Howdy! I've always enjoyed writing. In my sophomore year of college, so 2010-2011ish I wrote a ton of poetry. I wrote my first novella over the summer of 2012. It's titled Costly Gifts, and it's about teens with inconvenient superpowers being raised in a small cult-like setting. The book was a flop, more embarrassing than a source of pride, but proved I possessed the stamina for long form writing. With my second book, the paranormal-women's fiction novel Soul Walker, I landed on the title before the plot, and wrote it in 2016 after I quit tattooing. Stem & Stone, my young adult dark fantasy adventure novel, was written during NaNoWriMo in 2018 after I returned from backpacking through Europe, and Light Step, my adult fabulism novel, was written during NaNoWriMo of 2019. After that, my writing picked up and I wrote early drafts of (these are working titles) Mayflower (historical fiction, family saga, magical realism), Tony's Story (young adult fiction based loosely off my mom's upbringing), A False Foundation (Avatar The Last Airbender inspired, set in what is essentially Britain if Britain was positioned around the Himalayas), The Alleged Confessions of Amber Jax (supernatural crime fiction, horror), The Great Tomorrow (family saga, magical realism), and The Hesking House Turret (historical horror). I also blog every Monday, occasionally write in my diaries, and I'm gradually adding to my memoirs.
Stem & Stone was published in September of 2023 and Light Step was published in January of 2024. Somewhere between those dates, I began to lean harder into marketing, and got into the habit of selling my art locally, both of which stole time that prior would've been prioritized for writing tasks. For a while there, before Stem & Stone was released, I was participating in every writing event, NaNoWriMo of course, as well as Camp NaNo in April and either June or July. Before Tea With Coffee Media agreed to publish Stem & Stone and Light Step, if I wasn't actively writing or editing, I was querying agents, or submitting to publishers directly. I was very driven to see my work published. Then it was.
At which point my writing motivation plummeted. I've continued to edit Soul Walker on and off, and The Hesket House Turret was actually written after Light Step came out, I believe, or perhaps between release dates, but overall, my writing has slowed. I think, partially, I was pushing stories that weren't quite fleshed out, for a while there. And now that I have two novels out in the world, two novels I spent ages mentally plotting before setting down to write, I don't feel so pressured to be a word mill. It's okay to take my time mulling over the next story, being precise and careful rather than rushing to knock out that first messy draft, because I'm a published author. It's not that I now merit rest, so much as I no longer need to throw stories at the wall until one sticks. Two stuck. And they were two I took my time on from the get-go, whereas all of my other novels (sans Soul Walker), I didn't spend half as long planning, and the resulting chaos has made editing them all the more difficult.
As for Soul Walker, I'm worried that after the next couple of revisions, it'll get rejected again, this time by my current publisher. At which point, I would, of course, submit it elsewhere, but I'm not confident it would be picked up. And, I'm concerned that it touches on too many "triggers," too many sensitive topics, and that it'll offend my fellow leftists, and liberal readers. It shouldn't need to be said that I'm telling the story in the most satisfying fashion, not trying to instill fresh values in the reader, but there will always be those demanding a positive lesson, no negative impressions, and I'm not the author for them.
All that to say, I'm about to jump back into revising Soul Walker. I plan to change the style of the entire middle section, which is intimidating, but must be done. Most of the novel has been edited many times now and is relatively clean but there have been new scenes introduced and I'll be combing over those for errors. I want to return to The Hesket House Turret and The Great Tomorrow soon but Soul Walker is older and needs to come first.
Lately I haven't had ideas for new books, but maybe after this draft, I'll take a day to brainstorm for future ideas. Thanks for stopping by. I drop a blog post every Monday. Toodles!
Newsletter
Howdy! This past week included the first Friday of June, so I spent much of it preparing to sell art at the monthly street fair in downtown Bryan TX. Last month a potential shopper requested I bring a mushroom next time, so I ended up making an entire woodburning series around that theme. The shopper originally mentioned a lower budget for purchasing art so, in an effort to include cheaper pieces, this past week I made two smaller amanita muscaria woodburnings, the smaller & simpler of which I didn't bother to photograph for my records, but the other can be seen here.
I'd been meaning to tweak my old cat-Jack o'lantern woodburning so I took the opportunity to spruce that up as well. Now it glows in the dark.
The mushroom series isn't over. I made more mockups to be burned and painted.
I also glued down, cropped, and framed four of my collages, to be sold at First Friday. The event went well I think, despite being very hot. I did witness someone suffering a heat injury. EMS appeared quickly on the scene to assist but that served as a stark reminder to stay hydrated and maintain shade.
As stated in the above blog post, I'll be editing Soul Walker, my paranormal women's fiction novel, this week and likely next week as well.
I'm currently reading Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. The first 50 pages are basically Harry Potter, though this obviously came first. At around 150pages in, I'm enjoying the book and can very much identify with the main character. I also happen to speak some French, which is convenient, as there are untranslated snippets of French sewn in.
Thanks for stopping by! I drop a newsletter every Monday! Toodles!
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