Off and running

Right so, after a slightly rocky anniversary on the first (yeah...fun) the time to actually buckle down and work on this thing has come. Which means...I just totally copy pasted everything I had of my sequel into my NaNoWriMo account (username: Misszaius, book title: Hounds Thorn) like today. Which means the 10k words I had struggled to write for ages and ages are totally like already out there for all to read. And that means that I only have 30 days to write another 40k. Considering the time it took me to write the first fifth of the thing...this is going to be a crunch. A mad crunch.

Alright so I haven't yet added any of my possible friends that are also doing this because ah, I am technologically incompetent. Super secretly true, I totally didn't even know where I was supposed to put the damn novel to begin with. BUT that is not going to deter me from totally working on this today. Which is to say that after I go to the doctor's and paint a commission for a lady I'm going to write. No more "oh it'll be fine if I write ten words as long as I write something". Now is the time for writing like a damn 1.6k words a day. The horror. Procrastinator me, meet your nightmare.

This'll be fun.

Well this is embarrassing...

So I haven't died. I have been in fact going to physical therapy. And looking for work. And other hobbies. What I have not been doing...is writing. Which I intend to totally start doing again. For real. Know why?

I totally signed up to participate in the 2012 NaNoWriMo. I am 100% taking a write a novel in a month challenge to get me to work on my sequel. And, for extra fun, you can totally follow me and my progress and whatnot at http://www.nanowrimo.org. My handle is Misszaius. Right like Dr. Zaius from Planet of the Apes only Miss cause I'm a girl, right? So you can add me, follow me, stalk me, yell at me for being a major procrastinator, whatever you like. And of course I will attempt to update this blog with my progress from this whole write a damn novel in a month challenge. Cause holy hell it took me a year last time and they want fifty thousand words in thirty days? The math on this makes my brain hurt. And if the sequel is anything like the first book (hint: it is) it will be closer to double that size. Which I guess means I need to stop obsessively watching Honey Boo Boo and actually get to work.

For anything else taking the whole NaNoWriMo challenge, holy shit good luck. And good luck to me. Cause I am totally going to need it.

This is why I am a horrible procrastinator

Alright so even though I said I'd work on the sequel and even though I ranted that I do 10 words or 10 pages a day and I didn't care which it was, I sort of...skipped it last night. I don't even have a very good excuse other than I stayed up late playing video games and talking to boys (I'm only human after all). And today I have currently skipped but I have a valid reason for why.

I was baking cookies.

Yup. Cookies. Baking. Decorating. The works. For the hospital staff at Glendale Memorial in California for putting up with me for a whole month. And helping me to walk, learn how to redo things, the works. For Christmas. So I'm like a cookie Christmas elf. And since I still have to use crutches (or a cane but I want a bitching one instead of the boring one I have) my aunt came over and helped. And then we gossiped for a bit. BUT-

I fully intend to write more tonight. Totally. I had ideas for what I was planning on doing and had started it. This is where the spoilers begin (does it still count as spoilers if the book isn't written and only like 2 people have read it?)


(If you haven't read the first book none of this will make sense. That's ok. You can ignore it.)

Originally I started like three days after the end of 'Witch Bloom' and immediately had Connell and Rose jump into a business partnership. It makes sense. She does wedding flowers, he wants to bake cakes. One stop bridal shop. But looking back, that didn't quite work. Rose is just a touch prone to wallowing so I figured, after the end of the first book, the second book would find her well...wallowing. Which gave me the idea that maybe Celia would sort of take a starring role. I like Celia. I do. She's sort of the high school version of me (when I wanted to be a goth/punk girl but failed miserably). And she didn't get that much play in book one so I figure, why not make her important for book two? So she is actually the catalyst for Connell joining Miranda's Flowers (which is no longer Miranda's Flowers because she owns it now and that's too morbid even for me).

I also had about 50 pages of plot building where Connell convinces Rose to help him find his father, they go to his hometown, spooky campground, evil shapeshifters, Rose finds an unexpected ability, Francois ends up showing up, and then Rose decides she wants to be with Connell. All of that is out. All of it. Now let me explain why.

Connell is still trying to find his family but there is a reason behind it now other than 'hey let's go do this thing so we aren't in Boston anymore'. I like things to be motivated. And of course that turns out to be layered. Since I changed the ending for 'Witch Bloom' from what it was originally, I intend to use Francois more. So he will probably have to tag along from the beginning instead of showing up only to immediately be rejected. Evil shapeshifters are no longer straight evil but have reasons for their actions (because if you're a bad guy you never think you're a bad guy you think you're doing the right thing). Rose might still have some unanticipated side effects and of course some new-found abilities even though she still kind of sucks at magic. I figure in the heat of the moment instinct would take over and she'd be able to somehow fake it.

However, Rose and Connell are not going to get into an immediate relationship. I know I classified it as a paranormal romance book and I realize I skimped on the romance but this one I am sticking to. I haven't decided if they will eventually, if it will be in this book, or if it will never happen. It is obvious he is interested in the idea (as is Francois but I'm undecided on him) but my reasoning is this. She just got out of a seven year relationship with a douchebag but nonetheless, seven years. If she jumped into another relationship immediately it'd be more of a revenge fling than anything else. She needs some time to get her shit together and figure out her life since basically everything about it has changed.

Will there be tension? Of course. Will there be romance? Maybe some because I can't go completely cold turkey. Will she get with anyone? Undecided. And I am staying undecided. I'm just gonna write and see how it turns out. Speaking of writing...I should go do that now huh.

I have no more bad Bon Jovi puns

That's a lie. I have infinite Bon Jovi puns. I am just restraining myself. But...
Awwww yeahhhh
Cover art (and blog redesign because I am technologically impaired) by the fabulous Ashley Moore. Words by me because ah, that is the point of writing a book I suppose.

Here's the edit. Because I almost never edit anything in my life and generally don't plan out anything I write sometimes I forget things. But this one is important damn it.
I want to thank everyone who helped me along the way, encouraging me, helping me edit, brainstorming, or in general letting me rant about how insane I was to try and write a novel. And they are (I'm going to apologize ahead of time because I might not remember exactly everyone because it was a metric ton) in no particular order: My mom and dad (dur), Ashley M, Meg, Michael, Rochelle, Trevor, Cole, MJ, Ashley R, my aunt Becca, Jamie, Stacy, Larry, Marcia, Remona, Austin, Andrew, Kenice, Brandon, and Rony.

If I forgot you, I already apologized (see above). But I still thank you and I'm sorry my memory is terrible. It's genetic I think. I can't remember anymore. Now back to what this post was before I so rudely interrupted, ah, myself I guess.

And here's the problem I have. As I am currently recovering from surgery (and really when am I not?) I have lots of free time. And Amazon lets you track how many people have bought or downloaded your book. Great. Because it isn't like I'm already obsessive enough now you have to enable me to be even more OCD? This is why games like Skyrim exist.

And now for something completely different: I always get upset when writers say they only write when 'inspiration' hits them. Really? Really? I get inspired, truly inspired, like maybe once every few months. And when that happens I can sit down and write 20 pages like it's no big deal. But if I always waited for that, then I'd never finish anything ever. So what I do instead is write. Every. Damn. Day. And whether I write 10 words or 10 pages I consider it a victory. Even if I end up going back and deleting all of it because at least I got something out. And sometimes by forcing it like that I'll write crap, crap, crap, crap, and then BAM something actually clicks and it turns into gold. Or whatever the word equivalent to gold is.



Oh fine I'll have to eat it now and follow my own advice. Progress on sequel, here we come.

Is that progress I see?

On something that totally isn't what I should be working on, why yes. And no, before you say anything, it isn't a video game either. I mean actual progress on an actual piece of writing that I actually someday might finish. Let me explain.

So when I originally wrote the draft of what would eventually turn into 'Witch Bloom' I always had the idea in mind that it was a series. And a series it still shall be if I can ever stop procrastinating and actually work (and publish the first one but did you not catch that bit about procrastinating?) In fact after I wrote the first draft of book one I totally went on vacation for a week and then decided, nope screw that, and started writing a book two. I got fifty (that's progress for me ok) pages into book two when I went back and started rewriting book one. And once I rewrote book one and I do mean rewrote because I changed so much of it, I decided maybe I'd change my ideas about book two.

I figure 'Witch Bloom' is sort of a coming of age story except make the characters older and a lot more jaded (it's a pun see? Haha. And I hate puns.) As such it sort of stays in one area for the whole time. And that got boring so I decided book two, road book! Awww yeah, insert 80s montage! Well I ran with that idea (I need to stop it with the bad jokes like, now) and laid out fifty pages of plot and story and ideas and all sorts of fun things. And I just decided to kill all of it. I'd had ideas of what to change and whatnot but I decided tonight basically to just kill it all. I'd take the tiny baby pieces of what I liked and maybe rehash them into the current version but I'd start a completely new version from scratch instead of hacking and slashing what I had previously written.

In an odd spurt of productivity, I actually started writing said new sequel beginning. Unfortunately, it is probably another form of procrastination to not add in stupid grammar fixes to the first book. I do however enjoy writing new stuff more than I like editing old things. And there is something sort of fun about taking fifty pages and countless hours of working and just saying, nope! Not using you! Wait, no. It's the opposite of that. It's completely the opposite of that. But I didn't like the direction I was heading in and if I don't like it then I won't read it and if I won't read it then how can I expect anyone else to want to read it?



Ok so maybe I'm justifying it in my head but hey, at least I got work on a new new one done, right? Right?