From the Writing Cave: The Summer Writing Course, Silent Pirate Captains, and Other Updates

MINOR DISCLAIMER BEFORE YOU READ ON: I BEGAN THIS POST BACK ON JUNE 8th, 2020 AND THEN LIFE TOOK CONTROL. I CAME ACROSS THIS POST IN MY DRAFTS AND DECIDED IT WAS STILL RELEVANT. I WILL ADD NOTES FROM "FUTURE ESTHER" TO UPDATE DETAILS THAT MAY HAVE CHANGED.

Mood: Thrilled-ish.

Song of the Day: Run to You, Lea Michele

Movie and TV:  Watched Knives Out over the weekend.

Still binging Merlin and now Blood of Zeus. Netflix

Hello! Welcome back, to a very wild writing post. I may not have announced it here on the blog, but I know I certainly announced it on other social media. I am taking Derek Murphy's Summer Writing Course. Something I've always wanted to do, but just couldn't swing it, is take a writing class. I may have been writing for ten years, but I know there is a lot more I can still learn. Writing is my craft and I want to learn as much as possible. - Future Esther: I have 2/4 of an outline, my 8-points for the story, and character profiles for the self-paced assignments. I have not worked on it since Summer 2020.
 Hint: Dinosaurs - Jurassic Park/World fans will love it, I think. And this is an Urban SciFi, but not the one I said would never see the light of day.

My pirate captains have been silent. By this I mean the characters just are not talking or acting out right now. I really wanted to work on those stories, but I just don't have any motivation to sit down and write anything to them. I'm a go with the flow (in almost everything in life) so if I don't feel, I don't force it. 
In other news, my Patreon page is live! You can find a button link in the sidebar. A fair warning, because I set up the page with my imprint name, I have different tiers for different types of content. There is a tier exclusive to all my fantasy-scifi-paranormal followers. Which I created specifically for you amazing people. If you want to check out the other tiers (currently there is only a "Tip Jar"), you're welcome to do so! I also have a Ko-fi page. You can donate to my campaign for the price of a coffee. :D

Finally, my Xiphis reference notebook is stocked with backstory, character concepts, and other nonsense I might never use. But at the very least, it is on paper and I can refer to it if need be.
 I am also very excited and thrilled to announce that I have been outlining BOOK TWO of The Xiphis Saga. (Future Esther: this is now old news and I have already made progress, as you know.) I feel it is time to get back into it and continue the story. I've mentioned how I am not good at sequels, but this is working out.

This point forward is Future Esther: I have a bit to catch up on with the Summer Writing Course. The "Pirates" project is on hold. It is not that I don't want to write the book, I am just focused on other things right now.  Such as an art course and a course on how to self-edit (same teacher/instructor as the writing course).

Finally, I have created a new form of word count tracking. Or rather I am using a new system to track my word goals. I've been having some trouble getting the NaNoWriMo site to load (which is totally odd because it doesn't need high-speed internet to run), so I decided it would be wise to track my words another way. Some people rely on the word counting software in their writing processors, but I've caught a few authors who use a simple bullet journal with some markers and stickers. I decided to give that a try and it's working well for me. I think I will share a post on that in the future because it's quite fun.

Thanks so much for stopping by the blog. I hope you will come back soon. I try to update once to twice a week. I hope you have a fantastic rest of your day or night, depending on where you are in the world. Stay awesome, stay safe. See you in the funny papers!