Category: Publishing

Buds: A collection of stories

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I just put together all my stories from 2016 to 2019 into a 5 x 8 paperback. It is 371 pages long and the stories that are in this book are;

  • My Cousin Megan,
  • From the Mountain,
  • The Backup Girl,
  • The Witch’s Room,
  • The Things We Do,
  • Save One.

Feet or Fins and The Dragon’s Mate are not in the collection. I called it Buds, as in plant buds, because while they are not the first stories I wrote (I have a bunch of short stories from uni), they are the emergence of my writing style. I think in a few years’ time I’ll put out another collection as I think my novelettes and novellas are not long enough for their own paperbacks.

To do lists

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I’ve set goals in the past. Done things like post them to this blog as a form of accountability. I’ve usually achieve some but not others. In the last year I’ve pretty much been lazy about it. I’d list everything on piece of paper and then forget all about it. But I got the genius idea to actually find a goal check list on word templates and see what pops up.

So I found something that might fit me and put in my goals for the next six months. I’ve added the expected completion dates in hopes of pushing me along. Maybe if I view everything as an assignment then it might change how I see it.

The immediate things I want to complete this year is to publish Matt and Rose, hopefully within the next six weeks šŸ™‚ I want to complete the manuscript for my other story, so far titled, Those in the Forest, by the end of January.

Writing during the Quarantine

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Time, time, time.

Since March I have all the time in the day to write. For the most part I have spent my time equal parts writing, moaning about not writing, and wondering why my organic self cannot work like a machine. However it has not been a complete waste like I infer. These are the things I have done during quarantine;

  • The Dragon’s Mate: I wrote, edited and self-published this novella in two months.
  • Matt and Rose: A novelette that is just about ready.
  • Those in the Forest: Plan for a supernatural story about an escapee from a recluse cult. Only has a few thousand words have been written. Probably won’t be done for at least a year.

The first 40 days

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Digital-artistic-Sketch-of-a-Dragon-1146713332_2092x1438
My current quarantine project.

I look at my blog posts about the first 40 days of my creative endeavours and I’m like, is that all? I’m not nearly as productive as I would like and yet I felt like I had accomplished quite a bit. It’s strange how I see things.

I always want to have more done than I have completed and I somewhat blame my cross-stitch kits. Those little bastards call to me too much. I need to complete them like I’m trying to fill a fix.

I hope by the end of the next 40 days; we’ve come out of quarantine and that I’ve at least finished The Dragon’s Mate. I want to publish it by June/July. But that is not a set date. I also want to finish one of the three cross stitches I’m doing as well šŸ™‚

Works in progress

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Currently, I’m looking at shorter works that I can polish up while I’m in a bit of a writing slump. There is this one group of short prequel stories that belong to a story I haven’t written yet. That’s three years old now and I’m starting to panic. The days are passing by, and I’m not as successful as I want to be.Ā I am also moving to the Netherlands in about two months and the stress is getting to me.

The most current things I’m rotating between are;

  • A social sci-fi YA that I think will be quiteĀ long. It’s 60ish thousand words and maybe a third? done. Not too sure where I’m heading with the end. Maybe I might have to break it into two books? Atm, I’ve runĀ out of steam so it’s going on the back burner until I get someĀ more ideas for it.
  • A dystopian novel that is not even halfway through the first draft but I have a guestimate of where the ending is. I’ve changed the POV from first to third so it needs a rewrite.
  • A sci-fi YA that’s over 120 thousand and I need to complete the 3rd draft. I’ve lost a character somewhere and need to resolve that one.
  • The prequel stories I’m editing at the moment does not have a novel attached to them and I need to write a story plan for that, plus write a first draft of the novel.

I don’t think I’ll have any stories ready for publication for at least 12 months. That worries me because I wanted to have more done by now. I’m almost 30 and with not much to show for it. I know when I move I willĀ have some time off and hopefully, I’ll use it to my full advantage.

 

Looking back on my first book

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Feet or Fins was first published four years ago. It entered the world quietly because I didn’t market it and that was a good thing because of how bad it was written. I had to have a friend point it outĀ to me and I went back and was like, ‘Yeah, your right. Good thing no one bought it.’

That was my first foray into the self-publishing world and boy was I glad no one noticed.Ā I did like 14/15 drafts of that book and it still wasn’t good enough šŸ˜¦ But the next draft was immensely better. Thank you,Ā friend.

For the longest time, it was only on Smashwords and then I got over the idea that Amazon was somehowĀ lesser because it was a global corporation and knew that it would help me if I joined. Then I used the site to create a paperback version. By this stage, I had created a second cover image and when I finally got around to ordering a physical copy for myself I saw a few formatting issues. I used asterisksĀ to separate some scenes instead and a few of them were out of place.Ā Recently I updated my cover image again! I think this one is a lot nicer, andĀ it features two mermaids.