Hello,

Thanks for the likes and follows.

Last week, was all about the Thanksgiving holiday.  I spent time with my daughter, sister, and nieces. It was a blast, and I am still recovering from it today. Sorry not sorry for this late post. I accepted that no matter what happens now, I won’t be winning NaNoWriMo this year. So, Boo to that. The silver lining to all this is the 10k words I wrote. With a sigh of relief, I made note of the places in the story that gave me trouble and the plan is to work on them.  Makers and Mages will go through a type of overhaul and will most likely be the Camp NaNoWriMo project in April 2023.   

There are several projects I will review this week and figure out where they will go.   Over the summer I worked on an essay that I was proud of.  It needed to be updated and I planned to do it as a side project this month, but never got around to it.  I have two short stories that need their first drafts to be completed.  I need to seriously think about the content I am writing for the Medium account.  By the end of the first quarter of next year, I want to be in a paid partnership with them.  I have more thoughts on that subject but can’t share them right now. 

It just occurred that December will be the last month fourth quarter.  I like using this method to plan the year.  It is not as efficient as it could be but small steps to the greatest and all that. December is about the holidays, for me Christmas, Kwanza, and New Year’s.  It is also the month of reflection.  Many of the content creators I follow will either be reflecting upon the old year or sharing plans for the new year.   Not sure what the next four updates will be like a mix of both, I think. 

Last week, I wrote I won’t be looking into any new books.  That was a lie.  I was preparing seasoning for the Thanksgiving meal and started to listen to Lindsay Buroker’s Death Before Dragons series- book 1 was titled Sinister Magic.  This story is an urban fantasy, set in the modern world. The main character is a half-elf-human mercenary.  She is the classic loner but over the course of the series that is bound to change.  Lindsay Buroker has an interesting world-building style. There is a world similar to our own and then there are other realms ruled by shape-shifting dragons.  I have so many questions and only two or three were answered in the second book Battle Bonds.  I started to listen to that book over the commute from my niece and family’s apartment in Brooklyn to my house in Queens.

This week’s goal is to start planning for the success quarter of 2023.  It will be difficult because I only know half of what I should be doing.  I have promised over and over to write reviews on some of the things I read or watch.  It has not been abandoned.  I just have to adjust how many will be posted a month. 

That is all for now.  Congratulations to all the NaNoWriMo Winners.  I hope these words find us all doing well and sharing kindness all around. 

Hello,

Thank you for the likes and follows.

This is the last full week of NaNoWriMo. I am nowhere close to 50K words, I haven’t even made it to 10k. It would be okay if the other writing projects were worked on as well but those were also neglected.  This is going to be the last entry, where I write like this.  I like talking about not writing and the frustration of having a story in mind and heart but not on paper. However, this method may not be improving my situation.  Let’s start giving the writing week a rate.  I have gold and silver glitter star stickers, and I’ve decided to use them.  This is how they are going to be used.  I put one on the week during the week review.  It is something I am supposed to do with my planner over the weekend or on Monday.  Most of my writing week in November has been bronze stars.  I don’t have any bronze star stickers; I will improvise with a stamp or something.  I wrote on average 50 to 100 words on this story, every 2or 3 days.  That is an average estimate.  I also didn’t write every day on this project. 

I can’t pinpoint when things went south.  Sometime this week I will have to do some soul-searching.  But that is not what this update is about.   In previous entries, I wrote that I would explain the story, and the nano writing project, I wanted to work on during this month.  It can be honestly stated that during October, there should have been more preparation but incidents and activities outside of my control affected my time and motivation.  Despite all that, I must do my best to keep my promises. 

The working title for the writing project is called Makers and Mages.  The setting is a secondary world in the far future.  It is a romantic fantasy. The female lead is a human mage princess, her name is Taira Bright. She gets exiled from her kingdom by marriage to an elf prince.  I call him Caldir.  He is the crown prince and a maker.  Taira and Caldir have a strong dislike for each other and general hate for each other’s people.  At least that is what is believed.   There has been a human/elf war and both main characters will do what they can to prevent another war.  This is a basic enemies-to-lovers trope with a dab of forced marriage.  There were so many possibilities what could go wrong?

I’m looking over my notes and stuff to figure this out.  Meanwhile, this update and the Medium check-up entry are all due on Monday, November 21, because I want to be consistent.  These words may have been used before but not doing the research in the updates to find out. 

One of my many goals for this month was to keep the story simple, a romantic fantasy where two people who don’t like each other end up loving each other.  If the story needed to be turned into a fantasy romance, where my characters don’t like each other but eventually love each other and must save their kingdoms, as they know them, from a supernatural disaster or war.  Those elements need to be added later.   This was said before numerous possibilities, too many and I got overwhelmed.  I also wanted the story to have a setting that was a blend of medieval, modern, and futuristic aesthetics.  My elves were makers and thus a solar punk green city-state.  Now that this is written out, does that sound too ambitious?  Add that to the review list for Monday. 

In reading news, the Agents of the Crown series by Lindsay Buroker and narrated by Vivienne Leheny is complete, listened to the last chapters of Dragon Tears while playing Farmville 2.  I was able to enjoy a good book and reach level 75 in the game.   I also read a book titled Border CTRL+ESC by Ivy L. James, it was bought because I really liked the cover.  That story is a contemporary romance, with a forced marriage/friends-to-lovers trope blend.  Sometimes when I am stuck in writing my own romance stories it benefits me to read or listen to others.   Still on the fence if any of these books helped me or not this time.    

The goal for this week is to get to 10k or 15k by the end of this week.  It will be near impossible b/c of the holiday.  I won’t be starting a new audiobook series or book.  It just might be a catch-up week all around.  I have several books that were on hiatus.

That is all for now.  I hope these words find you all doing well.  Remember to be kind.

End.