Cate Morgan's Blog, page 12

Authoress In The Wild! (#tbcc)

Rule #1: Don’t go a-Conning in a costume weighed down in layers and/or leather. At least, not in August, in Florida.

Criminy.

50,000 people descended upon the Tampa Bay Convention Center this weekend, prepared to geek out and admire the work gone into one another’s elaborate costumes. Fortunately, this year, convention organizers seemed to have been better prepared than last year. Other than one “Sentry” who was under the mistaken impression that we are either a military operation and/or the Hunger Games, everyone was polite and helpful and very professional. Parking was a snap for the savvy planner, and other than the oppressive heat and sheer mind-boggling amount of people (never a good combination), it was, overall, a positive experience. Lots of kiddies this year, all dressed up, which it always fun to see.

For those who like to wax poetical on what’s Steampunk and what isn’t: shut the hell up. It’s fiction. It can be WHATEVER someone’s imagination decides it is. I didn’t have any problems, but a fellow ‘punker had gotten “schooled” by someone at a booth, and she asked my opinion. It as her first Con, and her first costume. I hope was I able to make her feel better, wherever she is now.

LOTS of artists this year, both mainstream and independent–the entire Exhibition Hall had been opened up this year, so there was plenty of breathing space and room to move around, despite the impromptu photo ops in odd places. Lots of fellow authors this year, too, both trads and indies. Saw some gorgeous artwork and craftsmanship, and picked up a fair amount of Loot. Among the takings:

2 Sandman comics I did not currently own. Because Sandman.
Several indie comics. Noticeable trend here: a lot of these were pitched as “Harry Potter meets X”.
Several books from Twilight Publishing, whose three representative authors were AWESOME. Picked up one of everything.
Replica Renaissance sewing scissors/dagger
Fully functional practice fan. Had they had two in black, I would have gotten a pair, but alas.
T-shirts! I added to my growing Firefly collection, and the Tech Monkey went with a War Machine.
Prints! Beautifully drawn David Tennant as Dr. Who, and Benedict Cumerbatch, and color promo prints of the Boondock Saints and Firefly.

Pictures!

What? I have a deadline? Better find another adventure to write about!

Fra-gee-lee!

Annoying little bugger.

Eep!

 

The Tech Money and I decided we were going to stay at a nearby hotel next year, if we can get in early enough, so that we can easily bop across the street to the convention and back. Also, no costume next year, because EVERYTHING hurt by the time we got home. I’ll save the costumes for Necronomicon in October.

In other news, I decided to give myself another week or so to finish drafting Act II of SEARCHER, since I’m very nearly finished and I didn’t have any other drafting scheduled for August. Then it’s just a matter of waiting for The Pink Hammer return edits of HEARTH & HOME (Waking Muse #2).

Now, off to nurse my Con Brain* and swim through my Loot like Scrooge McDuck, and count the days until Necronomicon. W00T!

*Symptoms include: Exhaustion, Sweating, Sore Feet, Crankiness, Muscle Fatigue, Empty Wallet, and a Severe Need To Never Do This Again–until next year.

Author’s Log: Happy Bloggiversary To Me!

WordPress was kind enough remind me this morning that today is my three-year anniversary blogging with them. Yowza!

I’m on my third (at least) design template, and I’m come a long way since (yikes!) 2011. I’d been on Live Journal and Blogger before then, and in April of 2011 my first book ever, BRIGHID’S CROSS (Keepers of the Flame #1) got accepted into Samhain’s END OF DAYS anthology, whereupon I Squeed all over the internet and fell over.

I suffered not one, but two Technopocalyses that caused me to have to restart my beloved fantasy novel (the perpetual work-in-progress), THE MINSTREL’S DAUGHTER both times. The last time, I’d backed it up in two separate places, and the Great Technopocalypse of 2013 took out ALL THREE LOCATIONS.

SonofaBITCH.

But I endured, and you’ve endured right along with me. You’ve watched me struggled through the ups and downs of writing (poor you!), seen me doubt and get into my stride, fall down, and start get back on the horse. I’ve celebrated, and mourned, and imbibed copious amounts of rum. I went from intending to traditionally publishing all the books I wanted to write (even if it took fifty or sixty years), and hoping my publisher would be willing to put up with me for that long, to joinging the hybrid author bandwagon and taking on the stultifying–yet strangely liberating–challenge of writing like a madwoman so I can released something new at least every ninety days. (Still working on that last one.)

So thank you, all, for coming along on this wild ride. Here’s to another three years of progress!

*drops mic*

*on foot*

Whoops.

Author’s Log: Taking Care of Business (& #ROW80)

So here am I, in the final week of July, with progress to report. And just in time, too–Tampa Bay Comic Con is next weekend, and I have much business to be getting on with.

(Yes, I will be costumed–at least on Saturday. Yes, I will be covering the con real time via Twitter, with summarizations and a few pictures to follow here on ye old blog. Most of my pictures, however, will be posted on my Facebook page, so stay tuned for updates next weekend!)

So, as I try to stave off Con Brain as much as possible, on to the updates!

1. Finish Drafting SEARCHER–ACT II (30K Words). My new drafting schedule is working like gangbusters, I’m happy to say. I can generally average a little over 3K words (or one chapter) per session, with between 3 and 4 sessions a week. One day I even wrote 4.5k, I was so in the groove! o.O

I have to admit, SEARCHER is proving to be fairly easy to draft. I’m not sure why or what the difference is, but I am literally flying through the story. I broke Midpoint and the 50K word mark this week, with three and bit chapters worth to go. If I keep up my current pace, I should hit the final 10K of Act II by Friday. Given that I’ll have to be up early for Comic Con on Saturday, I’ll be calling it an early night on Friday, which means my Saturday drafting day will be moved up a day to accommodate my weekend plans.

Thank goodness I arranged matters so that August will officially be a non-drafting month–because there is NO way I’d be up for my normal drafting on a con weekend. Could you imagine? Yeesh!

2. Revise HEARTH AND HOME (Waking Muse #2). As of today I’m through my first pass, and I’ve paid my initial editing invoice to The Pink Hammer, the balance of which will be paid once she’s done beating me–and the manuscript, but mainly me–into shape. There are a few things I have to fix, and I’d like to see if I can wedge a little more romance in there somewhere (ahem), but overall I think it’s in fairly decent shape. But I definitely need an expert perspective and eagle eye to make it the best it can possibly be.

I’m due to turn in a clean as possible draft on August 1. (This Friday! Eep!!)

3. Develop TARA (Origins #3): I definitely have some time on this one–after all, it will be novelette length, and with my current drafting schedule it shouldn’t be an issue–but I don’t want to mess with the good thing my Production Schedule has become. Thus, I’ll want to finish pulling together all the puzzle pieces this month as well. I’ve been spending my lunch hours at the day job working on this, so I don’t feel as if I’m losing anything by it.

It’ll help, of course, once I’m into initial content edits from Editor Awesome on Keepers #3, to make sure I keep continuity well in hand for Tara’s origin story. But I should have enough information at that point to put together something really special for my readers.

In other news, my newsletters are ready to go, as are my initial welcome messages to subscribers. I’m pretty happy with the way they turned out. I also ended up updating one of my possible future series for my Speculative Ink line to be more Cyberpunk and overall Shadowrun-y.

I’m still on target to write my Steampunk series next year (I even came up with tentative titles), but at some point I’m going to let my readers and subscribers to Speculative Ink vote on what they want me to write after that. I’m going to do the same with my Heart Linked list, at some point once Waking Muse is complete. I haven’t quite worked out the timing, yet, but it’s something I’d like to offer my readers by way of exclusive content.

The idea is to rotate between the two lines each year–Speculative Ink next year, and Heart Linked the year after that. I think there’ll be enough crossover  between the two that I can get away with alternate years, especially if I continue to write fast, and the fact the Keepers of the Flame is averaging one title per year, not including the companion titles in Keepers: Origins.

How about you guys? How are your summer plans going?

 

 

Author’s Log: Back To Black (Or Something) (& #ROW80)

 So, a week or so after my misadventures with Wisdom Tooth Shenanigans, I’m more or less back to normal–for a given value of “normal”, of course.

My sort-of, unofficial drafting goal is to draft 10K words per week, and as of this morning I made that goal for this week. Moving my drafting schedule to several days a week instead of every day is working really well for balancing writing with day job and life stuff. It also helps when I need to take a day off, because I still make significant progress by hitting at least 3K words per session.

The best part about the change-up to my drafting schedule is that I’m getting more, other writing-related stuff done (like planning and admin) while I’m on a Netflix marathon, and I’m feeling much more rested of late. This is good, because I work with a small team at the not-so-evil Day Jobbe, and someone just went on maternity leave, so I have to take on more responsibility. This is all fine and good, because now I don’t have a daily word count hanging over my head. I can draft like a demon during a scheduled session, and take a day off the next day, and it’s all good.

You may have also noticed some changes ’round these parts–that’s because I’ve changed up my Wordpress theme. It’s a portolio-based theme, which I think will suit me and my readers (thass you!) better. I’m still working out some kinks, so please bear with me. This blog has gone through a couple of iterations now, and this next one will be a good step up. LEVEL UP!

IN ADDITION, I’ve also set up my mailing lists, so if you want free review copies and exclusive content, then sign up now–space is limited!

This week I also got to announce the imminent release of BRIGHID’S FLAME (Keepers of the Flame #3) on March 17, 2015. Woo-hoo!!

On to the goals (July Edition)!

> PRE-PRODUCTION: Origins #3

This week during one of my planning sessions, I managed to sketch out a plot map. For the remainder of the month I’ll work on fleshing the map out into a viable outline and a series of story beats.

 

> DRAFTING: Searcher–ACT II (30k words)

I broke the 40K word mark this week, and I’m nearly at the halfway mark for the entire manuscript. LEVEL UP PLOT POINT! If I keep up the pace, I should have no problem reaching 60K words by the end of the month. Wisdom teeth notwithstanding.

 

> REVISE: Waking Muse #2

This week I’m adding Waking Muse #2 revisions to my non-drafting schedule. I want to have a couple of passes done before sending the manuscript off to The Pink Hammer at The Forge on August 1.

Your turn! What have you guys got going on this week?

ANNOUNCED: Brighid’s Flame (#keepers3)

It’s that time again! Editor Awesome and Samhain Publishing have decided to take on the third installment of my flagship series, Keepers of the Flame. BRIGHID’S FLAME  is now slated for (appropriately enough) St Patty’s Day 2015.

This one takes place in New York City, and our intrepid hero does not yet know what she is, and only thinks she knows what her destiny entails. The truth is going to prove quite the revelation.

Yes, am I am evil, evil author. :-D

I just turned in my publicity and marketing info, so more information will be forthcoming. Stay tuned!

Author’s Log: Wisdom Does NOT Come With Teeth (& #ROW80)

 Well, I didn’t write quite write as much as I’d hoped to this week, due to some minor wisdom tooth drama that made me miss a day (side note: OW OW OW!!), but I still made progress on the rough draft of SEARCHER. About 9-10k more words, and I’ll hit midpoint, maybe even by the end of this week. I’ve got my party to the capitol city, and my readers are about to meet our antagonists in person for the first time. Let the court intrigue and political dancing begin!

I’m really surprised with this draft. Usually, I experience at least one or two rough patches of plot stickiness despite all my assiduous planning, but not so far with SEARCHER. Every time I think I’m about to come up against something overly sticky, the solution presents itself with relatively little effort on my part. The story’s telling me where it needs to go, so I’m letting it lead me there.

And since the painkillers are making me a mite loopy–one to the goals (while I still remember them):

> PRE-PRODUCTION: Origins #3  (Deferred): I’m planning to work out a plot structure this week. It helps to already have had my back story written for Keepers #3, so my notes will guide me in determining what needs to take place. I want to have a complete outline in place by the end of the month.

> DRAFTING: Searcher–ACT II (In Progress): I broke the 35K word mark this week–as long as I don’t suffer any further, unexpected setbacks I should be back on track this week. I’m hoping to break midpoint this time next week.

> REVISE: Waking Muse #2 (Deferred): I’m still letting this one settle for a little while yet. I’m looking to start revisions mid month or so.

So, a short update this week, due to wisdom teeth that do not, in any way, make me feel more wise, and industrial strength Ibuprofen making me drowsy as well as loopy. Hopefully I’ll be back to witty form next week, at which point I hope to also have made progress on my new website-thingy.

Good luck to everyone this week–see you next Sunday!

 

Author’s Log: What I Did When I Was On Hiatus (& #ROW80)

 Oh, hey, look–it’s a fresh new round of A Round of Words In Eighty Days–the writing challenge that acknowledges you have a life!

And a day job. And a spouse. And pets (and, in some cases, children). And piano practice. And VIOLIN practice. And Dragon Age I and II to complete before III comes out in October. And a production schedule that looks like the lineup schedule of the World Cup, and enough stories in the queue to last at least a decade.

So, yeah. There’s that.

Things to do, things to do.

But first, let’s take a look at what I did while I was on hiatus:

No, not that.

Well, okay…maybe a LITTLE of that. After all, blowing through 10k words in 3 days tends to make a person a mite giddy. Like, JEREMY RENNER giddy.

But before the anime schoolgirl level of giddiness, came the MAD NINJA DRAFTING!

Okay, okay. Enough of the gifs. On to the updates:

I COMPLETED WAKING MUSE #2! And it clocked in at a little over 7k words over my original goal of 20k! W00T!! As an added bonus, I discovered that drafting each and every day doesn’t really work for me. I mean, I can force myself to do it, but I’ve found that forcing it just squishes my brain into a gray-matter thingy-blobby that only lets the storytelling flow out in desultory dribs and drabs. Instead, I’ve discovered  that by blocking out several hours of writing time and drafting under a clock, I can knock out the words like nobody’s business. Which brings us to:
The Revised Schedule: Check it: I wrote three chapters in three days, plus an epilogue, by drafting from 10:ooam to 2:oopm, with a Yoo-hoo break at noon, (i.e. when Thing 2 awakens from her midday nap under the bed to demand a prolonged snuggle and bouncy-ball time. If I schedule my drafting days to 3-4 hours of writing on Monday, Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday, then I have time to do other things and not get burnt out.  On Tuesday and Thursday, the Tech Monkey and I have dinner and watch Netflix marathons together, but I can also use this time for planning, revisions, or admin stuff. Fridays are my days off (unless the office at the day job is closed for a Holiday), when I cook for the Tech Monkey and we have game night. (He’s playing Elder Scrolls online, and I’m chugging my way though the Dragon Age series in anticipation of DA3.)
ACT I revisions of THE MINSTREL’S DAUGHTER are complete (FIRST PASS). There will be additional passes, of course, but right now I’ve got nine chapters looking like murder victims with all the red ink splattered all over the place. It still needs some work, but it’s getting there. The trick is to cut it up into manageable bits. I use Acts, because that keeps my structure in line.
I finished art proofs for my book lines, SPECULATIVE INK and HEART LINKED. I’m not quite ready to launch yet, but I’m getting there. I’ve also been playing around with a new site design, one that isn’t quite so busy, and that is more expressive of what I’m doing these days.

Here’s what the new round of ROW80 is going to look like for me:

o.O

No, wait. Let’s try…ah, here we go:

July:

> PRE-PRODUCTION: Origins #3

> DRAFTING: Searcher–ACT II (30k words)

> REVISE: Waking Muse #2

 

August:

> PRE-PRODUCTION: Waking Muse #3

> REVISE: The Minstrel’s Daughter–ACT II

> POST-PRODUCTION: Waking Muse #2

 

September:

> DRAFTING: Waking Muse #3 (25k words)

> REVISE: Keepers #4

> COMPLETE: Waking Muse #2 (Post-Production polishing and Release)

 

Don’tcha just love a good list? *scrunchy face*

It looks like I won’t be doing any drafting in August, but since that’s my off-cycle month, I’m reserving that for non-deadline side projects, like the Gaming novel I’ve been dying to write, flash fiction, or other SOOPER SEKRIT PROJEKTS ™! Or, I may just catch up on my reading and the Dread Laundry Monster instead. In other words, refill the creative well.

If I stick to my guns for the rest of the year, I should have a MUCH easier time of it next year, while still kicking things into high gear, since that’ll be when I start querying MINSTREL’S DAUGHTER.

Six months of craziness in exchange for high-octane results? Yeah, I think I can manage that. :-D

 

 

 

 

 

The Anti-Butt-In-Chair Argument (#IWSG)

The status of my production schedule for June month-end, if the spirit of keeping score, was as follows:

(1)   Novella completed (and therefore officially off my plate) in the nick of time;

(1)   Novella nearly drafted (90% done! W00T!);

(1)   Novel in Act I Revisions (approximately 9 chapters)

(1) Novella pending revision

As it stands now, I’m about a week behind in production, but I’m okay with that. Here’s why.

(Or, for those of you playing along a home, this is The Anti-Butt-In-Chair Argument.

I know, I know. It sounds like an episode of The Big Bang Theory, which is appropriate, since my ongoing Production Schedule as it stood suffered a explosion of galactic proportions. I’m not complaining—after all, I am the one who pressed the Big Red Button of BOOM ™.

It has to happen sometimes. I was struggling with my current production schedule, what with one thing and another, and the exhaustion was starting to catch up. I’m an epic planner, but what that means is that sometimes I get WAY ahead of myself and over plan without leaving room to rest. I mean, your body needs rest after a lot of physical activity, right? So it should follow that the mind needs rest, too.

It also didn’t seem wise (or fair to my readers) to open three new series this year and then for there to be a year’s wait between books for their favorite. But I also knew that as a full-time worker bee and part-time hybrid authorpeneur I could really only handle a book release three months without losing an unnecessary amount of sanity points. I mean, I’ve only got so many left. Any less and I’d have to horde them like Gollum and the One Ring.

“The stories takes our sanity preccccioussssshhh!”

So I took a good, hard look at my production schedule. And then I threw it into the fires of Mordor.

It made a pretty, pretty boom.

My day job—no longer evil, but still necessary—consists of a great deal of accounting, and scheduled payments from a variety of vendors. I also have my theatre background to draw on. So I used these two handy skillsets to rebuild a less punishing, but equally productive, schedule.

Don’t get me wrong: the next six months are still going to be busy as I shovel up the detritus of my last schedule and get the new one going. My novel production will remain largely intact, but I’ve reworked the more urgent novella production so that the full cycle takes six months rather than three. By giving myself more room at the end of production, I can conserve energy for drafting the next book in the pipeline.

Moreover, every three months on my “off” cycle I won’t be drafting anything with a solid deadline. Instead, anything I draft will be strictly for fun—or not at all. By recapturing the joy of writing on a regular basis, this will keep me jazzed and inspired and refreshed.

I had to force myself to leave regular, open slots on my schedule—playing merry havoc with my OCD, let me tell you—so that when contracted work comes in, or I end up racing down the road of one of my tangents—so that my mental and emotional energy is conserved. The best performers save it for when they need it—so they have somewhere to go when the need calls for it. You can’t play the entire show at an eleven, and then run smack into a wall at the most important moment.

So by dialing down my schedule to an eight, I can save the other three decibels for when I need to accelerate production, and I’ll still be able to meet the promise I made my readers by having something new for them every three months.

Balance. Discipline. And FUN.

Because if it’s not fun, you’re not doing it right.

 

Author’s Log: Goin’ Black (Back 7/7)

With LADY TENNANT finally out the door, and being between rounds of ROW80, I’ve decided to take a wee bit of a haitus to finish drafting Waking Muse #2 and ACT I revisions on MINSTREL’S DAUGHTER. You’ll still see me here and there on The Facebook and Twitter, but I will be more or less focused on cleaning up my production from June.

See you on July 7th!

 

Author’s Log: Pushing The Big, Red Button (& #ROW80)

I recently told Editor Awesome (who is still, verily, awesome), that lately I’ve felt like that scene from the Princess Bride: “I’ve got a wedding to plan, my wife to murder, and Gilder to frame for it—I’m swamped.”

In response I pushed the Big Red Button on my Production Schedule, which is my way of rearranging matters more my—and my readers’—liking. Because I love explosions.

BOOM!

Heh heh heh.

Anyway, I’m (finally!) releasing Waking Muse #1 into the wild as of this Friday. Rather than opening up two new series and making my readers wait a year between books, after releasing Waking Muse #2 in September, I decided to go ahead and released the third (and possibly final) book in December. That way I can also look into offering a box set in the first quarter of next year, probably for Valentine’s Day.

Also, this means my readers can learn to expect a new novella from me pretty much every 90 days or so, in March, June, September, and December, as long as I can keep releasing Keepers and/or Keepers: Origins books in spring every year.

This also opens me up to work on my novels, and anything else I want to draft for fun without a firm deadline. What I’m striving to do here is conserve my mental and emotional energy while still producing regularly (by extending my production cycle to give me plenty of lead time and room to balance projects in various stages of the process). It will also allow me to conserve my sense of joy and fun, which breeds inspiration.

The next five-six months are going to be chock full of revision goodness, as I get various projects into the next stage of production and then either submitted or completed. But, by golly, I’ll be able to breathe. I’ll have no more than three projects going in tandem within a given month, and beginning next year I’ll be down to two projects if I’m drafting to deadline, three if I’m not. This will hopefully give me time for contracted projects, cover art, and other side shinies that occasionally vie for my attention.

Here’s how things are looking so far:

Cleanup From June:

Drafting: Waking Muse #2—Nearly done—YAY!!
Revisions: The Minstrel’s Daughter—ACT I. Out of nine chapters, I’m on the last three.
Complete:THE LADY TENNANT (Waking Muse #1) is officially out in the wild via Amazon KDP Select as of 6/27. :-D

 

Looking Ahead To July:

Pre-Production: Keepers: Origins #3—I don’t have this one scheduled for drafting until December of this year, but I do want to get development prepped and ready to go on it. This will also mean re-reading through Keepers #3 to make sure I remain consistent and capture all the details I need pertinent to Tara and Stephen’s backstories. I’m imagining it as being something along the lines of Lord of the Flies meets Escape From New York. Or something. The nice thing about Origins is that my characters and settings are already pretty much researched and set out in its companion book, already drafted in the hot little hands of Editor Awesome.
Drafting: Searcher—Act II. Again, I’ll have to re-read through Act I to re-familiarize with the story, outline what comes next based on the plot points marked out on my story diagram, and then bust out the next 30K or so words.
Revisions: Waking Muse #2—Once I finish drafting, I’ll put it away for a week or so to marinate and so I can gain some perspective on it. Then I’ll give it at least three passes before turning it over to the Pink Hammer for a thorough pummeling (Post-Production).

It’s the beginning of a whole new Production quarter, so I’m excited to sweep up last quarter’s leavings and clear the way for an entirely fresh slate.

Until I blow that one up, too.