A Writing Update

For starters, I was interviewed recently on the Stardust and Gravel blog. Hop over there to learn extras about my books and some more things about me, like if I prefer movies, TV shows, or neither, and don't forget to enter for a chance to win a paperback copy of The Experiment.

Now for the writing update. A few weeks ago, I posted on my Facebook page that I had finished with my rewrite of The Crossways, book 2 of Time Captives, at 38,352 words, by far a record for me. The edits I made on my subsequent read through raised that number to 38,509. So now Time Captives is 2/3 complete. Book 3 will be Crannig Castle, but I haven't started it yet. I'm taking a break from Time Captives to write a companion to the trilogy.

This companion is called Espionage. Here is the logline:

In the midst of an alliance controversy, a nobleman's daughter must expose a heinous scheme by her father's political arch-enemy to force him to align with the evil strytes of Calhortz.

It will be a shorter, less complicated book than anything I have written in some time, and so it is a nice relief, in more ways than one. I'm estimating it will be about 24,000 words, and I'm aiming for ten chapters. (I just realized the number of chapters is the number of my favorite Doctor. Weird, and not intentional.) My goal is to finish Espionage by the end of August. I have a schedule that I have amazingly kept on track for a week, so I think this will happen.

Just a little bit more about it, because I like to ramble about my story ideas. The main character is a nine year old girl named Savanna, but called Vannie for short. I'm writing it in 1st person from her point of view. (Past tense, I can't stand present in the narrative of a book.) I haven't successfully written a book in 1st person, so if this works, which it seems to be doing, it will be my first. The only other complete story I wrote in 1st person was my stupidest picture book which will never see the light of day.

Vannie is a fun point of view character, and rather a relief from Adriel and Eleanor, the primary point of view characters in The Crossways. See, Adriel is a sullen and rebellious slave who is deeply hurt, and Eleanor has had her heart broken by her circumstances and been betrayed, and insists on dwelling on it, which can get sort of depressing. They'll both come out of it by the end, but they haven't quite yet. Contrast that to Vannie, who has a secure happy life, and has only the company of a very annoying cousin to complain about. Things do get more serious than that, but she still has a much lighter tone than either Adriel or Eleanor. Besides, it's fun to try to think like a little girl again. And the characters are super easy to develop, as opposed to my struggles with Time Captives who want to shut me out. :) I'm building a story board for Espionage as I write it on Pinterest. There's one for Time Captives as well.

What does this mean for publishing? Well, my plan is to publish Creighton Hill sometime early next year. I'm not sure of anything more exact yet, but I'll announce it once I am. I'm also thinking, not sure this will happen, of trying NaNo this year to write a sequel to Across the Stars about Hanna and Sam. If (and that's a big, major, huge if) I do, I will probably publish it next fall, if it's any good. You never can tell with sequels. Then the plan is to publish The Crossways in early 2016, Espionage in late 2016, and Crannig Castle the following spring. Who knows what will actually happen. After all, God is in control of my life, not me. His plans could be completely different.

Next on my writing plans, after Time Captives is finished, is to finally fully jump into an outer space dystopian trilogy I planned last year. It was sparked by a dream, and combined with ideas sparked by The Giver and my desire to write a space story because of reading Red Rain, The Destiny Trilogy, and Radialloy. I really can't wait to get into it, especially since every time I finish watching a Hunger Games movie I come away going "Must. Write. Dystopian." and start thinking about my story again even though it's completely different other than sharing a basic genre. What can I say? I've always loved evil government stories.

So that's a (not so) brief update on my current writing and publishing plans. (I could have rambled on longer, but I don't know that anyone would read it.) So long, for now!