Posted in Real Life, writing, tagged e-publishing, fantasy, first drafts, Multiple Projects, Real Life, rewrites, series, writing on April 13, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Because writing and making up stories is part of who I am, nothing can keep me from it for long. So . . . yeah, I’m back working on MAGE STORM. And a little bit on BECOME.
And on Plan B for the other issue. Because there’s never just one way to solve a problem.
Forward.
Posted in Real Life, tagged Real Life, Writer's Block on April 10, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Sometimes real life just sucks all the creativity out of you. I thought I’d gotten a handle on things. Friday that blew up. And I’m finding it very difficult to concentrate on writing anything right now.
Posted in Real Life, writing, tagged e-publishing, fantasy, first drafts, Multiple Projects, Real Life, sequels, series, writing on January 3, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Well, not quite. There’s still a lot of Christmas stuff to put back up, though the big stuff is taken care of. And one more family celebration.
But tomorrow I have to go back to work after two weeks off and that’s been messing with my mind today. Funny how, just as I start to sleep in, it’s time to set the alarm again. That, and they’re promising a week of unpleasant weather, to boot. Couldn’t have happened this week when I didn’t have to go anywhere but grocery shopping once.
Add to that I upgraded my PC to Windows 10 last night, which turned out to be more involved than I expected. It was one of the too-many things I’d had on my list to take care of while I was off so I figured I’d take care of it. I was prepared for the change to cause problems with some of my non-Microsoft applications. Never expected it to mess with Microsoft Office, though. That took a little time–and considerable angst–to work out. Oddly, so far all of the non-Microsoft products appear to be unaffected. Not that I’ve tried them all.
Nevertheless, I have managed to get some writing on WAR OF MAGIC done anyway.
I’m really going to try to have this draft finished by the end of the month. No promises, though.
Posted in Real Life, tagged Real Life on December 10, 2015| Leave a Comment »
Well, real life has a way of intruding on the best writing intentions. It appears my refrigerator has decided to die. Therefore, everything else that isn’t essential–including, unfortunately, writing–is on hold while I try to find a refrigerator I can afford.
Even this brief post is a day late.
Wish me luck.
Posted in Real Life, writing, tagged e-publishing, fantasy, first drafts, Real Life, sequels, series, writing on November 15, 2015| Leave a Comment »
It’s a good thing I’m not officially doing NaNoWriMo, because I’m pretty sure I don’t stand a chance of getting 50,000 words done in the month of November.
Sometimes that’s because I’ve got a difficult (for me) part to write, like that first sea battle I’ve ever attempted. Sometimes it’s because real life interferes, like the week, almost, when my energies went more into dealing with car issues stemming from recalls. (Don’t get me started on that one.) And then, of course, we’ve got Thanksgiving coming up, too.
But that doesn’t mean it’s been a total loss. So there’ve been relatively few days I’ve made the goal of 1667 words a day. I’ve been making slow, but steady progress. And I’m now more than a third through the first draft half-way through the month. It’s been well worth it and I’m going to make every attempt to keep it up, even into December. I’d really love to finish this first draft by or in January.
Posted in Real Life, writing, tagged Real Life on November 11, 2015| Leave a Comment »
Every once in a while, it’s necessary to take a day just to let the creativity wells recharge. I hadn’t really planned to take one today.
Then again, I hadn’t planned to be woken–very rudely–at o’ dark something this morning–on my day off–by my cat.
It seems to have disrupted the rest of the day. So, recharge.
Posted in Real Life, writing, tagged e-publishing, fantasy, first drafts, Real Life, revisions, sequels, series, writing on October 8, 2015| Leave a Comment »
Wow, I just realized that I completely forgot to post yesterday.
Real life just came up and hit me in the face yesterday. Taken care of now, more or less.
My only excuse for today is that it’s Thursday and it never occurred to me because I post on Wednesdays and Sundays.
So, to make this just a little writing related, I’m working my way back into WAR OF MAGIC, the fourth–and last–book of my DUAL MAGICS series. The brief hiatus was just what I needed I think. Both to recharge and to get a little distance.
I’m reworking the first few chapters right now because the beginning . . . just wasn’t working. This will be better. Then I can move forward.
Posted in Real Life, tagged maps, Real Life, writing on September 20, 2015| 2 Comments »
At least around here, you never do know what you’ll find when you look in places you haven’t looked in a while. I’ve been searching for some craft materials I know I have. I actually organized my craft supplies (most of them) last year. No joy. I finally broke down and bought some more–which probably guarantees that I’ll find the stuff I already had soon.
But in my search, I turned up some things I don’t even remember. Like this:
Not the best picture, I know. (It’s hard to get a decent photo of an unfinished piece of embroidery, especially really large or long ones. This is about 30 inches long.) But if you compare that to this:
You’ll see that the first is an embroidered version of a much earlier rendering of the map for the world of the Dual Magics series.
Actually, that first map is for the first “novel” I ever wrote–way back in college. (Yes, some form of this story–or, at least, this world–has been bouncing around in my head that long.) That original story, however, took place a few hundred years into the future of the Dual Magics story–and involved another group of people living farther north, as you can see. And really wouldn’t fit into the current cannon.
I don’t even remember this piece of embroidery. It’s not quite finished, either. There’s a little bit of work left on the southern mountains. Maybe I decided I didn’t like it. Or put it aside to work on something else. Possibly, it was meant as a companion for this:
which depicts elements of that same story I wrote back in college.
Meredith Mansfield, Author 