NaNoWriMo 2022: Announcing This Year's Novel!

Whew!! How is it almost November already?

This year has been... not quite like I thought it would be. Starting with battling Covid in January that set me back several months as my physical health recovered quite quickly, but my mental health (namely the psychological wherewithal to write) took a nosedive for several months... and then, just when I was getting to the end of a very stressful school year and looking forward to a summer of really hitting the second draft of Fugitive of Crossway very hard, my brother's health took a turn for the worse, and he passed away near the end of summer.

I've stopped a bunch of projects since then, but The Undersea Saga is here to stay, and here's why: I now see it as a small way to honor my brother's memory. It's on account of him that the piddly little stand-alone novella became a full-fledged series, anyway, and I'd hoped to be able to involve him in the development of Fugitive of Crossway as it unfolded... but although that's not going to happen, I'm still going to finish the thing, for sure!

At this point, honestly, I'm nowhere near where I planned on being at the end of last year. If everything had gone the way I'd hoped, I'd be making my final tweaks on Fugitive of Crossway, already sent it off for professional editing, and into the formatting/ design stage.

In reality... I've got three chapters actually "done", I'm headed into the really tricky part of the story that had the most changes and is definitely the middle part of the book that I'm the most iffy about... but where does that leave me for NaNo?

Why not go ahead and give myself a running start on Book 3?

That's right, folks, this November, I'm taking my first crack at Fury of Outwest, the third book in the Undersea Saga, and I'll admit, I'm excited to be able to return to actually pulling off a retelling, rather than "inspired by", as Fugitive of Crossway is!

So what story am I retelling for this third book?

Well, back when I was devising the series as longer than like two or three books, I knew that I wanted to use the four different "kingdoms" as the settings for the various books, and as such, this one would be Outwest.

This would be the most different of the four kingdoms, as it wouldn't exactly be a kingdom, per se... no kings or castles here! I envisioned Outwest as a combination of the American Wild West and the Australian Outback--just hot, desert-y landscape with scattered towns, villages, and ranches throughout, but mostly empty, barren desert.

And what sort of fairy tales take place in the desert? Why, Aladdin, of course!

This one was a bit tricky, as I'd already decided I wanted to write a "steampunk Aladdin", and I'd been jotting down plot ideas for that... but when it came to creating an "Undersea Saga" version of it, I came to the realization that there needed to be a lot more to the story than the "traditional" sense--a street rat comes across a magical item that gives him access to riches beyond reason... but then what?

In particular, I decided to gender-swap the main character. "Aladdin" became "Delaina", an outlaw who survived by raiding stagecoaches that dared cross the desert wasteland. Instead of a lamp with a genie inside... there's going to be a special "magical" device found by our intrepid protagonist, one that provides her with access to riches beyond belief. (I'm not going to go into any detail about the device, because spoilers!) I had already decided on an object back when this was "Steampunk Aladdin", but everything I'd thought of was only confirmed when I saw this premade and knew I had to have it!

I love the look of the device in her hand! I am still deciding whether to give her a prosthetic limb, so that may change by the time the cover design comes around, but there you have it!

Instead of the street rat going through all this charade to win the eye and heart of the princess of the realm... Well, that part I'm going to keep to myself for now, but here's hoping that readers will find my alternative worthwhile still! Suffice to say, I don't think this one will have much romance in it--at least, not where it is just now. I don't know, a character could crop up and catch Delaina's eye as I'm writing the thing. I only have the bare-bones notes at this point. After posting this announcement, that is next on the "writing docket", fleshing out chapter-by-chapter the notes I have. If I see fit to include a romantic subplot, I just might, but for now, it seems that Princess of Undersea is the only book with romance in it, in the series.

Wouldn't that be fitting, though? Making Ylaine and Nathan my only romantic couple in the series? I don't know. I'm still thinking on that one.

Meanwhile, there will be gunfights, subterfuge, and all manner of fun things--including, by way of connection to the rest of the series, an appearance by none other than "Calamity Jacqui" from Fugitive of Crossway. Due to the events of that book, she's no longer a performing carnie... but her role in Fury of Outwest is more that of a bounty hunter. She's been dispatched to track down and "retrieve" the thing that Delaina has... but can the outlaw last long enough to find out the truth?

Hang on to your bowler hats, everyone... this is going to be a wild ride!

Upstream Updates: Summer 2021

Life Stuff

Wow... Summer went fast. Did it feel fast to anyone else? I felt like I barely had time to think "Wow, the school year is over!" before I blinked and we were gearing up to go back to work again!

That's not to say that I had an uneventful summer, heat wave aside! I welcomed a new niece in July, and she's just the cutest little munchkin! She started out pretty tiny, but is quickly growing into a roly-poly, squishy baby with all sorts of coos and babbles to say!

As far as work goes, I admit I spent the month of August watching my inbox for any kind of sign as to what we might expect for the coming school year, and hoping fervently that it would be more akin to "normal" than it had been in the last... 3 years?? (1 extra year beyond the 2 years of pandemic, because before all of that, we were also dealing with a remodel that very much disrupted at least half, if not more, of the school building!) At this point, all I can say is it's not what anybody expected! 

We're required to mask up inside, but not outside--and on the one hand that means more fresh air, which is a good thing, but on the other hand, it means that at least three people are losing/dropping their mask at just about every single recess, so the school basically ran through their entire stock of on-hand "extra" masks in just the first couple weeks, and now has to resort to a stockpile of disposable masks.... which aren't always the right size for tiny kindergarten faces! In the cafeteria, the school invested in sheets of plexiglass dividing each table into 4 single-person sections, to prevent circulation of germs as students share a table and take their masks off to eat... but the plastic panes extend from the edge of each table by a couple inches, which makes it difficult to navigate a full cafeteria effectively, and the chatty kids are still ducking their heads underneath the panes to talk to one another, while the messy kids are flicking food and milk on the plexiglass panes... Staffing shortages are an issue too, as we've had several staff members who took jobs at other schools, or resigned, and so there are unfilled "holes" for which there may or may not be a substitute ready to jump in and work. We're trying our best to make the most of it, but man the stress level is high this year!

On a more positive note, I started a new Bible study with my mom and some ladies from her church, and I joined a church group with the church I'm attending, so my days are pretty full!

I did have a pretty eventful summer, if the totals below are any indication! I've kept right on writing nearly every day, adding another 100+ days to the total count, and on September 14th, I logged my 500th straight day of writing! You'd think I'd at least have something finished to show for it... but I suppose, in a way, I do: series like "Priscilla Sum", a whole draft of The Last Inkweaver, and all but the last little bit of "Clan of Outcasts" and the first draft of a brand-new book Fugitive of Crossway--so I suppose in a way there was lots that I accomplished! There's still more to do, though... so here's to another 100 days!

Words Written:
June—26,005
July—25,958
August—26,910

Books Read: 34/40

Now onto the nuts-and-bolts of the updates!

Writing

Current WIP: Fugitive of Crossway

This draft is shaping up nicely! I am working on the final chapter now, and I just have the epilogue to go. What a journey this has been! First developing a story entirely from scratch, then realizing that it was actually two stories--Mellisande's and Simon's--that I had to somehow weave together without losing momentum for either, and now as I'm looking back over how far I've come, I am pretty certain that I've managed to hit all the "high points" that I wanted to include in the story... and once it's finished, I'll be going back over it to do the same thing, but better!

I will definitely say that this story is going to have several more significant main characters than I had worked with in Princess of Undersea. In that first book, I could mainly focus on Ylaine, because everything was from her point of view, and Nathan, because his story was important to hers as well. Anyone who didn't have direct contact with either of those two wasn't really vital and so the story could stay fairly well condensed and focused on just the antics of a human and a Mermaid trying to navigate their prescribed social roles.
In Fugitive, I have at least four main characters: Simon, Yssandra, Mellisande, and Nykkola. Therefore the number of characters who have direct significance for each of those four is compounded, plus I needed a wider landscape to scatter them into.

More places, more events, more story... all of that added up to a much longer book than I could ever make Princess of Undersea into, and I've got to pare that down, figure out which scenes are useful to have all played out as the "key beats" of the story, and which are just brief stops along the way, and can be glossed over, or summarized in retrospect. There is something to be said for giving both sides of the story equal "page time", as it were, and not emphasizing one side more than another... Although, now that I'm thinking about it, I do kind of gloss over big chunks of Mellisande's story, and it still makes sense... Perhaps if I could simplify Simon's side in the same way, and kind of pick out the big moments for him, maybe it wouldn't take so long to get through both narratives.

Anyway, once I finish the draft, I think I'm going to go back and re-tool the two short stories that are going along with this one, namely the ones I wrote a while back for the A-to-Z Challenge, "Yet You Are Young" and possibly "Unlucky Urcellus" as well. The reasoning is that first of all, there is more that I wanted to add to "Yet You are Young" which I didn't at the time, and second... I couldn't help noticing how the third Undersea story I wrote back then, "Gondu's Gamble", seemed to confuse a lot of readers, since I really left a lot of the wording the same, so it really comes across as a rather slapdash, shoe-horned narrative than an actual short story. I won't make that same mistake again!

Also, if you're reading this, but you haven't followed me on social media yet, I should let you know that you're probably missing out! All month long (September), on a whim, I decided to create a post for every day this last month, to share different fun facts and sneak-peeks at both Princess of Undersea and the forthcoming Fugitive of Crossway. Fourteen fun facts plus an interactive game from each, making a total of 30 posts! I have to say, it's a neat marketing tool to have on hand now.

All in all, I've had a lot of fun with re-tooling Pinocchio, but it'll be even more fun to get on with the last two books and get back to actually re-telling a fairy tale again! Wish me luck for the rewrites and editing--I can already tell the job is going to be a doozy!

Blog serial: Clan of Outcasts Season 3

Speaking of a doozy... I'm calling it. This "season" of this never-ending tale is nothing short of a behemoth! I am well over 150K, and I have only just now reached the penultimate moment in the story! By comparison, the previous "seasons" combined clocked in at less than 100K. Basically, I'm almost doubling the word count.

Again, I think it speaks to the way I tend to start out with a story focusing intently on a handful of characters and limiting my world-building to "just the basics", such as the way I limited the realm to just the four "cardinal" locations: Wilderness, Castle, Harbor, and Forest. 

For Season 3, I added a pirate ship as a location, a ruined city and a secluded mansion both situated on a faraway island, I turned the Wilderness into an actual settlement called "Wildhaven".... and just like I was explaining above with Fugitive, I also had the audacity to add to this story with its already-loaded cast a host of new characters, introducing some of them in flashbacks of the last 3 years between the end of last "season" and the start of this one, and bringing aboard others in fresh and exciting ways.

I think that's been my favorite part of this serial story, is revisiting old characters in new ways, exploring their development even farther than before, expanding the world beyond the boundaries of The Realm... It's been so much fun, but I'm excited to see it end. And I mean it this time! After this, I don't think I have another loose end, another way to drag everybody into some kind of peril all over again. (Of course, I'm just going to leave this here for posterity in case I've just jinxed myself and I come back in three years with an even BIGGER caper!) At this point, the way things are planned out, the characters reach a healthy conclusion, the resolution doesn't leave anything very much undone, and I am pretty sure I'll be able to finish it over the month of October, which is great because after October, of course, comes...

NANOWRIMO (or as the laypeople call it, November)

Yep, yours truly is a glutton for writing projects, it would seem.

You would think I'd have learned. Last year I used NaNo as a launch-pad to get me rolling on Fugitive and it carried me through fairly well, I might add. I could have passed it by this year, too, since I've got other projects and things, and I didn't actually want to start Book 3 yet until I had a better handle on Book 2, which would definitely not be enough to warrant my 50K goal.

Made by me on Canva!

Instead, after I wrap on "Clan of Outcasts", I'm going to start plotting out an older story that I've been meaning to go back and rewrite. In fact, it was the first non-fanfiction story I ever attempted in earnest. I've actually excerpted it a few times already on this blog... now it's getting a re-boot: Fairies Under Glass! I even made a mock cover for it! 

I decided that I might have an easier time refining the story if I wrote it more like a blog serial, so that's what I'll be doing! Here's hoping I can get planning on it, so that when the time comes, I'll be able to present it in a consistent manner. Who knows how much things will change (I'm most definitely changing some character names!) when I start making notes and whatnot? I am excited to go back to this story that was really foundational in letting my imagination run wild, and applying all that I've learned about character development, pacing, and plot in the years since then!

So yeah, there's heaps of motivation to get things cracking over the rest of this month! As for what I'm going to be posting over the month of November... well, that just depends on what stage I'm at, I suppose.

Special Announcement: Return of the Blog Hops!

I suppose now is a good time to let you all know that starting in November, I'll be participating in a blog hop that will hopefully run one week a month, with the same group I've done hops with before--it's going to be lots of fun participating in these hops again! Look for those posts in a couple weeks!

Reading

Whew!! Going from 20 books to 34 in a single summer is quite the feat! I think it helped that a couple of the titles were a short story and a novelette... and I should qualify that to say that it was more like 11, because 3 of the titles in that count were from the month of September--but still! Not too shabby!

Starting in June, after the last update, I did indeed manage to finish One Word Kill by Mark Lawrence and found it fantastic! Definitely some good Stranger Things vibes, time travel, these things like "prophecies" or "predictions"... good times! A change of pace from his usual grimdark fantasy fare, but still magnificent nonetheless!

Through July and August, I managed an average of 5 books a month, which was cool. I even made a few trips to the library, as you can see by the pictures of my nightstand! It was nice to browse the bookshelves again, and that was how I was able to pick up books from series I've already started, such as Dead Beat by Jim Butcher (Yay, reanimated zombie T-Rex!!), Shadow Scale by Rachel Hartman (give me ALL the dragons!!), and U is for Undertow by Sue Grafton (Only 4 books left in the ABC Mystery series!). 

Not only that, but I also picked up books from new (to me) authors such as Ruth Ware's The Death of Mrs. Westaway (recommended by a friend who loves whodunnits, and I have concluded that we have similar tastes, although our reading habits might differ!), and R. L. LaFever's Theodosia and The Serpents of Chaos (It's Dresden Files for kids!!). Rounding that off with Call Down the Hawk by Maggie Stiefvater, the first book in a new trilogy that focuses on the three Lynch brothers from her best-selling Raven Boys Cycle--such an awesome summer of reading, I must say!

I also read four different indie titles, for which I posted Reader's Reviews. I've hyperlinked each of the following titles, so if you want to read my review, in case any of them sound interesting, you can definitely do that! First off was Speaker of Words by E. G. Stone, an author and book blogger who was kind enough to review Princess of Undersea on her blog, so I took this opportunity to return the favor! The next book I read to review was Find Me If You Can by Kelly Blanchard. I've officially started "Phase 3" of The Chronicles of Lorrek, and I honestly can't believe what's happening right now! You'll just have to read the review to know more.
The final books I read to review were the really short ones I mentioned earlier. Gutshot: The Catastrophe and Vulnerable serve as prequels of sorts to the Red Dog Conspiracy series by Patricia Loofbourrow, with the former giving the backstory all the way back to the cataclysm that made the world the way it is in her "alternate history future" that is the setting for the series, and the latter telling of one very important character's arrival in the future-noir city. Very cool to read, especially after a reader is immersed in the fantastic world of the series, and already familiar with a lot of the characters and world-building details.

As you can see from the picture, I still have a few books more waiting on my nightstand: Pendragon by D. J. MacHale (which I meant to read sooner, but didn't...), The Hollow by Agatha Christie (a Poirot book I haven't read yet? le gasp!!), and Troubled Blood by Robert Galbraith (and I had no idea there was yet another Cormoran Strike novel!). The others I've already read or started (as in the case of Conjuror by John and Carole Barrowman, after the whole mess of confusion I went through trying to start the Orion Chronicles last year...) and I'll tell you what I think of them in my next Upstream Update!

That's all for now, and until next time--

Catch You Further Upstream!

Upstream Updates 2020: November

Life Stuff

2020 is coming to a close, thank goodness! But it’s not over yet! This month started out with some good news, compared to what I was getting for a good long while, there: I was getting recalled to work! It wasn’t completely for the whole day, but it was enough, and I didn’t mind a bit! (After the first week, they bumped me back up to my full hours anyhow, so that’s that!The way they’re working the hybrid model is a group of up to 10 kids (there is currently eight in one group and 10 in the other) coming either Monday-Tuesday or Thursday-Friday, so it’s two small groups, they’re only in the building till 11:30, and then after my lunch, I spend about two and a half hours doing projects for teachers! Pretty easy, if you ask me. It’s certainly a lot easier to keep track of eight little kindergarteners than sixty-plus second-graders! And having only one recess in the day helps it not feel like I’m constantly going in and out of the room or spending half my day outside when I’d rather be in the room teaching a group!
So that was the start of my month, and it ended with the Thanksgiving holiday. Yet another in a long year of holidays which we would normally use as an excuse to get together with family or invite friends—but which we ended up spending as the same household group we’ve been every other day... Still, we did end up gathering as a family (except those that were sick, too far away, or did not want to take the risk) and that was lots of fun! The kiddos enjoyed seeing their baby cousin, and especially the amazing presents that “Nona and Papa” brought, like this sweet new ride for the two-year-old!

The other thing that pretty much monopolized all my free time this month was NaNoWriMo—It’s largely due to this that I have such stellar numbers as far as word-count goes, but still didn’t quite get done the reading I wanted to be able to accomplish—only three books, which puts me at a total of 40 books for the year so far—which means I need to complete 10 books in the month of December to make my goal of 50 books! I hope I can do it, considering that I won’t have to push myself as much for writing in a “normal” month as I have in this last month!

Words Written: 50K (I did it!)
Books Read: 3/4 (so close!)

Writing

Adventures in NaNoWriMo: Fugitive of Crossway

Cue triumphal fanfare! Fugitive of Crossway is officially underway! I didn't quite get as far into it as I hoped--and the chapters themselves ended up much longer than I anticipated. It is definitely unlike the first draft of Princess of Undersea ever was, and in some ways I feel like I'm learning a whole new style of re-telling in writing this one!

For Princess of Undersea it was all very straightforward because I could make my main character a mermaid and basically tell the story most of the way through, only deviating with the changes that I decided to make, and whatever came of those. In Fugitive of Crossway, it's a little different because the story in question is Pinocchio who is, of course, a puppet whose ultimate desire is to be a "real boy" and all the pitfalls of the fact that he is a puppet of "very little brain", to borrow a phrase from A. A. Milne, and therefore susceptible to every negative trait and temptation toward laziness that besets a boy. It's a cautionary tale, but in Italian, not German (like the Grimm's fairy tales), so instead of getting right to the point with everything it meanders, it disguises the message it's trying to send behind extreme scenarios and florid descriptions--so how to "re-tell" that, exactly?

Well, the closest I can really get is to pick up where "The Castaway and The Carnival" left off, and show Simon as the "grunt man" in Twyner's carnival, and attempt to show both sides of Pinocchio's personality in both Simon's lapse from the studious, ardent, yet under-privileged boy of Overcliff, where he was meant as a foil to contrast Prince Nathan's happy-go-lucky, lackadaisical attitude, to someone who would just rather not work so much, who wants to just get home by whatever means possible. It's almost as if the hierarchical social structures of Crossway have rubbed off on Simon, and he's adopted the mindset of "if I don't need to work, why should I?" because that's the way people on a higher "social rung" behave. He's unwittingly become a "puppet" of the culture around him. It was easy to be "the responsible one" around someone who had all of his needs met without any sense of responsibility, but when the tables are turned and everyone around him seems to put in a lot of work to benefit those in higher standing than themselves, without ever getting anywhere, he finds it easy to "blend in" with them, slipping into their habits of only working when they're "supposed to", and finding ways to make it easier on themselves whenever they can.

Not that this is something I'm going to bring out blatantly in the narrative--just one of those subtle, meta-things that I'm almost using as an excuse as to why I'm not exactly following the actual plot of Pinocchio. (And I may or may not have come up with this whole dissertation off the top of my head as I'm writing it right now... Just saying...)

The really fun thing about this story, though, is the dual plot-line! I have Mellisande the Mobile Storyteller/Librarian/Bookseller, who is part "Blue Fairy Stand-In", part "gratuitous self-insert", and all-in-all a fun character to write! She's writing about Simon and Yssandra, you see, but she doesn't realize it because she's given them different names. It's not quite a "Stranger Than Fiction" moment, because Mel only "sees" the actual narrative in bits and pieces, and she tries to put the scenes together in some sort of reasonable plot--kind of like me! I took a few opportunities to depict Mel in her writing element, the way she puzzles over the things that she's seeing--but how those play into what happens to Simon and Yssandra and the rest, well, you'll just have to wait for it to be released so you can find out for yourself! The fun thing is that Mel has received a letter inviting her out to a small village on the far end of Outwest somewhere (a place I picture as resembling Australia's Outback--just a vast, largely uninhabited (those parts of it that are actually habitable in the first place) space in the middle of the continent, where not much goes on that anyone really knows about) and that's going to connect to when I write book 3, which is going to be set in Outwest, itself! That being said, only time will tell if Mel actually makes it out there, but the way I look at it, every time Outwest is mentioned becomes a bit of foreshadowing for Book 3!

That being said... I made it to about halfway through Chapter 4 (out of 11 or 12) and it's definitely going to need some editing, but it's on its way, and I'm happy!

Blog Serial Focus: Clan of Outcasts

Seven installments deep and hoo-dawgies! Season 3 is definitely nothing like the first two of this series!
It's interesting because some of the flashbacks are re-capping stuff from three years ago, and others are at points during or before the timeline of the first two seasons, showing where the new characters come in--and I'm realizing more and more that I may have gotten too ambitious with this plot line. It was all nice and poetic to distribute the main characters from the first series into the different regions of The Realm at the end of the second series... but now I have to be careful with who I'm sending where and how many characters I have in the vicinity of one another at all given moments, because I am too much invested in continuity to mess up my own!

So far, I've got new Gifted characters like Risyn (successor to Korsan) and Anahita, who haven't gotten a lot of "airtime" just yet (but I'm probably going to make up for it at some point in the future, just you wait!), and then I have unGifted characters in just about every location (except the Wilderness, because that's now a community excusively for Gifted people, so the unGifted have no reason to be there) like Gavin (in the Forest), Hayden (in the Harbor), Sir Landis (at the Castle), and Markus (who is not really Gifted per se, but he's a cyborg, kind of like Denahlia!).

Then there's the Elvendom contingent--I randomly decided to throw them in because there were a grouping of Fae-looking characters who all had similar design of contrasting lines on their faces and pointed ears, so I decided that this would be a new realm of "maybe enemies, maybe allies" and their influence would be felt all around (like poor Erlis, who's spent so long as a half-dragon, trying her best to remain human and almost making herself sick because of it; she tries a "cure" made by combining her blood somehow with Elvish blood, and while that takes care of the symptoms, it also starts slowly turning her into an Elf, first in appearance then in her senses as well--which itself presents a whole new subplot to pack in there on top of everything else I'm trying to do with this series... This was what I worked on during the last month, when I wasn't able to make progress on Fugitive of Crossway, so that's where I'm at on that front!

Bits 'N' Bobs

There were a few other things I tried to use as a way of leveraging my word count this month (as I narrowly squeaked by at the last minute, truth be told!)
I made progress on the short story "The Runalongs", which was inspired by this post where three or four people talk about experiencing the same phenomenon of imagination during long car rides. When I'm done with it, the story itself would probably fit into an anthology with a "folklore" or "creepy" theme, because the imagery is kind of frightening at first glance, but I'm keeping it also kind of tame by holding onto that "warm and cheery" aspect, like a thing that is bizarre-looking and almost threatening on the surface, but once you see the way it is comforting and nurturing, it loses some of its horrific factor.

Then I also have the notes I made for a short story I'm writing to go along with Fugitive of Crossway, much like the "Tales from Undersea", only these will be "Tales from Crossway"! They're all taking place in Crossway, as it happens: from "Unlucky Urcellus" and "Yet You are Young", two "tie-in stories" that I already wrote as connected to Princess of Undersea (actually, more like they connected to the ideas that I introduced in Princess of Undersea and the only version of Fugitive of Crossway that existed at the time, "The Castaway and The Carnival"), but this third one is the story that gives more of the actual background of two new characters that I'm really having fun with from Fugitive, Nykkola the strange "clairvoyant" who runs the fortune-teller act at the carnival; and Mellisande, whose role I've already explained. BONUS: This story is also going to include more about the fairies and that whole concept that was really supposed to be a "throwaway explanation" concept but is ending up having a lot more depth and impact than I ever thought possible!

Beyond that, the rest of my words are spent filling out interviews, promoting Princess of Undersea and also taking opportunity to network, as a writer. To see all the interviews I've been featured on, just head over to the page for The Undersea Saga and I should have all the interviews linked there! I never know what the different interviewers will ask, and very often there are at least one or two questions on there that enable me to give a deeper insight or share some behind-the-scenes tidbit that you might otherwise never hear about!

As for what I'm going to be doing for the rest of 2020... Pretty much the same thing I've been doing all this month, except there's not going to be as much pressure to write every single day, so I might just be able to get more reading done over December! I want to keep plugging away at Fugitive of Crossway, at least until I get this draft finished. I'll also be working through the Clan of Outcasts series, so that should give me plenty to do over these next few months when my brain decides it doesn't like to focus on just one project every day!

Reading

As I mentioned before, I didn't really have the rousing success in reading that I'd hoped for. I finally reached the last chapter in Anatomy of The Soul--very cool stuff I learned about the brain, about the function of memory, and about how a functional awareness of all these processes serve as a stepping stone to understanding our relationship with God, and also as a means of understanding how we perceive others, and how we can extend grace to them.

Then there was also Masked City by Genevieve Cogman, the second Invisible Library book--oh heck yes! I love every aspect of it. Not only does it deal in worlds in which fairy tale and reality have effectively swapped places, but then Cogman throws in these concepts of dragons who inhabit certain worlds with connections to the Library, and also Fae, which represent the opposite side of the spectrum of order versus chaos, and there were so many delicious interactions between characters from both the Dragon world and the Fae world that it was absolutely a delight to read!

The ebook I made it through for my "Reader's Review" this month (even though I wanted to be able to have two finished!) is Song, the first book in the Manhunters Trilogy by Jesse Teller. It's one that I picked up because of a giveaway like two years ago, because I was fascinated by the concept (I found it along the same lines as the idea that I was cooking up at the time that would become The Clan of Outcasts, and I definitely thought I needed more of that in my life!) To find out more about what I thought about it, click the hyperlink above!

So what's on my shelf for December, you ask? I took the liberty of snapping a picture! I've got a physical copy of the next title on my Reader's Review list--I'm going back to the Jill Andersen series with Behind The Mask, the fourth book! I've already started in on it and it's just as heart-pumping as I remember! On my Kindle app I'm reading In Numina, the second Felix book by Assaph Mehr... It's about dang time, too! I'm realizing that it's been TWO AND A HALF YEARS since I read Murder in Absentia, but I still enjoy the concept enough that I'm willing to go through it again!
Once I finish that one, there's Adaline by Denise Kawaii (Thanks to Dream With Your Eyes Open Book Reviews for posting the review of a book that I saw at my last ComicCon and got interested enough to buy it!) and I hope to finish up the year (or start the new year!) with Son of No One by Daryl J. Ball! I really enjoyed the quaint style of The Tannis Project so I can't wait to find out how he does with good old sword-and-sorcery!

As for the rest of my nightstand, pictured here are: the two books I picked up at a book sale last month, Final Witness by Simon Tolkien (actually his debut novel, before he even wrote the Inspector Trave novels, so that's cool!) and Micro by Michael Crichton; then Redemption by David Baldacci--it's the next book in the Amos Decker series, which I have very much enjoyed, so I have high hopes for this one! And then (if there's still time) I have the book I got for my birthday, Beyond The Valley of Thorns by Patrick Carman, the second book in the Land of Elyon series. I'm also still working my way through Hercule Poirot's Casebook. (Side note: I finally figured out that as I'm reading through the portions of the book that are actual separate titles as well, I can just pull that title up on GoodReads, and then it doesn't feel so much like I'm spending forever reading just this one book!)
That's a lot of books! There's no telling how many I can finish... but at least none of them are library checkouts, so if I don't end up getting through the whole pile before the end of the month (and the year!), I can just keep reading till they're done.
Wow! I think I can already say that I'm heading into finishing this year in a very different place than how I started it, on just about every front! How has this year been treating you? What have you been writing or reading? Let me know in the comments, and as always....

Catch You Further Upstream!

Upstream Updates: December Edition!

NaNo-NowWhat?

Ah yes, the annual post where I come off my “writing high” and take stock of where I am at with my various projects, and decide what I will be working on in the coming year!

WRITING

The Last Inkweaver

I am now closer than ever to the end—and stinking proud of how far I have gotten! By the end of NaNoWriMo, I had made it all the way into the thick of a scene I like to call "Storytime with Tark", where Callista is telling this long and convoluted story as a diversion while her friends work together and escape the clutches of yet another trafficker... This scene is important for two reasons: first, it's actually the first time that Callista has put together a plan herself and delegated roles to other people with the expectation that they'll follow through on what she's asked them to do. Second, it's the first time that Callista has actually made up a story--and stories, at least in this world, don't just "write themselves"; this marks a real turning point in Callista's journey, and according to the Story Circle, I believe we're on the upswing and getting ready to put everything all together and bring it back around "home"!

This is the first time I have ever been successful with a second draft, and so to finish it would be a motivation for all the other projects I have ever abandoned over the years....

I won’t be spending ALL my time writing it, but I will at least shoot for finishing a chapter every other week until it is done. Then it’s off to the beta-readers! 

And speaking of “abandoned projects”...

A Writer’s Tale

Laura is well and truly entered into the society of Phantom Gulch... and right about now is the point at which she's going to run smack into the trouble that plagues the land, and get thrust into the forefront of the problem she will need to help the citizens solve! 

Granted, I didn’t quite manage “half and half” like I thought I would this NaNo... mostly because Inkweaver turned out WAY longer than I could have predicted... But anyway, I will be back to writing this one more regularly, too; probably I could manage a chapter or so a week, because it’s not as involved as Inkweaver. At any rate, I’m likely not going to count this project as “finished” until all 7 books are done, so it’s going to be a while! I should finish Book 3 by January, and by February, I should be halfway through the series, so here’s to more shenanigans there!

Short Story Sectional

So a lot of you might know that although I have not published another book since Princess of Undersea (Two years old, coming up!!) I have gotten a few short stories published in anthologies! 

There was “Arthur and The Egg” in DREAMTIME DRAGONS;

Also “The Starborn Legacy” in DROWNED IN MOONLIGHT;

And finally, “Heartsong” was included in the anthology CRACKS IN THE TAPESTRY.

Well, recently I submitted an old story to another anthology—I will announce which story and what anthology if and when it gets accepted (although if you’ve followed me on social media you might already know which story...)—and I am excited to announce that the same creative force behind DREAMTIME DRAGONS is producing a second anthology, this one with a theme of “Dangerous Damsels”, stories of strong female heroines who wind up facing their own demons and saving themselves.

To that end, I will also be poking away at my submission for that... which I recently devised!

I call it “Red: The Wolf”, and it’s a twist on the story of Little Red Riding Hood... except that “Red” is a known lycanthrope who defends her little woodland village from threats by taking on the appearance of a wolf to track down missing objects and people, fight off threats, and chase down runaway miscreants.

All that changes one day when she goes after one such swindler... only to find herself stuck in wolf form. 

It’s going to be wonderful and I am super excited to be working together with this group again!

The Return Of Old Projects

As Inkweaver draws to a close, and I find my enthusiasm for writing renewed with each accepted short story... I am once again drawn to return to old projects, just to see what I might be able to do with them now.

One such project is the adaptation I was writing, of Jane Austen’s “Persuasion", which I dubbed "Merely Meredith." I posted excerpts on this blog long ago, before my “career” really “took off”, back when my writing habit wasn’t any big deal... 

But after revisiting it briefly in the recent “A to Z Challenge” (notably for Letter E and Letter M), I found that I kind of missed it and I really did want to find out how it ended up! So in the coming year, I’ll be adding that to the regular rotation, taking a day or so a week to sit down and have a look over it, and perhaps to get back into the groove and push through to the end of that one.

Then, too, there is the matter of what kind of serial post to do. There was Priscilla Sum that never really got off the ground... I could possibly revisit that one and make it work.

That OR the "Flashes of Inspiration" series... Should I get back to doing those? Did you all like them? There are still plenty of prompts where I got them, people in that group just keep posting more and more. Should I keep writing with new prompts?

Or what about doing another Suggestion Box? Would anyone be interested in something like that? It would require participation and involvement from you, my followers. If you’ve never done it before... I promise it’s really easy, and a lot of fun, and I always credit the contributors, so that is more visibility for you, if you’re an author or a blogger like me!

Wattpad

I have a new project started! Since the works that seemed to be getting more attention (votes as well as adds and the like) were my fanfictions, I decided to start posting another fanfic--and the fun thing is, this particular fic is unfinished, so if it garners enough attention, then I would consider adding that to the "weekly writing rotation" until it's finished!

For those interested, the fanfic is titled THE SOUND OF AN ECHO and it's my contribution to the Percy Jackson fandom. I actually developed the idea for it shortly after being very disappointed with the films and pleasantly enamored with the books! It introduces a few new characters, actually centering a lot around a new enemy who wants to get control of a magical Hourglass that is basically "All of Time" and counts down to a global "Judgment Day" that would allow the deity controlling it to pronounce a sentence over the whole world and basically wipe it out... and meanwhile, Percy has to travel with and frequently defend a girl who is the daughter of Echo--and she's inherited Echo's curse in that she doesn't have a voice of her own, she can only speak with a voice she's heard. (Of course that doesn't go over well with the Aphrodite kids...) I got as far as not-quite-halfway, I think, so I still have a bit of time before I have to have a new part ready, but yeah... It's been fun to revisit that one and recall the ideas I'd dreamed up for it--I still have all my notes, so it still might happen, if enough people are interested!

Meanwhile, I've opted to hold off on updating A WRITER'S TALE until I finish "The Sheriff's Showdown." It doesn't seem like many people are reading past "The Dragon's Quest" anyhow... I'm wondering: Should I make each book its own separate work? I thought it might be more cohesive if I kept everything under the same cover, and treated it like a long, continuous work... but at the same time, that doesn't seem to be going very well. Maybe? Please do take a look at what I have there (particularly if you do have a Wattpad account, and thus can have unfettered access to it!) and let me know what you think I should do!

READING

It’s taken quite a while for me to get back to reading... So many GOOD books out there, so LITTLE time to enjoy them like I want to!! After having to return quite a few checkouts to the library unread (a couple of them in particular, I had been waiting for months, and just when I was about to have time to enjoy them... To send them back in??? Travesty.) I am finally to the point where I can take a break from writing to read a bit. Therefore, I am going to try and get through His Majesty’s Dragon by Naomi Novik before it comes due, and I’m about halfway through Sue Grafton’s T is for Trespass. 

In regards to ebooks, I am trying out reading two ebooks at once, since my copy of AmsterDamned by Nils Visser is only on my phone, and I have a Kindle Fire that I'm using for ebooks I get from Amazon, so on that one I've just started reading Finding Pandora by E. Rachael Hardcastle. Both are pretty interesting so far!

So these next few months are going to be pretty busy for both reading and writing. But it's what I love to do, so I don't mind it a bit! Feel free to let me know what you're reading and writing in these next few months! And as always,

Catch You Further Upstream!

NaNoWriMo Update: WIP Wednesday #3

A Writer's Tale #3: The Sheriff's Showdown

Right away, I noticed a difference in the way people looked at me and treated me. I wasn't an anomaly anymore. I was one of them, blending in with the average person, as I did on the frigate in my plain grey jumpsuit. No one hooted or whistled, and certainly no one stared beyond the normal amount of eye contact in passing. I relaxed into my new role as Laura, simple guest from the bluffs.

"Yoo-hoo!" Called a voice that made me cringe involuntarily. Sure enough, like fluffy pastel-colored clouds trimmed in lace, Tru and Pru sailed toward us, almost blocking our way with stately grace.

"My, my!" Sighed Tru. "Shirley Coldwell, you're a sight for sore eyes! It's been some time since we've seen you up and about, bless your sweet heart!"

"And who is this?" Pru squinted over her shoulder at me. Her eyes flew wide. "No! Not the newcomer we saw walking through town with the sheriff, is it? Why, I hardly recognized you, dear!"

"Land sakes, it is!" Tru responded. "Well, looks like the Coldwells have civilized you right up--and don't you look just stunning in that dress!" She smiled and took my hand. "Larissa, is it?"

I fought to keep my cool under so much social pressure oozing from every pore of these two stuffy ladies. "Laura, actually; just Laura."

The two sisters shared a glance. "Well, Miss Laura," Pru angled her attention back on me, "I think it would be just lovely if you would care to join us at our quilting circle happening the day after tomorrow."

Tru nodded. "Oh, do say you will! What fun we would have!"

At least they couldn't pressure me into something I had no interest in joining. "That's very kind of you ladies," I said, "but I'm afraid I've never quilted before, so I wouldn't be doing much--"

Four eyebrows lifted like a quartet of startled birds.

"Oh! Don't you worry about a thing dear!" said Pru.

"Yes, why--Miranda Constable's little girl is completely unsuited for needlework," Tru agreed, "but her mother finds little things for her to do--sorting fabric swatches and tidying thread, for example."

Pru smiled at me and took my hand again, petting it gently with her fingertips. "Do come; we'll find a place for you yet in Phantom Gulch's society!"

I pulled my hand away, steeling myself against the shudder that raced up and down my spine at their brazen condescension. "I'll think about it," I responded.

Shirley and I sidestepped the two sisters, well aware of the way they stared after us for as long as we remained in their sight. Subtly, Shirley directed me down a side-street lined with crates of fresh produce transported from other cities.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

The Last Inkweaver

At this point in the story, Matthias, Callista, Terra, and Rowinna have all escaped the bounty hunter, and they tried going out to the village of one of the fellow prisoners... only to find out that the village had been razed sometime in the past, and so there is nothing left there. They are forced to move on with very little supplies and not a whole lot of direction... when we come to this scene.

Something chirped near us, and my eyes alerted me to a small brown shape darting around my periphery.

"Chhrra!"

"Yikes!" I spun away from my seat with a yelp.

Terra bounded to her feet, too, but for the opposite reason. "Oh! How cute!" She broke a small piece off her apple core, holding it in the palm of her hand as she approached the quivering animal.

"Careful!" I warned her.

"Leave it be, Terra," Matthias grumbled.

"Shush!" she whispered over her shoulder.

The squirrel stood, tense and sniffing, until Terra was only inches away. In a blur of movement, it spun around and launched onto the craggy boulder behind it.

"So close," Terra murmured, and she set about clambering over the rocks as the tiny squirrel with the bushy tail scurried easily up to the top.

"Terra, don't!" I called up to her. "It's not worth it!"

She stood on a small outcropping just higher than Matthias' head. Her deft fingers hunted for holds in the uneven stone.

"I've almost got it," she said, swinging her foot around to find purchase on a higher cleft. By spreading herself flat along the surface of the rock, she could shift her weight gradually enough to haul herself up. At least, that was apparently her theory.

"Hey!" she called down to us as she worked herself up to her hands and knees. "I think I can see the town from he--eeeee!"

A single high-pitched wail, and Terra disappeared down the other side of the rock.

"Terra!" I screamed.

Rowinna and Matthias ran with me to the other side. There were more boulders piled there, and lots more tight spaces. Terra's body lay crumpled in one of them, her arms folded against her face and her feet wedged underneath her. I wanted to grab her arms and help her up, but Matthias held out his hand.

"Wait," he said. "We should check her injuries before we move her and end up making it worse."

With slow, calculated movements, he bent down and felt around back of Terra's head. I heard him hiss as he pulled his hand back. Rowinna and I saw red stains on his fingertips.

"Blood?" I gasped.

Terra groaned and shifted a little.

"Terra!" I picked up her hand. "Are you all right?"

"Oh," she moaned. "My head hurts!"

"Can you move?" asked Matthias.

Slowly, her hands twitched and her arms shifted. "A little," she mumbled. "It... feels like swimming..."

"She doesn't know what she's talking about," I spoke up. "Terra's never been swimming in her life." The coast was too far away, and there wasn't another body of water for miles around Mirrorvale.

"We need to get her laid out on the ground," Matthias said. "Help me support her arms and her head." He took one hand and I took the other, and Rowinna supported Terra's head. We lifted her up, slung between Matthias and I like a large, floppy doll. One foot had stuck pretty deeply between two rocks, and at entirely the wrong angle for a foot. When we were free of the rocks, Terra wearily lolled her head and tried to mutter, "I'm fine, I can wa--" But the moment that second foot touched the ground, she cried out in pain.

"Here." Even in the blistering cold, Rowinna took off her own blanket to spread out for us to lay Terra down. Matthias ran back to our little camp on the other side to grab her blanket to cushion her bleeding head.

"So... tired..." Terra slurred.

"Don't fall asleep!" I begged her, leaning close and clasping both her hands. "It's too cold--you're hurt! You need to stay awake! Stay awake, Terra!" I shook my head. "Oh, if only we had some medicine!"

The satchel slid off my shoulder, and I heard it give a small clank inside. Quickly digging in there, I pulled out a small cooking pot and a pestle. The minute I saw them, the staff with the Wordspinner emblem flashed across my vision. The Story-Healer! "... a Story-Healer’s Tale could grow an herb for any ailment..." Naten's strong, deep voice rang in my ears. I picked up the pot and the pestle.

Matthias wrinkled his brow at me like I was crazy. "Where did you get those?"

"They were in the satchel," I said. "I need to go find some healing plants."

"In this weather? In Greyfrost?"

I shook off his derision. "Just wait here. I'll be right back."

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>