I had every intention of getting right back into the swing of this story after Camp NaNoWriMo in April. It didn’t happen as well as I had wanted. I got bogged down in edits. These later chapters are in far more need of editing than the nine or so chapters previously and it’s making it difficult to get through. But I am persevering, as much as I am able! The time of plot twists is nigh and I’m super excited about it! 🙂
This story was started on a whim. Unfortunately, that means it’s the most likely to get dropped, which is exactly what I’ve decided to do. Not forever (I have way too many plans for this story to possibly consider dropping it forever :P), but at least until I feel like I’m in a good place with “Calenhiril’s Search”, which will probably be when I have the first draft completely finished, possibly not until the whole thing is posted. I just really want to focus on “Calenhiril’s Search” right now and get that off my conscience before I stress myself out with too many other things. And posting two stories at the same time (“Calenhiril’s Search”, and now “Clarity“) is more than enough for my plate right now.
What’s Coming Up in June
As of Wednesday, June1st, “Clarity” is officially live!
There are two chapters currently posted, with an expected chapter count of twenty, plus an epilogue. I will be updating every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, as time allows, so keep an eye out! I’ve already had some really favorable reviews and I’m very pleased about it. I use those reviews to motivate me as I go through the proofreading process for each chapter and my perfectionist brain keeps trying to tell me that it’s all crap 😛
That’s right, folks, July’s Camp NaNoWriMo is nearly upon us! I know, I can hardly believe it myself. But June is the time to prep, waffle, and generally stress about the relative sanity of trying to dedicate my life to this thing three months out of the year. And I’m doing a bang up job so far ;P
I’ve got myself almost completely sold on the idea of a Finishing WriMo in July, starting with finishing the first draft of Calenhiril’s Search, followed by a quick foray into “Paradise Found” (the “Worth Living For” short sequel that I’ve been promising for nearly three years now), and finishing up with “Wonderland Reclaimed: Down The Rabbit Hole” (the first part of my Wonderland retelling that I lost in The Great Disaster of 2015).
Which is a great plan. Solid. I’m excited to be a part of it.
(…)
Except that I also started writing out the summary for my Age of Ultron fanfic and I’m really getting excited about it. It even has a title now: “Good Intentions”.
So, yeah, who knows what’s going to happen in July. I’m still about 90% sold on the idea of a Finishing WriMo, and I would get to do at least one Marvel related fic if I did that, so… yeah. Stay tuned next month for my decision! 😛
Miles Walked This Month (Apr 26th-May 31st): 80.8 miles
Total Miles Walked: 280 miles
Milestones Reached: Traveling the Lone Lands to the Last Bridge
“Everything seemed gloomy, for the weather that day had taken a nasty turn. Mostly it had been as good as May can be, even in merry tales, but now it was cold and wet.”
~The Hobbit, Chapter 2: Roast Mutton
Ugh, that’s a nasty description isn’t it? Kind of like the weather today, actually. But I walked the farthest in one month that I have yet, so I just can’t quite feel as gloomy as Bilbo and the dwarves right now 🙂 I only have 45 miles to the Last Bridge and then things will start to get exciting!
That’s it. Literally, that was all I did this month. I edited over 80,000 words in 30 days, and let me tell you, there were days I didn’t think I was gonna make it. I started out very confident, completely certain that I was going to get everything done, maybe even get done early! And then I realized I was ripping this story apart and now I had to put it all back together, not once… not twice… THREE TIMES this happened to me, in the second half of the month! It was heart-stoppingly stressful some days, but I think I’ve done the story a lot of good.
For those of you who might not remember what the heck I was even working on, here’s a reprint of the horrible summary for Clarity that is getting a well-deserved rewrite sooner rather than later:
Clarity (A Loki Fanfiction)
Loki (the traitor, the usurper, former prince of Asgard) is imprisoned below the palace that was once his home, cut off from even his mother, possibly the only person in the whole of the Nine Realms who still cares for him. But Lady Frigga has always been a clever woman. And there is a girl in her service, a girl with no past and an unusual quality that makes her uniquely suited to the task the Queen has in mind. Klara might not know who she is, but in the dungeons of Asgard, she might learn who she wants to be.
I’m letting the story rest and I’m going to allow a few trusted readers to read the final product before posting begins in June. The tentative date for the first chapter to post is Wednesday, June1st, with a posting schedule of Monday, Wednesday, Friday, if anyone wants to mark their calendars!
Also, I have this playlist on Spotify I’ve been listening to while I work on writing/editing Clarity. Feel free to give it a listen if you want a teaser for the fic!
What’s Coming Up in May
My intention is to get back into the swing of regular posting, starting with one chapter per week for both Changing History: Calenhiril’s Searchand Double The Baggins, Twice The Took. I might post more as time allows, but mostly I’m taking this month to rest and try to recuperate my energy from my work intensive Camp session. And also prepare for the next Camp NaNoWriMo in July! A writer’s work is never done, it seems! Currently, my heart is set on trying to finish Wonderland Reclaimed, but that could change depending on how I feel about Calenhiril’s Search and DBTT by then. I could be doing a finishing WriMo instead! We’ll see what the future brings!
Until next time…
If you thought I forgot it was May The Fourth, you clearly don’t understand the level of extreme nerdery I operate at… ;P
Milestones Reached: The Midgewater Marshes, Weathertop
“Not far ahead were dreary hills, rising higher and higher, dark with trees. On some of them were old castles with an evil look, as if they had been built by wicked people.”
~The Hobbit, Chapter 2: Roast Mutton
Hey guys! I got bogged down in the Midgewater Marshes this month. I actually missed the Weathertop mark by 0.8 of a mile, but I’m counting it, because I’m sure I can see it from here…
I’m coming up on a long stretch of lonely land (125 miles!), which is probably gonna take me two months to get through, if previous months are any indication. Better get started!
So, I posted WAY more chapters in March than I had planned, which is AWESOME! I’m still not finished with the first draft of this story, but I feel like it will probably come to me as I go, and I still have at least 30 chapters to post before I really need to start worrying about it too much. I’m just really excited to get this all out there and ACTUALLY be done with Mel and Boromir’s tale 🙂
I’m gonna be honest, this came completely out of left field. I wrote the first 50,000 words of this by accident in July 2014, but I just had too many other projects going at the time to even consider posting it. I still have too many stories running at the same time (I’ll be posting THREE simultaneously, come June…), but I happened to read a really great Hobbit fanfiction (Stirring The Leaves, recommended to me by my friend, Sarah!) and it made me realize that my story deserves to be read. So here I am, with yet another story I’m posting even though the first draft isn’t quite finished. But I feel like I have enough of the framework figured out to get a start on it, at any rate. It’s just for fun right now, so we’ll see where it goes 🙂
What’s Coming Up in April
I finished all my editing prep work for Clarity, my newest Marvel fanfiction set during the year of Loki’s imprisonment preceding (and including) the events of Thor: The Dark World.
From my Camp NaNo Synopsis:
Clarity (A Loki Fanfiction)
Loki (the traitor, the usurper, former prince of Asgard) is imprisoned below the palace that was once his home, cut off from even his mother, possibly the only person in the whole of the Nine Realms who still cares for him. But Lady Frigga has always been a clever woman. And there is a girl in her service, a girl with no past and an unusual quality that makes her uniquely suited to the task the Queen has in mind. Klara might not know who she is, but in the dungeons of Asgard, she might learn who she wants to be.
Despite that terrible blurb, I’m really, really excited about this project, and so far it’s been a joy to edit! I’ve been adding and cutting and rearranging like a crazy person and it’s been a lot of fun! I’m really hoping to have everything done and ready to go by the end of the month, then it will rest for a couple of weeks before I start posting in June.
Speaking of long-term goals, it’s time to introduce our newest segment!
The Quarterly Round-Up!
So, at the beginning of the year, I set out some yearly goals and some quarterly goals, and vowed to reevaluate and re-prioritize every three months. Three months have come and gone and it’s time to keep my word! Let’s start with a reminder/recap of my goals for the year:
Overall goals for the year:Finish Changing History rewritesDONE!, Finish first draft of Changing History: Entwives, Write the Worth Living For short that I’ve been planning for ages, Edit and begin posting Clarity, Finish the first draft of all three parts of Wonderland Reclaimed.
Reward Project: If I finish Wonderland Reclaimed, I can write my Avengers: Age of Ultron fic for NaNoWriMo in November.
Now, let’s break it down by month!
January:First month of NaNoWriMo’s “Now What?” months, focusing on revising and editing. My goals are to finish editing and posting Changing History: Second Chances, and to finish the first draft of Entwives.
I didn’t finish my rewrite in January, which set everything for the year back a bit. I also didn’t finish my Entwives (now Calenhiril’s Search) first draft, but that didn’t set me back as much as I feared it might.
Unexpectedly, I started work on my new Star Wars collaboration, Resolving of Gray, with Sarah this month! We’re still working on it, but it’s slowed down a bit now, with both of us working on other projects at the moment.
February: Second month of NaNoWriMo’s “Now What?” months. I’ll be setting aside Changing History this month and shifting my focus onto my intense editing of Clarity (Loki fic). I will also add new words to the rewriting of Part One of Wonderland Reclaimed.
Because of the setbacks in January, February had to be completely rethought. I made the decision to move the editing of Clarity to April for my Camp NaNoWriMo project, and shifted my focus from new words to editing and finishing of Changing History. I also made the decision to add a new villain to Wonderland Reclaimed, which means that when I do finally sit down to finish it, it’s gonna be a lot more work than I had anticipated…
I finished the Changing History: Second Chances rewrites this month! It was glorious! There were gifs!
March:Prep Month for Camp NaNo #1. Prepare to edit Entwives, write out an outline of what I have so far and make note of any plot holes that need filling. I’ll also continue to add words to Wonderland Part One.
So, by the time March got here, everything was all outta whack. I did start posting the fourth and final part of Entwives (now Calenhiril’s Search)(see above), but I didn’t work on Wonderland at all. I did finish all my prep work to edit Clarity for April Camp NaNo, though.
Began posting Double The Baggins, Twice The Took on a whim (6 chapters posted)
So, despite a slow start to the year, I did actually manage to accomplish quite a bit in this first quarter, even if not all of it was in the original plan (the best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men, amirite? ;P). I’ve decided to put less emphasis on new words this next quarter, and more emphasis on getting these projects finished, be that writing, editing, or posting. On the flip side of that, I just found out that Alice Through The Looking Glass is being released on May 27th, and since my original novel is an Alice In Wonderland retelling, I would like to get that finished sooner rather than later, in order to capitalize on any resurgence in that genre that might result from the movie (which looks AMAZING, by the way, check out the trailer!).
As much as I’m enjoying editing my Loki fanfiction, in light of this news, I kind of wish I had set it aside and worked on Wonderland this month. Since that’s no longer an option (I’ve COMMITTED, dang it! ;P), I’m going to try (try!) to work on finishing the first draft in May, instead. With that in mind, here’s a break down of my goals for the second quarter!
April: Camp NaNoWriMo #1! Edit Clarity (A Loki Fanfiction).
May: Continue to post at least one chapter of Calenhiril’s Search and DBTT a week. Finish the first draft of Wonderland Reclaimed, or add 50,000 new words (whichever comes first).
June: Prep month for Camp NaNoWriMo #2! Depending on how May goes, either prep for editing Wonderland Reclaimed, or prep for a finishing WriMo (50K words on Wonderland/Calenhiril’s Search/DBTT). Begin posting schedule for Clarity (M/W/F).
I’m going to be honest, this next quarter looks super intimidating. It’s a lot of work. And I’m going to make a side-goal this quarter of making time for my original fiction, even if that means setting aside a fanfiction project I’m enjoying. I can always come back to it once I’m done 🙂
And that’s it! We’ll see what happens! If you’re doing Camp NaNoWriMo this month, break a leg, and I’ll see you all on the other side!
“Now they had gone on far into the Lone-lands, where there were no people left, no inns, and the roads grew steadily worse.”
~The Hobbit, Chapter 2: Roast Mutton
I didn’t quite make it to the Midgewater Marshes, but that’s mostly because I’m posting this a bit early! I didn’t want to wait until the end of next month to post an update, so here I am, just short of the Marshes and about to catch sight of Weathertop for the first time! I’m quite pleased with my progress and pleased to report that every month I have increased my distance, at least a little bit! We might make it to the Lonely Mountain yet!
A quick view of the current landscape:
Well… that’s depressing. But all the more reason to keep moving forward! 🙂 See you next month!
Changing History: I DID IT! I ACTUALLY FINISHED THE EPIC REWRITE!!!
Part Four (Calenhiril’s Search) will start posting on March 3rd and I’m SO EXCITED!!!
I’m not… technically… finished with the entire first draft of Part Four yet, but I’m far enough along (and I’ve edited the first half enough times in the past year) that I feel pretty confident in my ability to begin posting in March. Of course, I’ll probably only get three or four chapters posted before Camp NaNoWriMo in April, but that will be FOUR CHAPTERS CLOSER TO THE END, OH MY GOD, I CAN’T EVEN!
Writing Excuses: “15 minutes long, because you’re in a hurry and we’re not that smart.” If you haven’t listened to this podcast (starring Brandon Sanderson, Mary Robinette Kowal, Howard Tayler, and Dan Wells), then you are missing out! My friend, Elissa (who I’ve mentioned on this blog more times than I can count. If you aren’t reading her blog, WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU???) mentioned this podcast in a recent post and (surprise, surprise) I had never heard of it. But I had heard of Brandon Sanderson, so I decided to give it a shot. From that very first line, I was sold. I downloaded several episodes through Podcast Republic on my phone, and have been listening to the playlist for days. They make being an author feel like something attainable, something that real, actual people do, and do well. It’s both encouraging, entertaining, and informative, I highly recommend it!
Have You Hugged a Book Today?
I’m still behind, but I’m working on it. No, really! Stop laughing!
Here’s the link to my star rating breakdown if anyone needs a refresher. It’s also up in the header 🙂
Books I’ve finished:
Star Wars: The Force Awakens by Alan Dean Foster- Three Stars (though, to be fair, I really only skimmed it. I’ll be reading it again in more depth at a later time)
Ms. Marvel Vol. 3: Crushed by Willow G. Wilson-Five Stars
The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss- Five Stars (Patrick Rothfuss is a god amongst men…)
What I’m currently reading (In order of Date Started):
The Gunslinger by Stephen King– I finally started this series! I’m hoping to read the whole series this year, but I’m definitely behind, so we’ll have to see.
As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride by Cary Elwes– This is the book that my book club has decided to read for March, but I started it early 😉 I came to the Princess Bride later in life, but the story is so timeless and lovely that I fell in love instantly. Cary Elwes tells the tale of his experience making the movie with such wide-eyed wonder and humility, it is a joy to listen to. And the guest appearances from the other members of the cast and crew add delightful flavor to the book.
Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix- I’m gonna be honest here. This was not as jarringly awful as I thought it was going to be. It was horrendously painful (and god, I hate Umbridge SO MUCH!), but it wasn’t “awful”. There were several wonderful moments, mostly containing Sirius and Remus, and I think I felt more sympathy for Harry in the movie than I did in the book. I mean, he’s still an annoying emo-teen, but I felt a little more sympathetic toward his emo-ness. If you really want all of my feelings, you should check out the live!tag on Twitter (listed above), I’ve been told it was entertaining ;P
#Hashtags and other minutia
My Favorite Tumblr Reblog: Breaking your heart, one reblog at a time…
My Favorite Tumblr Post: Pretty much the only original thing I put on my tumblr of any note, which just proves (for those who were not already convinced) that I am a hopeless nerd ;P
Instagram: Nothing interesting on Instagram this month, so here’s another tumblr post! Not really a reblog, but not really original either since I just found it on the internet ;P
Milestones Reached- Frogmorton, The Brandywine Bridge
“At first they had passed through hobbit-lands, a wild respectable country inhabited by decent folk, with good roads, an inn or two, and now and then a dwarf or a farmer ambling by on business.”
~The Hobbit, Chapter 2: Roast Mutton
As I suspected, I nearly made it to Bree! I am roughly 11 miles away, as of this writing! I probably could have made it to Bree in fact, if I hadn’t taken a week off from doing nearly anything this month, and then gotten sick in the last week. Oh well, next month! 🙂
I was doing really well, but then I lost my 20 day streak and I sort of… gave in. I’ve done really well though! I got through my review of the first set of lessons and nearly finished the second set, which was exactly what I expected to accomplish 🙂
I also wanted to share some highlights from my lessons with you guys because, quite frankly, this program has been so entertaining, and deserves to be shared with the world ;P
Why yes. Yes, I am.This is unnecessarily frightening. Mostly because it’s true…Even my Spanish lesson thinks I should be writing!It’s occasionally uncanny how well this program knows me…
“And In Conclusion…”
Writing- Begin posting Calenhiril’s Search and start doing the preliminary work for Clarity (my Loki fanfiction, which I will be editing for Camp NaNoWriMo in April!)
Reading- I still haven’t managed to fix my audiobook files that I messed up, I’m going to try to do that this month, and then catch up on my reading!
Social Media- Don’t forget about Instagram! ;P
My Personal Life- Walk to the Midgewater Marshes. Complete 5 more lesson bubbles on Duolingo and reach level 7 (nearly level 8).
And… that’s it! This has been an exciting month, hopefully the momentum will continue!
Changing History: I managed to post three chapters last month, which is not as much as I wanted to get done. I also did not get any work done on Entwives at all. I feel a little bit stuck to be honest, I’m going to try to push through that this month, even if it means skipping ahead.
Surprise!: I started a new, exciting project this month, completely unexpectedly! Not only is it in a fandom that has been currently ruining my life (Star Wars: The Force Awakens), but it is also my very first collaboration! The story is a High School Alternate Universe fanfiction, based on this tumblr post:
I am really excited about this project and my collaborator is a complete delight! I’ll be sure to keep you guys updated as progress is made.
Have You Hugged a Book Today?
I’m sort of failboating here. Not good. Part of the reason is because I haven’t been listening to my audiobooks, like I did last year. And I am out of time when it comes to actual paper, apparently. I’ll see what I can do to fix that, but for now let’s take a look at what I did finish this month!
Here’s the link to my star rating breakdown if anyone needs a refresher. It’s also up in the header 🙂
The Help– I put this off for a long, long time. And even though I tried to wait until the book’s effect had worn off, it wasn’t long enough. The movie just can’t compare. It was good, don’t get me wrong (I mean, it did make me cry… twice), but the book was so much more. I actually don’t think it would be possible for anyone to make a movie that could compare to the book for me. I enjoyed it, but only in that it made me want to read the book again 🙂
I feel I should mention, I’m trying to live tweet whenever I watch one of these movies. If you’d like to follow along, or just go back and read my reactions to some of the movies I watch, the hashtag I use is #fogwatches
#Hashtags and other minutia
I did pretty well on the social media front this month! Yay me! Let’s play those highlights!
You see, not long ago she sent me a link to this post, by a blog called Nerd Fitness. It was all about walking to Mordor. Now, I know what you’re probably thinking:
And I concur. Wholeheartedly. In fact, after checking out the original website that contains the details of that particular walk, I felt a little bit overwhelmed by the enormity of the task. I mean 1779 miles? ONE WAY??? Eep.
But if you’ll look closely (and scroll down a little farther) there is another path that we might take. The path of that great (albeit reluctant) adventurer…
The path of Bilbo Baggins to the Lonely Mountain.
So, as a fan this really appeals to me, I get to start my adventure with the adventure that started it all! As a couch potato that is easily discouraged this also appeals to me, because (according to my calculations) the journey is only going to be 1755 miles, round trip! That’s still a lot, but because I am a complete nerd, I modified Nerd Fitness’s Google spreadsheet and broke the journey down into (mostly) manageable chunks. So, I went out and bought a Fitbit Flex and I have started my journey!
You are welcome to follow my progress on my modified spreadsheet, or even save your own copy of the spreadsheet and walk with me! After all, Bilbo didn’t go it alone:
Either way, I’ll be sure to keep everyone apprised of my progress, both here on the blog and probably on Twitter and/or Tumblr. Because nerd things deserve to be shared! 😛
Anybody use Duolingo? It’s a free online program and app to learn a language. I discovered it before, but never really committed. Now I think I want to try again, starting with Spanish. It’s a fun app that feels a lot like a game and I’m really enjoying it 🙂 If anyone is using it, or feels like signing up, feel free to find me and make me a friend, I can always use the competition! 😉 As always, I’m fogisbeautiful.
“And In Conclusion…”
Writing- I’m already having to modify my goals for the year. But that’s just life I suppose 🙂 In February, I plan to finish posting my edited chapters of Changing History: Second Chances, finish the first draft of Entwives, and finalize an outline for my Force Awakens collaboration. This is going to be a lot of work, but I’m going to do my best.
Reading- Get my audiobook files fixed, so I can start listening again. Finish The Wise Man’s Fear. Start The Gunslinger.
Social Media- Keep up the good work, yo! 😉
My Personal Life- According to early calculations, I expect I can almost make it to Bree by the end of the month, if I’m persistent. I think I can make it through my review of the first section of my Duolingo lessons and also finish up the second section as well.
And that’s it! The first Wrap Up of 2016! Not a complete fail, not a complete win, but I’m working steadily and that’s what counts 🙂 See you all in February!
FogIsBeautiful 