March Update (Good News-Bad News form)

Hey guys! I know it's been extremely quiet around here lately, and I apologize for that; things have been getting pretty hectic outside the blogging/writing world. Mainly, I've been loaded with homework and outside activities. Also, I haven't written in days which although is pretty sad, it's actually helped a great deal with de-stressing and managing my time. Going for a run's also helped (just a side note right there).

Good news: I've managed to finish my WIPs! Yay!
Bad news: I still haven't finished GOoD.
Good news: I'm almost done writing Chapter 4 of A Rush of Needles!
Bad news: I'm not done though. And it's been a while since I finished Chapter 3.
Good news: I've found a novel contest to enter for 2013 for young writers! Hurray!
Bad news: I have no idea what I'm writing for it. And it isn't going to be Depravity.
Good news: I've read both The Angel Experiment, School's Out--Forever, and My Soul to Save!
Bad news: I've only reviewed two of those three ^ And I still have to read My Soul to Keep. 


So, yes, I am about to end this post on a bad note. Does this mean March has been horrible and uneventful? Not really. Just busy and not as efficient as I'd hoped. Hopefully April will be different!

- E

An update on the WAPs and GOD, and everything else.

Over the weekend, I decided to get down to business.

There were several things I'd messed up on, when it came to following the Ink Timeline. According to the Ink Timeline, I have almost a week before I should be done with both my WAPs (Wikia-Article Profiles) and my GOD (Giant Outline of Doom).

Ha ha. Right.

Out of the twenty six WAPs I'm supposed to have finished by the start of March, I have written about fourteen of them. I have not exactly started on GOD, but Sunday night, I did start on the Pre-GOD, which is a timeline on What Happened Before the Start of the Series. Background information, basically.

This was a conversation I had with myself on Sunday night:

Me: No. Stop blogging. Write demon WAP.
Brain: Yeah, but you still have, like, two more of Mag's questions to answer for the tags.
Me: Nononono. Must flesh out info on demons. Must...flesh out...info.
Brain: Oh look. Susan Dennard is following you on Twitter.
Me: WHAT?
Brain: Yeah. I'm surprised too.
Me: *flails arms* Thatisthecoolestthingever! I haven't tweeted a single thing about her though!
Brain: So how about those tag questions?
Me: ...
Brain: And that Spanish homework?
Me: No. Can't do homework. Write demon WAP.

A typical mental war I wage on myself^

Then, at around ten the same night, I started having second thoughts.

Me: Okay, so...elemental WAP, check. Demon WAP, check...WAIT A SECOND.
Brain: ...
Me: What came after Event X?
Brain: I dunno. How about you check that GOD you NEVER FINISHED?
Me: What are you talking about? It wouldn't be there in the first place....Oh.
Brain: Oh?
Me: Oh. I need to make a Pre-GOD.
Brain: So like...?
Me: So like a timeline on the events that took place before the start of Book 1. Like all the foreshadowing, background info, Reasons Why This Event Happened in Book 1 stuff.
Brain: Ohh.
Me: Yeah. Oh.

So basically, I have to finish my WAPs, my GOD, my Pre-GOD, and printing the other 200-something pages of my current Depravity draft. All in a week. Or, I could just not follow my Ink Timeline. That choice seems much better than the other one...

- E

The Ink Timeline that I probably won't follow / Another Challenge-Thing

T h e  I n k  T i m e l i n e

- AKA: the-flawless-timeline-so-I-can-finally-finish-something. Honestly.


WHAT?
Well, it's a timeline. You know, your average line with times...and events...
But the important part is that this timeline doesn't give us a glimpse of the past--it gives us (specifically me) a glimpse of the future. So it's like--like--an outline of all my writerly goals. It will include everything I hope to achieve in the year 2012 before I start junior year in high school, which is supposedly The Hardest Year. This is the ultimate timeline. So it overrules every past thing I've said about my NaNoWriMo or my WIPs or whatever (by the way, after this post, I'm updating my other post on my WIPs just to keep everything as consistent as possible).

WHY?
Because I've realized my lack of progress in everything I've been writing, and have decided to do something about it. Will I follow this timeline exactly? Probably not. Will I at least try to? Probably. And the trying matters the most. At least I'd be getting somewhere with my life.


AND THE TIMELINE IS...?
The timeline is this:
(UPDATED: 3/3/12)

January - February: Finish the Wikia-Article Profiles (WAP) and the Giant Outline of Dread (GOoD) for Depravity. 

• This did not happen whatsoever. Instead, I finished all of my Pre-GOoD (the timeline of the era before the start of my WIP series), about half of my Wikia-Article Profiles, and have only started on my official GOoD. Epic fail of the year. So far.

March - April: Write the rough draft of Shadowed; meet the two-thirds mark for Depravity revisions (no idea where that would be). EDIT: As of now this will include:

• Finish the Wikia-Article Profiles (WAP) and the Giant Outline of Dread (GOoD) for Depravity.

May - June: Revise Shadowed. EDIT: As of now this will include:

• Write the rough draft of Shadowed; meet the two thirds mark for Depravity revisions

July - August: Revise Shadowed. Finish revisions for Depravity.


September - December: ???


Simple enough of a timeline, but as for actually meeting the goals...well, not so much.


BUT WAIT. THERE'S MORE.

I'm participating in the Harry Potter Reading Challenge! Through 2012, I have to reread and possibly rewatch all seven of the Harry Potter books and movies. I don't have to post a review about them, but I can post discussion entries on my blog or on The Reading Fever (<--well, I would comment in this case). I'm super excited because I. Love. Harry. Potter. (Even though I've got to say, the Potter Puppet Pals are pretty funny.)

This might be the sixth time I've reread the series. I can't wait.

- E

'Tis my MCs for Depravity.

I did a sorta similar post here on Shadowed's characters. But this time, it's all about Depravity. This really helps you get to know your characters ^-^

My Female MC's personality outline:

Global Personality Test Results

Stability (50%) medium which suggests you average somewhere in between being calm and resilient and being anxious and reactive. Orderliness (60%) moderately high which suggests you are, at times, overly organized, reliable, neat, and hard working at the expense of flexibility, efficiency, spontaneity, and fun. Extraversion (26%) low which suggests you are very reclusive, quiet, unassertive, and secretive.

Take Free Global Personality Test
Personality Test by SimilarMinds.com

clean, secretive, does not make friends easily, observer, hates large parties, risk averse, perfectionist, reclusive, solitude loving, more practical than abstract, does not like to stand out, high self control, intellectual, mind over heart, very cautious, takes precautions, respects authority, irritable, emotionally sensitive

Aaand my Male [Somewhat] MC o.o 

Global Personality Test Results

Stability (73%) high which suggests you are very relaxed, calm, secure, and optimistic.. Orderliness (46%) medium which suggests you are moderately organized, hard working, and reliable while still remaining flexible, efficient, and fun. Extraversion (70%) high which suggests you are overly talkative, outgoing, sociable and interacting at the expense too often of developing your own individual interests and internally based identity.

Take Free Global Personality Test
Personality Test by SimilarMinds.com

social, outgoing, worry free, optimistic, upbeat, tough, likes large parties, makes friends easily, rarely irritated, open, enjoys leadership, trusting, dominant, thrill seeker, strong, does not like to be alone, assertive, mind over heart, confident, controlling, feels desirable, likes the spotlight, loves food, social chameleon, hard working, concerned about others

Polar opposites here. Woah. o.o

- E

I'm killing trees/The Giant Outline of Dread.

Confession time!

What does a writer/potential author do best?

Kill trees.

No matter what kind of writer you are, whether or not you write brilliant stories or crappy stories, you will have to kill trees. Well, indirectly. Words go on paper, paper comes from trees. End of flowchart.

I try to avoid printing as much as possible. Since two weeks ago, I'd done all my editing on the computer, but it had been very slow. I felt restricted, like I couldn't see the Bigger Picture. Then two weeks ago, I started printing out my manuscript at school, 10 pages each time I managed to get a computer. So far I've printed about 100 pages, and...you know. 100 pages. That's...a lot. Way more than enough to make me feel guilty.

*sigh* 100 pages. 200 more to go. *winces*

The reason for killing trees, however (at least for me) is to get ready to make the Giant Outline of Dread, or GOoD for short. GOoD will either drive me crazy or make my life considerably easier--or maybe even both. Or neither.

The point of GOoD is for organization purposes. So far I've been working on my WAP (Wikia Article Profiles--they're ideas/word building of my story based on the articles and format of Wikipedia), which also helps with the whole brainstorming ideas part of the organizing. But what I really need is GOoD:

story arcs > chapters > major events = post it notes
post it notes + more post it notes = GOoD

(^if that made any sense at all)

I hate to get all technical, but that up there is GOoD. It's time to stop spending hours trying to remember tiny details in my manuscript and start getting organized.

*sigh*

- E

A post in bullets.

Some facts about today:

• This is my second blog post this week. (That's right. I believe I deserve a pat on the back. *pats herself on the back*)
• I should be doing my physics PEPSI (Problem-Solving Exercises in Physics--which doesn't even spell PEPSI, unless you scramble/rearrange the letters or something) problems right now, instead of writing this blog post and half-staring at my 8th draft of Depravity.
• My 8th draft of Depravity is currently at 106,000 words, 399 pages, double spaced, size 12 Cambria font.
• I want to make it exactly 400 pages.
• I should be finishing up my last page of THINGS TO DO list today, but that probably won't happen.
• I have chair auditions/playing test grade tomorrow for the French horn and I'm freaking out because I can't play my parts the way I want them to.
• At least, I can play my parts. Just not the way I'd like to play them.
• I really want to watch Spirited Away again today.
• Last night was the first time I've watched Transformers 3 with my sister (and the first time I've watched it, ever), even though we should have been watching The Help.
• I still need to finish the book The Help. I should have finished that before The Last Hero. 
• Now I have Clockwork Prince to read and An Abundance of Katherines to read in the near future.
• I am somewhat stressed.
• My physics and chemistry finals are on the same day and I haven't started studying for either.
• I have had these spontaneous urges to write.
• I think I should have gotten my PSAT scores back by now, but I haven't.
• I have gotten my scores for the PLAN though. Apparently they're not very spectacular, although I think if I hadn't missed eleven questions on the science part, they would have been much better.

- E

Musical inspirations.

I actually have a bunch on my playlist, but I'm going to share with you awesome people a couple of them. I don't really listen to...sophisticated music like Adele or Florence and the Machine (that's what I call sophisticated music, for some reason). I'm more of the, well, alternative/punk rock/pop kind of person. So...I'm stereotypical. Hm. That's what my sister calls me anyway.

Well, moving along...here...is...Depravity's playlist! Or part of it anyway:




The Adventure - Angels & Airwaves



Shadows and Regrets - Yellowcard



My Immortal - Evanescence

These songs make me so happy :3

And then, I've made a playlist for my "Unnamed" novel. Already. I know, I know. I should probably be concentrating on the actual manuscript before making a playlist. Ah well.



Na Na Na - My Chemical Romance



For The First Time - The Script



Chaoz Fantasy - Paragonx9
--because my MFC loves techno

What are your musical inspirations?

- E

W.I.P. Database.

'tis here

DEPRAVITY  {YA Urban Fantasy} -- in the Giant Outline of Doom phase. See The Ink Timeline.
is my current official work in progress. The story is about fifteen year old Gwen, who finds out she is a demon slayer and is sent to a demon slayer training school, where she must uncover the motives of a supernatural guild of assassins and its relationship with the disappearing students--and Gwen herself.

'tis here

SHADOWED: THE RETELLING OF THUMBELINA {YA Fantasy}-- see The Ink Timeline.

Thumbelina was born from the flowers. Maia was born from the shadows.


In the land of Celeste, Maia Amblyne lives a seemingly quiet life with her adoptive grandmother, but at night she faces vicious apparitions in her sleep: looming shadows that taunt her and draw her to them. So when Maia sees one of these shadows when she is awake, she is compelled to follow it. She will soon realize, however, that the shadow-like creature is a trap, and when it disappears with Maia's grandmother, Maia is determined to get her back. But to do so would mean striking up a bargain with a newcomer, a faerie prince from a completely different world named Zeric who claims he needs Maia to help his clan rise to power, but will be able to help Maia find her grandmother.


But Zeric is not the only one who needs Maia. For a malicious intent, the current ruling clan of Zeric's world needs her to control the shadowed creatures that stalk the night. And a mysterious faerie named Cassandra requires Maia's assistance as well. Maia herself must spend time mastering her skills of control over the shadowed creatures, but she must do it quickly. For despite the number of people who are willing to help her, there are many more who are willing to kill her; and each person she encounters can either take her one step forward--or one step back.

Shadowed was my NaNoWriMo project in 2010 and 2011, but both years I was not able to complete it (boo...)

* Shadowed creatures are gigantic things. Like this big thing.

A RUSH OF NEEDLES -- read it on FictionPress.

When sixteen year old Nell Carlton stumbles upon a strange man encased in needles, she is brought into the dangerous world of the puppets and their human puppeteers, where she must find her role and learn about her abilities to help a supernatural guild.

This is probably my most unofficial WIP that I'm actually writing. You can go to this post for a more detailed blurb, and for more information on ARoN.

That's it!

- E

Popping in on the Classics.

This blog's been pretty inactive lately, but I guess it's just because I've been extremely busy with school work--and the like.

We're currently reading A Tale of Two Cities in English, which a lot of people find boring, and stupid, and annoying. I'm not one of those people. I actually find it interesting, and I'm actually reading ahead (which is pretty bad on my part, since reading ahead had almost always resulted in bad things happening to my grade). But the thing is, I don't understand it very well.

I mean, I do. Because if I didn't, then I wouldn't be saying it's pretty decent. But it takes me awhile to get past one page, especially one page without much dialogue, and I've found myself rereading paragraphs and lines just to figure out what Dickens is trying to say. This is probably just because it's a Classic, and was written decades ago. But one of my friends told me that, as a writer, not being able to understand a Classic made her feel kind of...suckish. Does this mean I've been reading way too many YA novels? Does this mean I should expand my range of reading, and start picking out all the other Classics? Does this mean my overall writing knowledge sucks?

Hopefully not.

---

On my own writing, I've progressed to my 8th draft. Yesh :P Draft 8 means going through all my revision notes and visiting all those revision-based web pages to get a good feel on how to, well, revise my novel. I can't believe I'm saying this, but: this is going to be so much fun.

And I also present you this article I found on Let The Words Flow: Overused YA Themes . You can find another similar article in The Writer. Pretty interesting.

- E

December comes rolling in...

First and foremost, I'd like to say one thing:

I really didn't enjoy NaNo.

From what I've heard, most of the population of NaNo writers love or loved NaNo. I guess I'm not of the majority. Not sure if that's a good thing, or a bad thing. But the truth is, I suppose I just didn't really get into the writing zone, or my NaNo novel. Everything felt dull and pointless, and I wasn't motivated at all. It didn't help that schoolwork (a whole lot of schoolwork) was in my way. I suppose either Shadowed or Thumbelina didn't work out for me. Or maybe, it was because I was still so caught up in Depravity and Incandescent that all I could think about were demon slayers and not faeries and shadows. And what-not.

Which is why I finished NaNo with a messed up 30,535 words.

Am I going to start back up on Shadowed again? Maybe. I've never gotten such a creative idea before, and I'm still somewhat excited about it. But I'm not known for going back to old, unfinished novels. So maybe not.

As for Depravity, I'm doing fairly well. I'm more than a third in with my revisions, which are really tedious and annoying, but interesting all the same. For Depravity's sequel, Incandescent, I haven't written much, but I've gotten some pretty good ideas. This must mean something, right? I might not have won NaNo, but I at least had gotten somewhere with my Ascendancy Series.

Along with Depravity and Incandescent, I'm starting a third, 8,000-word novel for a Fiction Novel Writing Contest. Winner gets $1000. I'm not doing it for the money though. Not...really. I'm doing it because I'm just curious. I've never entered a contest before. It'd be good experience, wouldn't it? I have some pretty good ideas for my 8,000-word novel, but I don't have at title, and not many character names. Ah well. It'll happen soon enough. The submission deadline is January 15th, so I better get a move on.

Oh. And it's snowing over here...unfortunately.

- E

Depravity: Wordle.

From FictionPress and Let The Words Flow author/contributor Julie Eshbaugh, I've discovered a new way to revise my drafts: Wordle!

I've only used Wordle once in my whole entire life; I don't usually use generated softwares or anything too much. Instead, I'm more of a GIMP or Photoshop (though I stick with GIMP) type of person. That's how I release my technological creativity. I don't tend to use sites such as Wordle or anything.

But then, I discovered this revision process! I'm not going to get into it too much since Julie Eshbaugh already took care of that, and you can view her blog post.

And now, here's mine:

- E

Problems with Action Scenes.

So after finally getting to my draft 6 revisions, or making notes for draft 7, I've realized something.

I'm pretty awful when it comes to action scenes.

Going through my first official action scene, I've ended up with about a dozen notes on one page. It's pretty sad:

That would be half of the page.

I wonder if this'll be what Shadowed looks like, once I revise it. Well, if I win Nano, anyway. Hopefully I do. There's less than 2 weeks before Nano begins, and I'm getting kind of worried...

- E

Putting off Revisions.

A month ago, I decided to go on a revision break for my current WIP, Depravity. After searching through more than just a couple of writing articles, it's been clear to me that taking a break from one's novel, and then attacking it later on, refreshes the mind and makes it easier to point out flaws in the manuscript.

So that's what I did.

September 9th was my first end-of-the-break date. But when I realized that the 9th was a Thursday--a day of the week that, annoyingly enough, is the busiest for me--and I was already overloaded with homework and other activities, I realized September 9th just wouldn't work. So I'd moved it to the 12th, in full hopes that I wouldn't have any messed-up weekend events on that day. Because the 12th was a Sunday, and that's usually when I'm the most free.

But the 12th was the day after one of my most exhausting events of the month. Which means I couldn't do anything at all on the 12th, either. In fact, I'd completely forgotten about my revisions.

I dunno, but is high school supposed to be this stressful? Is it supposed to suck so much out of a student's "other life"? I mean, seriously. Jeez.

Now today, the 18th, almost a week over when the break should've ended, I'm still too busy working on my AP Geography project to do anything. All I know is that I'm particularly exhausted from high school. I miss middle school so much. The whole entire time I was just floating around, earning straight A's with ease. Now...it's much harder. And I'm finding it extremely messed up that I can't write and balance my school activities.

This is literally procrastination to its max--at least for me, it is. Months ago, I'd wanted to finish Depravity by December, and then send off my query letters. Now? I'm not so sure anymore.

On the otherhand, Incandescent is coming along nicely.

- E

An Introduction of Sorts

Actually, I wanted to create a blog once NaNo started, but I'm way too eager to wait. I've blogged before, but this'll be my first public blog. Well, sort of.

So an introduction is required. Er...let's see. I'm [known as] Ella. I'm 14 at the moment, and I'm a writer--more or less. This year will be my first year participating in NaNoWriMo, and I'll be writing the retelling of Thumbelina. And it'll be classified as dark fantasy.

But NaNo Novel (titled "Shadowed" because I suck at naming my novels) won't be the only thing I'll be working on. I've completed my first novel at a total of 104,000 words a few years ago, and I'm revising it. Yay! (/sarcasm) It's known as Depravity, and will probably be known as Depravity for the rest of its existence. Depravity is about demon slayers. It's Buffy Meets Harry Potter original and awesome and right now, it sucks.

I'm on revision draft number seven.

But yep, that's it on me. Nothing too extravagant. I'll be blogging about both Depravity and Shadowed, but more on Depravity once November comes.

- E