Communication is one of the first things we learned to do as children. It’s an essential part of our lives, so much so we’ve discovered ways to make communication easier no matter what language you speak if you speak at all. Despite its grand importance, one of the things people struggle with most in their relationships is just that, communication.

Communication all begins with expectations. We expect our work acquaintances to interact with us on a superficial level while also maintaining boundaries on more touchy topics, like politics or religion. We put our friends on a higher pedestal. Not only do we expect cordial conversations, we expect a level of acceptance no matter how our opinions differ.

With friends, a new dynamic is introduced into our relationships, reaching out. While in our superficial relationships, we don’t expect and sometimes don’t want to receive a random call checking in. In our friendships, there’s a level of expectation to be valued.

Here’s where communication gets tricky. Being valued means different things to different people. One person finds value in being able to maintain a relationship without constant verbal communication. These relationships become more valuable the busier you get. Knowing someone is going to be there no matter how much time has passed is a great feeling.

On the other hand, people find value in being remembered. Even people with the above feelings may fall into this category as well. Being remembered is about people thinking to include you. It’s about getting that random phone call asking how life is going. In some ways, it’s what everyone wants in their life, a friend that always remembers them.

I could go on about problems with communication for days. The takeaway is, communication is complicated for everyone. Every human being is terrible at it, so every human being can get better at it. Never let communication get in the way of your relationships just because it’s hard because communication is essential.

Recently my wife and I were able to sit in on a personal finance course. These courses are organized through our church and run by volunteers. In this particular session, the discussion focused on goal setting, and an interesting thought was shared. One of the members of the group mentioned having a goal to go to the gym each morning. Now at the onset that sounds like a great goal. You can keep fit, you gain discipline, and it’s a great way to start your day, but the longer I thought about it the more I realized it was a horrible goal.

Why so bad? It’s simply too hard to accomplish. Can you imagine having to complete a task daily as a goal for the rest of your life? If you mess up once, you’ve failed. If you don’t make it to the gym for any reason you’re now left making excuses for yourself as to why it doesn’t count against your goal. This sparked a whole new idea in my head that related directly to my own goals as a writer.

For a while there I was setting goals to write daily. I felt like by committing to writing every day I would be able to accomplish my overall goal of completing my book and publishing it. The problem I was always facing is I’d have legitimate reasons for not being able to write, but the failure of writing took me down a deep slope of hopelessness until I finally picked myself back up and set a new goal.

Failure is hard and setting a daily goal to write and constantly failing and re-failing on that goal was exhausting. When I listened to this person describe what their goals were to what they are I realized writing daily wasn’t a goal at all, it was a task I needed to complete to achieve my goal. How does that change anything? By making writing a task suddenly I’m no longer a failure when I don’t write. Instead of spending weeks to months being stumped because of that one day I decided I wanted to do something besides write, I feel invigorated by the idea I can fill my time with whatever I need to help me achieve my overall goal.

Not all people’s brains work like mine. Some people work perfectly well under a strict daily goal. Even with this method, I think it’s smart to keep short-term goals right alongside those long-term goals. For now, I’ll focus on setting a weekly goal. At this point, I’m just trying to properly title my actions. By labeling my daily writing as a task to complete I know it will just get more challenging to keep my goal if I fail to complete it, rather than failing to achieve my goal. I find I often make the switch anyway after setting the goal, but I’m affected more deeply when I haven’t defined it from the beginning.

So quick explanation. I’ve been posting less because I just got a new job offer which will require a big move. That was the root of my last post. I was realizing how precious time was because it could so easily be taken away. Today I wanted to bring things around to what I’ve recently been listening to and that is Tolkien.

If you’ve heard of nothing else you’ll know of the Lord of the Rings movies, whether you’ve seen them or not. They were amazing in so many ways. Even better were the books themselves, but as I’ve delved deeper into the writings of Tolkien a whole new world has appeared.

Tolkien was an amazing writer, but on top of that, he was an amazing world builder. I mentioned before I felt a sort of kinship to Tolkien and that comes from his world-building side. I love world-building. My book began as a story has evolved so much over the time I’ve been writing it, and a lot of that is because I’ve looked deeper into the world.

One of the amazing things Tolkien did was incorporate lore he’d created in his youth and placed it into the Lord of the Rings books. So much of the lore surrounding Lord of the Rings is completely lost if you don’t look deeper into Tolkien’s writings and try to understand the deeper world he created. I love that about Tolkien.

I think that speaks to us, beginning writers. Tolkien created a world and he wrote a compelling story that held to many of these strange ideas, and information not necessary to the moving forward of the story. As a beginner, I think I get so caught up in telling a story in a way readers will understand I forget to let the world of my story play a part in the tale.

Tolkien is an inspiration on letting creativity pour out in the way that suits the artist, and not for the sake of the beholder. Writing is good, but it should mostly be for oneself. Creativity is something powerful and important no matter how much money you gain from it. Never let creativity die.

As a writer, especially one that doesn’t make a livelihood writing, time is precious. Thirty minutes could be the difference between finishing a project or having an unfinished manuscript sitting on your computer hoping you’ll remember it exists. Time is one of the most important things you’ll need when writing.

The biggest challenge is finding that time. When it comes to writing it’s very easy to put it last. Work that pays for your living comes first, then family time, then sleep, and necessary eating. Finally, writing sits there usually squeezed in front of the sleeping and eating. Even then the time could only be a few minutes leaving it hard to keep a train of thought.

At the end of the day doing what you love has to cut into your time somewhere. Whether that be making a simpler meal, letting family know you’ll be sitting some time out, or staying up some late hours. The extreme would be quitting your day job and take on some full-time writing.

Personally writing is a release for me most days. It’s nice to sit down before sleeping and put my imagination onto paper.

Growing up I would say I had a very active imagination. I enjoyed playing video games that made me a part of the story. I enjoyed pretending with friend and on my own epic tales of adventure and heroics. Last of all I enjoyed writing.

When you get into Jr High school is about the time it becomes “weird” to have your head in the clouds. This is the time people get into sports or other activities that were tangible. I fell into that mold in school. I wanted to play sports, but a part of me still clung to the imaginary. It started with choir and turned into being in theater.

While not letting out the true imagination I felt I kept a hand on that imaginary world that grew in my mind throughout my life. All of this seemed weird to me. I mean I’m a grown adult still imagining a complex world that doesn’t exist. Many times I doubted the worth of continuing to grow this pretend world, but as many times as I doubted I also clung to the joy I felt when creating it.

Needless to say, it’s been a great comfort these last few days listening to books and podcast, both by and about J. R. R. Tolkien. Not only was he and intelligent scholar, but his imagination was active. He created a world he was so entranced by it dominated his life behind the scenes till he wrote the Hobbit and suddenly that world was put forward for the world to see.

I’ve always loved the Lord of the Rings, but the more I learn about Tolkien the more I feel like kindred spirits. I always thought of my book as a history about a time in an imaginary land and even thought to write an opening explaining it to be such. I only recently learned that was the Tolkien’s style when writing the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit. It gives me encouragement to hear his own thoughts on his world creation and on creativity in general.

Author

See Talon Review

Story Set-Up

Here we begin with Garrett’s investigation of the hierarchy of St George. After the events of Rogue, Garrett begins to question St George’s involvement with Talon. All his life he’s been told dragons are horrible creatures. Now he knows that’s not true. What else is St. George lying about?

Rating

Language: This is similar to Rogue. You get the occasional F-word, but it is used as a cuss. Other language is throughout the entirety of the book.

Violence: You get men shooting guns at dragons, dragons attacking and killing humans. Men fighting against men in sword combat.

Sexual: In this one, you get suggestive material, but it could also be interpreted as nonsexual because the feelings that are being had are not understood by the characters themselves.

Plot

I’m going to be honest. At this point, I was a fan of Garrett’s so when I found out the title of this book was Soldier I got excited. I really enjoyed seeing Garrett out on his own searching for answers about St George. I also enjoyed the interaction with Jade, the new eastern dragon. I think that was a cool inclusion.

I was really upset about Ember and Riley’s relationship. Honestly, I felt like Riley backtracked because Garrett was gone. Sure he has a few moments where he really shows Ember what he’s feeling, but it only seemed to come after Ember forced it out of him.

Just like in Rogue we get a back story, but from Garrett’s past. I feel like this flashback was much more productive than Rogue. Here we get a story we didn’t really know, with a satisfying connection to the current story we’re hearing about.

The conclusion is epic. Not only do you get a surprising reveal, but the tragic end that I felt Garrett deserved.

Character Development

Garrett: Honestly Garrett’s character is going through the same changes since Talon. Here we get him actively fighting against St. George and trying to help his fellow soldiers see the light. I think so far Garrett has the most growth throughout the series.

Ember: Ember makes her choice here. She chooses to love Garrett despite her bond to Riley which is a big step. It was nice to finally get an understanding of what those feelings were, but even better to see her chose Garrett despite that natural bond.

Riley: He actually grows in this story. Instead of being stuck in his usual rebel without a cause attitude, we see more of that caring side in him. He’s able to break some of his previously held prejudices and actually see Garrett’s sacrifice for what it really is.

Dante: I love how Dante’s story progresses. You see into his mind all the terror he’s witnessing and why he keeps pushing forward. You see the evil taskmaster with no emotion, then see the emotion come out where it can’t be seen. You get to see Dante become evil and it’s a cool perspective to be a part of.

Summary

I think every series has a book that you read and say, “That’s the one that made things interesting,” and that’s what Soldier was for me. Talon ended on a cliffhanger, Rogue kept the story going, but Soldier made the story interesting.