Weekly Recap

I got way more done in Cuba than I intended, even more than I posted on this list. This is what I got done in the last two weeks:

• Cursed: Dark Divinity story line options
• Elemental Army story line revise/edit/complete
• Begin story lines for two new series (Iron Angel, a dystopian sci-fi fantasy series with mutants and super-powered humans, and Abducted, my first alien/sci-fi series)
• Finish the story lines for the Areios Brothers
• Read as many books as I can (this was hard since I dropped my Kobo in the water... Sigh... But I got two of them done!)
• Take lots of photos of beaches, sand, food, and drink
• Get a good tan!

Now that I'm home and slowly getting back on track, here are my goals for this week:

• Finish Eternity Blood storyline
• Extend and edit Eternity Blood
• Cursed 2 & 3 storylines
• Cursed: Demon's Daughter chapter 6 edit
• Hollow Hill chapters 8 & 9 edit as well as other edits
• Shallow Water edits
• Restart Cursed: Dark Divinity (if I can find time)

That's a lot of editing that I'm setting myself up for, but I want to get back into the Cursed series now that my best friend helped me finally get past the writers block for it. I won't give anything away obviously, but let's just say that things are gonna get crazy for Constance and Dro.

This week I have to send most of my stuff back to Edmonton for my move, but I do want to get more of Eternity Blood finished now that I'm extending it to a full length novel. Long story short, I was editing away and started adding more scenes... and more scenes... and more scenes, until I realized I was having too much fun with my characters. So I'm giving them more adventures, going into more detail, and making it a lot more intense. Hopefully, I'll have both Eternity Blood and Needfire ready to self-publish by this summer.

With all of that in mind, I guess now would be a good time to get to work! Cheers!

Amy

Back In Bronze

I'm officially back in cold, wet, snowy Canada, a far cry from the blazing, beautiful Cuban sun. Sigh. However, two weeks was a good amount of time to be away. I had an absolute blast: Sun almost every day, white sand beaches, ocean water, excellent free food, dolphins, catamarans, crabs, tours, friendly people, moonlight walks on the sand, getting an actual tan that was noticeable to everyone for once, laughing at my brother and his friends after they played over 30 games of Beer Pong...

Feet on the sand... Nothing like it.

View from the Royalton lobby, the best resort I've ever been to.

 The first week was pretty much a blur of sitting on the beach, relaxing in the sun, and doing plot work. I want to say that I got a lot of reading done to, but then I would have to lie and say I'm not a klutz. Long story short: Kobo e-readers are not waterproof. I almost cried when I broke it, but on writing this I'm pleased to say that I have a brand new e-reader and am catching up on all the books I listed not too long ago.

Crepes that were flambeed right in front of you after dinner.

Love that water...

I made the most of my e-reader disaster that week though. Instead of moping and being jealous that my brother's girlfriend would sit beside me and use her e-reader (no, not out of spite– she's absolutely wonderful, and I loved talking about the books she was reading into), I decided to get through all of my story lines. I built worlds, wrote characters, planned adventures. I got through Cursed: Dark Divinity, Areios Brothers, Elemental Army, Iron Angel, and Abducted. One week was down, another one to go...

Wally the very friendly dolphin.

Pelicans behind a concrete boat. Yes, concrete.

The second week was a bit busier. We did three excursions: swimming with dolphins, a private catamaran tour that took us to lunch, more dolphins, a coral reef where I saw my first Barracuda (holy @#$% those things are fast), and a private island for us to explore, and a tour of Havana. But I still needed to occupy my mind, so I worked on another two series that I haven't looked at in a while. What was great was that there was an entertainment worker there who not only listened to the same bands I do and liked the same comics and movies, but he was a writer who was kind enough to look through my work and tell me what he thought. He enjoyed what he read, so that's a good sign!

The waves crashing over a road in Havana.

My first time holding starfish!

Even those extra story lines didn't eat up the rest of my time, however. So I gave in and wrote some new, random scenes for Agents of Limbo, as well as two steampunk series that I've been thinking about doing in the future. I also got started on a new scene for Eternity Blood, which I'm looking forward to getting into again. While I miss Cuba, I have to say that I missed sitting down at my computer and writing. But I'm back and slipping into writer mode again. I move back to Edmonton in 12 days so it will be hectic next week, but I will get more work done on Eternity Blood, Needfire, and Areios Brothers 2.

In the mean time, I hope you all enjoy the rest of your week, and will be posting a book blog on Saturday. I did manage to read 2 books before my Kobo had its cataclysmic water encounter, so there will be a review! If you want to see more images from my trip, take a look at my Instagram page and leave some love!

Amy

Weekly Recap and Vacation Time

Well, I managed to get all my goals done for last week! I also completely finished my edit draft of Needfire. It's currently out for review, but if all goes according to plan, I'll be self-publishing it sometime in the summer. This is what I finished:

• Cursed: Demon's Daughter chapter 5 edit and post
• Hollow Hill chapter 6 & 7 edit and post, as well as other general edits
• Edit Shallow Water
• Edit through and extend Needfire and Eternity Blood
• Continue the story lines for the Areios Brothers

These next goals are going to be over a two week span since I'm going on vacation to Cuba tomorrow!

• Cursed: Dark Divinity story line options
• Elemental Army story line revise/edit/complete
• Begin story lines for two new series (Iron Angel, a dystopian sci-fi fantasy series with mutants and super-powered humans, and Abducted, my first alien/sci-fi series)
• Finish the story lines for the Areios Brothers
• Read as many books as I can
• Take lots of photos of beaches, sand, food, and drink
• Get a good tan!

Okay, okay, so those last goals don't have anything to do with writing, but this is a weekly goal post, right? So, do I think I can get through all those story lines? Frankly, no. But most of them? Yes. Out on the beach, there won't be anything to distract me. I want to say that I would actually do some writing but Iron Angel and Abducted have been two series that have been on my mind for a long time.

I'm one of those writers who likes to plan way ahead of time so when it comes down to writing, I can just start going. I won't have to worry about where the story will go because I'll have written it down in advance. That isn't to say that the plots won't change (Agents of Limbo and Elemental Army certainly have) but I'll know the direction to take.

A beach-side view of the Royalton Cayo Santa Maria. Can you think of a better place to write? Nope? Me either.

Things will be rushed when I get back from Cuba, but I'll post my progress and the goals I've accomplished. Planning without internet– now that will be a change. I know I'm going to have a lot of fun, and really look forward to doing everything on my list. I hope everyone stays warm (I know I will be :P) and has a great spring break!

Nos vemos más tarde!

Amy

Monthly Goals: March

I got most of my February goals done! Yay! I finished and submitted all my anthologies, worked on the edits for my short stories Needfire and Eternity Blood, and finished the first series of edits to Areios Brothers 2: Shallow Water.

March will be interesting as far as writing goes. In a few days I leave on vacation for a few weeks, and will be completely away from my computer. So that means no new words. :'( That doesn't mean no work, though! I'll be spending two weeks reading, drinking, relaxing, and soaking in the sun, but that doesn't mean my creative mind will shut off.

I'm going to do some research over the next couple days so I can finalize the plots for the Areios Brothers. I'm also going to try and get past my writers block for Cursed: Dark Divinity so I know which direction to take it. Hopefully I can get the plot outlines for Elemental Army all figured out, too. And, if I can accomplish it, I'm going to write out the plots for two new series' that I'm going to be working on in the future. I know you probably think I'm crazy for putting so much work into my vacation, but trust me when I say that I can't just shut off for two weeks. My mind's going to wander regardless, so I might as well let it wander while drinking margaritas in the sun and sand!

When I get back from my vacation, things are going to be even more rushed. I've got to start sending boxes across the country and prepping for my move back to Edmonton. It'll be a stressful time, but hopefully the two weeks I'll have will be enough to get it all done. Needfire is almost finished so I'll be sending it out for another review. If I get a lot of positive feedback and don't need to do much work on it, I'll get a cover made up and officially self-publish my first book! Eternity Blood will be next on the list, and then it will be back to Cursed and the Areios Brothers.

This is a big month coming up, but I think I can get a lot of these goals accomplished. I'll consider myself very efficient if I do. Now, if only the weather would be as efficient in heating up...

Amy

Weekly Recap

Okay, okay, I know, I didn't get as much done as I wanted to this weekend. I mean, I got another short story completed and submitted, but I didn't do any as much editing. Here's what I got done:

• Continue February anthologies and edit/send at least one more
• Edit Shallow Water
• Edit through and extend Needfire and Eternity Blood
• Continue the story lines for the Areios Brothers
• Finalize the storyline for Elemental Army (this has been here for a while and it's bugging me)

So with that in mind, here's what I intend to get done this week:

• Finish last February anthology and send it in
• Edit Shallow Water
• Edit through and extend Needfire and Eternity Blood
• Continue the story lines for the Areios Brothers
• Finalize the storyline for Elemental Army (so close to being done!)

Basically, this week is all editing. Wish me luck!

Amy

Weekly Recap

I know it doesn't look like it, but this week has actually been very productive. I wrote and edited a lot of this month's short stories, even sent one out to the intended publisher today. I caught up on almost all of my read-swaps and completed another two storylines for the Areios Brothers series. Work will continue to be slow so I should be able to get the rest of them done over the next couple weeks. Here's what I got done last week:

• Begin February anthologies
• Edit Shallow Water 
• Post chapters 5 & 6 of Hollow Hill and chapter 5 of Cursed: Demon's Daughter for review
• Edit through and extend Needfire and Eternity Blood (Got to Eternity Blood, but not Needfire)
• Continue the story lines for the Areios Brothers
• Finalize the storyline for Elemental Army

There's some real life stuff I need to do this week– printing out forms, making phone calls, Mom's birthday, packing, working, dentist– but there will still be lots of time for writing. This week my goals are:

• Continue February anthologies and edit/send at least one more
• Edit Shallow Water
• Edit through and extend Needfire and Eternity Blood
• Continue the story lines for the Areios Brothers
• Finalize the storyline for Elemental Army (this has been here for a while and it's bugging me)

So that's what's coming up for me! I hope everyone has a terrific week! :)

Amy

Weekly Recap

It was easy to get most of my goals done for this week. I'm very happy I managed to finish Shallow Water. I was short on my final word goal, but that's what editing is for, right?

• Send Cursed: Demon's Daughter and Hollow Hill out to more agents and publishers
• Finish the first rough draft of Areios Brothers 2: Shallow Water
• Finalize the storyline for Elemental Army

This week my goals are:

• Begin February anthologies
• Edit Shallow Water 
• Post chapters 5 & 6 of Hollow Hill and chapter 5 of Cursed: Demon's Daughter for review
• Edit through and extend Needfire and Eternity Blood, the two shorts I might self-publish
• Continue the story lines for the Areios Brothers
• Finalize the storyline for Elemental Army

Lots to do this week, and my hours have increased, but I think I can at least start some of these. Wish me luck! :)

Amy

Weekly Recap

The goals were easy to get to last week, and while I didn't get to Elemental Army, I did get two and a half plotlines done for the Areios Brothers. I call that an accomplishment!

• Continue single plotlines for the Areios Brothers stories
• Finalize storylines for Elemental Army (my steampunk series)

 This week, I'd like to:

• Send Cursed: Demon's Daughter and Hollow Hill out to more agents and publishers
• Finish the first rough draft of Areios Brothers 2: Shallow Water
• Finalize the storyline for Elemental Army

Nice and easy, and I should be able to intersperse that while I pack for my move back to Alberta. Long story short: Needing money sucks.

In other, more interesting and fun news, I came up with a new story idea! It's fledgling, so I can't tell you much, but right now it's a fantasy steampunk story revolving around vampires, werewolves, an ancient race of guardian warriors, and a royal exile with a big bad secret. I don't have any inspiration images to share, sadly, but as I think more about it I'll be sure to show some. Right now my big focuses are obviously the Areios Brothers and Cursed. But who knows where my brain will take me!

Amy

Weekly Recap

Okay, I didn't get as much done as I wanted to, but:

• Continue rough draft of the Cursed sequel, Dark Divinity
• Think more about what I want to do with the Areios Brothers series (sort of, read more below)
• Finalize storyline for Agents of Limbo
• Work on my short story Needfire and prep it for (possible) ebook publication

A lot of work has been done on Cursed: Dark Divinity, and it's still going really well. I haven't done much by way of storyline for the Areios Brothers, but I did work on two scenes that have been burning in the back of my mind for a long time. I can't give much away, but let's just say that while one scenario goes well, and the other goes horribly, horribly wrong. I haven't gotten to Needfire, still trying to figure out how I'm going to extend the story and if I still want to self-publish it.

Next week, the goals are:

• Continue rough draft of the Cursed sequel, Dark Divinity
• Think more about what I want to do with the Areios Brothers series (sort of, read more below)
• Finalize storylines for Elemental Army (my steampunk series)
• Start anthologies for February
• Work on my short story Needfire and prep it for (possible) ebook publication

For anyone interested, I'm now on Figment, so you can check out Hollow Hill and enjoy Derek and Liam's first adventure.

Amy

Montly Goals: Janurary

With the new year starting, I feel it's the perfect time to get back in my old swing of things. Aside from edits, I haven't done as much work on my own major stories as I wanted to. NaNoWriMo and Hollow Hill morphed into a full blown series, but my primary focuses are on Cursed and Agents of Limbo, the stories I want to be known for. The December short stories have helped bring me back into the mindset of Leon and Jace, and by the end of the month I want to have completely finished my series outline revisions.

I'm currently working on the first draft of the Cursed sequel, Dark Divinity, and am hoping to have the complete storyline finished as well as another two chapters. The plot lines for my steampunk series, Elemental Army, are nearly done, though like Cursed, there are some final details that need to be worked on before I can really get writing.

There are a couple anthologies that I'm going to complete before their February first deadlines, but those aren't very high on my priority list. I'd rather work on the stories that I care about than random shorts I come up with. This means a lot more submissions to agents, editors, and publishers.

My work hours are significantly lessened this month, but that just means more time to do what I really, really love. With all the free time I have, I'm sure I'll get a lot done. I'll be posting more on the blog, since I know I haven't been doing mid-week posts regularly. Be sure to stay tuned!

Amy

Weekly Recap and The Next Steps

It has definitely been a productive week for me, even though I haven't been posting much to the blog lately. Last week's goal was easy to finish, but this week's goal is a little more challenging:

• Complete Hollow Hill and NaNo

With Hollow Hill nearly fully completed its first draft, I've been thinking about where to take it from there. And I don't just mean as a series. Oh, I would have no problem continuing on and while I won't give anything away, there's more than enough for me to continue Derek and Liam's adventures. But right now I'm thinking more along the lines of publishing.

I found a couple great articles about getting your NaNo novel published, as well as what to do if your story isn't accepted the first go round. I definitely found both these articles really helpful and will be looking to them for advice when Hollow Hill is ready for its edits.

Bearing that in mind, I'm going to be looking for a digital artist to create a cover for Hollow Hill. I'll be doing one for Cursed once that's completed since I already have some cover ideas in mind, and I definitely think it would help my case if I sent a PDF to a publisher complete with a pretty cover. I'm positive that others have tried this and not succeeded, but you never know until you try, right?

Coming up December, I'll be writing another short story for Christmas. My Agents of Limbo Halloween short turned out to be a huge success. I received lots of praise for it so I'll be bringing Leon and Jace back in time for the holiday season... As soon as I figure out what sort of trouble they can cause during the busiest time of the year.

Another thing that has been going really well has been my story outlines for Elemental Army. When I needed a break from Derek and Liam or while I'm stuck waiting for the bus to show up (yes, universe, I know this is you telling me I need a car, but how about you give me some money first?), I've been working on the outlines for each particular story. So far I've completed three of them in a series that will likely be seven parts long. I gotta say, I've loved writing those out just as much as I have Hollow Hill. I adore steampunk and the world I created for Elemental Army because I really did build it from the ground up. It got to the point where I was about to buy Legos and build my own map of the world. Seriously.

Anyways, this was a longer post but a lot has been going on in my writing life lately. I'm really excited and happy for the progress I've been making and hopefully sometime in the new year I'll have something credible to show for it, whether it's a self-published work or something in an anthology. So that's what's been happening! I'm excited to see what happens next... ;)

Amy

Decisions, Descions...

National Novel Writing Month is still a ways away, but I'm already getting prepared for it. Since registering won't be hard, I'm focusing on my two current issues:

1. Coming up with the plotline for a story I want to do.
2. Figuring out how the hell I'm gonna write a full novel in between work days. I get two days off a week and while I am writing constantly, a decent sized novel is about 90,000 words, and usually it takes me a couple months to finish a draft. I predict a lot of late nights and Red Bull ahead.

But in reality the first problem is the one I want to iron out right now. I have a lot of ideas (and I do mean a lot), and I'm not going to cheat by putting Cursed: Demon's Daughter in there, prologue or not. That would be cheating, and I don't like to cheat. The same goes for Agents of Limbo and Elemental Army. I've written parts of both of those, so they aren't in the running yet. I've got a couple ideas on the backburner for now that could work:

• A prequel for Elemental Army. While I was writing the first chapter, I came along an idea for a prequel series when one of the characters was mentioning something that happened ages ago. It would tie in to EA in a very huge way, though I'm not going to start with it because I don't know how long it will take me to write the entire story out, whether it'll be one story or two.

• Prequels for Cursed and Agents of Limbo. When I said I wasn't going to put them in there, I meant it, but the prequels would be separate stories on their own. The Cursed prequel would take place while Constance and Andromeda are working for the cartel, while the AoL story would be during Leon's teen years when he was doing his very best to snark everyone to death, including his big brother Jace. I've put Leon and Jace on hold for a while as I work on Cursed, but I miss writing Leon and Jace.

• A brand new story completely unrelated to anything. I have a couple werewolf ones I'd like to try out as well as an idea semi inspired by a dream I can't really remember, though it was a hell of a lot like Inception.

So you see my problem?? I don't know where to begin. I would love opinions, so leave them in the comments! Majority rules in these kinds of things, and I intend to have the story I want picked out by next week so I can start planning during the travel time for my vacation. I can't sleep in anything that moves, and working passes the time. When I make my decision, I'll post the lucky winner and a brief synopsis of what can be expected from the story.

Has anyone ever participated in National Novel Writing Month? If so, I'd love to know what you thought of it and what sort of advice you would give a newbie. Comments are love!

Amy

Monthly Goals: September

So with August now at an end and summer with it (officially, they say), I've made up my list of things I want to accomplish for the month of September.

Since I'm currently working on three different things, here's the standings...

Agents of Limbo

· Finish editing AOL 2, which shouldn't be too hard, though I will have to send it out for more edits afterwards.
· Finish first draft of AOL 3, which should also not be a problem. I'm flying through it like nobody's business. ;)
· Define further plot outlines... I like to plan things way in advance, so yes, I do know how the AOL series will end. Having said that, I've got a long way to go in getting there, but at least I'm looking forward to it. :)

Elemental Army (aka Steampunk series)

· Finish half/all first draft of EA 1. I was on a bit of a steampunk craze a couple weeks ago and just sat down and started writing. I don't really know what I was expecting to accomplish, only that I got down the first draft of the prologue and first chapter, and I'm really happy with them.
· Come up with subtitle names... I might have agreed on the series name, but each book needs a title, right?
· Decide on the final plan for the series. I know what I want to do, but I need to sort it out because there's a lot of potential things that can and might happen, but I don't want it to drag out longer than necessary. Maybe.

Other

· Send a submission to a publisher. This will likely be AOL 1 since that's the major series I have going and I want to back it up, but I might also try and send in EA 1 just for the heck of it.
· Start a series to post on the blog... I don't want to be a writer who's all talk and no proof, so once I settle on which series I want to post, I'm going to break it up and do (hopefully) weekly posts of an entire series or selection of shorts. The first post might not be for a few weeks until I make up my mind on which series, but I'll keep you posted as soon as I can.
· Continue to vamp up the blog. I'm knew to it all and a little clueless as to how to add HTML code and get social media buttons for my Facebook page, Twitter, and Instagram. I know- I'm awful at social media stuff :S Any advice would be awesome and much appreciated!

Wow, okay, this turned out to be a lot more goals than I intended, but with a long weekend coming up I should at least get some of them done. As always, I'll post playlists and keep you posted on what's coming up. Until then, ciao!

Amy