trying to just wing it with the help of Google and Google Earth. It’ll probably be less detailed than I had planned, but so far, I don’t think the entry is suffering too much as the mood is being set more by conflict than setting.  

I’m considering this the final entry as this is where I would end if I were to publish My Darling Tragedy as a book. But the online journal will continue on Patreon as well as the free platforms Royal Road and Substack. However, when I finish this entry, I may take four to six weeks off to do a writing sprint of a new novel, just to see how much of a first draft I can get down in that time. I have nine weeks of journal entries already written, so an attempt at a new novel shouldn’t impact the publishing schedule of MDT.

Other than that, I haven’t been doing much other than reading, overeating, watching Terrace House again, and listening to ILLIT and BABYMONSTER.

If you’re not reading My Darling Tragedy online and missed the hints above about it now being on free platforms, please click on the links above and check it out!

A Good Rejection

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
Flower Buds painting by Neil Carroll
A painting I recently purchased from Neil Carroll, an artist I follow on Instagram. I love square paintings and oil on panel is my favorite medium. I’m often inspired by art.

Since my last blog post, I slipped from being eleven weeks ahead of my publishing schedule to ten weeks. I don’t want to make excuses, but at the beginning of August I had Covid. It was the third time I’ve had it, and the symptoms were comparatively the most severe. The worst part is that I was extremely tired for weeks and was sleeping thirteen hours each night. I did still write every day, mostly to uphold my streak which is currently 654 days in a row, but my overall word count was low.

But Covid isn’t the only reason for my reduced productivity. I’ve been struggling a bit to write lately because I love Orly and I’m at a point where things are going to happen that are going to hurt her, and it hurts me to hurt her. I ran into this problem especially while writing Scribbles of the Empress, because Orly was grieving so hard and for most of the writing, I didn’t know if she was going to survive the book.

In other news, the short story I wrote titled My First Scribble, which is sort of an Orly origin story has been rejected by a few journals so far, including Electric Literature, but I received a note from the editor telling me it was close to being selected for publication and she gave me some encouragement. Even though it was a rejection, her words boosted my confidence.

I’m well now and will keep writing. My Darling Tragedy is nearing 100K words and I may try to daydream up another short story.

Hope, Hope, Hope

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
Manga drawing from Orly's Journals
A scene from Orly’s Journals Entry 33: “Hanabi”

Since my last post, I wrote two more short stories. The first, entitled Yote, is about my childhood best friend Gote. I wrote it in response to a call for submissions by The Sun for stories about nicknames. I felt so good about the story that I submitted it to two other journals as well.

Inspired by the No Kings protests, I wrote another story entitled Five Years. My beta reader and ChatGPT had strong, positive reactions. I haven’t sent it anywhere yet but hope to next week.

In an attempt to cheer myself up, I commissioned a manga artist to do a drawing from Orly’s Journals. I just saw the final yesterday and am very happy with it.

Speaking of Orly’s Journals, I’m currently 10 weeks ahead, and am currently writing Entry 66. I also added two new perks to my Patreon. The first is that I’m now posting screenshares of me writing, to show my writing process. The second is that I’m now calling out my favorite sentence/passage posted during the month and explaining what it means to me.

So, if you’re not part of my Patreon, I hope you’ll check that out. I hope you’ll also wish me luck with finding a publisher for my two new stories. Finally, I hope you like the manga illustration from Orly’s Journals Entry 33: “Hanabi.”

Forever Yours, Button

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
ChatGPT made me this graphic

I sent My First Scribble to three literary journals but have since stopped submitting. The reason is because I entered it into The Masters Review Anthology Contest and they don’t allow simultaneous submissions. It’s a contest for emerging writers. It’s a total longshot but it could potentially gain me a lot of visibility if my story was one of the ten selected.

Between wanting to keep submitting and since Fractured Lit just announced a flash fiction contest, I wrote another story on Friday called Forever Yours, Button. It’s a short story told from Mayuko’s perspective. At 213 words, it ended up being micro fiction instead of flash fiction, so I plan to submit it to other journals or enter a micro fiction contest.

I’d like to share both stories with you here, but I can’t publish them anywhere until I hear back from everywhere I’m submitting. Hopefully when you read them it’ll be on a journal website.  

Again, please wish me luck.

My First Scribble

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
An AI generated image for my short story My First Scribble
ChatGPT drew this for me.

This week I wrote a short story called My First Scribble. If you guessed that it’s a story about Orly, you are correct. But it does not use the word “vampire” once. This is because Orly is only six years old in the story and is not yet a vampire and has not yet met Yelena. The story is about the first time she learns of her ability to see the evil in others in her scribbling. Does that count as an origin story?

It’s short, approximately 1,400 words. It’s meant to work as a standalone story and will hopefully appeal even to those who have never read her trilogy or journals. I plan to send it out to literary journals and hope one will accept it for publication. Until that happens or until I’ve had my fill of rejection slips, I won’t be able to share the story. I hope you don’t mind me telling you about it anyway.

Please wish me luck.

Ahead

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
My new MacBook Air
My new MacBook Air

I ordered a new MacBook Air. Even though I probably didn’t need to, I splurged on an M3 processor because I figure I’ll have this laptop for at least six years. I had to wait longer for it to arrive because I also ordered 1TB of storage. But even after it arrived, it took me 17 days to open the box, because getting new things (especially tech stuff) often stresses me out. But I finally opened the box and on Saturday, I wrote in public again for the first time in weeks.

I took this week off from work to write. I had been struggling recently and slipped behind in schedule to where I was only six weeks ahead. Though I’ve been spending a lot of my break sleeping, I’m working very hard while I am awake and am already again eight weeks ahead. At the outset, it was my goal to end up ten weeks ahead, but at the rate I’m going, maybe I’ll end up ahead by eleven weeks.

I’m pretty happy with how Orly’s Journals is going again. I did end up slowing things down a little, or at least it feels like it’s going in that direction. I’ve given a longer view to her relationships with Vance and Silviu and it’s made things feel more real and less constructed.

Right now, I’m at Starbucks, listening to Deafheaven, sitting at a communal table where three highschoolers are shooting a boomerang of them doing a cheers with their grande cups, and my phone is blowing up with MS Teams messages. (Apparently someone Zoom bombed the Budget Forum today and something inappropriate appeared on screen—the things you miss out on while on vacation.) I just finished Entry 48: “Cap” which I began writing yesterday. It’s a complicated entry and was difficult to get the ending right.  

I might write more later, but now, I think I’m going to switch gears and read War and Peace. My second goal during my vacation was to finish it. I’m in the Epilogue now. My third goal was to go to the gym every day for just 30 minutes, but that hasn’t happened once. I think the chances would increase if I didn’t sleep so much.

I was just thinking… If I could ever get enough weeks ahead, maybe twenty, maybe I’d step away and try to do a writing sprint of Forever Candy just to get it all down and then I could clean it up at a slower pace while writing Orly. I really want to write that story. It’s just a thought, but maybe I should make it a goal.

 

 

Slow Down?

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi
My Instagram post honoring my MacBook Air
My Instagram post honoring my MacBook Air

This past weekend, I wrote six hours on Saturday and seven hours on Sunday. The whole time I was working on Orly’s Journals Entry 43: “Obscure.” It felt like a difficult entry to reach a point where I felt satisfied. But overall, I think writing the journals is going well. I’m maintaining a pace of completing one entry per week and am still eight weeks ahead of the publishing schedule. I don’t know how they’re reading though. Instinctively, I feel like things have become compressed, with too much happening in too small a space. I mean this for the relationships Orly is developing. I feel like things should be progressing slower so that they have more time to take root into something that feels lasting because it’s now deep. But I’m also wary of slowing things down as I don’t think it will appeal to the journal readers. I feel like I’ve lost my global view of the story, and though that’s uncomfortable, part of me is okay with it because it’s a serial and feels closer to real life where everything can’t be planned, things unexpectedly pop up, and your short-term goals shift quickly. But I really do wish I had a better feel for what the reader experience is like.

Sunday morning, I was writing at Starbucks and my MacBook Air crashed twice, both times causing me to lose text. I’ve had the laptop since 2014 and apparently, it’s going to continue to crash because I haven’t been able to update the OS since 2023. So, I’ve decided to retire it as I can’t continue to lose text while writing. I feel very grateful though for all this laptop has given me. The entire Black Wax Vampire Trilogy and The Last Midnight were written on it over thousands of hours (I’m guessing). But until I replace it, I’ll do all my writing at home on my Mac Mini.