Writing Recap 2024 - The Varoding Review

Three years counts as a tradition.

I would say three years of annual reviews now qualifies as a proper tradition. It isn't visible yet, but this was quite a prolific year of writing for me. I made significant progress on my second book. It is perhaps one final set of revisions and reformatting away, but the book is functionally complete.

I gave an advance copy of it as a gift for Christmas and got the chance to see it in its printed state. In person it looks massive. It's current format is 8.5 by 11 which leads to looking somewhat textbook like. I wrote the whole book in LaTex in order to make full use of a variety of features. This lets me generate a scriptural index, citations, and allows for easy resizing should I choose to do so. It wouldn't be my suggestion for a lighter work, but I think it works well for something with such a large volume of scriptural analysis. Maybe I'll do a post on the technical aspects of book publishing eventually.

"Arcana lie somewhere between the secret and the mystery. This is not a book of the hidden revealed, or great spiritual mysteries solved. It is the interpretation of symbols and scripture in plain sight, such that they point the way towards these mysteries. A study in Biblical symbolism from the foundations of the world. Written in three volumes. The first on the Old Testament and additional world history preparing for year zero. The second on the life of Christ. The third volume is on additional symbolism and the pursuit of the grail quest." - From the upcoming book jacket.

Self promotion is something I struggle with, but I think this book is important enough that it is worth doing. You'll see a fraction of it in the excerpts below. Fundamentally it is an attempt to orient scripture and world history in a coherent way, digestible to the precocious reader. I think the target audience is someone interested in religion and esoteric history, but hasn't quite grasped the strangeness of the Old Testament or the surrounding world context. For such a person the book has the potential to be life changing. Even if you are knowledgeable about such things, there is the opportunity to learn something new.

Final polish aside, I expect the book to be out in the first half of 2025. Writing, as with many projects, is one burdened by the final details. Astute readers will have recalled that I was talking about a different finished book last year. That one was a fiction novel that is complete but I have been slow to officially publish. There's a variety of reasons for that, some good, some bad. Maybe I'll put it out next year, maybe never. Advance copies of the novel are available on request.

To keep up some level of public posting the content was mostly released in the form of book excerpts. There is a challenge in posting excerpts for something that was explicitly not written in article form due to the interconnected nature of the work. Despite that there were some good standalone sections that help to show more of what the book is about. On with the articles.

The Abominations

The first excerpt posted of the year focused on a specific part of Ezekiel. Too often the visions of Ezekiel are portrayed as incomprehensible or disconnected from the New Testament, but this is not correct.

Ezekiel is given a vision of horror in the temple and it is a horror that shows what the fall of a priesthood looks like. It requires some larger context, but it is very clear what God finds so detestable, and what Christ arrives to correct. This is one of three chapters on Ezekiel as I regard it as a very under-appreciated book.

Temptation and Fasting

Now in the New Testament, we are attempting to understand Christ as demonstrator and fulfiller of this new covenant. This chapter centers around Christ's encounter with the Tempter, and the significance of fasting. This is part of a larger theme of the book centered around the concept of the renunciate. The significant utility spiritually and materially that comes from renouncing certain fineries and pleasures.

I think the second volume is where the book really hits its stride. Able to take a sprawling foundation and focus it to a single point on the life of Christ. It's a cleaner piece of writing to finally focus down on the one life, rather than the millennia that was spent preparing for it.

The World Spirit on Stage

An election post. Referencing Hegel's encounter with Napoleon, I recount my own experience with Donald Trump. It's a funny story, but the subject is important. If you are the sort of person who sneers at Trump, you simply don't understand how bad things have gotten in so many places. I may delete this article and bring it back as a spruced up inauguration post. I have joked to friends before that if you spend enough time in America you either end up as a Republican or a Democrat. I would prefer not to consider myself political, but we are in an age where politics finds you.

It's an open question on how much I will write on current events going forward. Having finished what I consider to be my foundational book I have quite a free hand when it comes to further writing. I think that web 2.0 rewards rapid rushed commentary, but there is probably a balance between snap judgments and writing on topics decades out of date.

The Trial of Pilate

This chapter is not overly representative of the second volume, but despite that it stands alone well. Pilate is a fascinating and controversial character. I find it interesting to see him as a secular elite who has belief almost forced upon him. I think especially today as people get further from belief in the possibility of God, Pilate's story becomes more relevant.

Toohey the Tastemaker

Centered around Rand's villain Ellsworth Toohey. Mostly an opportunity to remark on the state of mass culture and the particular role of the critic. It's an article that would have been groundbreaking ten years ago, but I think most people are generally aware of these concepts now. Still as I embark on the next year of writing I think it's important to note why this wont just be another movie review blog. That's not to say that I wont use this platform for contemporary criticism and commentary, perhaps even of the flavor of the month, but there are some things that simply don't need to be relitigated.

That was all I posted for this year. Not surprising when so much of my writing time was dedicated to the book. Still, I think that it is good practice to keep putting some content out there, even as I focus on longer form efforts.

I don't know what the next year holds. My first two books were written more out of a compulsion than any kind of desire to write. Despite that there is a level of natural affinity that develops after several hundred pages. I am much improved writer from this process. It's also given me a good understanding of how to prepare content for publishing, from text files to nice looking books. Perhaps in another life (and more importantly another century) I would have run an interesting publishing house.

The more interesting question is what should I write? I have a few more book ideas, but I'm unsure if I love any of them enough to bring one to fruition. I'm hoping to dabble in some more short stories and see where that takes me. There's always contemporary commentaries, even if such things blow away in the wind.

As the saying goes, "if you are reading this, it's for you". If you've made it this far in the annual review, what would you like to see me write about? Reviews of independent works, answers to questions, maybe even some current events. So long as it's within my purview I am open to requests. I hope to be more social with my writing this next year, but that is a far more time consuming task than the writing itself. Temper expectations accordingly.

As always, thank you for reading.

The previous year in review can be found here: