12/02/2014

Update on Current and Future Projects

At this time of year, about six months after writing the first draft of my summer novel, I start to get antsy ....



I'm ready for the new novel (this one is titled, "Between the Carries") to be done, out, published, but I know that the editing process is at least as important as writing the thing in the first place ... so I wait, and work, and write, and wait.

I've been working with my beta-reader and editors on the book since a few days after I finished the rough draft in July, adding and chopping and polishing what will be the third book in the Tyler Cunningham Adirondack Mystery series ... but it's not enough.

I need more writing stimuli in order to keep things rolling.



In the months since I finished the rough draft of BTC, I have worked on a variety of writing projects, and have been enjoying all of them immensely ... I love the feeling of having written something that nobody's ever seen/read before.



Each of these projects offers me another way to experience writing, to tell a story, and I can feel the pull of the words as I explore these different ways of writing.

I've been working on a piece of serial fiction, "Watcher in the Woods", that will likely be available in January.

I am still working on a short story for an anthology, it explores the concept of metafiction, along with a character/story the likes of which I've never tried to write (including, gulp, a sex scene), titled "Now is the Winter". The anthology should be available early in the new year.

I've been blogging more frequently than ever ... at least once, sometimes more, each week. I set a goal for myself, and find that forcing myself to blog, the pressure of a looming (if manufactured) deadline is good for my writing muscles.

I just began a #twitternovel, which is written in 140 (or less) character "chapters" ... it's fun, and supplies yet another challenge in writing in a new and different way.



All of these experiments in writing force me (inevitably/unstoppably) to grow, to change, to improve. The action of writing in all of these differing forms is stimulating/enervating/inspiring, and I constantly find new ideas for stories and characters coming to me (thank goodness for my iPhone's memo app).



I find that the toughest thing for me now, in my life as a writer, is finding the time to write all of the stories I have struggling for primacy in my brain ... they're all treading water, waiting for me to scoop them up and give them life on paper.

I have to be patient and fair, and give each one its turn/space/time on the stage of my brain and laptop.

Thanks,

Jamie


No comments: