It Be the Time of the Updates!

Mentioned this before, but because of the plots in my current WIP, I've had to run at least cursory factual edits following each Part of this projected three-part book. I roughly knew what each part would entail from the onset, but even with planning, I kept a pantser mentality-- which often meant fiddling with details that I liked better as the ideas presented themselves along the way.

That being said, yesterday, I finished the run-through on Parts I and II, where I'm currently drafted to. I'm not planning on jumping right back into writing so I'll be taking a short "break" of indeterminate length. I took some great notes to look out for when I'm starting up this conclusive third part, but there are a few parts I had to mark because they were based on my memory of events in UnNamed. I do not trust my memory to be 100% so I'm going to be reading UnNamed before going back into my third draft. 

Why? Well, I published UnNamed back in February (on my mother's birthday to be exact) and it's July. In those five months, I did about 6 or 7 book covers projects, some odd number of art projects besides that-- juggling those things made it necessary to reread much of UnSung's progress even, just to be sure I was still recalling events as well as the characters would (or rather better, because I'm pretty much the Almighty of Almighties where their development is concerned). Sometimes even notes miss out on the subtleties and it's completely useless to try to create emotional or dialogue shortcut devices or notes. You have to creep over those moments in the raw, test them over and over fully, to see if they're still working for the story.

In any case, UnSung Part 3 drafting will be my next hunker-down project. In the interim, I'm going to play peasant/house-elf and get some cleaning and organizing done. The subsequent scheduled post, another cover reveal, ought to tell you why. If you didn't get to it, my birthday and the release of the final(?) book in my first series coincide a week from today and not only do I intend to enjoy the week ahead fully, but I intend to jump into more summer project fun without having any excuse for distraction. Fully cleaned fish tank, dusting, vacuuming, the Wiping of the Surfaces, making sure all things I will need for my projects are readily accessible (notebooks, clean fast computer, pencils, pens, drawing tablets-- you know, my tools of the trade).

Rituals can be cathartic towards the anxiety of beginning new things. Or, continuing old things, which is what I remind myself if I get the beginner jitters. I call it Domestic Tetris, the stacking, organizing, brain-engaging act that doesn't separate me from the Plotting Tetris I'm lining up for. Because, let's face it, a very involved process can leave us a little forgetful for the domestic parts of life. You just don't really notice those dishes or clothes piling up with your heads engaged elsewhere. 

Not that it ever gets terrible. Keep in mind, I'm raising two boys so there's only so much I can get away with falling into any task uninterrupted. They're old enough now that they actually get what goes into my work and they're mostly very considerate of giving me ample time to do it. They're still kids though and they need things and in truth, I like the time they want to spend with me too. Just as much as wanting to know when they're hungry or sick or need help, I also want to hear what they think about and are interested in. Many times, they've inspired my own ideas in some way too.

Leaving the post at that. Finished one thing, taking a break to better tackle the next things ahead. I do have some short comic ideas in my head and the web comic idea still nagging for my attention, so I might do a bit of that here and there too. Really no use making plans where I'm concerned. Creatively, either I'm in or I'm out and there's not really much compromise when it comes to my attention. I can force it a bit, but as a rule, if I can't get my head in it within 15 minutes, I'm just wasting my time. I'm more likely to sabotage my own work and end up running some frustrating damage control. So it will be what it will be and hopefully, I can share some more interesting work with you once I've latched on enough to bring something to completion. Having a great track record with it so far.