I realized that I haven’t done an update in a long time. I’ve been posting the books I read and I’m trying to include details about what I’m learning along they way, but what about me?
Starting in about December of 2020 I recommitted myself to writing. I joined a biweekly writing group, I meet approximately weekly with an accountability buddy, and I’ve been doing a lot of writing. So far in the last 8 months or so I have written 8 chapters of my epic SF space opera novel. That is too big for me right now and while I’m still noodling on it, I decided that I needed to work more on craft. For my writing group I’ve submitted probably about 8 different stories ranging in length from flash to about 7500 words.
One of my flash pieces (about my least favorite insect) is currently out for review after being rejected twice so far, but I’m proud of myself for putting myself out there. I am currently working on a story that came to me as a response to a call for an online magazine’s 100th issue (it involves a language barrier used to an advantage), and also another story that I have been thinking about for about 8 years but only put words to paper (figuratively) last month. This one is about a post-global warming society but I feel like it is a hopeful story and not a doom and gloom one. I actually wrote the whole first draft of the story in one epic day with two of my writing club members. Both halves of the story have undergone preliminary review with my group and they gave me some great ideas to take the story to the next level. I feel like both of these stories are going to be as good as I can get them within the next month or two, so I hope to have 3 stories out in the world by early Fall.
This coming winter maybe I will turn back to the novel. I feel like I have grown as a writer this past year and I definitely want to get the novel written. I have 30-40 chapters roughly outlined but I struggle with all the moving parts; this is a pretty epic story with a huge cast of characters and alien races and political intrigue within all the aliens and humans, and multiple star systems and at least 4 POV characters. It is a lot to keep straight but given that I’ve been thinking about this story for more than 35 years, I have a lot of the details in my head… it is just really hard for me to get those details down on the screen the way I want them.
So, that is my update. Thanks for reading!