Jumping Around July 2020

Hello everyone! I had a super busy month in July!

I spent most of it wrestling with the second draft of Mirrors of Ice. It was a lot of pulling at my hair and turning through my notes, but I went from about 78k to 104k, and I think I worked out the biggest kinks. I’m feeling a lot better about the POVs and character arcs. I’m going to do another pass over it soon and as long as I’m feeling good about it, I’ll be ready for betas!

Once I finished that, I decided to try my hand a shorter retelling, something for a newsletter builder. I decided to do a retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Red Shoes set in the same world as my Bewitching Fairy Tales series, but not quite the same time. It’ll be earlier on, but there might a familiar face or two. I’m currently revising that draft, and it’s not going great. If you haven’t guessed by now, I don’t think I’m capable of short form fiction. I’m really struggling to get the pacing, plot, and character arc right in under 15k. Right now, I’m at 12k, and I feel like I’m still missing something. Hopefully, I’ll put my finger on it soon.

After I got the first draft of my The Red Shoes retelling done, I did a really quick read through of Mirrors of Ice to start prepping for the next draft, but I got the last of my feedback for Stalks of Gold towards the end, so once I did the readthrough, I switched tracks.

I finished the last draft of Stalks of Gold a little bit after August started. Yay! And, I’m feeling really happy with it. I’m planning on publishing early 2021, once I’m sure it’s ready, and I’ve got everything set up. When I get my newsletter and Red Shoes retelling ready, I’ll probably include the first couple chapters of Stalks of Gold to read.

Now for this month, it’s working on the The Red Shoes retelling, and doing some outlining for a future Cinderella retelling and prep work for the next big project which I am so excited for, a Beauty and the Beast retelling. And, getting used to my new computer!

See you all next time!