From Alexander’s Desk – 7/17/2022
“Hello,” from the desk of Alexander Vaillencourt. It’s been about three months since I’ve left an update on my writing, but to be honest I’ve had a lot going on in my life that has kept me from writing as much as I’d like. Between not getting enough sleep to analyzing my position on each of my projects to simply spreading myself too thin by working on too many things, I just fizzled out.
The Rebirth
I’m happy to say, however, that I’m about ready to resume writing with a fury. I have a series I’ve been working on under another name for which I’ve released the first book (in 2016) and I’m probably 80% done with the second book. Unfortunately, I got stuck because I didn’t like some of the critical elements in it. Because of that I opted instead to start a new project, the world of Ansparia, which I’ve been sharing with you all. After speaking with my wife, I think I’ve decided to restructure book two in my original series and rewrite it, but that will likely be put on hold until I finish the Renegade Ocarinist – which brings me to speak a little bit about my process for writing the Renegade Ocarinist.
The Methodology
Normally when I write, I plot it all out. I’ve got an extensive outline that acts as a backbone for my story. I allow myself to deviate from it to provide fluidity to my writing but I always come back to it to get back on track. With the Renegade Ocarinist, I decided to come up with a loose storyline and make it up as I go. “Plantsing” as it’s known as among many in the writing community; Half planning and half pantsing (writing from the seat of your pants). It’s been a good experience for the most part but I find it’s taking me longer to write because, SQUIRREL! I’ve got about the word count for the complete novel but I’m only about 40% through the storyline, so I need to reassess this project and see if I want to outline the entire thing and keep only that which falls in line with the outline (plus a reasonable amount of leeway), just make an outline for the remainder of the story and trim this first part down during editing, or just press ahead as I am and have a lot more to edit out later.
The Demise
I’ve grown tired of writing the serial micro fiction about Zamy and Landric and haven’t really had a lot of others show any interest so I think I’ll try writing a little more and wrapping them up in the next couple weeks. I might do other micro fiction but I don’t know if I want to do an ongoing series like I have been. Eventually I’d like to resume writing serial micro fiction but for now I need to focus on my novels.
The Discouragement
I did release an ebook of poetry and songs from my world of Ansparia but I hate how the formatting turned out – and I’m having trouble seeing any changes I’ve made because apparently my kindle app won’t give me the latest version, even though I’ve followed all the suggestions about updating my data. Incidentally, the KDP previewer does NOT show me what the book looks like on my iPhone so I’m currently at a bit of a loss.
The Horizon
As a recap and list of action points going forward, this is what is on the horizon for my writing. Item one, I’ll be wrapping up Zamy and Landric and that will bring an end to my serial micro fiction. I may write some micro fiction still, but probably not serial for quite some time. Item two, I’d like to get the formatting on my poetry book set and announce its release. Item three, I need to restructure the remainder of The Renegade Ocarinist and get it back on track so I can continue writing it to completion. Item four, I need to do the same for book two of my previous series. Anyway, I’ll be a bit more active again and will resume my writing updates (even if not weekly).
Until next time, stay safe and enjoy life!
~Alexander
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Serial Micro Fiction: Gears of Myrekal – Part 3
Serial Micro Fiction: Zamy and Landric – Part 2