Author: jongraylang

I mentioned this somewhat briefly a while ago, but this is not dead!

Let’s see.  We’ve got a premise and a couple main characters.  We are working out the world for these two and it’s been an interesting experience.

Why interesting you say?  Well, we come at the story creation process differently.  Some things that I just take for granted on how I do things are exactly not the way he does things.  And vice versa.

We are in the process of having to come up with a communication style that works for the both of us and right now that’s all about finding where the holes in our thoughts are.

It’s been an interesting learning experience.

There’s that word again…

I am beginning to think that once I know what I think I am doing, I should just shrug my shoulders and accept that I don’t.  Every new step forward seriously feels like it leads to one hundred steps back.

So, there I am and I think I’ve got my book cover all figured out.  It took me forever, but I finally know what I want.  I am really happy with my plan and I’ve narrowed my choices down to a few artists.  Then the other shoe drops and I come to learn (!) that I what I want will be prohibitively expensive.

And I understand, boy do I.  An artist has to make a living and pouring your heart and soul into something and getting little back for it is tough.

Now, most of this is due to my lack of knowledge.  This means more reading of Copyright Laws, Limited Use Agreements.  And I’m sure as soon as I dive down that rabbit hole; there will be even more that I barely have a clue about.  So it’s back to research what can be done and come up with a new game plan.

But you know what?  At least I know what I want now.  And that is worth quite a lot on its own.

After NanoWrimo was a bust this year and knowing full well that my story was failing, I decided to sit back and recalibrate myself for a while.

What better time than December, I thought?  I can catch up on some reading.  I can lock down some more ideas on the all-important what, where, when and how so the fourth story moves forward.  Since I’ve been relatively incommunicado for the past long stretch of months, I figured I’d do some friend time too.

Did I succeed? Well…

I finished The Nun with a Gun!  I really liked writing her.  I am pretty sure I will do another at some point.  I even wrote a little about another character that popped in my head. I have a couple other characters I want to write more about as well.  Not to mention the other ones that crowded my mind on my trip!

I actually did get some friend time locked in, too.  It’s always good that people are willing to accept that you may disappear for months and still say “hey” like it’s only been a day or two.

I even fleshed out some pieces of the story that fit the narrative that I had cut out earlier because they didn’t seem to fit.  I’ve also got an idea that I need to alter through the existing story where it will fit better for the last one.

Did I catch up on any reading?  Eh… not really.  Did I get as much done as I wanted?  As I hoped?  As I expected?  Sadly, no.

But, were the Holidays an easier time?  Why, yes they were.  And I am looking at this shiny New Year as a time to get that fourth one done, the third one rewritten until I am actually happy with it and even get the story out there.

So, yay for the future!

(photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash.com)

Is there a way to make this happen?  Is there a way to make all the things happen with limited amount of time in a day? I am still trying to figure out.

When I started this whole process, it was just to see if I could.  After that it was to exercise my creativity.  Then it was to push for consistency.  Somewhere along the way, I had to start pushing things to the side to make my deadlines.

My skills dropped, my time with friends and family fell to the wayside and my workload increased.  That last bit has nothing to do with writing except that it has eaten more of my mental time and I feel my writing has suffered for it.

I’ve tried not sleeping, but that only made me more tired.  I pulled back somewhat on my deadlines, but the desire was to get better and faster at this idea.  So far, that has not been the case.  Well… the faster part anyway.  I do feel that I have improved as a writer and that was the main goal from the beginning.

So that’s one plus.  Maybe I can figure this whole thing out.

(photo by Sergio Rola on lifeofpix.com)

NanoWrimo was a bust for me this year.  I didn’t even hit the low number from my first attempt.

On the one hand, my coffee making skills have reached a new level.  I mean I’m roasting my own beans now.  And with that came a whole new gamut of understanding as to what it is about coffee that I actually like.

Whoa… Off topic much?  Well, this month, yes.

The ending of the story has always been known to me.  I didn’t know where things started or where it went, but I knew how it finished.  So this should be easy then, right? Apparently not.

The amount of information a person needs to remember to keep the continuity going becomes staggering.  I thought I had all my little ducks in a row, but I found out within the first week that I needed more rows.  And more ducks were involved than I had initially remembered.

My writing slowed down. But then I was taken with this random idea and wrote heavily that day.  I either had two ideas or one that would merge together into something completely different than the initial ones.  Aah the freedom of a new idea(s).

I ended up fleshing out other story ideas that had popped up in my head during my trip.  Writing was fun!  But this book sat there like an accusing finger, waiting for me to get back to it.  So I muddled through it some more.

In a fit of a need for word count, I blasted through the ending and even finished an epilogue.  I knew I needed more of a structure than I had needed previously.  I went all out and wrote down every idea I had concerning the story and created an outline for how the beginning gets to the ending.  The holes in it were huge and I knew I needed to go through the previous books to figure out what was missing, but now was not the time to read.  I wandered back to where I had stopped and muddled through.  My word count dried up, but still I wrote every day.

Well… until the weekend of my birthday.  I became more distracted.  Other requirements piled up and book four slid back a little further each day.  I made some headway this week, but I finally decided I would need to start over.

Kind of heart breaking, but that is what’s needed to complete this one out.  Most likely I will use what I have written just not where it’s currently at.

I will complete it and rewrite it until it is done.  A story needs a finish as much as it needs a beginning.

Perseverance is the key… as always.

It’s time!

I may be quiet for the next few weeks as I struggle through the first draft on the fourth and final book of my little series.  My current journey has an end! I am both excited and trepidatious.

Can you believe it?  Because I barely can.

Am I ready? I can say with the utmost confidence, not enough.  But I shall Nanowrimo on!

But is it happening? The answer is yes!

For those wanting to know, I finished Nun With A Gun.  That story will play out while I work on book numero four.  I won’t be posting much else as I mash my face into the grindstone.  But yay for getting her adventure completed!

See you on the other side, my friends.

Every time I think I know what I’m doing, I find out that I don’t.

Well, not to the fullest, anyway.  As a case in point, I recently took a class on Self-Publishing from Alex Delia.  This was to finalize my thoughts on how I would handle this whole thing.

You see, I went in with a plan that had a solid beginning and then with a couple different plotted courses.  As the class went on, I realized that I would have to chuck a large portion of that solid beginning because I hadn’t really included a few things.

And by a few things I really mean many.  Not to mention that I also had the wrong idea on how to handle a few steps in the process.  On the good side, though, I now have a full plan that includes a release calendar.

On the less than good side, I have to push back my calendar more than I want to.  I also have to find the time to read what looks like a ton of information to fully lock this plan down.

What’s the old saying, one step forward, and two steps back?

I sent this one on to my beta readers (Thanks guys!) and waited in anticipation for their news, comments, et al.  Of course there were problems but they were of the grammatical type, missing words or duplicated words.  But huge plus on what’s come back so far!  It’s an easy read and it flows right along with the other two.

Another plus is that I have gotten better at asking my reviewers more direct questions about plot points in the story versus an overall review.  I mean, the overall is incredibly important, that’s how I was told the characters were wrong in book #2.  But my direct questions have helped me with the realization that some plot points didn’t quite have enough information.  They just needed a little more.  This has been rectified and it definitely feels like a fuller story to me.

But talk about making lemonade out of lemons.  This rewrite went by pretty fast while the first draft most assuredly did not.

Strange how that all works out, isn’t it?

(image courtesy of Ryan McGuire of http://www.gratisography.com/)

My sudden yet inevitable hiatus has ended!

I’d been saving my time off to go somewhere and go somewhere I did.  I ended up driving around Scotland, Wales and England.  It was wonderful, informative and I was able to fill in some possible gaps in the family histories.

I also went and visited areas that are somewhat known for their fairy activity.  Sadly, I wasn’t snatched away and forced to dance until I grew too old to continue.  Or maybe I should say, fortunately?  Hmm…

I didn’t find any elves during my stopover in Iceland either.  Well… that I am aware of anyway.  The fae folk are supposed to be quite sneaky though.  Also, who knew that mashed fish would be so good?

I came back refreshed and full of new ideas and characters.

Of course, now I’m jetlagged but I’m back!