#norse mythology is my comfort zone and if i have the opportunity to write about any characters remotely resembling norse gods

[stephs-bookshelf]

What are your favorite genres? I'm trying to get out of my reading comfort zone and read different genres. Can you recommend a few of your favorite books?

My favourite genre is definitely fantasy, I’ve read some great stuff recently including:

The Book of the Ancestor Trilogy by Mark Lawrence - starting with Red Sister, we follow Nona Grey who is 9 in the beginning of the first book but grows to 18 or so by the end of book 3. It focuses on the girls being trained to be killers at the Convent of Sweet Mercy. It’s fantastic and filled with really great female characters 

Kings of the Wyld by Nicholas Eames - I haven’t read book 2 yet but book 1 was amazing. The former members of a mercenary band all now in their 40′s get back together to go rescue one of their daughters who is trapped in a city surrounded by dangerous monsters. It’s funny and just a whole lot of fun. 

The Twisted Tree by Rachel Burgeons - a very atmospheric book about a girl who goes to Norway to visit her grandmother only to find that she is dead. It’s inspired by Norse mythology and it’s very good 

Vicious by V.E. Schwab - I’ll take any and every opportunity to recommend Vicious. Two pre med students discover the key to superpowers and become bitter enemies. It’s brilliant. 

Literally anything written by V.E. Schwab, she’s wonderful (she also writes under Victoria Schwab sometimes) 

And some non fantasy recs:

Truly Devious Trilogy by Maureen Johnson - An intelligent YA mystery thriller series about a girl who goes to a school with the goal of uncovering what happened to the founder of the school’s family when it was first opened. Seriously adore this series, it’s fantastic. 

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon - my favourite book of all time, this follows Daniel in post civil war Barcelona as he tries to discover why someone is going around burning every copy of every book written by an author of a book he owns. This book is beautiful and since we’re all stuck inside at the moment it’s great to read as Daniel goes all over Barcelona and even outside the city and it makes you feel like you’re right there with him. 

The Illuminae Files by Amie Kauffman and Jay Kristoff - A really great science fiction series about the survivors of a mining colony that is attacked by a big corporation and their attempt to get away from the company to raise the alarm about what they’ve done, oh and they have a potentially crazy Artificial Intelligence on their ship to deal with. This trilogy is fantastic and while yes there are some bits that feel very YA (the central characters are teenagers and they act like teenagers, it’s not surprising) it’s excellent and will have you rooting for the protagonists.

I hope this helps you to branch out and try something new! Enjoy your reading!

#anonymous #asks #thank you for asking me this #I love talking about books #thanks for giving me a chance to #please ask me more questions

[dotcollegeblog-blog]

Evaluation

During this project, I have changed many things as to ensure I made my project in the time limit and to a good standard. I recorded all of my research, production and changes on my Tumblr blog.

I feel over the course of this year my skills have developed significantly. At the beginning of the year I  had never used Adobe software or used a drawing tablet. I did not feel i would be able to grasp these skills very quickly but over the year I surprised myself more and more until i came to this project. This project opened up an opportunity for me. I had to decide whether to stick to the things i knew and stay in my comfort zone or if i wanted to try something newer that i was less confident.

When I started this project I looked at the definition of “thrive” and found that it originated in the Norse language. I did not know much about Norse mythology I just knew that it fit the theme we were given. This seemed, at first, like it wouldn’t get me anywhere as I didn’t identify with my audience and what they liked because I personally didn’t have much interest in the subject. I came to realise this would open up the opportunity to research something new and look at how I can use this information. During this research I learnt about the world tree and all the types of creatures that inhabited those worlds. The more I researched the more confident I became in the more I wanted to know about the subject. This was how I knew this was what I wanted to do for this project.

In my proposal I said I would be creating 9 characters based off of the worlds in Norse mythology. In the end I created 4 characters as I felt this would be more achievable in the time limit. I mentioned this in my Design Document when I made this decision. In doing this I allowed time for more detailed art style and back stories. Initially I was going to have a very simple lay out similar to that of the Margoth and Lolita images I used in my research (this can be found on my blog).  In the end I went for more of a book style approach of writing in paragraphs about their backstories as opposed to characteristics and personalities. I feel that allows my audience to connect with the characters more whereas the other way would just let the audience know useless facts and information.

I also mentioned in my proposal that I would be working on my digital art as it was not something I was confident in. During the concept art most of them were done with traditional methods but some of them were digital. I tried different styles and methods to find what I was most comfortable with whilst keeping in mind my goal of improving in digital art. I decided I would still use digital art, but go for a more sketchy style, as I feel I struggled too much with a cleaner art style but also because I feel it fit my project better.  

When I finished my project, I did a play test with my classmates to see what they thought and what they would change. Majority of the responses were very positive with only a few negative comments mostly about spelling and grammar which I fixed in my definitive version. The rest of the answers I was given were praising my efforts. These results were posted on my blog.

Overall, despite having to make changed and wanting to achieve more, I feel that my project meets the requirements given to us.  I also feel that if I were to continue with this project and create the other 5 characters this would be a professional product that my audience would enjoy and maybe even those who don’t usually like the things my audience like.