The Revision is Done!

Hey! How are you today? I hope you all had a great week. Ours started with a long weekend (awesome) and the next four days turned out to be a blur of revision and rain.

Yeah, we've been having some shitty weather in NSW. I really hope the sun makes a comeback and sticks around for a while. Fingers crossed.

Well, as I mentioned above, I got stuck into the final read-thru of VampNovel2 this week. So, after listening to my Playlist during my daily afternoon walks (except for Thursday because it was pouring for most of the day), I grabbed my Paperwhite and some scrap paper. Then, I settled down to read the story, while taking note of any errors.

I cut a bunch of excess, but added quite a bit too. Something peculiar happened. Just before getting started on Tuesday, I decided to add a new subplot that fit the narrative and complicates things a little more. As well as changed a certain detail about a few characters. So that required a little extra work.

Anyway, after working really hard on this final draft, I finally reached The End! 

• New VampNovel1 final word count is: 90,348.

• New VampNovel2 final word count is: 90,746.

I'm SO excited! Not only did I finalise the second novel tonight, but because the two books are connected, I also had to update VampNovel1. Any changes/additions made to VampNovel2, directly affect VampNovel1. That meant a lot of extra tweaking. But I absolutely LOVED every single minute spent with these characters, so I didn't mind.

As I mentioned last month, the initial story idea came to me around this time last year. This 80s vampire story is a violent horrormance with plenty of complications.

I'm very happy because I set myself the personal goal of completing VampNovel1 in April, and VampNovel2 in May. As you can see, I did it. Yay!!

Oh, and one more thing. Do you watch Only Murders in the Building? We started watching it the other day and binged the whole first season very quickly. It's ADDICTIVE & I love it. Love cozy mysteries. They're very comfy and intriguing, with quite a bit of danger. Loving it.

We're also enjoying Murderbot and Duster.

That's about it for now. Have an awesome weekend! 

 

More Revision & Some Editing!

Hey! How are you today? It's been a SUPER busy week, and it's left me feeling mentally exhausted. To be honest, the shitty weather didn't help. 😫

I'm SO glad the weekend is finally here!

Anyway, my goal for this week was to get through the third draft of the unhinged/wild novel I'm currently revising. So, I got stuck into it on Monday afternoon and ended up reaching the end by Wednesday night. Yay! It always feels good to reach this point because it means the story is almost done. There's only one more check left to do: to read the whole thing on my Paperwhite.

Actually, it's already sitting there waiting for me. LOL.

The word count is now: 70,932.

That's right, this story has made it past the 70k mark. I mean, I knew I was going to make some additions, but also deleted quite a bit. Not sure what the final-final word count will be, but that's next week's problem. 😅

After finishing such an extensive revision, I like to give myself a bit of a break. So the intention was to take Thursday, Friday and the weekend off to recharge my batteries. BUT!! Edits hit my Inbox on Thursday morning and there's no way I'm going to leave them there. Especially since I'm determined (obsessed) to get my WIP finalised next week...

So, I got stuck into the edit and managed to get it done. Sure, I kept working into the early hours of Saturday morning, but I was determined to get it done because I want to enjoy the weekend. I really need these two days off so I can be clear-headed when I start the final read-thru on Monday. Oh, and I have to decide on a title...

Well, that's it for now.

I'm going to enjoy the weekend with my awesome husband. And now that the weather has changed and the sun is back, I hope it sticks around for a while.

Have a great one!

Revision Time!

Hey! How are you today? I hope you all had a lovely new year! 😊

Although January always moves very slowly and my brain hasn't fully grasped that the lazy festive season is done, I decided to get stuck into my first writing project of 2024: the second draft of the novel I wrote back in November.

This is to kick-start my writing goals for this year, and to make sure that I continue to stick to my plan of staying on top of my finished first drafts. I did very well last year and revised the stories I wrote a month or two after finishing. So I want to keep that going.

Those eighteen months or so that I spent catching up on first drafts I pretty much abandoned to my hard drive motivates me enough to make sure I don't falter again. 😅

I started the revision on Monday and ended up reaching the end on Wednesday night. But last night I went back to add dates to the timeline. It was a lot trickier than I first thought but I've got everything figured out now. See, I wrote this story in a non-linear style. The events are happening in two different timelines but they're not in proper sequence. I know it sounds a bit weird, but totally fits this wild story.

Anyway, now it's done. So... yay.

This is the second draft word count: 69,152.

I'm very happy with this progress and can't wait to start the third draft next week. This is a strange little tale about unhinged women who aren't likeable, but sure as hell are interesting. They get up to some seriously crazy stuff and I'm looking forward to getting this finished and hopefully out into the world.

Well, asides from that, I've been having a nice week with my husband. Though there is one pesky thing that is causing me some anxiety. A publisher I signed a contract with last year has decided to stop communicating. I've tried to reach out with no success, but I have to keep trying.

That's it for today. Hope you all have an awesome weekend! ☺️

 

2023 Goals

Well, we've almost reached the end of 2023, so I suppose it's time to chat about my goals.

This year turned out to be packed full of stuff. My husband became a bus driver, which flipped our routine. I managed to get my writing back on track after spending so much of the last few years revising, which is fantastic. And sadly, we lost our beloved 16-year-old Loki, which broke our hearts. It's been nine months, but we still miss him every single day.

Loki was more than a cat. He was family. He was the embodiment of our apartment. And without him, it feels like something is missing.

Anyway, I don't want to get off track and get sad all over again. I'm here to talk about the personal goals I set in January.

Here's how they turned out:

• Go for two daily walks: LIKE I SAID ABOVE, OUR SCHEDULE CHANGED THIS YEAR, SO MOST DAYS I END UP GOING FOR ONE VERY LONG WALK (JUST UNDER TWO HOURS).

• Get back into yoga and schedule more workouts: ALTHOUGH WE DID YOGA, IT WAS ALL OVER THE PLACE. STILL HAVEN'T FOUND THE RIGHT BALANCE. 🫤

• Write between 100-200k words: I WROTE 190.934 WORDS.

• Read 100 books: I READ 102 BOOKS.

• Revise/finalise my NaNoWriMo 2022 first draft: YES! I ACTUALLY DID THIS IN MARCH.

• Write a novel or two: I WROTE ONE 65K NOVEL.

• Write a novella or two: I WROTE TWO NOVELLAS (45K & 30K).

• Keep writing short stories & subbing Try not to self-reject & submit stories no matter how much of a longshot it is: I WROTE THREE SHORT STORIES BUT DIDN'T REALLY SUB TO MANY OPEN CALLS BECAUSE I WAS WORKING ON LONGER STUFF.

• Take part in NaNoWriMo: OKAY, THIS ONE'S MESSY. I DID WRITE A FIRST DRAFT (65K) DURING NOVEMBER, BUT I DELETED MY NANOWRIMO ACCOUNT & WILL NEVER TAKE PART AGAIN.

• Continue playing Animal Crossing and get into some other cozy, cute puzzle games: I'M STILL PLAYING ANIMAL CROSSING EVERY DAY & PLAYED COZY GROVE REGULARLY AS WELL. I ALSO FINISHED UNPACKING, CONTINUED TO PLAY THE TETRIS 99 CHALLENGES & RECENTLY STARTED SUIKA GAME. ACCORDING TO MY NINTENDO SWITCH STATS, I PLAYED A TOTAL OF 681 HOURS THIS YEAR! WHICH IS AWESOME.

Well, that's how I did with my personal goals list! Not bad. I'm very happy with what I achieved.

Now, here are some other very cool writing highlights:

• I now have TV/Film representation! I'm represented by Alec Frankel from IAG. This is SO EXCITING!! ☺️🎉

• I signed eight contracts this year.

• Writer Firsts: I got some amazing blurbs from a bunch of awesome authors, had my first hardcover and audio book releases & my most reviewed story ever!

• I edited four novellas and two are already published.

• I wrote, revised & subbed two prequel short stories that are now available for free at DarkLit.

• The two novellas I wrote this year, I also revised & finalised. Which is a big deal because I promised myself that I would keep up with first draft revision.

• I made two covers for my own books. I made the BEAST OF BURDEN cover, and with the help of Andrew Robert, I made the cover for CHANGE OF HEART.

• I finally updated my website! This was something I wanted to do all year but didn't get to it until this month. And now that I've done it, I want to make changes when needed.

• I got the rights back for two books.

These are the novellas that were released this year:

These are the short stories available for free:

I have a Creepypasta shortie in this Cemetery Gates Media anthology:

As I mentioned above, now that I've updated everything here, I've decided to concentrate on my website/blog more. After what happened with Twitter, NaNoWriMo and Substack, I'm starting to get sick and tired of closing down accounts and starting over.

My website is my personal space, and I want to highlight it a lot more.

Also, I'm not going to bother with a newsletter for now, I setup my blog so that you can subscribe and get updates sent directly to your Inbox whenever I post here. It just makes sense, and serves the same purpose as a newsletter.

Well, this is how my 2023 goals turned out! I'm very happy with everything that I managed to accomplish. And I'm very excited because SUFFER THE DARKNESS happens to be one of the projects I worked on last year. It means that those eighteen months I spent rewriting/revising all of those forgotten tales on my hard drive was definitely worth it.

I better write up some 2024 goals soon. ☺️

This Novella is Done!

Hey, how are you today? What's new with you?

This week, I've been busy working on the final read-thru of my current revision project. That's when I sit down with my Paperwhite and read the story from start to finish. It's also when any weird sentences or  repetition really stands out. I get very focused on the nitty-gritty details and usually end up mentally exhausted by the end of the day. But it's SO worth it.

I ended up cutting quite a bit, then adding some back. There were a few things that needed to be tightened and had to match the previous story. But it's finished now! I wanted to get this draft done by the end of September and I did it. Yay. 😃

The final word count is: 30,037.

I'm immensely proud of how this little dark tale turned out because when the idea initially came to me, during one of my afternoon walks, I pushed it away. Didn't want to waste time writing it. To be honest, I didn't think it was going to work. Yet, the characters wouldn't shut up and pieces of dialogue kept appearing out of nowhere. That's not even considering how vivid the imagery was... 

Anyway, I'm glad I gave in. And now it's finished before the long weekend.

I'm looking forward to spending three days with my husband. It's also daylight savings time. I can't wait for the longer days. It's really starting to feel like spring around here. When it doesn't feel like summer. Yeah, we had a few really hot days last week.

Well, that's it for now. I think it's time to enjoy the fact that another writing project is wrapped up. Instead of sitting on my hard drive for years. 😅

Have a nice day!

I'm back in Revision Town!

Hey! How's it going?

It's me again.

I took a week off to rest my brain after spending most of August revising a 45k novella, but now I'm getting stuck into another lot of revision.

Yeah, I can't stay away.

This time I'm working on this story. The one that came to me out of nowhere and I was convinced it wouldn't turn into anything. Then it became a 30k novella. 😬

I wasn't sure if I was going to enjoy re-reading this tale of woe. Even thought I might end up scrapping it after all. But nope, once I got started I couldn't stop reading. It only took me two long evening sessions to revise. I cut quite a few words, moved a bunch of stuff around, and even added new words. Deepened the description and emotion, intensified the horrifying stuff.

It's now 31k, which is pretty cool for a story I didn't think would go anywhere. LOL.

Anyway, this is another horror novella. One that revisits old territory from a very different perspective. It's bleak and dark, takes the main characters on a pretty shitty journey that—of course—doesn't end well. But I knew this going in.

Funny thing is that while I was out walking this afternoon, my wicked writer brain decided that the ending I have right now needs to be changed. And even presented me with the new, darker ending. Ultimately it leads to the same place, but in a much faster-paced and more screwed-up way. I like it.

So, now I've got a bunch of notes to tackle during the third draft! 😳

That means I'll be taking the rest of the week off, and will get stuck into the third draft next week. The final read-thru the week after. Yeah, the plan is to have it finished/finalised by the end of September. That way, I can take October off to concentrate on reading creepy books while figuring out what novel I'm going to write during this year's NaNoWriMo.

Well, I've got a few crafty things I want to do during what's left of this week. And plenty of stationery/toy organising. 

Until then, have a great day!

The Revision is Done!

Hey! How are you today?

Well, it's Friday. The 1st of September. The first day of spring. And the coldest day we've had for a while.

I went for a nice and long walk earlier and the wind chilled me to the bone. 🥶

Anyway, enough about the weather.

This turned out to be another busy week for me. The final read-thru usually is. It's when I sit down with my Paperwhite and read the story from start to finish. Doing this always highlights repetition, sentences that are too long, or awkward wording. Things that don't add anything to the overall story. It's when I end up cutting a lot of words and replacing even more.

I don't know why it happens, but every story has a handful of particular words that somehow appear a hundred times. LOL. This time it was: focus, accept and heart. I had to make sure there wasn't too many of them. The great thing about weeding out repetition words is that when I replace them, the new word choice ends up strengthening the sentence. Or encourages me to rewrite it completely.

Like I said, it's the nitty-gritty stage that sharpens the dialogue and narrative. The draft that enforces the emotional depth and develops the character connections even more. With this particular novella, I also had to re-read the sexy scenes a few times because they add a new layer to what's going on. 

I actually finished finalising everything late last night and ended up cutting roughly one thousand words. But a tiny addition that makes a big impact came to me during the day. So I added the few sentences this afternoon, and now it's really done.

The final word count is: 46,580.

I'm very happy with this novella.

It's a story that started as a way for me to deal with the unexpected loss of our beloved Loki. Losing him earlier this year hit us hard, and I didn't deal with it very well. He was my writing buddy, spent all day with me while I created stories. In many ways, he kept me in check. Without him around I tend to take less breaks, and sometimes even forget to eat. I miss him a lot and writing this novella helped me deal with how much his absence has affected me.

From the loss came a spark. An idea that stemmed from my own thoughts. And from that, I now have a completed manuscript about grief, love, and accepting what was there all along. That it turned into so much more and took my characters to places and situations I didn't expect, is a plus. 

It's been an emotional ride, but I'm glad I followed through and let my imagination run wild.

August turned out to be pretty busy. I finished writing a 30k novella, edited another one that will be published later this month (15k), and revised this one (46k). Yikes.

Well, that's pretty much all I wanted to say today. Just an update to mention that this novella is DONE. Yay!! 😊🎉

I'm going to enjoy the weekend with my husband and then take a week off writing. After that, think I'll get stuck into another lot of revision for this novella.

Take it easy and have a good one!

Revision Time!

Hey! How are you today? I know I'm a little late, but welcome to August. Yay.

I have big plans for August. ☺️

As you already know (because I posted about it) I finished writing a novella during the first week of this month. Then, I took a week off to read and have a small mental break. But I got back into writing this week.

After spending about eighteen months revising a bunch of first drafts that I kept abandoning for years, I made a promise to myself. That I'll never put projects away for longer than three months. Depending on the length of the story, one or two months is enough distance between drafts. This is a good plan to have. Especially since I don't want to go through that again.

The hard work I put into revising those unfinished projects was time well spent. I don't regret it. I'm glad I put in the effort and came out with a bunch of completed novels and novellas, but it's not something I want to tackle again. It was a LOT of work and nearly broke my brain.

Actually, SUFFER THE DARKNESS was one of those abandoned stories, and look at where that little novella is now. It's my highest reviewed/rated published book!

Anyway, back to my current revision.

Do you remember that story I wrote in June? The idea that came out of nowhere and helped me process the sadness/grief I've been suffering over the loss of my beloved writing buddy. Loki was more than just a cat and he spent most of his sixteen years stuck to my side while I wrote the day away. Losing him hurt a lot. It still does. But this novella helped me process some of my feelings of loss, while giving me the chance to create characters facing a completely different set of problems.

It ended up being a story of self-discovery and acceptance. Of finally realising what's really important, while enjoying a few pleasures along the way. This tale became something very different to what I first envisioned, but I'm very happy with how it's shaping up.

Last night, I reached the end of the second draft. I cut some words, added even more, smoothed things out, made it bloodier, more violent, and changed one character's name twice. Think I might have a title too.

The new word count is: 46,622.

Now I'm putting it aside until Monday. When I'll get stuck into the third draft. This will be an even deeper revision to make sure the story doesn't have plot holes. I'll also figure out the chapter settings, which is something I really enjoy doing during the final round.

Well, that's it for now. Sorry this post veered off into several tangents, but it's all part of the same process for me. ☺️

Have a great day!!

March Revision Update!

Hey! How are you? Is everyone ready for the weekend? I know I am.

I spent all this week working on the final read-thru of Tuesday.

This is the novel I wrote during NanoWriMo 2022. It's a dark tale about a complicated family who live in a small Australian town that has as many secrets as the residents. It's told in two POVs, one set in the past the other set nowish. I originally planned to revise it last month but a lot of life changes happened and I pushed it back to March. 

Here's how I did this week:

• Monday: 62/234pgs (85,816w)
• Tuesday: 121/237pgs (85,795w)
• Wednesday: 198/234pgs (85,354w)
• Thursday: 235/235pgs (85,025w)
• Friday: 235pgs / 85,050w

That means this novel is DONE! ☺️🎉

Yeah, this was actually the final read-thru. When I put the story on my Paperwhite and read it away from my laptop. It's amazing how many things I find with a simple change of screen.

Mostly, I ended up cutting quite a bit of excess. Things that over-explained or confused the narrative. I also added fragments throughout that helped move everything along, or strengthened relationships. In some cases, ruined them even further. 😬

Spending three weeks fine-tuning this tale of woe and mystery was a lot of work, but it's always rewarding when I get to the other side. I also formatted the Doc and backed everything up.

Tuesday (without considering trunk stories) happens to be the last revision I have left to tackle. That means I get to play around with new ideas and dream about other stories and characters. And I find that very exciting.

AND READ! I've neglected my reading so much I'm like FIVE books behind on my Goodreads Challenge. 😫

But first, I need a break. So, bring on the weekend.

Have a good one! ☺️

 

The Revision Continues...

 

Hey! How are you today? 😊

Well, this week I got stuck into the third draft of the novel I'm currently revising and not only did I reach the end tonight, but I also had enough time to take care of the changes/additions list. Yes, there's always a list leftover. It wasn't a long one this time, but I took care of everything.

That means I get tomorrow off. Yay.

Anyway, this is how this week's numbers looked: 

• Monday: 85/237pgs (87,948w)
• Tuesday: 146/237pgs (87,573w)
• Wednesday: 218/237pgs (87,050w)
• Thursday: 236pgs / 86,158w 

Very excited that the third draft is done! Yay. 😁

As you can see above, I ended up cutting quite a few words. All excess that didn't need to be there, or could be condensed in some way. I also ended up chopping the last four pages of one chapter because it didn't add anything to the story. Actually, I think it confused things.

Sometimes, you just gotta make sure the character doesn't go off on a tangent that doesn't fit.

I'm happy with how it's turned out and added it to my Paperwhite so I can read it one last time. What I love about the last stage/proofread, is how reading the story away from the laptop makes other things stand out. One thing that always catches my attention on the Paperwhite is word repetition.

But that's something to tackle on Monday. I'm going to take three days away from the story. Looking forward to the weekend, but that's still a whole day away.

Have a great day!

It's Revision Time!

 

Hey! How are you today? Great, I hope.

The last few weeks have been a bit strange. Draining and sad. Asides from losing Loki and getting used to hubby's new working hours, we got our next Pfizer booster on Friday. So we were feeling pretty crappy last weekend. That Covid shot sure makes you feel like shit, but it's worth it. And the effects wore off by Monday. Phew.

Well, it's been a while but this week I got stuck into a bit of revision. That's right, after finishing my outstanding Revision Projects last year, I promised myself that I would stay on top of my drafts from now on. There's no point in piling them up for years. It's much better to stay on top of things.

So, this is me getting stuck into the first draft of last year's NaNoWriMo story. I still like to put distance between myself and the first draft, one or two months is good, but I don't want to put them aside like I used to. It gets out of hand too easily.

So, here's  my progress:

• Monday: 83/235pgs (87,603w)
• Tuesday: 154/235pgs (87,601w)
• Wednesday: 235/235pgs (87,568w)
• Thursday: 235pgs / 87,845w

The second draft is now done! Yay. ☺️

I'm very happy with how this story turned out. This draft involved cutting away excess, and adding necessary details I missed during that first-draft writing frenzy. It wasn't too messy, so I'm looking forward to tackling the next two drafts.

The plan is to have this novel finalised by the end of March. I really like these characters and the story gets quite dark and goes places I didn't think it would. The relationships in this story are as messed up as the horror side of things. I also feel like there's definitely a true-crime influence in this one, which solidifies the narrative.

It feels good to have started the process. I'll put it aside until Monday, but I'm sure I'll be adding notes to tackle during the third draft. LOL.

I enjoyed the revision, but I missed my writing buddy. Loki used to sit next to my desk whenever I was working, and I really felt his absence. 😔

Have a nice weekend!

The First Week

I don't know if it's because I'm tapping into some sort of New Year Energy, but I wanted to post a little something to mark the end of the first week of 2023. 😊

(I'm really hoping this is the year when the world moves away from the ridiculous.🤞)

Anyway, Monday was a public holiday so we enjoyed the last day of hubby's break. On Tuesday, he went back to work and I got stuck into several small writing projects.

Firstly, I completed the third draft of a short story I wrote late last year but got pushed aside because of NaNoWriMo and revision. Then, I tweaked the beginning of one of the novellas (formerly a novel) I revised last year. And even re-read an old 5k short story I wanted to tighten.

I ended that day with a bunch of file/photo/pics updates, and setup a new tracking words/pages spreadsheet.

The next day, I completed the final read of my (pushed-aside) shortie and finalised it. Ended up being just below 4k words. Initially, I was going to file it away in my Completed Folder, but found a submission call that totally fits this weird, little tale. So, fingers crossed.

That day, I also finished reading a book.

On Thursday, I spent most of the morning updating my submission calls list. I subbed several stories and queries, and got a rejection for one only hours later. Rs always suck, but as I mentioned on Twitter... I'm trying not to self-reject.

It's hard when the market is swamped and every submission call gets hundreds of subs to fill a small amount of places, but I want to at least try. Last year I did a lot of: Yeah, I'm gonna sub to this, this, and this, only to let time slip away before I could send anything because a voice deep inside kept telling me not to bother. Well, that voice is wrong. I want to send my stories to places. It might be a longshot, but I want to try.

Besides, now that I've cleared my Revision Plan, I want to see if I can get some of those stories out there. See if anyone's interested.

Asides from all of this writing stuff, I also FINALLY sorted out my Moleskine Planner. It was something I'd been meaning to do for several weeks. 😬

It's funny how much I managed to achieve during a week when every single morning, as soon as I woke up, all I wanted to do was go back to sleep. Yeah, that's strange for me in the middle of summer, but I had a break hangover. Plus, this shitty rainy weather isn't helping. *yawn*

Well, I think that's enough from me.

Have a good one!

Tracking Words & Pages

 

Hey! How are you today? It's time to post another New Year tradition on my blog. I've been posting a screenshot of my previous year's Word Count Tracking Sheets for a while. So, why stop now? 😁

So, here are my 2022 stats:

Total words written: 160,534.

Total pages revised 3,843.

Although 2022 turned out to be an extension of the previous two years, as far as WTFuckery? was concerned, I managed to complete several writing goals. And the most exciting thing was finishing up my leftover Revision Projects. As well as completing another NaNoWriMo.

That explains almost 4k worth of revision pages and the bulk of the yearly word count! 😅

If you're wondering where I got this very handy spreadsheet, it's something Sidney Bristol used to annually share on her blog. Although this side of her blog hasn't been updated for a long while, you can still get your hands on the basic spreadsheet HERE. All you have to do is update the year yourself.

Either way, I wanted to give her the credit she deserves because I LOVE using this spreadsheet and have been doing so for years. It's so helpful and helps keep track of my daily, monthly and yearly productivity.

This post only covers my actual word and page count stats. If you're interested in a more detailed list, the other day I posted a breakdown of my 2022 Goals.

Yesterday, I setup my spreadsheet for 2023 and have already added new words and revision pages.

Anyway, here's to another productive year!

Some Kind of Goals

Welcome to my 2023 Goals post. 😁

I'm not a big fan of resolutions because they don't usually stick, but goals are a different story. I love putting together a goals list at the beginning of the year, and post them here.

These are the things I'd like to achieve/continue to do this year:

• Go for two daily walks
• Get back into yoga and schedule more workouts 
• Write between 100-200k words
• Read 100 books
• Revise/finalise my NaNoWriMo 2022 first draft
• Write a novel or two
• Write a novella or two
• Keep writing short stories & subbing
• Try not to self-reject & submit stories no matter how much of a longshot it is
• Take part in NaNoWriMo
• Continue playing Animal Crossing and get into some other cosy, cute puzzle games.

Well, there it is!

This is my list for 2023.

Are you making a list this year?
 

2022 Goals

Well, here we are again.

We've almost reached the end of another year. And boy did 2022 turn out to be quite a weird, and often shitty, year.

I thought 2021 was bad, but things are not getting better. Nope.

I'm not sure what's happening to the cosmic order of things, but it feels like the ridiculous is slowly taking over the world. We're shifting towards a world where cruelty and bigotry is rewarded, but empathy and inclusion is belittled. I mean, how else can every pathetic thing that's happened so far be explained? The fact we're still in the middle of a pandemic, and most people choose to act like it's over, is only the tip of the iceberg.

There's a whole lot of WTFuckery? going around. 😐

Just take a look at what's happening to Twitter. A social media platform that didn't need to be made worse. But a spoilt man-baby decided he wanted to spend someone else's money to buy it and is slowly destroy it. Ugh. People are just rotten, I suppose.

Some good things did happen in this silly world. Our daughter came back to Oz. The LNP were voted out earlier this year. 

Anyway, let's get to my personal goals. 😁

Here's how they turned out:

• Go for two daily walks: THIS IS SOMETHING WE DID THE WHOLE YEAR BECAUSE HUBBY CURRENTLY WORKS WITHIN WALKING DISTANCE. I REALLY ENJOY THE TWO-DAILY-WALKS ROUTINE & ONE-DAILY-LONG-SUBURBAN WALK ON THE WEEKEND.

• Keep doing yoga workouts two/three times a week: WE CONTINUED DOING YOGA WORKOUTS DURING THE YEAR BUT, UNFORTUNATELY, DIDN'T MAINTAIN THE THREE-WORKOUTS/WEEK ROUTINE WE WANTED. STILL, SOME YOGA IS BETTER THAN NO YOGA.

• Write between 100-200k words: ENDED UP WRITING 159,020 words & EDITING A WHOPPING 3,843 pages. 👀

• Read 100 books: READ 117 BOOKS. (5 DNFs.)

• Revise/finalise the rest of the (5) novel first drafts sitting on my hard drive: I ACTUALLY FINISHED DOING THIS IN SEPTEMBER & COMPLETED 5 REVISION PROJECTS (Cosmic, Madness, Summer, Neon, Stuck), 1 FULL EDIT (Possess) + ABANDONED 1 YA WIP AFTER FINISHING THE SECOND DRAFT (Urban). I ALSO CUT A TOTAL OF 104,423 words!

• Write a novel: I WROTE ONE NOVEL DURING NANO (87,682w).

• Write a novella: I BRAINSTORMED, RESEARCHED & STARTED WRITING THREE NOVELLAS BUT DIDN'T FINISH ANY OF THEM. 😬

• Keep writing short stories & sub: I WROTE 7 SHORT STORIES AND HAD ONE OF THESE STORIES ACCEPTED INTO AN ANTHOLOGY THAT WAS PUBLISHED EARLIER THIS YEAR. 

• Take part in NaNoWriMo:  I  TOOK PART & GOT MY 16th WIN! (This time I wrote another horror story about a family with too many secrets, a place with too many ghosts & an old mystery that resurfaces.)

• Clear book clutter/piles: WHILE I DID CONTINUE TO GO THROUGH MY SECONDHAND/REVIEW BOOK STACKS, THE NEW BOOK PILES ARE STILL OUT OF CONTROL. 🫤

• Continue playing Animal Crossing: I'VE NOW BEEN PLAYING ANIMAL CROSSING: NEW HORIZONS (ON MY SWITCH LITE) EVERY SINGLE DAY FOR OVER A YEAR.

Well, that's my list of completed goals!

As far as having stories published, 2022 was a total shocker. I did sign a new contract with Otranto House for my second YA horror novel, and my Creepypasta story will be published in an upcoming Cemetery Gates Media anthology next year, but as far as actual new releases go, there was only one:

SOMETHING BAD HAPPENED: An Anthology of Horror, collected and edited by Jennifer Bernardini was a great opportunity. I was lucky enough to get an invite from the awesome Wayne Fenlon. The anthology involved picking a writing prompt from Jennifer Bernardini's very inspiring, Something Bad Happened: A Horror Journal, and writing a short story. My contribution was a dark tale about a hellish roadtrip that doesn't end well for the narrator. 

On a side note, since writing this tale, I've actually written two more short stories that either mention or feature a distasteful character in The Loaded Trunk. She just keeps popping up. LOL.

Another very cool thing was having a piece I wrote, posted at Ginger Nuts of Horror. It was inspired by the very disturbing movie, Fresh, and is called, Not So Fresh.

Well, there you have it. The focus for 2022 was getting through the outstanding Revision Plan I set for myself last year. While that turned out to be a long and tiring endeavour, it was also very rewarding. And now, it's DONE! 🎉

2022 Summary

Now I'll need to come up with a 2023 Goals List...

Revision Time!

Hey! Long time no blog, huh?

So, how are you? What's new? What have you been up to? 😁

After getting several revision drafts done in a row, I decided to take most of August off, and spent it with my awesome husband while he was between jobs. It was a lovely break and prepared me for the final Revision Project. Yay.

This time I tackled a YA horror novel that deals with urban legends/myths, but has a demonic twist. I really enjoyed writing the first draft of Urban back in 2017, so I was looking forward to finding out if I still felt that way. Five years away from this story put a lot of distance between the original concept/idea and, although I still liked a lot of what I read, I spotted too many problems.

Here's how my week turned out:

• Monday: 37/182pgs (69,041w)
• Tuesday: 74/178pgs (66,930w)
• Wednesday: 104/169pgs (63,050w)
• Thursday: 160pgs/60,398w

Well, the second draft is done.

As you can see, there was quite a bit of word-cutting done during this draft. Excess, things that didn't need to be there, and plenty of other probs that stood out.

Yeah, this revision didn't work out the same way as the others.

I mean, there's a lot to like about this tale because so much of it is essentially a series of stories within the main story. But for some reason, the thread that strings it all together wasn't as strong as I remember. 😧

Looks like I've reached the stage where I have to admit to myself that this novel isn't working.

I initially started thinking about this as early as Tuesday, which is a shame. This situation reminds me of something I said to my husband after watching the movie, Ouija. I told him that although there were quite a few cool ideas/concepts that I really liked, the overall story didn't work.

Well, that's exactly how I feel about Urban.

So, after reaching the end and thinking about it, I've decided not to continue the revision process for this novel. Instead, I'll probably cannibalize chunks from this draft and will turn them into shorter stories. Actually, there's one particular creepy scene that I think will work great as a short story. And other bits that can be added to some of my other future ideas.

So, it's not a total loss. 😊

Now that I've completed the Revision Project List, I can tally the total number of words I cut this year. Between this draft (-9,637w), June's novel (-17,056w), the novella I revised in May (-27,927w) and March (-24,600w), as well as February's (-25,203w), I've now cut a total of 104,423 words this year! Yikes!!

Although, since I'm scrapping this novel, one could easily consider the entire word count cut. 😬

Oh, and another great thing about completing this project is that I can update my Revision List for the last time:

• April 2021: Full edit of Wall of Dolls
• May 2021: Full revision of Destiny
• June 2021: Full revision of Victoria
• August 2021: Full revision of Possess
• September 2021: Full revision of Monsters
• February 2022: Full revision of Cosmic
• March 2022: Full revision of Madness
• May 2022: First edit of Possess
• May 2022: Full revision of Summer
• June 2022: Full revision of Neon
• July 2022: Final edit of Possess
• July/August 2022: Full revision of Stuck
• September 2022: Second draft revision of Urban done before abandoning the novel.

Well, I might be finishing this Revision Quest on a bittersweet note, but I'm still super excited to have reached The End of a long task I set for myself last year. 😁🎉

All that's left to do is sorting my files. Then, I look forward to getting stuck into a bunch of new projects because the writing never ends.

But for now, I'm going to enjoy the next three days with hubby before he starts a new job. 

Have an awesome day!

July/August Revision Update!

Hey! How are you today? What have you been doing?

Here in Oz, the Covid situation keeps getting worse. The daily case numbers are still too high, and the deaths make me very sad. Still, people refuse to wear masks and continue to pack into crowded places without any social distancing. They're also too slow to act on the vaccine boosters. Luckily, hubby and I got our second booster several weeks ago, so we're now fully vaxxed. Again. It really isn't hard, but people are lazy and think that living with Covid means pretending it isn't there. 😡

Anyway, I better stop because this is something that grates on my fucking nerves.

After putting my current Revision Project aside for a week, so I could complete the final edit for another story, it was time to get back to Stuck. Especially since this is the last read-thru.

Here's my progress:

• Monday: 43/179pgs (65,532w)
• Tuesday: 86/178pgs (65,463w)
• Wednesday: 118/178pgs (65,560w)
• Thursday: 141/178pgs (65,306w)
• Friday: 177pgs / 64,836w

That means this novel is DONE! ☺️🎉

Although this story didn't require a complete rewrite or huge cuts (like several other projects) I did have to make quite a few changes. Most of the stuff I fixed were typos, tiny inconsistencies, and making sure the timeline was solid. This is the first book I've set during Covid, so I wanted to get all the details right. Not to mention the chapters that are set during different historical times.

I had to pay close attention to detail, so it took a while to get through.

Still, I had a lot of fun with this haunted house ghost story. And actually, it was raunchier than I remember... which, in the context of this particular tale, is definitely a good thing. Well, that's what I reckon, anyway. 😉

Unlike the previous mentioned projects this year, I ended up adding words to this one. 1,256, to be exact.

Another great thing about completing this project is that I can update my Revision List again:

• April 2021: Full edit of Wall of Dolls
• May 2021: Full revision of Destiny
• June 2021: Full revision of Victoria
• August 2021: Full revision of Possess
• September 2021: Full revision of Monsters
• February 2022: Full revision of Cosmic
• March 2022: Full revision of Madness
• May 2022: First edit of Possess
• May 2022: Full revision of Summer
• June 2022: Full revision of Neon
• July 2022: Final edit of Possess
• July/August: Full revision of Stuck

Love the way this list looks now! I can't believe I have ONE first draft left to revise: an old YA novel (from 2017). Yay.

However, I've been working really hard during the last three months (3 full revisions + 1 edit) so I definitely need a mental break. I think I'll take the rest of this month off, so I can have a break with hubby. ☺️

Have a great weekend!

Back to Revising!

Yep. That's right. Since this is my penultimate Revision Project (yay!), I decided to take only one week off between drafts. 😁

And it turned out to be a nice week because I read several awesome novellas, and spent Thursday and Friday with hubby. It was such a lovely long weekend.

So, how's everyone doing this week? Here in Oz, we're in the middle of winter, which is turning out to be quite a bad flu season. Not to mention the rising Covid cases. Yet, people insist on not wearing masks indoors. People are so fucking frustrating because wearing a mask and getting vaccinated/boosted aren't hard things to do. Ugh.

Anyway. My next revision is Stuck. This is the novel I wrote during NaNoWriMo last year, so it's not one of my older WIPs. It's what I called: A haunted house ghost story. A description that still fits perfectly.
 

Here's my progress:

• Monday: 37/160pgs (62,996w)
• Tuesday: 59/160pgs (63,056w)
• Wednesday: 131/161pgs (62,746w)
• Thursday: 161pgs / 62,411w

The second draft is now done! Yay. ☺️

I really enjoyed revising this novel because it's actually weirder, creepier and a lot raunchier than I remember. And I consider this to be an awesome thing. LOL.

This time, I ended up cutting 1,169 words. Nowhere near as many words as the other four WIPs I tackled this year. I think that's got something to do with the fact that I write cleaner first drafts than I used to. Don't get me wrong, I still cut excess words, moved sentences around, made several additions, and had to double check several details. But I didn't delete half of the story this time. 😅

Anyway, I'm happy with how this is shaping up and look forward to completing the next two drafts. But this draft is done and I'll put it away until next week.

It's time for a bit of a mental break.

Have a great day!

More Revision...

Hey! How are you today? 

Well, I've been very busy working on the third draft of Neon, and that means that I'm at the stage where the story is totally eating my brain. 🤯

When I'm not sitting down in front of the laptop revising, I'm on my phone fine-tuning timelines, changing character names, taking notes to add more attention to detail, and rewriting the bits that I'm not 100% happy with.  

Yep. That's what I worked on this week. And although it means that I'm not reading the (many) books I want to get stuck into, I enjoy losing myself in the revision process. I love everything about writing, but revising these semi-abandoned first draft novels is turning out to be very rewarding. 😊

Anyway, here's how this week turned out:

• Monday: 42/147pgs (55,488w)
• Tuesday: 70/147pgs (55,096w)
• Wednesday: 100/142pgs (53,062w)
• Thursday: 126/126pgs (47,754w)
• Friday: 131pgs / 49,012w

As you can see, the word count has gone down again! Yep. Did a LOT of chopping. 

It was nice to get into the groove of this story! Even though it was stuck on my hard drive for years, I often thought about this weird tale because I had a great time writing it during NaNoWriMo 2019. Of course, like all the drafts that came before, there were several problems: excess details that didn't work, not enough description in vital places, an ending that didn't fit. 

I ended up cutting SO MANY words!

There were several places in the story that needed a good trim/changes, and I think this strengthened the overall story and cleared up a few things that didn't make sense to me during the re-read. Or didn't need to be there at all. I mean, I had an aerobics class scene that was purely there for the 80s aesthetic, but didn't move the story along. 😏

LMAO.

As I mentioned above, the ending needed a bit of work too. I actually re-wrote the last section completely, and I'm much happier with this version. Well, happy with figuring everything out, but this new ending is sadder than the original one. Yet, more satisfying. If that makes any sense.

Okay. I'm all out of words now. It's time to enjoy the weekend with hubby so I can return to this story with fresh eyes on Monday. Only have one more step to go: read Neon on my Paperwhite.

Have an awesome weekend, guys! 😁

It's That Time Again!

That's right! This week might have started with a public holiday, but I still got stuck into a new Revision Project.

This time I'm working on Neon, which happens to be a sci-fish horror novel set in the 80s, featuring wrestling, different dimensions, and loss. I was very excited about getting back to this story because I wrote the first draft during NaNoWriMo 2019. 

Anyway, here's my progress:

• Monday: Public Holiday
• Tuesday: 42/161pgs (64,507w)
• Wednesday: 75/156pgs (61,392w) 
• Thursday: 128/148pgs (56,684w)
• Friday: 145pgs / 55,390w

The second draft is done! Phew.

I have to admit that attempting to complete this draft in four days was a bit ambitious, and I had to sneak in an extra revision session last night, but I'm SO glad I pushed myself. 😬

 

So, in true 2022 revision fashion, I cut 10,791 words. Yikes! I'm not surprised because there were several bits that didn't need to be there. I also decided to change a few things, so that meant cutting details that were no longer relevant.

I really enjoyed getting back into this novel because I like the main character and the weird shit she finds herself in after an unexpected loss. This is her story and I'm happy with the progress.

When I hit the third draft next week, I need to fine-tune several things. I'm looking forward to tackling the next stage in this bizarre 80s trip. 

Well, that's it for now. This turned out to be a mentally exhausting week that was jam-packed full of stuff.

I'm looking forward to the weekend.

Have a good one!