Only one chapter completed this month. It was a pretty short one, but it was a good example where the scene worked exactly as I planned during the outlining stage. Hopefully the next few will continue that trend!
I also hope that I don't get too distracted with my other hobbies. Composing music has been occupying a lot of my free time lately, and the Switch 2 comes out next week, soooo I'll need to work on some self-discipline to keep on my writing schedule.
Hope everyone has a great month!
March! The month of madness! Actually this whole year has been quite the whirlwind, but that’s all I will say regarding that. Only positive things from here on out!
This month has been an absolute success getting back into my writing. I wrote two new chapters and worked on a lot of revisions. Part of this drive has stemmed from a March Madness writing event put on by PaWriCo. It's been a low stakes "competition" where other writers urge each other to log in hours spent writing or developing their stories. Seeing our Team Orange hours rise throughout the month has been encouraging and helped me find time throughout the craziness of life to open up Word and start typing. And for those curious, I spent 70 hours working on my writing! Hopefully in a month or two, I’ll have completed enough of Book 2 to start getting Beta feedback, so if you're interested, feel free to reach out. I'm really happy with how it's turning out so far!
In non-writing news, work has been the most fun I've had in years, the Elbaph arc in One Piece continues to be fantastic, I saw Princess Mononoke in 4K at the Imax, and I cannot wait for the Switch 2 Direct this week!
Well October didn't go exactly as planned. Due to some health issues, I lost almost two full weeks of writing, so I was only able to finish three chapters instead of the planned five. Oh well, life goes on. I've already started the next chapter however, so here's hoping I can make up some extra writing time before the end of the year!
In other news, I went to a live playing of the Avatar the Last Airbender soundtrack. As expected, it was amazing and filled my soul with immense joy. That show is just so good! I can only aspire to write something a tenth as good someday.
It's funny how some scenes flow onto the page effortlessly, while others seem like an all-out brawl. This latest chapter was a struggle, fighting to be completed all the way to the last paragraph. Every time I thought the characters were done deviating from the outline, they kept surprising me.
I purposely build in enough space within the outline for spontaneous deviations such as these, and when I come across a change I - or in this instance the characters - want to make, I always ask, "Will this be able to serve the narrative later down the road?" If not, then it is probably not an idea worth spinning my wheels on. But in this chapter, every single deviation seems like a strong enough idea to see how they play out. I'm curious how my thoughts will change further on in the development of the book. Who knows, maybe these scenes won't survive the dreaded editing knife.
But for now, I'm excited to jump into the next chapter!
July has flown by and it’s been a whirlwind of a month. I wrote two chapters of Book 2 and have a solid start into a third one. Outside of actual writing, I’ve been busy working on supplementary sketches and designs for the series. Some things are marketing related such as bookmarks and business cards, while others are in-universe items. For instance, I spent about two weeks designing an airship that will make an appearance in Book 2 (that’s right, we’re finally going to see airships!).
I’m also working on a promotional image to represent The Hues of Unity as a series. Think of it sort of like a movie poster but for a book series. It’s coming together nicely but I'm still a few weeks away from being able to share.
Overall, it’s been a pretty good month, looking forward to August!