Wow. It’s been a super long time since I posted any kind of a writing update. People have been asking what I’ve been doing since graduate school besides coaching writers, and the truth is that starting my business has kind of occupied the front part of my brain for a long time. But I am writing! Just slowly. I’ve been pretty tight-lipped about my new novel, mainly because I don’t want to burst the bubble I’m in with it. I also don’t know right now if it’s one monstrous novel or three shorter ones and that scares me a little, but is maybe a good thing.
The WIPS
The novel is a YA fantasy about three girls haunted by a classmate who disappeared without a trace a year ago. Without giving away too much information, because my agent hasn’t even seen it yet, the fantasy element is supernatural and very witchy. And thematically, it’s very much about sacrifice and rebirth. (At least I think so at this point. I don’t want to hem myself in by promises before I have a readable draft.) I’m hoping to have this finished up this summer. I’ve been working on it for a really long time and it feels kind of past due. I also have an idea for sequel, but I’m not getting into that until this one is a thing in the world.
I’m also working on a couple of other side stories. These are both shorter form, I think, and I might want to self-publish them. One is a YA magic mirror story that I started writing in graduate school. The other is actually for adults. I haven’t written anything for adults in a super long time! I’m calling it my Yellow Wallpaper story. It’s about a woman who finds a staircase in her home that takes her straight into her unraveling sense of self and forces her to choose between the life she always wanted and the one she walked away from 20 years before.
As for the pandemic?
I blogged at the arachne blog here about what my challenges have been. Mostly that everyone is home right now and the boys don’t have any real direction or rhythm in their lives, which is causing a little friction. So I’m working on getting myself back on some sort of a schedule.
Oh, and I’m trying out alternate day fasting.
My weight has yo-yo’d the same ten or fifteen pounds in the past five years. In January, I was at my heavy weight after the holidays and I got super sick with a gut infection. Without going into gross details, I do NOT want that to happen again and I have to be very careful about my food now. So my doctor recommended I get serious and lose the weight permanently. So far, it’s going well, and I think it’s something I can sustain. I chose the alternate day fast so I could get the gut healing benefits. So I’m committing to a month to see what the results are. My goal is 35 pounds. I weigh in for my first week on Sunday. I’ll probably do more of these personal blog posts now that the writing stuff is all over on the new blog.
Out.
