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Thursday, December 30, 2021

Upstream Updates: Fall 2021


Life Stuff


It's the most chaotic tiiiime of the YEEEEEAAAARRRRR!!!!!!

No joke, these fall months (September/October/November) have been absolutely bonkers! I'll admit I was kind of hoping that perhaps after the first month or so things would settle down and kids would fall back into the rhythm of expectations and routines and things would calm down... but that doesn't seem to be the case. I don't know if it's the fact that all throughout those three months there were kids in just about every grade level who were absent at one time or another, and so every time they've been gone and they come back, it's starting over from square-one as far as routines and expectations go; or the fact that every month has brought new and drastic changes, from starting the school year at a staffing deficit, to starting small groups which meant we were switching classrooms every half hour, to adding on a Pre-K classroom (requiring some reorganization for the class that was originally using that room) a month into the year, and so on and so forth--there are still several kids that haven't "gotten the memo", as it were, and continue this pattern of misbehavior that makes it stressful for those of us who have to be on high alert to make sure that the misbehaving kiddo doesn't hurt other kids, while also trying to be available for other kids who invariably need help... and, yeah. It's definitely feeling pretty unstable at this point... here's looking forward to the new year and seeing what progress we can make then!
Unfortunately, all this chaos in my working hours leaves me creatively and mentally too drained to write most days... So these last few months have been not as productive as my summer was, but oh well! I've got a pretty good trajectory for other things, so bring it on, 2022!!

Words Written:
September--25,783
October--27,250
November--35,105

Books Read: 37/40* (Note: I read the final 3 books for my 40-book reading goal in December!)

Writing


Fugitive Of Crossway

It is done! Well, the first draft, anyway. I managed to finish it in October, and it came together nicely--with a final word count of about one hundred thousand words. That's about three times the length of Princess of Undersea, if you must know.

That just means that I'm going to spend the winter figuring out what parts of the story are truly necessary, and whittling things down enough for a second draft, to try and get it all pulled together by spring, so I can see where I'm at! I already have a plan for the first chapter that actually shortens what I originally wrote by a couple pages, at least--or so it seems. I think if I can do that for each chapter, we'll be in much better shape by the time I actually write out the second draft!

Anyway, once I was done with the main draft, I moved on to the short stories. I successfully re-plotted both of them, and got the first one done. For now, "Unlucky Urcellus" has been re-titled "The Curse of Urcellus Marin", and "Yet You are Young" has become "The Mermaid's Fate." (Fun fact: did you know that "Urcellus" is actually a masculinized twist on the name "Ursula"? But nobody outside this blog is gonna know...) I had reasonable success with "The Curse of Urcellus Marin", rewriting it to focus on the story more (as I mentioned in my last updates post) and also including some details and references that I had only just come up with while writing the first draft. Although it isn't necessarily detailed in the main narrative itself, there are some quips and cracks that different characters make throughout his brief involvement in Simon's story that I felt should be described more and actually portrayed in this story--the fact that the Marin family tended to be rather unscrupulous in their pursuit of success, the process that resulted in Urcellus choosing to willfully ignore the customary fishing boundaries, and what happened to him and all his credibility because of it...

The fun thing I realized when I started writing "The Fate of The Mermaid", too, is that it really did happen just after King Theodore banished the fairies from accessing Overcliff, since it was decided that they brought the plague that decimated the kingdom's population--so I'm able to include that as a reference in the story. The troubling part is that elsewhere in Princess of Undersea, I also mention that trade with the Mermaids had ceased long before that... Inconsistency, much? But maybe I can use this story as a clarifying explanation as to why all that happened the way it did, so that it just looks more like I meant to say it the way I did, instead of it being an innocent slip-up like it probably was at first... That's the beauty of being the writer, though, isn't it? As long as I can figure out a decent explanation, it doesn't have to be written off as a mistake!
That being said, I do think that focusing on building a story rather than throwing in as many alliterative words as possible works so much better!

Meanwhile, I won't say too much just now because I'm saving up the news for my plans of 2022 for the NINTH birthday post of this blog (nine years already, how is that even possible??) but I will say that it's shaping up to be a great year!

Blog Serial: Fairies Under Glass

With the completion of "Clan of Outcasts, Season 3" in late October, I was certain that I would be able to get started on the next serial, "Fairies Under Glass" fairly quickly. The trouble was that I basically only had a week to start jotting down notes before NaNoWriMo hit, but I was confident that between adding to my notes, and actually writing the draft, that would give me plenty of material to allow me to get the words in and be successful at writing every day. I was especially confident that writing it in the style of a serial would allow me to expand and shift focus on things in ways I didn't do it as a novella. (especially considering how much Priscilla Sum expanded as I wrote it!)

All I can say is that the momentum lasted me about a week. I did fairly well, not quite getting up to the daily word count sometimes, but finding ways to eke out a few more words here and there, and confident that by the weekends, I would be able to make up the difference...

I was so wrong. After that first week, my creativity took a hard nosedive, and I struggled to keep up with everything for the rest of the month, battling some days when I didn't even write at all! Most of that I think was due to a lot of work fatigue that set in over November. Like, September was a bit chaotic, and October a little more so--but a lot of things started happening one right after the other in November, and that culminated into me being too drained and too busy during my off-work hours to do very much writing, if any at all. Long story short, I "failed" for the first time since 2013, really, and only managed to get just over 35 thousand words by the time November ended. (And, quite frankly, I've spent the whole of December just making up for everything I didn't write during November, so it's been a quiet month...)

But all that is to say, I didn't start posting Fairies Under Glass right away because I didn't have it all together far enough in advance, so it's coming in January!

I will say, I've done a fair bit of changes to it that seem to be working quite well. I'm stuck naming the main character "Casey", but I've given him a few friends that he hangs out with, just because I'd painted him as such a lonely character in the first draft... and that is only because at the time, I distinctly remember that I didn't really know how to balance character dynamics! I have a better handle on it now, so here we go!

The one thing that I'm still not sure about is whether it should be in first person or third person. I originally wrote it in first person, but I thought that for the serial, just to change things up, I'd switch to a third-person limited-omniscient, the way I'd written Priscilla Sum--but something about that isn't sitting quite right. Unfortunately, now that I think about it, I wouldn't be surprised to realize that this might be one of the things that was holding me up so much over the course of November--the downside of third-person means it's a bit harder to get into the characters' "headspace"!

At the same time, to go back now and switch everything to first-person, only to decide to switch back later when first-person doesn't fix the problems I'm having... Yeah, that's the biggest reason you haven't seen this serial yet!

Wattpad

It came to my attention in December that I hadn't touched my Wattpad stories since August, when I was really getting into writing the "Clan of Outcasts" serial and the thick of trying to finish Fugitive of Crossway, in spite of the fact that a lot of my most popular stories are still getting comments and adds and upvotes--still is pretty awesome! But it inspired me to get back to updating my stories again, so Priscilla Sum is on there, and I've started posting Season 3 of Clan of Outcasts as well, to... not much fanfare. But it is what it is, and it brings my total number of works on there to a nice round forty, so there we go.

Reading


And now we come to a more encouraging part of this post!

I checked out a few books from the library at the beginning of October, fully intending to read them... and then as time went on, I didn't manage to read them... and then it came time that I ran out of renewals, but I still hadn't read them... I finally finished them by the beginning of December, so I am no longer in trouble with the library lending services!

Anyway, in four months I managed to finish four indie books--three of them were ebooks, and one paperback! It started with Petra by Cheri Lasota--a very steamy Italian vampire romance novel by a local author. Those who know me know I'm not very often in the mood for anything overly smutty--but I will say that Lasota at least kept things outside the sexual scenes interesting enough, and generated plenty of sympathy for her characters that I didn't mind it so much! From there I moved on to The Night Alphabet by David M. Donachie, a book that I'd won in a giveaway a few years ago that had been sitting on my queue for a while--and wouldn't you know, it turned out to be a bunch of short stories in an A-to-Z Challenge style, similar to what I've done before! By this time, I realized that I was just moments away from my 150th Reader's Review. Not the 150th title, of course... I've had double- and triple-features when the books are short. But that distinctive spot I reserved specifically for You're Not A Real Goth Until You Sack Rome by Katherine Perkins and Jeffrey Cook. Cook is an author from the north end of my state, and he's been a huge support in my author networking endeavors, as well as a brilliant author whose books I've loved--unfortunately, he passed away before I'd even read the book, but at least Perkins got to receive my review! Most recently I finished Spirit's Lullaby by J. E. Mueller, a signed copy I'd had since many years ago that I finally got around to reading--and wouldn't you know, that was the 40th book I've read this year, so with the end of that one, I also achieved my reading challenge goal for 2021! You can follow the hyperlinked text on each of those titles to read the full reviews. 

Meanwhile, as far as library books I ended up reading, there were a couple Agatha Christie books, The Hollow, which was a Poirot novel I hadn't read yet (and a rather strange one at that...) and The Man in The Brown Suit, which wasn't (and I didn't mind that at all!). They were both of them nothing to write home about, but Conjuror by Carole and John Barrowman was definitely everything I hoped it would be! Devious villains, a driving plot, and fantastic characters that kept me fascinated all the way through. Dire King by William Ritter, the Jackaby novel, was splendid to read, with very excellent character development. Last of all, Troubled Blood by Robert Galbraith was unexpectedly long, but very well done. A lot of developments in the lives of Cormoran and Robin. Trying to solve a 40-year-old disappearance is hard enough, without so many other things going on in the lives of the two private investigators!


I'm currently reading Pendragon by D. J. MacHale at last, and also I couldn't resist cracking open one of the books I got for my birthday: Archenemies, the second book in Marissa Meyer's Renegades trilogy. I'll admit it took me a while to get into Pendragon, because I didn't quite understand what was going on at the very beginning, but I'm definitely in the "rising action" now, and things are moving quite quickly!

So there you have it, the last update of 2021--and as we close out the year, I'm looking forward to 2022, and I hope you are too! Next time I post, it will be the Upstream Writer's NINTH anniversary! Stay tuned! And as ever...


Catch You Further Upstream!


Tuesday, December 21, 2021

Reader's Review: "Spirit's Lullaby" by J. E. Mueller

Synopsis from Amazon:

Lost souls. Scheming demons. A young woman caught in a struggle she does not understand.
Tella is gifted, able to communicate with the dead. Using her gift, she guides lost souls, helping them to cross over. When she discovers demons deceiving helpless souls and recruiting them for their own dark designs, Tella finds herself caught in a conspiracy between realms. To stop this growing threat, she must master abilities she does not yet understand.

Can Tella master her gift in time or will she join the lost souls like those who tried before her?
A Tune of Demons follows three young women caught up in the twisted schemes of angels and demons, taking readers oh a spellbinding journey of love, magic, and redemption.

>>>>>>>>>

My Review:

Oh goodness! It’s times like this that I seriously start to figure that maybe I need to rethink my strategy of waiting A WHOLE ENTIRE YEAR (OR THREE) between consecutive books…

But then again, that’s the true mark of an excellent sequel, is it not: to be able to pick up the next book and be pulled right back into the world as if you’d never left?

That is exactly how I felt finally reading Spirit’s Lullaby.
I opened it up, quite forgetting not only most of the characters (except I knew of Key and a couple of her friends—a vague awareness of her royal siblings, and the like…)

But as I mentioned before, Mueller did an excellent job of bringing me right into the action and intrigue. Tella is traveling with Lydia, a Blessed warrior tasked with seeking out and dispatching demons who plague the villages around Shaudrey. Tella helps with her Gift of speed, and the fact that they can usually get hints of where demons are active because Tella can also see ghosts who are still trapped on the mortal plane. It is through conversations with different ghosts they encounter that Tella begins to realize that there is something dangerous afoot, that the enemy they defeated in the last book wasn't the "Big Bad" himself, but just a link in the chain that threatens to destroy the world and make it another demonic domain. There is that, and there is the mystery as to Tella's other abilities, such as being able to weild Blessed magic as well as Cursed magic--she feels kind of "trapped" between the two warring sides of the spirit realm, as much as the ghosts themselves are trapped and prevented from moving on into the afterlife. Can she find the answers she needs? Can Lydia and Tella figure out what's really going on before it's too late?

The characterizations are marvelous. Even the "cameos" from characters introduced in Fire's Song were clear and sound enough to re-conjure the memory of them as if I'd only read it a few months ago. Mueller crafts a suitably intriguing story, one without an obvious outcome, that keeps the reader guessing, and populated by characters and plot devices that are interesting enough to hold the reader's interest. I remember one of the things I said about Fire's Song was that I became so invested in the characters that I would stay up far too late reading, just to know what happens to them--the same holds true for Spirit's Lullaby, even though by now I didn't really have the luxury of reading until my eyes closed by themselves! The plot twists made me catch my breath, the pacing held my interest consistently from beginning to end, and while the conclusion answered a lot of the questions from the beginning, it also set up some definite changes that we as readers won't get to see the effects of until the next book--which I am so glad I have already!

Spirit's Lullaby is an excellent sequel as well as a worthy story in itself. I give it *****5 STARS***** and I would add to it an Upstream Writer Certified RECOMMENDED endorsement. If you're looking for a gorgeous fantasy/paranormal adventure with kickass heroines and quality characters with a fascinating plot, look no further than the A Tune of Demons trilogy!

Further Reading: (Also By The Author/Paranormal/Fantasy/Compelling Adventure/Strong Heroine)
A Tune Of Demons Series--J. E. Mueller
       -Fire's Song 
       -Spirit's Lullaby (*This book)
       -Dreamer's Melody
The Bhinian Empire--Miriam Forster
     -City of A Thousand Dolls 
     -Empire of Shadows
Verona: The Complete Mermaid Tales--Pauline Creeden
       -Scales 
       -Submerged 
       -Salt 
       -Surfacing
Lord of the Wyrde Woods--Nils Visser
     -Escape From Neverland 
     -Dance Into The Wyrd 
Talented Series--Amy Hopkins
     -A Drop of Dream 
     -A Dash of Fiend 
     -A Splash of Truth 
The LouisiAngel Series--C. L. Coffey
        -Angel in Training 
        -Angel Eclipsed 
        -Angel Tormented


Monday, December 6, 2021

Bookish Blog Hop December 2021--Day 6: "A Book Based On A True Story"


Leslie Conzatti (Me!)

Continuing the theme I started with my answer yesterday, namely “a book set in WW2”, the book I chose for today’s theme is
Until We Meet Again by Michael Korenbilt. It tells the story of the author’s parents, Manya and Meyer, two young Jews fighting for survival through the Holocaust. Manya decides to go on the run with Meyer while her family strives to hide, and in the process, the two lovers are arrested and sent to separate prison camps. The story brings the reader into the harrowing uncertainty of living in a ghetto, where you were never sure whether your neighbor was going to tell on you; and the intense suffering of camps like Auschwitz, where the only thing Manya had to keep going was her faith and the hope that someday she would see Meyer again--that is, if he survived and she survived. 
I’ll admit, I don’t really read a lot of nonfiction, but this one came recommended by a friend, and it was definitely worth reading!

Vidya Tiru @LadyInReadWrites  (Instagram | Twitter | Facebook

Again, too many options for this prompt, but I decided to keep it limited to two books. First up, The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank. This can easily make it on my book from my childhood theme as well and has appeared often on my blog. Each time I read the book (even today), I am inspired to be more than I am: to write more; read more;  be braver and stronger; and simply be more human. For any of you who have not yet read this book, I definitely recommend you do so today; and if you have read it before, pick it up again for a re-read. 
The next book I want to mention is When Stars are Scattered by Omar Mohamed and Victoria Jamieson. This graphic novel memoir, based on Omar Mohamed’s gripping true story, is heartbreaking, raw, powerful and at the same time full of hope, inspiration and awe for the strength that is in each one of us as humans. A must-read for all ages (ignore the age recommendations completely) and a book that will stay with you for a long time. 

How about you? Have you read a book recently, or do you have a favorite book that is based on a true story? Tell us about it in the comments! And head over to my Facebook author page to find links to the other posts in this blog hop!