Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Wednesday Factoid: Interacting

Today's Wednesday Factoid is: How often do you interact with people of another race or ethnicity?

I guess just about every day? Of my three closest friends, one is a black man, and I talk to him just about every day (though most of our interaction is through text/social media and on the phone). Text-based messages are most of my interaction with everyone, though, so I count that as "interaction." My inner circle of family and friends beyond those three includes several people who are black, several people who are Latino, and a bunch of people who are Asian. I'm not one of those "LOL I don't see color" people, but while thinking about it, I was kinda irritated at the question for making me pick it apart in this context. Not really sure why. I also work in a small office and four of us are white and one is black, so I suppose that also "counts." 

I remember once the same black friend I'm referencing up there was in one of those oh-so-pleasant Facebook arguments with someone about diverse fiction, and the other person was claiming diversity in media is usually forced because in real life black people just don't hang out with white people really. He posted a picture of his friend group (containing different genders, different races, different body types, different sexual orientations, and different ability statuses), and got told his real life is an unrealistic diversity postcard.

A different question, though, is how often I am in a space where I am not the majority race/ethnicity, and that's very uncommon. I can only remember being in that situation when I visited Japan, when I visited and stayed with a friend's family, when I went to a black church to participate in a performance, and usually when I ride the bus in my city. I imagine my friends who aren't white who might blog about this question would answer similarly to me about how often they interact with people of another race or ethnicity, but that they would have the experience of being around LOTS of people different from them much more often than I do.

Tuesday, August 30, 2016

Good enough

I've always been kind of an artsy person. From early childhood I loved crafts, drawing, singing, music, writing, even dancing. But as I got older, I had to pick a direction, and it was pretty hard since I loved several arts.

I guess I eventually "picked" writing, with the intention of continuing to enjoy singing and drawing as a hobby. There were a lot of reasons for this--most notably, all those fields are notoriously competitive and low-paying unless you're one of a tiny number of elite, and writing involved the type of competition I could do from home without being expected to perform, travel much, or engage directly with other people as part of the job.

I've achieved a little success with writing. Getting an agent is nothing to sneeze at. Getting two agents is nothing to sneeze at twice. A book selling is great, even though it wasn't to a publisher in the Big Five and it wasn't fiction like I always wanted. I've sold several short stories. I'm good enough at this to be paid. And I'll probably keep going to the point that I do sell one of my fiction books. Maybe it'll be huge, and maybe it won't. Either way, that's what I'm doing.

But the other stuff? I drew all the time when I was a kid. When I was in high school I thought I was going to have a singing career (and I had reason to believe that, considering I consistently got into audition-only honor choirs, even in college). But now, I'm only pursuing writing as a career, and I'm content with doing those other two things as hobbies. I do an awful lot of both of them, too. I record a new karaoke song just about every week. I draw two webcomics (one weekly, one monthly) and have been doing a bunch of fan art lately.

And it's pretty consistent that people who aren't in those fields themselves tell me I should do those things professionally. I know enough about both to just kinda laugh at that--I don't think I'd even want to even if I could--but I'm not sure how to handle people's compliments without sounding like I'm being politely humble or maybe insulting the person who's trying to compliment me by suggesting they don't know what they're talking about. I mean, they kinda don't, I guess? They don't know how much better "real" singers and artists are than me, and they don't know how the ins and outs of that field aren't appealing to me. But it's hard to accept a compliment without kinda insulting myself with something like "It's really not that good." Which sounds empty, even though I truly believe it.

I know what I've put into writing, and I know that I'm probably not willing to put that into drawing or singing. You get what you pay for, so to speak. I haven't done the hours. And I guess I haven't done the . . . seriousness? I've never honestly looked into getting a job that made use of my singing or my drawing. Sometimes people pop up on my fanart postings and say I should work on a cartoon show or comment on my karaoke performances and tell me I should become a recording artist, but like . . . I don't even want those things. Or at least I don't think I do. And I don't think it's just intimidation because of all the talent out there, or I'd certainly be frightened into self-propelled obscurity in writing too since cheese knows there's a ridiculous number of talented authors scrambling for the same thing I am.

I don't have to do a thing professionally to do it fairly well and to enjoy doing it. I don't have to be trying to go somewhere money-making with a talent if it's just kinda better than most people but not on a professional level. I just like to doodle stuff and record covers. That's not a situation I perceive as "not doing anything" with it. If nothing else, it entertains me, I guess. That's good enough.

Saturday, August 27, 2016

Personal Digest Saturday: August 20 – August 26

Life news this week: 
  • Saturday I spent a bunch of time reading and processing Internet stuff. Then Eric came to pick me up for Drink and Draw and first we went to the Mini Doughnut Factory, which was new to me. We got a box of six donuts and each ate three, and then we had a great Drink and Draw! I got so much drawn there--finished my So You Write comic for next month, finished a sketch dump of pictures of Amethyst, and started a sketch of Garnet and Peridot because I'm a nerd. Eric drove me home and crashed at my place.
  • Sunday I went toy shopping, put a bunch of my mom's stuff on eBay for her, wrote a little bit of e-mail, and spent a bunch of time coloring my Drink and Draw sketch. Man, it came out much better than most of my drawings!
  • Monday was back to work. I was prepared for a rough week but in some ways it wasn't as bad as I expected and in other ways it was worse. I had a TON of stuff to do to help my team prepare for an interview and then ON TOP OF THAT I had three proposals to kickstart by myself. (I usually have a lot of help with them and just handle the administrative aspects, but this time I had to organize the content too and it was kinda like being tossed in the deep end.) I came in early and worked late almost every day of the week. All I did after work was clean up my drawing and post it, then be silly on the Internet.
  • Tuesday at work we got a visit from our corporate HR person and I had to deal with ordering lunch for the presentation as well as all the other stuff I was juggling. Was cool to meet Katrina though. We ate PDQ and I struggled with plotting stuff on a map all day. At home I did another drawing for the upcoming Thursday cartoon episode and got some reading done.
  • Wednesday Jeaux had something else he was going to do so I arranged to have Jeaux Day with him Thursday, and had my mom over instead. We ate spaghetti and later ate popsicles together. I drew some of my webcomic and we hung out together. I helped her with some health care stuff and that was about it.
  • Thursday was long work with fixing drawings, finally getting my proposal stuff for the first due date in a workable form, and finalizing a presentation board. Then I met Jeaux for Moe's burritos and to his house for cartoons. I was expecting a pretty emotional episode this week and yeah, I got it. (There were tears, but it wasn't too bad actually. And my favorite character finally had another song, and it was a duet!!! Seriously, even if you don't like/care about this show, this is a really good calm-down-handle-it song.) Then we decided to watch a couple episodes of the show Stranger Things because everyone's talking about it. It's pretty good. Victor called after I got home and I finished my drawings for the comic while talking to him.
  • Friday was a bit of a madhouse. My entire team went to an interview and left me at the office, and then there was a problem with the presentation and I had to do some quick tricks long distance to save the day, heehee. While they were gone I did a bunch of stuff for the proposal that needed to go out, and when they got back my office manager reviewed my work and made very few changes, yay! So I got my proposal out on time, and then on top of that the next one I needed to work on turned out to be inappropriate for our firm so we aren't going to respond after all. Less work for me, whew. I went home, posted my comic, and relaxed.

New reviews of my book:
  • None.
Interviews, Features, Mentions:
Reading progress:
    New singing performances:

    This week's performance was "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" by Whitney Houston. Sorry, this one's really not good. 

    New drawings:

    Completed at Drink and Draw: Amethyst sketch dump.
    Begun at Drink and Draw and completed the next day:
    Peridot and Garnet. My headcanon: Garnet thinks it's
    cute when Peridot claims to be the leader.

    Here's a side-by-side comparison to the original sketch from Drink and Draw:

    Picture for this week's episode: "Mindful Education."
    A mindful Stevonnie. :)

    I was texting progress on the drawing to Jeaux while I was doodling them. :)


    Webcomic Negative One Issue 0589: "The Ones Who Wrote Them Down."

    New videos:


    New photos:

    Mini donuts with Eric!
    Donut selfie!
    My usual sammich at Drink and Draw: VLT.
    I really like candy buttons.
    Aesthetic of the day: Classy with a hint of cartoon nerd.
    Bee dress with Cookie Cat necklace.
    Tiger Millionaire plushies exist and I got one!

    Social Media counts:
    YouTube subscribers: 5,349 for swankivy (5 new), 588 for JulieSondra (1 new). Twitter followers: 821 for swankivy (lost 1), 1,285 for JulieSondra (5 new). Facebook: 293 friends (1 new, Cheong friended me) and 199 followers (lost 2) for swankivy, 637 likes for JulieSondra (1 new), 55 likes for Negative One (no change), 126 likes for So You Write (no change). Tumblr followers: 2,469 (7 new). Instagram followers: 84 (2 new).

    Wednesday, August 24, 2016

    Wednesday Factoid: Sunday Routine

    Today's Wednesday Factoid is: What is your Sunday routine?

    I actually kinda have one. Unless I'm on vacation or someone's staying with me, it's usually something like this:

    • Get up when I want
    • Have coffee
    • Play online while waking up
    • Take a shower
    • Have breakfast
    • Play online some more until my hair is dry
    • Record a karaoke song and post it to my website
    • Start the laundry
    • Continue whatever projects or activities I started the day before
    After the morning/early afternoon routine, I don't really have specific Sunday plans. (Sometimes laundry gets pushed to the end of the day if I'm lazy or get caught up in something.) Sometimes I'll read, draw, nap, redecorate my house, make a new video for one of my channels, write, do website stuff, spend too much time on Tumblr, talk on the phone, or watch stuff on YouTube. I don't often go out on Sundays. I just like to stay in and get stuff done.


    Tuesday, August 23, 2016

    Not about me

    I have a short and kind of whiny thing to post about today.

    There are people in my life for whom I am a certain kind of invisible because I'll never date them.

    I'm not particularly sad about this. Not to sound like a cliché, but it's their loss if I can't be important to them unless I'm their romantic partner.

    But it does kinda sting sometimes when I'm reminded that for people who think that way, I don't really count in the scheme of things. A while back, a friend talked to me for a long time about romantic troubles, then immediately afterwards wrote some stuff on their blog about how they have "no one" in their lives and are completely alone, etc. I guess I might as well have been a statue for all it mattered, even though I was being a friend and listening. I've also repeatedly had friends suddenly disappear from my life without explanation when they start dating someone, and then when I'm there to distract them or comfort them after the breakup, I'm suddenly worth paying attention to again (until they meet the next person).

    [Sometimes I feel like Patsy up there.]

    This is a problem for anyone who has, shall we say, possibly immature and/or insensitive/oblivious friends. I know it's not a particularly rare problem. And to be honest I'm 100% on board for people having their intensely distracted/infatuated phase in a new relationship. I just, you know, expect them to still treat me like I'm important too once they've recalibrated their balances. I definitely don't want to be the disposable friend that you put in a box until you need someone to spend time with. I want to be a person to you, not a convenience or a provider of a service. 

    This is especially hard for people like me who don't have romantic relationships. I really don't like feeling like I must have been something amusing to do in between what really matters. And I also hate that when I talk about wanting to be valued and treated respectfully, some people misinterpret that as romantic jealousy. In other words, "You wouldn't be jealous about it if you weren't secretly in love with him." Well, there are different versions of love, and I give my love in ways that sometimes cost me quite a lot. When I'm taught by certain folks that my sacrifice and care isn't even on their radar because I'm not their girlfriend, would you believe it stings a little?

    But I tend not to unload these troubles on my friends because when they're talking about their own troubles, they're not going to be receptive to mine. And I don't want to make their issues about me. I might feel used or ignored or dumped, but the reason it hurts is that I care about the person who did it, and when they come back, I so often want to continue supporting them and giving them more chances. They don't do this because they're bad, I remind myself. They don't do it because they mean to. But they do it. And every time they do, I do find myself giving less. Being less invested the second time around. And even though I'm making it about me here on my blog while not invoking any certain person's name, I know better than to make them deal with my disappointment in them. If I ever do bring it up, it won't be while they're having a crisis. I can handle getting treated like garbage without internalizing it. I know better than to believe I deserve to be treated like that. Many people don't. Many of the people I'm talking about here don't. 

    I don't need it to be about me. I don't need that from them.

    I guess it's just sad that if I did need it, they wouldn't be there for me.

    It makes me appreciate those who reciprocate comfortably and value me in their lives even more.

    Saturday, August 20, 2016

    Personal Digest Saturday: August 13 – August 19

    Life news this week: 

    New reviews of my book:
    • None.
    Interviews, Features, Mentions:
    • None.
    Reading progress:
    • Currently reading: Dumplin' by Julie Murphy.
      New singing performances:

      This week's performance was "Asleep" by the Smiths

      New drawings:

      My old-timey Gems doodle from "Buddy's Book."

      Webcomic So You Write Issue 62: "Slipped Through."

      Webcomic Negative One Issue 0588: "Time Away."

      New videos:



      New photos:

      Me with my first love: candy.

      Jeaux's game at my house while he's recovering.


      And the haircut comparison photos:

      Front, February 2014
      Front, August 2016
      Back, February 2014
      Back, August 2016
      Social Media counts:

      Wednesday, August 17, 2016

      Wednesday Factoid: Back to the Land

      Today's Wednesday Factoid is: What "Back to the Land" skills do you have, or wish you had?

      Oh, that's easy! I have basically none!

      I'd be, like, the WORST person to do one of those wilderness challenge things with because I'm completely useless outside a city with the comforts of home. I don't really even do camping that well.

      To be honest, I don't actively wish I had any "back to the land" skills. I know that developing them takes work and experience, and those are not the things I want to devote my life to. I think it's good that some people enjoy them and can take care of themselves outside the city and with no electricity or whatever, though I tend to be a little skeptical of interacting too much with people who look down on city living. I'm really thinking of a particular subset of them who believe that "the end" of urban life is coming and that when everything explodes, only they and people like them will be able to survive, and they love talking about and yearning for the death and destruction that will wipe out modern conveniences and crown them the knowledgeable, competent ones. Them and their guns, you know.

      People who want to live in more natural, connected-to-the-Earth communities don't bother me that way at all. Especially since most of the commune people recognize this is a choice they've made, not a superior lifestyle that they wish people would be forced into.

      As for skills I'd like to be able to have, I think the one I'd like most is to be able to competently grow my own food. I've had very little luck with this even with trying to grow herbs, and I think it would be cool to have a vegetable garden. As such, I've just raised a few things in pots.

      It would also be kinda cool to be able to start a fire cuz that's awesome. But I very much doubt I'll be doing that without a lighter anytime soon. :)

      Tuesday, August 16, 2016

      A person

      My friend Jeaux just had (minor-ish) surgery and I'm helping him out in a few ways. I went to the hospital with him, sat with him before the procedure, held onto his stuff (someone's gotta keep your glasses and your phone, you know?), helped him get dressed after (well, just his socks and shoes), and let him recover at my house. It's not that he couldn't be alone or needed anything, but a) his apartment is a second-floor apartment and he's not supposed to climb stairs, and b) it's always good to have someone around to help you with stuff and observe you to make sure you're okay after something like this.

      I got him a couple things at the store, cooked his dinner, hung out with him while he played video games, watched some silly videos with him, took his temperature when we were worried he might have a fever (probably not though), and bothered him with a bunch of questions about how he's feeling. He seems to be doing great, even though the recovery stuff is Very Gross and I won't go into why. (I have given him his own trash can for bloody things, and that's all I'll say.) He's taking care of his own Actual Medical Stuff so I don't have to do anything really except help him with little things, but if he did need help with something, I'd try even if it was pretty gross.

      I don't mind helping at all, but he keeps saying thanks for all this and even gave me a hug last night. (We don't really hug much, though we don't have a policy or anything. We're just both not cuddly people.) I just say I'm glad he trusts me enough to be there for him during a sort of vulnerable time. We trust each other and can depend on each other. He's not my boyfriend, my partner, or my husband, but he's sort of my Person.

      It's nice to have a Person to trust. But what's weird is that people think if we have that sort of confidence and trust in each other, we must have (or just probably have) a physically and/or sexually intimate relationship. At the hospital, they told Jeaux to get in his hospital gown and then just shut the curtain with me in there with him. Like it was obvious that if a girl was with him for support, she belonged in the room with him while he was naked.

      I just stepped outside the curtain and waited 'til he was done. I don't need to see him strip. Like eeeeeew.

      (Just kidding, kind of, because we don't mind like changing our pants in front of each other or whatever, but it's mostly because neither of us care to look. It's hard to explain, but I guess neither of us is uncomfortable doing stuff in front of each other that you don't do in front of strangers or acquaintances partly because we really have no desire to put those actions into intimate/sexual context. If that makes sense.)

      Jeaux reminded me that if I ever have to have surgery he'll be there for me too. But besides that, we can sort of expect that each other will be around for such things as having a plus-one for things to make them less boring, having someone to ask for advice or help, and having someone there for the things you need a Person for--someone who knows when you don't want them there, too. We understand each other's boundaries really well. We both prefer low amounts of social interaction and enjoy our weekly hangouts partly because we're so well prepared for how long they'll last. Neither of us is clingy or sullenly expecting more time or attention than we get from one another. We just really found a balance that works, and we fulfill each other's needs really well.

      But even though he's an important lifelong friend, the flavor of our feelings isn't romantic and never has been. And he has never once tried to move our relationship toward something more traditional--not even when we first met and men are most likely to interpret any feelings they have for a woman as sexual/romantic. He never presented me with those desires or acted like I was supposed to deal with them. He never acted like it should just be expected that a heterosexual man will desire an attractive woman no matter what and just expect her to live with knowing he would like it better if they were romantically/sexually involved. Jeaux has never, not once, treated me like my asexuality and aromanticism are some impediment to our closeness.

      And of course there are still people (including some who should know better) who insist that he is surely hiding these feelings from me, or that inevitably he and I will just decide to stop being special snowflake friends and get married like everybody else, or that there's something inappropriate about us being each other's Person if we're not romantically involved. I've even heard people say that without that romantic bond and/or stated romantic commitment, you can't trust that the other person will be there for you. It is this bond and only this bond that guarantees that support.

      Funny, since I've seen declared commitments (up to and including marriage) get violated and fail to hold up under stress all the time, and yet we seem to be handling "in sickness and in health" pretty well for people who aren't married. True, this is minor and will pass, and I can't guarantee I'd be in a position to help him if he, say, became permanently disabled and needed a caregiver, but I can say with certainty we'd both help each other to the greatest extent we could if we ever faced a really bad situation. We've already proved that we step up to the plate for each other.

      I'm rambling again but I guess my point is a) partnerships you can trust can come in flavors other than sexual/romantic and b) Jeaux's pretty great and I kinda resent that people don't respect our relationship's depth because we're not involved that way.

      I hope I never NEED to have a Person step up to help me, but I like knowing he's there.

      Saturday, August 13, 2016

      Personal Digest Saturday: August 6 – August 12

      Life news this week: 
      • Even though it was no fun going back to work after vacation, it helped that I had awesome cartoons to watch. :) Like, imagine you're a football person and the Super Bowl is a huge exciting event for you. Then imagine it goes on every day for a month. Except it's only 11 minutes long. That's what this month has been. It's weird and distracting.
      • Saturday I had to pack up my stuff and leave with my friends. We did some toy shopping, and then Meggie and Katelyn had to leave to go visit her mom and go back to Jacksonville. I processed pictures for most of the free time that day and did my blogging. Then just watched cartoon reactions on YouTube.
      • Sunday was a nice lazy day, though I did a bunch of stuff too--laundry, karaoke, drawings, unpacking. I talked to my sister and Mom, made some tofu, and just decompressed, I guess.
      • Monday I dug myself out of a ditch at work, but it wasn't too bad at all--I finished my backlog of stuff the same day. Then I went shopping, went to Jeaux's house for Steven Universe double episodes "Beta" and "Earthlings" (holy crap, "Earthlings" was intense!), and then watched Jeaux play the new video game No Man's Sky over Skype. He has been excited about this game for more than a year and now he can finally play. YAY! Also a poster I special-ordered came--a limited edition Steven Universe art print. Gotta get that framed.
      • Tuesday was kind of a joke. I played a bunch of silly online quizzes. At Jeaux's, we had more pizza and watched "Back to the Moon" (another really good episode!) and the season finale to the first season of Wrecked. Then I went home and hung out with my mom. We had some pasta and I put some of her cool dishes up for sale on eBay. Oh, and I bought some toys online.
      • Wednesday I bought more toys and had more down time, ate at PDQ with Jeaux (I had a grilled cheese!), watched the episode "Bubbled," and hung out with Jeaux longer than usual because he was on vacation so he didn't have to run off to work. I did some more drawings.
      • Thursday was a little busy at work. At Jeaux's I ate popcorn and watched him play his video game until cartoons came on. We watched the episode "Kindergarten Kid" and I went home, talked to Mom, and talked to Victor on the phone while finishing up the comic.
      • Friday I did a bunch of business development stuff at the office, then watched "Know Your Fusion" at Jeaux's while eating an entire bag of cheese popcorn. Then I went home and posted my comic and didn't do much but talk about cartoons online and hang around being a dork. I have gotten tired early every day this week, and I keep waking up early too. Isn't that the opposite of what vacation is supposed to do?

      New reviews of my book:
      Interviews, Features, Mentions:
      Reading progress:
      • Finished this week: Nothing. See above notes about comparing cartoons to the Super Bowl.
      • Currently reading: Dumplin' by Julie Murphy.
        New singing performances:

        This week's performance was "Walk This World" by Heather Nova

        New drawings:

        Did a bunch of more-detailed-than-usual drawings to celebrate the last week of Summer of Steven episodes. These were each drawn as sort of "guesses" about each episode's content focus, so I could use them in my Facebook posts to talk about episodes.

        Day 16: Peridot and Lapis being nerds,
        with Amethyst and Steven in the background.
        Episodes: "Beta" and "Earthlings."
        Day 17: Rubies going to the moon!
        Episode: "Back to the Moon."
        Day 18: Steven in a bubble.
        Episode: "Bubbled."
        Day 19: Peridot determined to conquer a monster in the Kindergarten.
        Episode: "Kindergarten Kid."
        Day 20: Garnet and Pearl opposite Amethyst and Steven,
        with their Fusions silhouetted behind them.
        Episode: "Know Your Fusion."

        Webcomic Negative One Issue 0587: "Not For You."

        New videos:


        New photos:

        My shirt for Day 16 of the marathon, watching "Beta" and "Earthlings."
        My new limited edition poster.
        Jeaux playing No Man's Sky while I watch on Skype.
        My shirt for Day 17 of the marathon, watching "Back to the Moon."
        My shirt for Day 18 of the marathon, watching "Bubbled."
        My shirt for Day 19 of the marathon, watching "Kindergarten Kid."
        My shirt for Day 20 of the marathon, watching "Know Your Fusion."
        Social Media counts:
        YouTube subscribers: 5,352 for swankivy (no change), 583 for JulieSondra (4 new). Twitter followers: 821 for swankivy (9 new), 1,273 for JulieSondra (1 new). Facebook: 291 friends (lost 1? or maybe a certain person deactivated again?) and 201 followers (1 new) for swankivy, 637 likes for JulieSondra (1 new), 55 likes for Negative One (no change), 125 likes for So You Write (1 new). Tumblr followers: 2,464 (lost 3). Instagram followers: 82 (2 new).

        Wednesday, August 10, 2016

        Wednesday Factoid: Childhood Creations

        Today's Wednesday Factoid is: What things did you create when you were a child?

        All kinds, guys!

        I used my construction toys to make a robot family and conceived their various evolutions from one form to another (long before Pokémon existed). I made a weird board game out of paper that caused a babysitter to call me "The next Steven Spielberg" (which irritated my mom because she didn't want me to be "the next" anything). I (with the help of my sisters) made a juice concoction from all the drinkable substances in the house and named it Wee Punch. (I do not remember why, but we had a list of the ingredients and sometimes begged Mom to let us buy them even though the punch itself was kind of gross tasting.) I made a game with my friend about a kidnapper who made us cook for him, whom we escaped by feeding him a bomb. I made macrame, finger-knitting ropes, and friendship bracelets. I made illustrated stories about girls who did things. I made dollhouse furniture and holiday cards with poems in them. I made tacky earrings from beads. I made taped recordings of music I made up or attempted harmonies to existing songs. I made time capsules. I made hats out of paper.

        Mostly, though, it was probably drawings. 

        Age 5, self portrait
        Age 5, representation of my dad reading the paper on the toilet

        Probably first grade or something, self portrait

        Age 7 or 8, random braid girl

        Age 7 or 8, random ballerina

        Age 8 or 9, Popples fan art
        Age 8 or 9, depiction of my youngest sister's face whenever she got her way
        Age 10, a mermaid
        Middle school, attempted realism
        Middle school sometime, random market square
        An adorable cover for what became my very first completed novel