Projects, projects everywhere …

28. February 2013 · Write a comment · Categories: Bringing Stella Home, Edenfall, Empress of the Free Stars, Heart of the Nebula, Lifewalker, Novellas & Novelettes, Stars of Blood and Glory, SW I-IV: The Jeremiah Chronicles, SW-V: Dreamweaver, SW-VI: Benefactor, SW-X: Wanderlust, The Back Burner · Tags: , , , ,

… and not a clue where to start.

Seriously, I feel like that guy in the Russian proverb who’s chasing two rabbits.  Except, in my case, it’s more like a dozen.  Here’s what I currently have to choose from:

Stars of Blood and Glory — This one is in publishing mode, and should be out in a week or two.  I’ve gone through all the line/copy edits from my editor, finalized the book teaser–all that’s left is the formatting and cover art.  The preliminary sketches look really good, so it shouldn’t be too much longer before it’s ready to go.  Of course, it’s more of a publishing thing than a writing thing, but still important.

Lifewalker — This is a rough draft that’s only about 15% to 20% finished.  It’s in a totally different genre than I’m used to writing (post-apocalyptic / weird western), but so far it seems to be coming along fairly well.  I hit a block a couple of weeks ago and put it on the back burner for a while, but I may be ready to pick it up again.

Star Wanderers: Benefactor — This is another rough draft, about 35% to 40% finished.  It’s a parallel novella to Star Wanderers: Fidelity, except from Jakob’s point of view.  Right now, I’m in the phase where everything sucks and I don’t know where to go with it.  It’ll probably turn out just fine, but I may have to put it on hold for a while.  However, if I could just push through and finish the damn thing, that would be preferable.  It’s only another 15,000 words …

Star Wanderers: Dreamweaver — This is a first draft that I need to revise.  Last night, I looked over it for the first time in eight months.  Opening the file was like pulling out an unopened bottle of wine that’s been sitting for years in the back corner of the wine cellar.  So far, it seems pretty good, but I’m going to wait until I hear back from one of my first readers before doing any serious revisions.  After that, maybe run the first chapter through Kindal’s writing group, and if everything seems good, I’ll probably publish it sometime in April/May.

Star Wanderers: The Jeremiah Chronicles — This is purely a publishing project.  Basically, I want to bundle the first four Star Wanderers stories and release them as an omnibus.  To do this right, though, I’d have to commission some cover art, which takes time and money.  Since it’s not a writing project, and I already have enough publishing projects on my plate, I’ll probably put this one off until Dreamweaver is out.

Mercenary Savior — Long term followers of this blog might recognize this as the old title for the novel that became Bringing Stella Home.  Well, I plan to recycle that title, as well as the original prologue, in a prequel novel that basically tells the origin story of Danica Nova and her band of mercenaries.  So far, I’ve got the prologue and the beginnings of the first chapter.  Haven’t looked at it in a few months, but if I get stuck on these other projects, I just might pick it up again.

Heart of the Nebula — A second or third draft that needs a deep revision.  This is probably going to consume all my writing time for six to eight weeks, and I’d rather do it all at once rather than in chunks.  It’s been on the back burner long enough that I can probably pick it up again, but I want to finish a rough draft first.

The Sword Keeper — I’ve still got this one on the current projects bar, but it’s been a while since I’ve worked on it, so it’s pretty much on the back burner.  I think it’s at about the 40% mark, though honestly I have no idea.  It’s an epic fantasy novel, a bit outside my usual scope, and it’s turning into a beast of a book.  The story is pretty solid, though, so I’ll probably finish it before the end of the year–that is, unless the muse drops an anvil on me (which has definitely happened before).

Empress of the Free Stars — An unwritten novel that’s been kicking around in my head ever since I finished Stars of Blood and Glory.  Basically, it’s a direct sequel from Hikaru’s point of view … except that I can’t really discuss it without giving away spoilers (TO A BOOK THAT ISN’T EVEN OUT YET).  In any case, the prologue has been beating on me to get written, and I finally caved and started it last night.  I’ve got a pretty good idea for what’s supposed to happen in this novel, but there’s still a whole lot of room for the story to surprise me.

Edenfall — Ah, Edenfall … this is probably my most neglected story.  I started it a little over a year ago, but hit a block, and then Star Wanderers happened.  I’ll pick it up eventually, but to really do it justice, I feel like I need to go backpacking in the wilderness for a week or two.  The weather isn’t good for that right now, so it will probably have to wait until spring.  Or maybe I’m just making things too complicated.  We’ll see.

Star Wanderers; Wanderlust — A Star Wanderers story from Samson’s point of view.  This one is going to be tricky, but I’ve actually got the whole thing plotted out already.  However, I don’t want to write it just yet, because there’s still a bunch of other Star Wanderers stories that need to come first.  Or maybe I will write it, and let it sit for a while until I write the others.  Maybe it’s better to finish it first and let it sit for a while, just to be safe …

Those are pretty much all the projects with titles that are floating around in my head right now.  There are a few others, like parts VII and VIII of Star Wanderers (from Mariya and Lucca’s points of view, respectively), but those aren’t quite ready to start.  With all of these, I’ve at least got some words on the page.

So now that I’m in that frustrating space between projects, I think I’m going to take a week or two to just let my creative mind do whatever the heck it wants.  Hopefully, I’ll get excited enough about one of them to see it all the way through.  I’m not going to stress about word counts so much as putting time in at my chair, doing something.

Man, I wish my creative side weren’t so scatterbrained.  Though as long as I’m still finishing stuff, I guess it’s all right.

And now that I’ve procrastinated long enough by writing this blog post, it’s time to go hang out with my friends and procrastinate some more.  Later!

Productivity? Yeah, about that…

10. February 2013 · Write a comment · Categories: Novellas & Novelettes, Novels, Stars of Blood and Glory, SW-VI: Benefactor · Tags: , , , , ,

So, for the past week, I’ve kind of been between projects.  I finished the revisions for Stars of Blood and Glory last Saturday, after a week or two of light revisions, but since then it’s been a bit of a struggle. I’m still working on Star Wanderers: Benefactor, and progress on Lifewalker had been coming along, but haven’t managed to really immerse myself in either those stories yet.  As a result, I don’t really have much to show for this past week, other than a scene or two in Benefactor and a new first chapter for Lifewalker.

One of the problems, I think, is that I haven’t really been able to turn off my internal editor.  Even with my blog posts, I’m constantly going back and rewriting the previous sentence.  This sucks, because it slows down the writing, makes the process tedious and painful, and doesn’t necessarily improve the quality of my writing either (at least, not beyond a certain degree).

What I really need to do is run with a project until I hit my stride, and then do all I can just to keep a steady pace.  So that’s what I’m going to do with Lifewalker this next week: force myself to write without really caring too much about whether the stuff on the page is pretty good.  Because usually, when I don’t angst about it too much, it actually turns out pretty well.  Sure, I might write myself into a hole I can’t get out of (at least, not without breaking the story), but if that’s the case I can always toss out a couple of chapters and redo things.

So far, Lifewalker has surprised me quite a bit.  I have a general direction I want the story to go, and a vague idea of where the main character is going to go up, but when it comes to a particular scene, things will pop up out of nowhere that takes the story in all sorts of interesting directions.

For example, my main character is currently wandering a post-apocalyptic Utah with just a handful of possessions.  One of them is a copy of Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn: The Final Empire.  At one point, he spends a night among the people living in the ruins of Santaquin (“Sannakin”).  Out of nowhere, I decided to have him read them a chapter or two from the novel, which of course confuses the heck out of them.  So then they start asking him questions, like whether the world before the apocalypse was covered in ash like in the novel, which leads them to all sorts of wild and ridiculous speculations.  The aside only lasts a couple of paragraphs, but it takes things in a whole direction that I hadn’t planned it to–one that really fleshes out the world.

This is my first time writing post-apocalyptic fiction, and while it seems a bit daunting, when I actually sit down and focus on putting out new words, wild and interesting things happen.  The research is a bit daunting, but the story takes place two hundred years after the apocalypse event, so there’s actually a fair amount of leeway.  As long as I’ve got Google Earth running in the background, with ready access to Wikipedia when I need it, I should be all right.

As for Benefactor, don’t worry, that one’s coming along as well.  When I’ve had too much of the post-apocalyptic world, it’s actually quite refreshing to come back to the familiar universe of the Star Wanderers series.  Bouncing between the two stories should be a good way to avoid burnout–though at my current pace, that’s the least of my worries.

Next week is going to be fairly eventful.  I’ve got a job on Monday that will take up most of the day, and LTUE will keep me occupied all Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.  Still, I should be able to get in at least a chapter or two in both stories.  We’ll see how it goes.

That’s about all for now.  It’s getting late, so I’d better turn in.  Night!

Slow going (but still going)

09. January 2013 · Write a comment · Categories: Novels, Stars of Blood and Glory, The Sword Keeper · Tags: , , , ,

I’ve been back in the States for exactly one week now, and while my stomach is still having trouble adjusting, I’m more or less used to the American way of life.  Not much culture shock this time, though that could change once I get back to Utah.  That place is pretty strange.

So without a foreign culture to navigate (or a job, though hopefully that will soon change), I have a lot more time to focus on my writing.  Trouble is…it’s coming slow.  Like, reeeally slow, at least for me.  I’ve been clocking in at less than 800 words per hour, sometimes as low as 500.  I’m still hitting betwen 1.5k and 2k words per day, but still, it’s way more of a struggle than it needs to be.

I think the main problem right now is that I’m writing with my internal editor looking over my shoulder.  Somehow, I seem to have forgotten how to turn him off (maybe that’s why I didn’t get very much written in Georgia, hmmm…).  To compound matters, it seems like every ten minutes I want to get up and do something else.  That’s not a very good way to be productive at anything, let alone writing.

Fortunately, I think I’m slowly getting the good habits back.  I’m writing a little less than two scenes a day, and the momentum is building.  With this timer constantly staring me in the face, I’m much more conscious about how I structure my day.  I haven’t hit four hours of productive writing time yet, but I am consistently getting to three, so I think it’s just a matter of self discipline before I can up that to four.

All boring writer stuff, I know.  But the long and short of it is that I’m slowly getting back into the swing of things.  If I can turn off that internal editor and start writing faster, I think I can finish The Sword Keeper before the end of the month.  That would free me to work on a lot of other things, most noticably publication of Stars of Blood and Glory.  That’s the next one in the publishing queue, though I’m still waiting on a couple of first readers <cough>.

That’s about it.  I just wanted to vent some frustration, since man, writing is tough when your internal editor is breathing down your neck.  But don’t worry–I’ll shut him up soon, and my writing will be better because of it.

Time to get immersed back in story.

Hello internets! I’m back (sort of)

22. December 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: ,

So today I said goodbye to my village and moved out to Tbilisi, where I’ll be spending the next week.  It was emotional.  My host mom cried.  It was raining, too, which pretty much reflected the way I felt.  Goodbyes are tough when you’re going halfway around the world.

The last few days have kind of been like a slow-motion whirlwind, a sort of in-between state where I’m not really rooted where I am, but I’m unable to go anywhere else.  Unfortunately, due to some poor planning on my part, I don’t fly back to the States until the 31st, so things are probably going to continue like that for a while.

Well, there are worse places to be stranded over Christmas than Tbilisi.  There’s still a lot in this part of the country that I haven’t seen, not to mention the city itself.  For about $9 a night, I’ve got a roof over my head and a comfortable bed to sleep in, as well as regular internet.  Also, with all that free time, I should be able to get a lot more writing done.

So yeah, when I’m not busy writing or exploring, I’ll definitely be more active here on the blog.  I’ve got a couple of new years-ish posts lined up, and I’ll probably come up with something Christmas-related for Trope Tuesday.  Life day, perhaps?  We’ll see.

In any case, it’s getting late and I’m exhausted.  Good night.

Some new thoughts on productivity

01. November 2012 · 3 comments · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

I’ve been thinking a lot about writing and productivity, mostly because I seem to be struggling a lot with it lately. With nanowrimo just starting, this is a pretty topical thing to blog about, but I also want to look at it from a long-term career perspective, since that’s what I’m personally more interested in.

As writers, when we spend all our time procrastinating or fail to meet our word count goals, we tend to beat ourselves up and frame the problem in terms of a lack of self-discipline. If only we had greater will power, we could buckle down and pound out five or ten thousand words a day like those super-prolific authors.

While there’s definitely something to say for raw self-discipline, though, I think there’s another dimension to writing productivity that we tend to miss. Not all writing-related activities are productive–and not all non-writing related activities are totally unproductive. In order to make the most efficient use of our writing time, I think it’s more important to understand and respect our individual creative process than it is to merely force ourselves to produce more words.

To better understand my own creative process, I took a little time to group every writing-related thing I do into four different categories:

  • Writing activities
  • Fill-the-well activities
  • Publishing chores
  • Procrastinating

WRITING ACTIVITIES

This should be pretty self-explanatory. It’s basically all the stuff that leads directly to a finished manuscript. It requires the highest amount of energy and produces the most important content.

Activities in this category include:

  • Writing new material
  • Making substantial revisions (putting in and taking out)
  • Updating chapter and scene outlines

FILL-THE-WELL ACTIVITIES

This is the non-writing stuff I do that helps me to be more productive when I switch back to the writing activities. Basically, it’s the stuff I do before and after I write that helps me to maintain a creative momentum.

Activities in this category include:

  • Reading
  • Blogging
  • Catching up on blogs
  • Listening to podcasts
  • Doing mindles chores
  • Going on walks
  • Exploring new places
  • Watching movies
  • Playing RPGs
  • Talking with friends
  • Reviewing first reader feedback
  • Writing character outlines
  • Making book soundtracks

PUBLISHING CHORES

This is all the professional stuff that I have to do, which may feel productive while I’m doing it, but actually takes time away from the stuff I should be doing. I still have to do it, but I should waste as little time doing it as possible.

Activities in this cateogry include:

  • Ebook formatting
  • Producing cover art
  • Writing blurbs and book descriptions
  • Writing author’s notes
  • POD typesetting
  • Handing financial stuff (royalties, invoices, etc)
  • Researching the publishing industry
  • Processing copy edits
  • Sending out email newsletter

PROCRASTINATION

Again, pretty self-explanatory. This is the stuff I shouldn’t do, but end up doing anyway in order to avoid stuff that feels like work. It’s all the stuff that I need to cut out entirely if I want to maximize my productivity.

Activities in this category include:

  • Minecraft
  • Alpha Centauri
  • Any other game that I can’t stop thinking about
  • Checking ebook sales numbers
  • Dicking around on Facebook and Twitter
  • Browsing the Kindle Boards
  • Watching TV and Youtube
  • Minecraft

So now that that’s done, what next?

I’m still figuring this part out, but I think the best thing to do would be to put as much distance as possible between the stuff that boosts productivity (writing and filling the well) and the stuff that doesn’t (publishing chores and procrastination).

The way I see it, there are basically two ways to do this:

  • Physically separate the activities. Do all your writing on a machine that’s disconnected from the internet and doesn’t have any games installed, and do everything else on a separate computer.
  • Set aside blocks of time specifically for writing. Organize your schedule so that writing is a priority, while acknowledging the need to take breaks and refill the creative well.

I can’t really do the first one while I’m here in Georgia, but I definitely can do the second. So far, I’ve found that waking up early to start the day with an hour of writing helps me a ton to build and keep momentum. However, I need to do a better job setting time aside in the afternoon, both for writing and for refilling the well. If I don’t, I usually end up procrastinating by default without realizing it until it’s too late.

So anyhow, those are some of my latest thoughts on writing and productivity. What are yours? Does this square with your experience, or is there a better way to think about it that I’ve missed?

Still here, wherever that may be

20. October 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Novellas & Novelettes, Novels, SW I-IV: The Jeremiah Chronicles, The Sword Keeper, Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,

Wow, it’s been forever since I’ve been active on this blog.  I guess living in the developing world will do that to you.

It’s not that I don’t have good internet access, it’s that the places where I can get it are often noisy and crowded, with a fair amount of cigarette smoke.  By the time I’ve checked my email, caught up on all the blogs I follow (or at least the interesting ones), and generally finished screwing around done everything else I need to do on the internet, I’m pretty wiped out.

I’ll try to write my future posts offline, like I did in Jordan, so all I have to do is copy and paste.  I can’t really do that with Trope Tuesday posts, but for everything else, it shouldn’t be a problem.

In any case, I’m still here–wherever “here” is.  Currently, it’s Tbilisi.  I came out for the weekend to pick  up a package from the USA…I was hoping to get the new kindle paperwhite, but instead got the case and adapter.  Turns out the actual device is shipping out next week–I’d say it’s a disappointment, but I’m actually just relieved to know that it wasn’t lost in the mail.

Things are going well out here in Georgia.  The village kids are a lot of fun to teach–I basically feel like a rockstar whenever I’m at the school.  It certainly helps that I give out stickers left and right every time someone actually does their homework.  Whenever I pull them out, the kids say “smiley!” and go crazy.

But yeah, even though I enjoy being out here, I figure it’s time for a change.  Like I mentioned in the last post, I’ve accomplished just about all my goals for coming out to Georgia, which mostly had to do with trying out a TEFL career and seeing if it’s a good fit.  I think it is, so I plan to go out again after a few months, but I want to come back to Utah for a while to see some old friends, spend time with family, and recharge before the next big excursion.  That’s the plan, anyway.

As far as the writing goes, things are going, but slower than I’d like.  I’m only in chapter two of The Sword Keeper, which is kind of frustrating, but I think I’ve overcome most of the hurdles and now it’s just a matter of buckling down and doing it.  I definitely think I can have this novel finished before the end of November, which would make it my second novel for the year (third, if you count Star Wanderers I-IV).

In terms of publishing, though, things are looking great.  I found someone to proofread Star Wanderers: Sacrifice, and she should be getting back in the next few days.  If all goes well, it’ll be up on Amazon and Smashwords by Monday the 29th.  Star Wanderers: Homeworld is also getting close–I just need to get the feedback from my first readers and figure out where to go from there.  If there aren’t any major issues, it should be up by the end of November.

I’m debating whether to splurge on the cover art for the omnibus, and if so, who to ask to do it.  This series have a very different feel from my Gaia Nova series, even though they both take place in the same universe.  Not sure what to do for the illustration, or who to ask to do it, but that’s still a few months down the road.

That’s about it for now.  I’ll end with a few shots that my friend took in Prometheus Cave, one of the coolest sites out here in Imereti province.  Imagine about a mile of caverns, brimming from floor to ceiling with formations like these:

Later!

Update on STAR WANDERERS and other projects

23. September 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Novels, Stars of Blood and Glory, SW I-IV: The Jeremiah Chronicles · Tags: , ,

So I’m back in Kutaisi again, recharging my netbook battery due to some chronic electricity problems out in the village.  Seriously, I think I heard a transformer explode this morning.  Anytime it rains, you can prettymuch expect a blackout here in rural Georgia.  Hope for the best, plan for the worst–but that’s the subject for another post.

Anyhow, here’s where things currently stand with Star Wanderers:

Part III: Sacrifice is almost ready for publication, and will hopefully be up in a few weeks.  I’m just waiting for  some feedback from my first readers, to make sure there aren’t any major problems.  I made some pretty big changes to the story after getting some helpful feedback I got from my friend Laura, so I don’t want to put it out until a few other eyes have seen it in its current form.  Of course, I’ll need some help with proofreading, so if anyone wants to exchange services (proofreading or formatting), just shoot me an email.

As for Part IV: Homeworld, I’m currently wrapping up the 2.0 draft and should have it finished by the end of the week.  I’m really excited about this story, especially the ending I have planned and the way I want to bring together all the threads from the first three parts.  You know that moment when a story just comes together naturally, without being forced or anything?  Yeah, that’s what I’m experiencing right now.  It’s awesome.

So the plan is to publish Star Wanderers: Sacrifice (Part III) sometime in mid-late October, and to publish Star Wanderers: Homeworld (Part IV) sometime in November.  As with parts I and II, they will both be free via Smashwords for the first two weeks to subscribers of my email newsletter.  To sign up, fill out the form in the sidebar ——–>

This isn’t the end of the Star Wanderers series, of course.  I’ve already completed the first draft of a parallel novelette to Part I: Outworlder from Noemi’s point of view.  I’d also like to do stories with the other characters, like Samson or Mariya.  And of course, there’s the omnibus for parts I-IV, which I’ll probably release early next year.  If you’d like to see a story from any particular point of view in this universe, let me know–I’m always open to new ideas.

In the Gaia Nova series, I’m hoping to publish Stars of Blood and Glory by January.  I’ve been in touch with my copy editor, and things are looking good for a 2012 release.  I need to make another quick revision pass first, which I’ll probably finish in October, and then we’ll see about getting the ball rolling.

So that’s where things stand right now.  I’m happy to see that sales are trending up on all the platforms where I’m published, which means that I can reinvest more in new titles and put them out more frequently.  And my teaching schedule here in the village is pretty light, which means I have lots of time to write–that is, when we actually have electricity.  And even when we don’t, there’s always pen and paper.

That’s just about it for now.  My battery’s almost at 100% and it’s starting to get dark, so I’d better go.  See you all later!

Form rejection and WOTF closure

27. June 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Novels, SW I-IV: The Jeremiah Chronicles · Tags: , , , , ,

So I finally got an email from the Writers of the Future contest.  It reads:

Dear Entrant,

Your story has now been judged and did not win or place in the 1st quarter. Even though you have never had to wait for results in order to submit for the next quarter, this hopefully gives you incentive to submit again. The more often you enter, the better chance you have of winning, and improving  your skills.

I do urge you to join our forum if you have not already, or subscribe to our judge, David Farland’s newsletter. Lots of great tips at both locations to help you.

I do hope you are already working on that next story and do let me know that you did get this e-mail.

Best regards,

Joni Labaqui

I’m not going to lie: it’s a pretty disappointing way to end an 8+ month wait.  But when you’re a writer, rejection is just a normal part of the business.  I was hoping to get at least an honorable mention, but oh well.

Stories are fundamentally subjective: what might work really well for one reader might not for another.   The important thing is to write the best stories that you can, and to send them out into the world until they grow into their audience.  I still feel confident that Star Wanderers represents some of my best work to date, so I plan to make it available as soon as I can.

I’m flying back to the States on Friday, but Part I is already edited and formatted, so I’ll probably publish it over the weekend.  In the meantime, I’ll finish the first draft of the complete novel somewhere between Tbilisi and New York.  That’s one good thing about the long wait–it helped me to finish the story and work out some of the kinks before publishing it.

So yeah, the WOTF rejection is a bit of a setback, but at the same time, it’s also quite liberating.  All I really wanted was to get this story out to the readers, and now I can finally do that!  If you like my other stories, I think this is one you’re really going to enjoy.

Expect to hear more about it soon!

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