Project Seas = To Dance the Sea of Storms (Short-Story)

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I apologize for last week. I keep telling myself that I’ll work on 2-3 blog posts over the weekend, but it just never seems to work out. Last Saturday, I went have my taxes done, and I wasn’t able to get the blog posts again for a second week, so I decided to just do shorter blog posts so that even if I can’t do it the blog daily, I can at least get 2-3 blog posts per week. Today I’m going to start that with a shorter post on managing to finish a new short story.

2 Few Days

So, after finding out that I’ve only had two (2) writing this year, I was very disappointed in myself as a writer. I’ve had many other things to do, but only working on a project for 2 days was something that I have to better with. I’m slowly working my way toward a possible schedule for my class in terms of grading, but I think I over-extended myself on the amount of school projects that I’ve taken on this semester. However, there’s no use complaining–I just need to try to balance my writing, school, and life as best I can in order to accomplish what I can.

So, long story short, I set up a 250 word session goal for Scrivener and worked toward the ending of the first draft of the project. I wrote 272 words in 2 days, but because I was already close to the end of the story, I managed to finish the draft in those two days.

It took me a total of 9 Writing Days to finish the story: 5 days in December, 2 in January, and 2 in February. It is approximately 2,300 words. I feel that it needs a little more, though.

To Dance the Sea of Storms

I’ve had a version of this title for most of the time that I’ve been working on it. I think I’ve said before, but in case I haven’t, most of my stories are generated from ideas that come to me first from titles. I generally think of the title first and then the plot, characters, and setting all come from the title. Rarely, it doesn’t work this way, but for this story, it did.

I will save a “deep-dive” on the plot and story and initial idea for the “Author’s Note” when I send the story off for the first time, but I’ll give a little information about it here. It is a fantasy story inspired by a line of dialogue in a fairly well known story by Stephen Crane called, “The Open Boat.” My story involves sailing and high seas adventure in fantasy world. Think of it as Master and Commander: Far Side of the World in a fantasy world.

So What’s Next?

I’m going to work on another project (planning it out and writing an outline). When I finish that one (hopefully, in a reasonable amount of time), I will come back to To Dance the Sea of Storms and work on the 2nd draft. In the interim, I’ll do a character sketch of the main character, Brynn and jot down notes for how the larger world works. I already have an idea for a new “beginning” scene that should show Brynn’s character to the reader without doing as much telling as I am in this first draft. Considering that this is the middle of February, I don’t think I’ll get back to working on the revision to this story for at least a month. However, as I’m comfortable with doing one new short story per semester, I think I’m still on pace to have the story ready for submission by late April/early May.

I enjoyed writing the story, but I just wish that I could have finished it in December or early January (by spending more time on it more consistently). I most definitely plan to do that during the revision phase.

Sidney

Please consider supporting these fine small press publishers where my work has appeared:

Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora WolfRead Childe Roland for Free at Electric SpecPurchase  HawkeMoon  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or eBookPurchase  Dragonhawk  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindlePurchase  WarLight  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindlePurchase  Ship of Shadows  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindlePurchase  Faerie Knight  on Amazon.com (Paperback) or KindleCurrently Working On (February 2021):Unhallowed (Weird Western Story)
Out to MarketStarlight, Starbright (Science Fiction Story)
In for Revision & EditingThe Independent (Science Fiction Story)
Out to MarketTo Dance the Sea of Storms (Fantasy Story)
Prewrite: Completed, Plan & Outline: Completed, Write a first draft: Completed, Revision: Not Yet Started