On Tuesday afternoon, April 30th, 2019, I won Camp NaNoWriMo. It will be 2 months until the next Camp NaNoWriMo. What does one do during those 2 months? Well, I shan’t be working on my rough draft during May. I’ll let it sit until June. I have edits to get through for Love on the Other Side of the Sun II: The Book of Invasions, which should come soon. Hint, hint, if you’re reading this, Patricia. Something I decided to do last night during that hypnagogic time between waking and sleeping was to write Myrrddin Rising, which is my novel about the return of the one popularly called Merlin the Magician of King Arthur’s Court. I’m using 2 ideas for that; the books about him by E.B. White and The Strange Case of Benjamin Button. I saw the movie a few years ago, and it seemed to give an excellent portrayal of how someone could live backwards. I have chapters 1-8 and have started 9 on my main flashdrive.
Myrrddin Rising is in the modern or, as it’s called now, urban fantasy genre. It takes place in Berkeley, CA in the hills, which have a number of large houses perched on them. My MC won the lottery sometime ago, bought a big house that was formerly a frat house, and invited a few friends to live in it with her. I had gotten almost to the end of the 1st draft, when I lost it because some of the files on the flashdrive were corrupted, and it had to be reformatted, and I lost all those drafts. I’ll have to learn to back them up, I guess.
There are 2 references for The Book of Invasions. I got it from the English translation of an Irish history which was penned in the 12th century by some anonymous monk. I wonder if he’s any relation to that old ubiquitous Greek Anonymous, who wrote so many things. The other Book of Invasions is an album by the Irish band Horslips, but I took my title from the original. I think I’ll add a footnote to that effect next time I get edits, which should be soon, I’d think. I get 2 weeks to do the edits in but they only take me 3-5 days because I get to them right away. Oh, I may let a night pass before I get to them, if I don’t see that I’ve gotten them before the evening. But I get to thm right away the next day, after I’ve fed the cat, gotten my caffeine, and meds & vits. And I don’t rush through them either. I take it slowly; page by page, paragraph by paragraph.
I read so many posts on Facebook of people saying they want to write. That isn’t enough. Writers don’t write because we want to. We write because we must. It’s a compulsion, like the compulsion to drink, take drugs, gamble, have sex or any one of a thousand other addictive behaviors. It’s called hypergraphia. You don’t hear about it being called an addiction, because it’s a “healthy” addiction, and there are thousands of pushers and enablers out there. When I don’t write for a few days, I go a little crazy. The pressure builds up in me and has to come out somehow. It’s like a volcanic eruption. Most people have a story in them that yearns to come out. I have an entire bookshelf of stories that must come out. So unless you have that driving need, don’t bother. You’ll save yourself a lot of bother and heartache.
But if your True Will is to write, write. Keep at it and either hunt for a publisher, or, if you can afford it, publish it yourself. You don’t need to go through the complicated process of Knowledge and Conversation with your Holy Guardian Angel if you have that drive within you. It’s all just a matter of application; seat to the chair, fingers to the keyboard, and mind to the task. If someone were to tell me s/he wants to write, I’d ask hir, “What are you doing now?” If it’s something other than writing, I’d say, stop it, and write. Churn your soul out onto the screen or page. It’s not glamorous or exciting. It’s hours spent by yourself while your wrists grow stiff and sore, or if you have a Dragon like I do, your throat grows raspy. But you do it anyway because you have to, because you must. You have words in your head that have to come out.
Watch for Takuhi’s Dream when it comes out from Crimson Frost Books, and later, Love on the Other Side of the Sun II: The Book of Invasions from the same publisher.
