Tag: writing

March Write Day: Plans to Execute

On By Steven D'AdamoIn FantasyLeave a comment

The shortest month of the year is through, and I half-heartedly wish I had a few more days. It’s been a good month overall, I just had a lull in the middle.

But an ending is also a beginning, and I’m pleased that a new month is starting.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Complete my first round of revisions on Uprooted, The Herb Witch Tales #1.
  2. Read three books.
  3. Exercise at least three times a week.

Complete first round of revisions on Uprooted?

No. I’ve gotten about halfway through my draft. This is the primary lull I mentioned above. I just didn’t sit down enough nights to read through my story. Sometimes revisions, just like writing, is about number of sessions as much as productivity per session.

The good news is that halfway through, I like this story. The pacing is a little disorienting at first, which is intentional, and I can feel it slowing down into its middle rhythm. This first revision pass-through is about the overall flow, so feeling through those ebbs and flows is a good sign of how readers might engage with the story.

This revision process is also highlighting likely next steps for me. I think I want to complete this read-through of Uprooted, focused on overall flow and only obvious edits, and then read through again to trace scene placement and length.

Examining the scene placement and length per scene will help me determine whether particular scenes are unbalanced against others, or where natural breaks in the narrative occur. I wrote this story into ten chapters, but do the chapter breaks make sense? Are they too long? Because this is a novella, I’m starting to think that I should have more numerous but shorter chapters to help make the story more digestible.

I just want to validate that idea with a second read-through.

Once I have a good handle on the overall narrative flow and the scene breakdown of Uprooted, I’ll switch gears and follow the same process for New Earth, allowing me to ensure that the two stories make sense together as well as independently.

Read three books?

No, but I read two and started a third. I also made more progress on A Memory of Light. I got stuck on a longer nonfiction book, Dawn of the Code War, which is a bit of an oral history of the FBI’s, and the US’s, initial foray into cyber attacks. Really interesting read, but not the type of thing I can power through in a weekend.

I’m currently reading a short thriller, The Wrong One, by Dervla McTiernan. I’ve read a few of her Cormac Reilly books, so I did not hesitate to pick up this short story on Audible.

Next, I’m looking for some fantasy / historical fiction. Might be going back to Bernard Cornwell’s The Last Kingdom series… I’m on book eight.

Exercise three times per week?

YES at least in the back half of the month. I finally bit the bullet and paid for a workout app program thing. I chose Asana Rebel, since they had a one-year subscription deal and I kept seeing their ads. (Your Instagram marketing campaign worked on me, Asana Rebel! Curse you!)

I started with their intro program and am moving onto full yoga sets. It’s not terribly difficult for me to find 10-15 minutes of exercise time in a day. 20-30 minute sessions will be tougher. I’m thinking I’ll intersperse their yoga sessions with resistance training and… dare I say it? Sprinting.

I’m not into running, although I’ve been told I’m built like a runner. I’m not interested in long-distance running, but sprinting to build leg strength sounds okay. I just need to figure out what that type of workout looks like.

Asana Rebel is nice, because they push notifications to you about a weekly goal — mine is three workouts per week — and quiz you on your mood and what types of exercises may help you in the moment. At the moment, I like the structure it provides. I just need to be disciplined in building on top of it, so that’s what March will be about.

Goals for March

  1. Revisions for Uprooted, The Herb Witch Tales #1. I need to complete my first read-through focused on narrative flow and pacing.
    • Then I need to complete a second read-through to reverse engineer scene structure and chapter layout.
  2. Read three books. Pretty straightforward. I also want to continue making good progress on A Memory of Light. I’m at the point where some narrative chips are starting to fall, and it is both dreadful and exciting.
  3. Exercise at least three times a week. The app is making me do three workouts per week, at minimum. So that’s baseline. I also want to start adding in other forms of training, so I’m mentally aiming for 4-5 workouts per week, and I’ll see how my routine develops from there.

Steve D

Creativity and Finding an Outlet

On By Steven D'AdamoIn Creativity Sessions, On StorytellingLeave a comment
Creativity Sessions writing process. Evening Satellite Publishing.

Creativity is tricky. Trying to be creative is even trickier.

In recent months, I’ve found myself searching for more of an outlet for my creativity. Writing stories is my first creative love, but the fact is that it comes with several limitations, some of which I may be unnecessarily imposing on myself.

I also struggle with a lot of the mental aspects of sharing my creativity with others, especially through social media. How much sharing is too much, too revealing, too damaging to my own privacy? Ideas run through my head all the time, and I feel compelled to share them with people, but I often don’t, or perhaps more often I share them in person with my wife or my friends. That type of creativity sharing can be quite cathartic, but it leaves open the question of whether, and what, and how I share my creativity beyond that limited group of people.

This very post comes out of a sense of frustration that I didn’t have something else to write about. So, I’m going to do some unpacking here and see where it takes us.

Limits on My Creativity

I mentioned above that it feels like there are limits to my creative outlet in writing stories. As soon as I wrote that, I thought that many of those limits must be self-imposed, so I’d like to examine them. In no particular order:

  1. Not enough time
  2. Worries over my copyright
  3. Keeping ideas about my fantasy world-building close to the vest
  4. Limited formats
  5. Limited platform(s)

Five off the top of my head; not bad. That should be enough to delve into for a bit.

Not enough time

I’m not a full-time writer and likely will not be in the foreseeable future, so this limitation is partially by circumstance. However, I think it’s also due in part to the way in which I approach writing. I primarily write novels or at least short stories, and so sitting down to write 100 words doesn’t feel like much of an accomplishment.

Now, look, I fully realize that every little bit counts towards the greater goal. I get all the writing mantras. But it can be difficult to maintain that steadfastness day-to-day, week-to-week, month-to-month as you churn over a longer story.

Worries over copyright / protecting my ideas

I’m combining items two and three, because they feel very much related, although still different

Worries over copyright infringement is not easy to navigate, especially online, as I discussed last week. But even beyond the notion of someone stealing my work, I’m quite protective of my creative ideas, especially when it comes to my world-building universe.

With enough prompting, I can quite easily ramble about the myriad ideas I have for my fantasy universe, but I sometimes worry that speaking my ideas out loud will… release them from my mind. As if the words roll off my tongue and the ideas themselves evaporate.

Strange, I know. I’ve learned to be careful about how much I reveal about my stories, my ideas, and where I might take them, because I don’t want to lose the drive to write them down. Speaking them out loud is a form of sharing them with the world, but I know I can develop them in so much more depth and with more coherence if I write them down. So, I try to “save” my ideas for my writing, or maybe only discuss certain aspects of them, if I want to workshop them with someone I trust.

Another piece of “protecting” my ideas springs to mind.

Limited formats / platforms

I’m also combining items four and five.

I realize that there are tons of platforms out there where I can publish stories for various online communities to read. Wattpad, Tumblr, Reddit, IngramSpark, Kindle, this blog… and literally hundreds or thousands of other websites I cannot even name.

But does publishing my story in one space restrict me from another? Is a freemium story platform like Wattpad too open to exploitation of my ideas? Is there just too much damn content online for any of this to matter? I have no clue.

Creative Limits

If you couldn’t tell, I’m in the process of reassessing how I write and publish my stories. I love the idea of publishing novels, and I will continue to strive for that. But if I’m only publishing a novel once in a blue moon, then where do the rest of my ideas go? Is there somewhere else I can put them to get them into the world without feeling exposed — to copyright infringement, or loss of my ideas to the ether, or whatever else?

These questions bug me, so to this point I’ve resigned myself to the full self-publishing process with novels, novellas, or short stories, because it feels more official, and safer.

But I think I can find something else to fill the drawn-out in-between spaces — spaces in my head, in my publishing schedule, in my day-to-day schedule where smaller ideas can be nurtured and thrive. I just don’t know what yet.

Steve D

Questioning Online Publishing, because Internet

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On PublishingLeave a comment

Of the multitude of world problems to concern a reasonable human being over the last few months, one has lingered in the back of my mind in a more personal and, dare I say, private, way. I think about my writing a lot. It’s the main reason I have this blog, as a space to write about writing–my ideas, the writing process, the publishing process, the connective tissue of good storytelling.

I also think about my place as an “author” a lot. Not my level of notoriety or what I earn from writing — negligible in either case — but in how my writing and my “profile” is seen online. Privacy is always a consideration for someone who has a presence among the online public.

Every time I get a new idea or see a new tool for my writing, I consider whether I should be doing more to protect my own privacy and security online, as well as protecting my data and copyright. In an era when AI-generated tools are quickly gaining the ability to look, sound, illustrate, or write like real people, I question whether I should have an online presence at all.

With search engines becoming harder to navigate and the overwhelming glut of Content out there, it’s hard to find cogent, well-thought-out answers to these types of questions. So, I just want to pose my questions in a general way, talk a little about my thought process, and see what other writers or creators of any type think.

Is copyright sufficient to protect my writing in the chaotic realm of the internet?

I have registered US copyright of my only published novel, and automatic copyright over all of my writings on this site, a short story in an online litmag, and a 12-part series published on Wattpad. (See a rundown of my writing here.) My writing is generally available to anyone who happens upon it online. My novel costs money to purchase, but that’s it.

Is this enough to protect my work from billions of users who may find it online? Legally, yes. But practically? I really don’t know. My novel could have already been lifted, translated into another language, and republished under someone else’s name, and I’m not sure how I would find out about it. The odds of that happening are probably slim, but IP theft definitely exists online.

Should I care?

At a certain point, I feel like worrying about copyright infringement online is like chasing ghosts. In my broader existentialist view, I will have no control over the things I write and publish after I’m gone, so is it worth fretting over it now? To some extent, I think, but honestly — I just want to be able to publish my own work and sell it to people who want to read it. I would hope I can carve out a space to do that much.

Are free publishing platforms “safe” for putting content out there?

I published my short mythology series on Wattpad in 2019, mostly as an experiment to see what kind of readership I could get publishing one chapter per month. The short answer is: not much. Wattpad is social media for writers, so you have to be really prolific to gain a real following there. A lot of authors use Wattpad to publish first-look drafts of their novels, section by section, to gain a following ahead of self-publishing it in full. (Traditional publishing will generally not publish something that has already been published, so Wattpad is a readership-building tool for self-published authors.)

I don’t doubt the success that some authors have on Wattpad, and I have definitely read some good content there. But is it worth the effort for me to provide my writing there, for free? I’m not really concerned about providing free content. I have given a lot of thought to doing just that to build readership of my work. But Wattpad is a platform where anyone can sign up under anonymous usernames and scrape content from millions of stories by nearly as many authors.

Is that really a “safe” place to put my work? I’ve already done so, but only with a side project, not my primary novels. Wattpad is in the business of bringing authors to its platform, so I would think they take copyright infringement and data security seriously, but it’s a free service (that has a premium user tier).

Is cloud storage really secure enough for my writing content?

George R.R. Martin famously stores all of his writing on a DOS computer in his basement, which has no internet connection. I don’t use cloud storage for my writing yet, but I’ve thought about it. Currently, every outline, draft, and finished manuscript of my writing is stored on a flash drive. I’ve used it for years, but I’ve always had a little fear in the back of my head that it will break, or burn out, or get lost, and all of my work will be gone.

Cloud storage offers a back-up plan, if not a primary storage option. I pay for a cloud storage solution for personal/family photos, but I still hesitate to put my writing there. Cloud storage servers can get hacked, data can be corrupted, and work can still be lost.

I don’t have solid answers.

But these are the questions that pop up every time I think about doing something different with my writing. I can (and probably will) do a deep-dive into the writing/self-publishing threads of Reddit at some point to see how others feel about this. For now, I just wanted to voice my quesitons.

Who else thinks about this stuff? How do you approach it with your creative work?

Steve D

3 Elements to Revise in an Early Draft

On By Steven D'AdamoIn Creativity Sessions, On StorytellingLeave a comment
Creativity Sessions writing process. Evening Satellite Publishing.

I’ve started a full revision of The Herb Witch Tales this month. I’m currently revising the third draft of Uprooted, and will move straight into revising the second draft of New Earth.

These novellas form a duology, so it’s important to me that the characters, plots, and narrative themes align between them. I had written the first part in full, started the second part, and then decided to rewrite part one. Now that I’ve finished a subsequent rewrite of part two, I’m taking the time to revise both parts together.

Thus, my focus for this revision phase is first on consistency of those big pieces, knowing I’ll likely have to come back again to revise for smaller details.

That got me thinking about which elements are important to focus on during a given revision phase.

I’ll start by looking at what to focus on when revising an early draft.

3 Elements to Revise in an Early Draft

I’m using the term “early draft” here, because every writer drafts at a different pace. Some take three drafts to get a polished story; others take ten, or fifty. An early draft could be a discovery draft, where you’re just getting words onto paper, or it could be a draft that has already gone through a couple of revisions, but still feels raw.

In any case, you have a completed draft that you know needs some work. Where to begin? I’d like to highlight three places to start.

1 – Scene Development

This might seem obvious, but an early draft likely has a lot of plot holes to fill. Read through your draft with a questioning mind. From scene to scene, are there any questions left unanswered about how your characters are behaving, jumps in time, or events that are not presented to the reader directly?

It’s okay to leave some of these things for the reader to interpret, but that should be an intentional decision. If you’ve skipped a ton of scene development for the purpose of getting that draft finished, then many parts of the story may feel unfinished when you’re revising.

With every scene you revise, ask yourself:

  • Does this scene transition well from the previous scene?
  • Does the scene demonstrate new or reinforce established information about the characters, the plot, or the world they’re in?
  • Does it transition well into the next scene in a way that readers can follow?

2 – Character Consistency

Pay attention to the way your main characters may change – or not change – over the course of the story.

  • Do their attitudes shift, and do these changes serve the narrative?
  • Does each character have consistent voicing — the way the speak, act, fidget, or think?
  • Do their decisions align with what the reader knows about their fears, their motives, and what’s happening around them?
  • Does each character have agency, able to make decisions in reaction to what’s happening around them, rather than being buffeted through each scene like a toy doll in a hurricane?

Similarly, do your side characters have a purpose in your story? These are the folks who may only appear in a few scenes, or in the background of whatever the main characters are doing, but they should be there for a reason. A character who just reacts to what’s going on around them – a child who only complains to their parents, or a sidekick who only cheers on their leader – will fall flat. If you’re taking the time to create a character and place them in a scene, then give them something to contribute.

3 – Narrative Flow

This follows on element number one above, but forces you to take a step back and view your story not just for each individual scene, but for how the entire piece comes together.

  • If the story is intense with drama or action, are there moments of quiet and calm, or is the reader constantly pushed from one crisis into another with no respite?
  • Does the narrative meander from one scene to another, taking random expository detours that last for pages on end?
  • Does the plot flow naturally, or will the reader feel jolted along due to unexpected time jumps, or sudden changes of place?

Finding Your Story’s Intention

None of these things are bad to have in a story, but they should be intentional. Revising an early draft should give you the opportunity to understand, and improve on, the tone, pacing, and style of your story.

And don’t fret the details of Editing or Proofreading just yet. That will come in later revision phases.

Steve D

January Write Day: New Somethings

On By Steven D'AdamoIn FantasyLeave a comment

Well, here we are. 2023.

Time to look back on all my goals from 2022 and recalibrate for a new year. I’ll probably do a general goals review post for all of 2022 at some point this month, but this is not that post.

Today, let’s just stick to the here and now – how December went for me and how I would like for January to go.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Finish New Earth.
  2. Read three books.
  3. Exercise three times per week.

I feel good about this one.

Finish New Earth?

Yes! At least, as close as I can get with a second draft. As I had mentioned last month, I did not track a word count goal for December, because I just wanted to finish the story.

I got over the bump of the final conflict, and I have some falling action to write. The reason I’m not too concerned with the falling action is twofold.

a. Right now the falling action just feels like a cliff notes section of the day after, and that’s uninteresting, both as a writer and a reader.

b. I need to review both stories in The Herb Witch Tales, Uprooted and New Earth, in full to ensure that I’ve hit all the big thematic beats I wanted to hit throughout this duology. That will really determine what I need to cover in the falling action.

So, a revision phase is in order. I’m still not sure how I will proceed with that. Printing the two documents of 70+ pages each just to red-line edit them feels wasteful.

Plus, I have a shiny new writing tool. I got myself a small, hefty laptop whose sole purpose is to give me portable access to my writing in a pinch. For the last couple years, I’ve primarily been writing on a desktop in my office, which is in the back room of the upstairs of our house. A nagging technical issue aside, it’s not a very convenient writing spot when I have two kids running around and usually don’t get more than a half hour to sit and concentrate on something.

What I’m hoping this new laptop will give me is a way to sit for 10 or 15 minutes in my kitchen and try to scratch out a couple hundred words while dinner is on the stove, or while my one-year-old is falling asleep with a bottle in his mouth next to me on the couch.

Read three books?

I read five books! One was short, and another was very short, but I don’t care. I did not meet my 2022 GoodReads goal of 26, but a final push over the holidays brought me to 22 books read for the year, which I’m not upset about.

Exercise three times a week?

Minus the weeklong feasting of the holidays, yes. My strategy to simplify my workout goal has really helped me focus on what I need to do on a given day to just achieve a bare minimum.

Part of the problem is that work has been so stressful the last few months that I’ve all but stopped taking real breaks during the day. I wasn’t letting myself take substantial breaks, which obviously cut into any workout time I might have.

So, in addition to the workout plan, I also just need to give myself the space to have some self-care time during my workday, when I’m by myself and have some control over my schedule. If I had a resolution this year, that would be it — allowing myself the space for self-care, without feeling guilty about it.

Goals for January

  1. Start revising The Herb Witch Tales, #1 and #2. I don’t quite know what this process will look like yet, so I can’t commit to a timetable yet. I definitely don’t want to sit on these stories for too long. I just need to figure out my revision process and start. That likely starts with an overarching view of the themes, plot threads, and character beats I want to follow throughout both stories, so I think I have some contemplating and organizing to do first.
  2. Read three books. I’ve made more progress on A Memory of Light and just started listening to 1984, so January reading is off to a good start.
  3. Exercise at least three times a week. I’m not going to jump ahead of myself. I have a decent routine down, and I need to figure out how to build on it. That could include incorporating a longer yoga session or two into my week, but I’ll see how it develops. I also got a double-end bag for Christmas, which provides a great way to get some cardio and shoulder/triceps workout in. I just need to clean out my garage and install it. We’ll see how that goes.

Steve D

December Write Day: Distraction Winter

On By Steven D'AdamoIn FantasyLeave a comment

November felt very full, and it also flew by. The holidays have been more fun this year since our 4-year-old is starting to understand the holiday season a bit. He loves all the lights and decorations on houses in our neighborhood.

I’ve been distracting myself from stress at work with some new shows and books, so that’s been interesting, too.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Finish 9-section outlines.
  2. Finish New Earth, The Herb Witch Tales #2 draft.
  3. Read three books.
  4. Exercise three times per week.

Finish 9-section outlines?

Yes, and I finished them so early in November that I forgot I had done them. I created 9-section outlines for five main characters in The Warden of Everfeld: Legacy, most of whose story arcs intertwine with the others. It’s not perfect, but it gives me a general plot direction for each character.

This exercise helped me understand that I’m conflicted about one of my characters. I think their arc will provide some much needed perspective about a particular conflict, but I’m still not sure how their arc will end. So I’ll need to figure that out.

Finish New Earth draft?

No, but I’ve gotten closer, and that’s good. With really only the final resolutions to cover, I’ve been proactively outlining as I go. I will usually take a few notes at the bottom of my document, but more recently I’ve gotten into the habit of writing several lines about the next few beats I want to make in the story.

That has helped focus my writing energy on the immediate plot, rather than side-quests. I do love a good story side-quest, though.

Read three books?

Yes, and I nearly read four. I’m still working through A Memory of Light, and I’ve started working through the Sherlock Holmes series, stories I’ve never actually read before.

Exercise three times per week?

Recently? Yes. For all of November? No. I’ve gone completely minimalist in my routine, because something is better than nothing until I figure this out. A few calisthenics type exercises for one muscle group – 10 or 15 minutes, tops. If I can find 20 minutes for a real yoga session, fantastic. That’s where I’m at right now.

Goals for December

  1. Finish New Earth. I’m so close. I’m not tracking a monthly word count goal at the moment, but I am going to try a weekly goal. I organize my work tasks on a weekly basis, so why not try that with writing? Monthly has not been working of late. I’ll write about how that goes next month.
  2. Read three books. I’m pretty well on my way.
  3. Exercise three times per week. Minimalist.

Steve D

November Write Day: Small Goals

On By Steven D'AdamoIn FantasyLeave a comment

October has come, and gone and so has Halloween. I used to love Halloween, but I haven’t done much to celebrate it in recent years.

Our 4-year-old is now all in. He dressed as a bat this year, and he chose the 1-year-old’s costume as the Hungry, Hungry Caterpillar, which was just a top-notch suggestion.

I think I’ll have to get more into it next year.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Finish 9-section outlines for four POV characters in The Warden of Everfeld: Legacy.
  2. Read 3 books.
  3. Exercise 3 times per week.

Finish 9-part outlines?

Not quite. I finished two character outlines, made good progress on the third, and need to work on the fourth.

I definitely feel like these outlines will help me write more confidently once I return to my partial first draft for The Warden of Eveefeld: Legacy.

I just need to finish them.

Once that’s done, I might try to expand each character outline into a more detailed story outline. I’m not sure how I’ll go about that quite yet.

I’m not planning to participate in National Novel Writing Month this year. The timing just isn’t right for me, and I’d rather focus my attention on other story things.

Read three books?

Yes, and I came close to finishing four. I powered through two consecutive books in The Saxon Stories series. You can see a dual review of those here. Then I read The Moor’s Account by Laila Lalami, which I reviewed here. I enjoyed all three.

I’m still working through A Memory of Light, the final tome in The Wheel of Time series. I’m going at a steady pace with this one, and I’m happy with it. I’ve been reading this series for too long to sprint through the ending.

Exercise three times per week?

Not really, at least not to the extent I wanted. I have definitely been a little more active day to day, which is progress. But I’d still like to add in a few solid routine days each week.

Goals for November

  1. Finish 9-section outlines. This shouldn’t take much if I can just sit and focus on it for a bit.
  2. Finish New Earth The Herb Witch Tales #2 draft. I just want to close this story out in its current form. I’m not sure what that word count will look like, and it’s not important. I want to put a pin in this story before returning to Legacy in earnest.
  3. Read three books. Same same. I already have one book nearly complete, and I’m eyeing my next choice.
  4. Exercise three times per week. On top of more general stretching, which should really be a daily routine for me at this point.

Steve D

October Write Day: Still Resetting

On By Steven D'AdamoIn FantasyLeave a comment

September was a strangely long month, but it went pretty well. A lot of my attention has been drawn towards watching House of the Dragon and The Rings of Power and listening to reaction and theory podcasts for each episode. I’m a couple episodes behind on Rings, but I’m really enjoying both of them, for quite different reasons.

I’m also a little miffed that those two shows, plus Andor, plus the start of football season all happened in the same month. So Andor will have to wait, although I’ve heard good things.

But in non-TV news…

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Progress my writing.
  2. Read 3 books.
  3. Exercise 3 times per week.

Let’s see how I fared.

Progress my writing?

Yes, in some small ways, which was really my goal. I transcribed notes from a beat-up journal into a larger, cleaner one. The beat-up journal went through a washing machine because I forgot it in the pocket of a pair of pants. So, many notes were lost to wear and ink-bleed, but I’m satisfied with those I was able to recover through the dried, stiff pages as I peeled them apart.

Lesson learned: don’t use journals that can fit in your pocket. It might sound nice and convenient, but they are too easily thrown in with dirty laundry, apparently.

Part of those notes included the beginnings of an outline for The Warden of Everfeld: Legacy. I’m not good at sticking to outlines with my stories, but there are too many factors at play for me not to be a bit more organized with this story:

  • It has now been five years since I published The Warden of Everfeld: Memento, the predecessor to Legacy, which obviously raises a lot of continuity concerns I want to avoid.
  • I have 60,000+ words written already, but I last looked at them in 2019 — so I kind of have to start over anyway.
  • It’s a fairly complex story, with three broad plotlines that hover around each other but do not necessarily cross.
  • It’s based primarily on established characters, so in addition to getting the plot right, I want to get the voicing and the continued character development right.

So I’m building my outline using a few techniques, starting small and then expanding outward.

  1. First, I write a logline for each major point-of-view character, so I know who that character is and what they want.
  2. Then, I’m breaking that logline down into a three-act story — basically three mini-loglines for the beginning, middle, and end of that character’s arc.
  3. Then, I want to break that down further into 9 parts, 3 parts per “act” to identify how that character’s story progresses.
  4. Once I have a nine-section outline, I want to add general notes for each section to help drive the narrative details that will drive each plot point forward.

I’ve never used this method to outline an entire story before, so I’ll let you know how it goes.

So, while I didn’t do much writing in September, I definitely feel like I’m laying the groundwork for a project that has been screaming for my attention for… 3 years.

Read three books?

Checks Goodreads…

No! I finished one long audiobook that was really a lecture series about linguistics. It was John McWhorter’s series on Language Families of the World, one of the Great Courses offered on Audible. I enjoy linguistics, but this was a long listen. I had been picking away at it for a couple months and decided to just close it out in September.

I then powered through a short military sci-fi story that was pretty good.

Two books isn’t bad, but I’m trying for better in October. I already have one book down and another well on its way!

Exercise three times per week?

Vaguely. I don’t have a set routine so much as I have a nagging feeling that I need to move and do some kind of physical activity on most days. That generally takes the form of some basic stretching and yoga poses and some resistance training, and maybe an extra long walk with the dog.

I want to start interspersing those “lighter” days with power yoga videos again. I’ve gotten away from any set yoga routine and want to start it up again, even if it’s just a few times per week.

So, I’m exercising, just not as much as I’d like to, and with no real goals in mind except not feeling stiff, or lazy, or weak.

Goals for October

  1. Finish 9-section outlines for four POV characters in The Warden of Everfeld: Legacy. Now we return to a more specific and quantifiable writing goal. If I can lay out the foundation of an outline for my four primary characters, then I’ll feel comfortable returning to my draft-in-progress to read through it and start building out my outline.
  2. Read 3 books. Like I said, I’m well on my way. This month’s focus is just reading for pure enjoyment, even if I end up reading three books in the same series in a row, which is a stark possibility. Usually I try to diversify my reading list, but nah. It’s time to just read anything that catches my eye.
  3. Exercise 3 times per week. What I want “exercise” to mean from this point forward is not just a few stretches or a long walk. I’d like to get in the habit of 15- or 20-minute sessions of stretching/yoga mixed with resistance training. I have a basic routine down pretty well that combines some yoga poses with deep squats and push-ups, but I also want to mix it up with guided yoga sessions focused on movement and strength. So I’ll just need to be a bit more deliberate about how much I exercise each day.

September Write Day: Time for a Reset

On By Steven D'AdamoIn FantasyLeave a comment

I can’t recall much of August, except for a couple of things that seemed to take up most of my mental capacity for the month.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Write 4,800 words.
  2. Take the next writing step.
  3. Read 3 books.
  4. Exercise 3 times per week.

So where are we at?

Write 4,800 words?

No. I think a fair bit of it had to do with stress from work distracting me. I had a big presentation and a work trip within a week of each other towards the end of the month, and I think these were just hanging over me. I could feel it during the work day, and it bled into non-work things.

I’ve felt much better overall now that I’m over those hurdles.

And yet I have been unable to craft a decent ending to New Earth, The Herb Witch Tales #2. I generally know how I want this story to land, but I’ve become stuck on the mechanics. I’m thinking I need to step back from this story for a bit until I can work out the ending.

Take the next writing step?

No, but I think that’s what I need to focus on for this month. As I said above, I’m going to step back from New Earth and focus on something different for a change. Switching projects can often be refreshing.

Alternative projects include:

  • Transcribing notes from a small beat-up journal into a newer nice one
  • Revisiting my partial draft of The Warden of Everfeld: Legacy to outline that novel.

I honestly haven’t yet decided what I’m going to work on, and I’m okay with that. It could be a little bit of everything.

Read three books?

No. I’m 100ish pages into A Memory of Light, the final book in The Wheel of Time, and I find myself not rushing through it. I’m definitely enjoying reading it. I guess I just don’t want to gloss over sections just to get to the end.

Exercise three times per week?

I’m getting there, but not quite there. I like my mini routine and may be looking for something additive this month.

Goals for September

  1. Progress my writing. Honestly, I just want to pick away at one of the projects I mentioned above. No quantitative goals. Just forward movement to keep my brain working.
  2. Read 3 books. We’ll see. I definitely want to read more things. I’m just not holding myself to finishing A Memory of Light, so I’ll need to find something else.
  3. Exercise 3 times per week. Same same. Like my other two goals, this is more about consistency than anything else.

Steve D