NaNoWriMo 2018: The Wizard

Laura Highcove

I’m finally able to say that I have a complete rough draft for The Huntsman. Turns out I lied to everyone on Facebook though. I apparently started on the Huntsman (according to my blog) for NaNoWriMo of 2016, meaning it’s only been two years, and not three. Sorry for the confusion, but I’m far happier to realize that it only *felt* like it took a million years to write this book.

I struggled a lot with this book, as most people do with sequels, but knowing other people have suffered like you have only helps but so much when you’re in the depths of your own suffering. However, in September of last year, when I was feeling particularly panicked, I decided to write a note to myself that I wouldn’t look at again until I had finished this book. It is as follows:

Sept 27, 2017: I am so beyond stuck with this story that I don’t even understand how any of it is going to work. There’s so much that needs to go on, none of it is flowing. None of it works. I am sitting here terrified, going to through the story trying to find something that will work to make this story make sense.

So when I do make this story work, I am going to look back at this moment and remind myself that I can make anything work. It might not look pretty between here and there. I might have to change or completely rewrite a bunch of stuff, but there is a way that this story works and makes sense, and I just have to get out there and find it without worrying about what it looks like now or how long it might take. If I can make this story work, then I can make any story work.

I’m so proud of me for making it through. All it took was stubborn refusal to give up on my story. Well and support, breaks, some wins, and a whole lot of words. But mostly not giving up. 🙂

And now, on the 31st of October, NaNoWriMo looms. I am immediately launching myself into The Wizard, which is book three of this trilogy. I figure there’s little point spending time polishing book two before I finish book three. Mostly I want to see if I can create something resembling a satisfying ending on a book three. Plus, there’s a high likelihood of something needing to change in book two anyway. I changed quite a few things in book one while writing book two, and that one I had polished.

I’m a little anticipatory (Huh, spelled that word right on the first try.) about NaNoWriMo this year, but I think it’s mostly surrounding starting on the third book of my trilogy. If a book two was uncharted waters, then book three is so far off the map I can’t even begin to wonder what it will be like. But then being a discovery writer, to me, is all about having faith in your ability to eventually figure out wtf is going on. Writing, keys flying over the keyboard, and suddenly your characters are doing something you didn’t expect, the plot is going out into left field, and that moment when suddenly it all works and makes sense? Oh man, it is pretty great.

I’m sticking with the standard 50k words for my NaNo goal. I know I won’t be able to get much past that without going through and smoothing a few times anyway, so trying to push for more words will just burn me out like it did two years ago. (Yay, learning from my mistakes.) So 2000 words per day (Fridays off). No big, it’s just NaNoWriMo. If you’d like to follow my progress: This is me.

Feeling Productive

Laura Highcove

From the past several posts, you can probably see that things have been rough for a while. Yep, it was. And I kept going because, well there wasn’t any other option in my opinion. I can only hide under the desk for so long before writing calls me back.

And these past two weeks I’ve really been tearing it up, writing-wise. Part of its is inspiration from the Wxr cruise. Another part is I am rewriting the Law of the Prince Charming to change the tense because I realized it worked better. And part is giving myself the goal of having an actual rough draft of the Huntsman finished before NaNo so I can start in on the Wizard. But I’ve put in more total hours this past week than I have in any previous week this year, and I still didn’t record a lot of the reading I was did. (Reading is still hard for me to chalk up toward career time, even if I am paying attention as a writer too.)

So I’m feeling very productive, and that is a nice place to be in. The plan is to carry the momentum forward. I have a list of the scenes I still need to write for the Huntsman, and I’m hoping to get those done in time to do a smoothing pass before November. I am trying to kick up the speed at which I am rewriting the Law of the Prince Charming. I seem to be at about 2 chapters a week, but even in just changing the tense of the words I already have written, it’s taking far longer than I expected. I also have an idea for another story that is literally trying to chew its way out of my head. Not sure if this is just a result of my anxiousness about trying to get the Huntsman done, or if the idea really warrants some attention. Either way, I’ll be doing a lot of writing for a while.

Quick pitch: “Dragons ride the elemental storms and Ryo was trained to fight both.” Yeah, I wrote it just now. It’ll be better when I spend time on it.

WXR 2018: Finding My Tribe

Laura Highcove

I started listening to Writing Excuses at the end of season nine, so 2014. And after getting part way into season 10, I went back and listened to the archives. All of them. I found out about the cruise in 2016, and I applied for the scholarship for the past two years, but finally saved up enough money to go this year. I wasn’t sure what to expect. I hung around on the Google group where everyone was talking for months ahead of time. I picked my roommate, Morgan, because she wrote fantasy and didn’t snore.

But it wasn’t until the Saturday when I flew into Houston that the people-interactions really started. I met Eric in the airport using the Discord app everyone was on for conversing on the cruise. Then, since Morgan’s flight was delayed, (There was rough weather, most people got delayed.) Eric and I met up with Michelle and we all shared an Uber to the hotel. Both of them had been on the cruise before, and Michelle let me tag along into the group of people she knew as soon as we got to the hotel. Everyone seemed really nice and entirely non-threatening.

After picking up registration bags, we went behind the waterfall where they had swag for us. I went up to a table with books on it, because of course I did, and the person behind the table began to describe the books. I had to reboot because the voice that was speaking was Dan Wells, and I was entirely unprepared to hear that voice in a non-podcast situation. Then Howard Taylor said something from the table beside him, which furthered the surrealism, and I had to ask Dan to repeat himself because I hadn’t heard what he actually said. He was very nice about it, which bolstered my confidence further, so when I turned and saw Mary Robinette Kowal at a third table, and walked over and asked if she could also speak for me to complete the blowing of my mind. She acquiesced.

I managed to work through the “getting to know you” sheet where you get people to sign your paper based on something about them, like what genre they write or what their job is, by actually talking to people. Though, in truth, I was given a task, and I am good at task completion. But it was also a very comfortable situation. Then those of us who went on the NASA tour further bonded by living through the torrential downpour on our cart train that had no sides.

That night was the cocktail reception, and oddly enough, I settled right into talking with people. Part of it was by that time I had bonded with my roommate, and I’m always braver when I have someone I know around, and part of it was that I sat at a table and almost everyone was a genre writer. Even if I do attend other writing events, I rarely find genre writers, and if I do, they’re all YA. (Not that I have anything against YA. I just feel like I never find adult fantasy writers.) So again, it felt a little surreal to ask what everyone was writing and have so many of them be my same genre.

At this point I was still rather intimidated by the hosts, but I still managed to get my books signed and to ask them to hug my stuffed animal gryffin (That I’ve had all the people who are important in/to my life hug). It was also the first time I was able to meet Brandon Sanderson. I cried a bit, I’ll admit it, but he was perfectly accommodating, and he signed my book and took a picture with me grinning like a silly fangirl. My one regret about the whole situation was that I was simply too overwhelmed to approach him as a writer. It doesn’t help that he wasn’t on the cruise, so while I got to see Mary Robinette, Howard, and Dan as real people, he’s still Brandon Sanderson. At least for now.

The introduction/instruction speech that came at the end of the reception really helped to settle things in my mind, and solidify the feel of what to expect from the cruise. All of the instructors and the helpful team were introduced, as well as the rules for how to treat each other. I know the Wxr hosts have always been pretty big on making a space safe for everyone there, and I was really starting to feel that.

The next day we got on the boat and that’s when things finally started to settle a bit in my mind. All of the Wxrers had red badges that hung from our necks, meaning we could spot each other through the, well frankly, massive crowd of muggles who were on the cruise as well. The classes were simply amazing, though that’s fodder for another post. We all ate dinner together rotating tables so we got to meet other people, as well as the hosts. Morgan and I sat with Dan, Howard, and Mary Robinette on various nights.

And I found the most amazing thing happening. I was interacting with people. People I didn’t know very well, but it was like that red badge was magic. As soon as I saw it, I would meet the other person’s gaze and wave, and they would do the same. Or I could just walk up and start a conversation. We were able to just be comfortable around each other, as people, because we had been brought together by this cruise.

I am not normally one to join in or participate in conversations. I like being on the sidelines, listening to other people say interesting things, but never feeling like I have anything to add to most conversations. And if I do, it’s usually a quick comment and then over. Only at the dinner table, I found so many people with topics they wanted to discuss that were interesting and that I had something to say about. One night I started talking about Supernatural and fan fiction, and I realized almost halfway through the night that I was actually having a good time participating in a conversation. That I had things to say, that these were topics in which I was interested. I have never before had such an actual lengthy conversation with people in a group setting like this, not even among my friends.

I also hopped into a discussion on magic system creation where I felt emboldened to add some to the conversation. And I jumped into a quickly created critique group that all looked at the part of my story, I’ve been trying to fix forever and thought was “okay”, and told me it still didn’t work. And I felt safe getting that feedback, and glad that they were willing to say something.

I had, for the first time, actually found my tribe. So much so that I cried when it was time to leave the boat. After my flight landed in Atlanta I found myself looking through the crowds for red badges and being sad when I remembered I wouldn’t be seeing any. I clung to Discord, that last connection I had to them, and I mourned not being on the cruise anymore.

For the first time I really understood Daisy’s reaction in Agents of SHIELD, after she’s freed from Hive’s control, and she throws herself at him again, begging for him to let her back in. I felt like I had been removed from a situation that felt so right for the first time in my life, that I wasn’t sure what to do without it. Maybe I’m being overly dramatic, and maybe I’m not. But I know I need to figure out a way to be able to go on the cruise again next year. And for now, I’m very grateful for Discord and for everyone involved with putting on and attending this cruise.

Gratitude and the New Normal

Laura Highcove

I’m going to start this post with gratitude. Gratitude for my friends, with whom I spent a wonderful week of discovery at a resort in the Dominican Republic. Gratitude for the Writing Excuses Cruise Team who put together a writing retreat so wonderful I cried when it was finally over. Gratitude for my husband who is so supportive of me and my pursuits. Gratitude for my boss (And friend) who worked with me so I could do these two events, even so annoyingly close together, and took care of my cats while my husband and I were away. Gratitude for my cat Nickel, and the ten wonderful years I got with him. And Gratitude for myself and my stubborn refusal to give up on me.

These past couple of months have been really tough for me emotionally, almost entirely due to Nickel’s rapid decline in health and final day last week. It was difficult for me to remember how many good things I have going on in my life and the amount of support that is readily available. But then that’s part of my depression.

I have been so out of my own normal habits that it’s been uncomfortable trying to go back to them. I didn’t have a weekend at home for a month. My writing has been ridiculously on and off again, and of course I’ve barely looked at social media outside of checking on the new season of Supernatural. Thus why this post is coming in on a ‘not Monday’. I realized I needed to just get something out. Just like I needed to just do my laundry on whatever day, and clean the bathroom finally. I had a lot of life changing experiences all in a very short amount of time and I still haven’t been able to sit down and fully process any of them. There might be no ‘returning to normal’ after this, because my normal has shifted so dramatically.

But even then, the laundry still needs to be done, the bathroom still needs to be cleaned, and I still need to write. So I guess enough has stayed the same.

There is a Way this Makes Sense

Laura Highcove

It’s funny, even though I know the only way I’m going to get past this stuck spot in the Huntsman is to keep writing, and even though this persistence has always worked in the past, I still find myself dreading the idea of working on my story. Being human is such a funny thing. It’s so easy to get bogged down in the present and somehow think things have always been terrible, and always will be terrible, but then if it’s going well we worry about how that will change for the worse.

It’s all a matter of perceptive. I’m really no more stuck with this book than I have been in the past. And truthfully, I’m farther along than I ever have been. I’m starting to figure out some things, but IDEAS! are easy, and bringing them together to make sense for the end of a book is hard. I always get stuck at this point of the book, and have for a number of trunk novels that never got finished. The Law of the Prince Charming, while not the first book I managed to power through, is one of very few. And it took six months of agony before I basically just popped out the second half of the book.

It’s been longer for this one, and I figure the reason is I just haven’t found that thing, that bit that ties it all together. It’s out there somewhere. I know it is. A thing I try to tell myself in times like this is: “There is a way that all of this (my story) makes sense.” That doesn’t mean things won’t have to change or shift around, but there is a second half of this book that is beautiful and wonderful and makes sense. I just have to tap into it …by continuing to write until I get past this stuck spot. Blargh. I mean: I know I can do it!

Put in the Work

Laura Highcove

Trying to write a new story hasn’t really worked out. I’m just not excited enough about any of my new ideas. I wrote on one for a few days, got words out, but just didn’t feel any excitement about where it was going. As such I went back to do a revision pass on the Huntsman while taking into account the notes my husband left and the conversation we had on the way back from Baltimore. Even that’s not going particularly well, but it’s at least better.

I’m trying to lean very heavily on this article that I luckily read last week. So at least I’m still moving forward. I got a good amount of hours logged compared to the last three weeks, so I’m celebrating that win. Or trying to.

I still feel like I’m whining, which is something I try to avoid doing, but I’m also not going to lie and pretend everything is okay. That’s part of what got me into trouble the past two months.

30 min

Laura Highcove

So it’s been a little longer than two weeks like I said, but I needed a little longer to get myself back together than I thought I would. I went through a really rough bit and I’m still climbing out of the hole on the other side.

Long story short, I found out Nickel has cancer and I hid from my depression by binging 13 seasons of Supernatural and ignoring the rest of my life. If you’d like the full story and the lesson I’ve taken away from it, you can sign up for my newsletter, since I’m not going to go into those details on the open Internet.

I did manage to get the alpha of the Huntsman up and I went to Otakon this past weekend. I even managed to have a pretty good time at the con and a great discussion with my husband about the Huntsman during the easiest (no traffic) trip back from Baltimore we’ve ever had.

Still struggling with the lingers of the habits I formed over the past two months, and so right now I’m rereading some old stories I’ve written, writing some on a new story and thinking through the ideas I got from my husband during our talk. I need to get back into the habit of writing. Motivation is low. Right now I’m going to be happy to spend 30 minutes a day writing new prose. I might check in more often for a bit so I can keep up with my goals.

Before the Shift

Laura Highcove

Didn’t quite make my goal of getting through Gabir’s turning point by Sunday, but I was pretty close. I had it done by Tuesday. All things considered, this first part of the story is starting to come together. However, this is the point at which the story really starts to fall apart. I have ideas of what I want to have happen, and some of them aren’t working, some of them feel forced, and others just aren’t good.

Part of what I want to get out of the alpha read is feedback and even suggestions for the story. At the same time, I feel rather icky with the idea of sending it out in this state. (Even to people I trust.) The Law of the Prince Charming’s story was solid all the way through before anyone but my husband saw it.

A few things happened since my last post. The Show Team is back from Nationals (they did very well) so I am currently enjoying my first full day off in two and a half weeks. However, two weeks ago Nickel, one of my cats, started having a health issue and while I don’t have a solid answer as to what’s wrong, the possibilities are rough. As such, I haven’t been in an entirely good mental state. I haven’t been able to go ‘head down’ on my story like I was planning once the Show Team was back. Nickel has an appointment with a specialist next week, and depending on the answers (or lack thereof) I’m not sure how things will be going forward.

I’ve been trying to get as much done as I can before the possible shift in my reality. But even on a good day it’s hard to slog through the story when nothing feels like it is coming together. Maybe I really do just need this feedback. While I was able to write the Law of the Prince Charming almost entirely off my own ideas, it’s a book two and I have even less skill with this than I have with ending a book. Maybe a little outside influence is exactly what I need.

Pushing Through the Huntsman

Laura Highcove

Things are a little rough right now. I’m in the middle of working the barn 7 days a week (with one coworker) for two and a half weeks. I’ve done a pretty good job of losing track of what day it is, and I’ve been grumpy, tired, and watching a lot of Supernatural.

As such, I’ve gotten very little writing done. But not none, because I like writing and I want to write. I made a bit of a breakthrough a week ago with the order of some scenes in a few chapters, and then hit the wall of the most underdeveloped part of the story. My brain’s a little lacking in the “organizing the overall plan” space right now, so it’s probably harder than it should be.

But, as you may have seen in my newsletter, my plan is to have some alpha readers look at the Huntsman at the end of July. Last time I had my hubby read it. He was able to give me some very good advice that cleaned up a lot of things and I’m hoping this time will do the same. It would probably really help for me to have writer friends who are willing to do critiques, but I’m not strong at making friends.

I still have work through this weekend, and then I’ll be back to my regular schedule. It’ll probably take me a day or so to get back into the swing of things, but after that the plan is to plow ahead full speed and get the Huntsman as ready as I can make it. Right now I have 11ish chapters left. (41k words) Things are rather haphazard at the end of the story, so I can’t really count on those to be anywhere near the same amount of words or work to bring them up to snuff.

My first job will be organizing the scenes I have written into a workable order, sight right now they’re mostly scenes I wrote totally independently of each other, all stuck into the same part of the story. Then I need to make sure all of the elements I need are in there, and then smooth it out a bit. That, of course, being the least important bit, since my alpha readers will know it’s a little rough. I actually left notes in the story when I had my hubby read it to warn him at two distinct points when the amount of polish took a moderate, then severe nosedive. He still got through it enough to help me out.

Anyway, so measurable goal: By the end of next Sunday I will organize though Gabir’s turning point, which is approximately three chapters. All scenes need to be orange, which means all of the elements are in the scene, even if it’s not perfectly readable.