Look, footnotes

The blog has been somewhat quelled because there is relatively little in life to talk about to an unfiltered public. The dayjob? Definitely not, especially these days. The boy? I want to respect his privacy as much as I can.¹ Trust me, there is so much I could say about this kid, and I’m sure it will creep in.

That leaves books, and writing. I’m mostly re-reading at the moment, largely due to some recent GraphicAudio releases from House Andrews, but also because they are one of the few authors (authorial teams) that seems to actually include parents as main characters occasionally.² Other than that, I am largely reading books to the boy. Favorites include a Field Guide to North American Birds, including little buttons that make them sing, and Bluey.

Writing is….happening? I’m hitting between 500-1000 words a week, which is solidly in my goal for the year. I’ve even done some side projects since the start of the year.³ So clearly the words are there, doing word stuff, but it’s not very exciting to share. The current WIP has a working title of Briar Rose, which somewhat telegraphs some of the content, but not as much as you would think. I thought it would be a standalone novel. It may still become that in edits. But we’re over 80k and the big reveal hasn’t happened yet and there’s a lot of side plot stuff I want to go back in and braid around the main story. So to be honest I have no idea how long it will be at this point. I know the first draft will be done this year – I feel pretty good about it – but first draft and actual completed rough draft of a book are two different things for me and I’m not putting any pressure on my writing career right now outside of my current obligations because, well, there’s a lot of pressure on life right now in general.⁴

I did make a notes Discord for some of my projects. This is something one of the writing forums I was in mentioned – it’s been kind of fun! Essentially you start your own private Discord and dump links and inspiration into it, as well as any private confessions about the process or anything else you want to remember. It kind of serves as a scrap book and worldbuilding archive all at once. I’ve got one for A River Wide, and I think we’re closing in on a cover for that project! That means things will start popping off soon and I will have a lot more to share. So stay tuned! I’m hoping some of the fun things I’ve saved and sent to myself in that Discord will be good blog fodder as we get closer to publication.

I think by the end of the year I’d like to try to get some things polished and get back on the submission train. I mostly stopped submitting things when I was pregnant and haven’t returned to it – it’s the most stressful part of the writing process and I needed some way to cut stress.⁵ With the relative lack of dedicated writing time I haven’t wanted to use it doing the actual publishing side of stuff, but the winds are changing. I’m getting antsy. I want to get stuff out there, for better or worse. I want to be read.

Soon, anyway. I’m really excited for it.⁶

1. He’s talking now. It’s the most wonderful thing. Sentences! Today’s was “Mama eat” at breakfast. ↩︎
2. Gasp. ↩︎
3. I wrote a whole short story! Who knows when it will ever get submitted, much less published, but it exists! ↩︎
4. Being a working parent is hard. ↩︎
5. High stress pregnancies in older women go poorly. I figured I would pre-empt those statistics. ↩︎
6. I am also excited for footnotes. Perhaps this will reinvigorate my blog writing! Your girl loves footnotes. ↩︎