(and if the spacing is all wacky on this post, it's not for my lack of trying to keep my lines spaced out the right way. grrr to blogger.)
I (christy) have news for you. Well, really just updates on myself. But I'm excited to share with you!
I have two (recently) completed novels. (Only I've decided to bury one of them.)
My writing history:
October 2009 Solstice's first words were written. (I didn't know what genre it was then. I called it Fantasy Romance.)
May 2010 Solstice's 116,000th and final word was written.
September 2010 Solstice's rewrite began. (Shortly after I began calling it Parnaormal Romance.)
August 2010 Fixing Shelby began. It's a contemporary YA novel. In fact, I announced it in this post. (I was really dorky then. It was before erica helped me out.)
February 2011 Solstice's rewrite was complete except for the three chapters from another character's POV.
June 2011 Solstice's rewrite was complete except for a couple of scenes that need to be plugged in. (I started wondering if it was Sci-Fi.)
July 30, 2011 I decided Solstice should never be queried or see the light of day. BUT, since the protag's story really began with her great-grandmother and the journal she kept (holding the family's secrets), I decided to keep my concept, but start at the beginning.
SO I wrote 8 pages of notes plotting the novel out and developing my characters. IN FACT just in case it ever goes anywhere, I've plotted out the complete trilogy, books 2 and 3 having my old protag from Solstice, Dawn. HOWEVER I will never rewrite Solstice again. By the time I get to book 2 in that series, it will be fresh.
The problems with Solstice were:
-My original idea for it was contemporary. Completely in reality.
-It evolved into a mess of complications during the first writing and I was afraid of fantasy. I was afraid to be creative. I felt silly creating fantasy worlds and making characters have bizarre and awesome powers.
-During the rewrite I added in even more complications to my characters and the plot.
-I could never nail a query or a logline. BECAUSE I was never quite certain what the main plot was. HECK, I didn't know what genre the dang thing was!
Book One (a stand alone novel) will be told from Dawn's grandmother's (as a 17-year-old) perspective, BUT it will take place in the present. NOT in the 1920s. IF Dawn ever gets to tell her story, it will be 2067. WHICH may help book three with the dystopian feel I'd always envisioned for it.
SO my newest protag is Marian Hudson. She's going to have spunk. And love cheese. (Har har. erica, that was for you! ;o))
In addition to my 8 pages of notes, I wrote
Seventeen-year-old inter-dimensional Transporter, Marian, fights against time and a rogue Themuran council-member after he infects her friends and family with an incurable disease while hoping to rally rebel Transporters to help him take over the Earth dimension.
July 31, 2011 Fixing Shelby (the unedited version) was completed at 49,000 words!!!!!! This one I will query once the query is written and critiqued and once the novel is edited and beta-read.
AND just in case an agent likes it and wants another YA contemporary from me, while in church I thought up another one with a protag named Leslie Adams. I'll leave the details to that one a secret for a long, long time.
Some novels we know when to shelve but it doesn't mean they don't remain a part of us!
ReplyDeleteIt's funny how this process goes, isn't it. I wrote my first one as a family drama and it will be a YA focusing on the teen before it sees another round of querying... (just need to figure out where it fits). I also have a trilogy where I needed to write ALL before I rewrote the first, but now that the first is rewritten and only a single round from ready, the next two need total rewrites...
ReplyDeleteWe learn so much from everything we write. I have learned as much as those books that ended up being just for me as I have with books I put out to the world.
ReplyDeleteShelley
I always love hearing about writers' processes. It's a finicky, long-term road. But hats off to you that you're going gangbusters on such interesting sounding stories. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteB
Sounds like you've got a lot going on! Good luck with all your manuscripts! They sound very intriguing.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations! You've put your first novel in the drawer, which is where most first novels belong. But you no doubt take its heart with you wherever you go, and that's great. Now you can start building that lovely castle of ever-better stories and structures. (I recently took my first novel from its drawer and blew the accumulated dust off —years and years worth—and guess what? I still love it. Needs work, oh yeah, bigtime, but it speaks to me. Fun.)
ReplyDeleteIt's a whirlwind isn't it?! LOL! Thanks for sharing your history, it makes me feel a little more normal. :) And great new logline!
ReplyDeleteCongrats on finishing Fixing Shelby! I'm sad about Solstice, but I think the new idea to focus on Marian sounds really cool. Can't wait to read it!
ReplyDeleteI've been there, too. And everywhere along the way. I'm excited to be close to query-ready with my wip. Can't wait to virtually hold your hand through that process, too.
Lots of writing going on! Yay! I like to write the query first too, to pin down the main components of the book and the voice. Not that it can't change later, but it kind of sets my foundation. Yours sounds really cool!
ReplyDeleteYay for Fixing Shelby!!! I have high hopes.
ReplyDelete