Mid Year Writing Update 2023
Well, updating every two months fell through, so let's do a mid-year writing update instead.
I've accomplished a fair amount during the first part of the year from coming up with stories to writing more in my current works in progress. But I think the biggest thing I accomplished is finishing the first draft of two of my novels. That brings my first draft archive up to four in total. Have any of these drafts been edited... no, but they're done, and that's better than nothing.
The first zero draft I finished this year is the first book in my fantasy buddy cop mystery series, Project HF. It follows a husband and wife crime-fighting duo, and in this first book, they return to their hometown to solve a crime. They have been avoiding going home for a couple of reasons, and this is the main subplot going through this story. I started this book during Nanowrimo 2022, where I started working on every book in this 12-book series. I have a whole Author's Log of the work I did during that time, and the first three books in this series were the most thought out beforehand.
Luckily, when I brain-dumped everything I had for HF Book 1, it gave me plenty to work with. I had tons of dialogue and specific scenes in mind for this book, and it felt good to write all of them out. But I had to fill in the blanks between these scenes because many were spread throughout the book by the end of my brain dump. Also, since I was working on all the books at once during Nanowrimo, I was more inspired to write some of them at the moment than others. By the end of Nanowrimo, I had finished about 10% of this book, and in December, I took a break from this series.
By the time the new year rolled around, I was still writing the series bit by bit, but none of the books had a finished draft yet. So, I was determined to at least finish the first one so I could methodically work my way through the series one book at a time. I finished it in February and did a little work on some parts of Book 2, but I wanted to focus my efforts on another world for a minute.
So I turned my attention to Project FMTM, my Cinderella retelling. Cinderella has always been my favorite fairytale, and this probably won't be the only retelling of it I'll write, but this one has a lot of elements that I love. It takes a lot from one of my favorite retellings, "Ever After," where my Cinderella masquerades as an aristocrat to get close to the Prince as her friend's Robin Hood crew tries to help the revolution. But surprise, she ends up falling for the Prince.
This book has been in the works since Camp Nanowrimo in July 2022. I did another brain dump of everything I had in mind for it and then went back to fill in the blanks. Now, the main reason I think this one was harder for me is that it is feeding off more common things we see in fiction nowadays, and from what I've seen online, people are sick of Cinderella retellings, which made me hesitate to finish this book at all.
Why write it if it already has multiple strikes against it? People will probably hate it because it's just another Cinderella story.
But that's where I had to stop myself because there is so much more to the book than the typical Cinderella story. It has heists and found family and confidence glow-ups and my main leads courting, and so much more that made me excited about the story in the first place. Not to mention, there's a black girl at the forefront of it all, like the Brandy Cinderella I grew up watching and loving. It takes so many bits and pieces of books, movies, and tv shows that I love and puts them into this one story.
This is a story I want to read.
That's what I constantly had to keep reminding myself of when I write. Maybe this story won't appeal to everyone. Heck, there are plenty of books out right now that I have no interest in even attempting to read (I'm looking at you horror.) So I know that not everyone will love or even like this book. But that doesn't mean that I shouldn't write it. In the end, the books I write are for me first, and if other people like them, that's great. But to finish these books, I need to focus on what I want them to be first.
This thought and actually having dedicated writing days helped me finish this book in June, two weeks before its inception anniversary.
Moving into the second half of the year, there are so many other writing goals I want to achieve.
First, I want to continue to work through finishing all of the books in the HF series. As tempting as it is to go back and edit the first one, I want to finish a full pass of the series to get a better idea of what I want the series to be as a whole. Also, I can make sure that I'm putting easter eggs to future plots in earlier books.
Second, I want to brain-dump some of the other books on my mind lately just so the plot bunnies can calm down for a minute. One that's been at the forefront is a Spicy Romance thriller series with a family of vigilantes finding love and this might be my focus for Camp Nanowrimo this year. One of the book series that got me back into reading as an adult was the Temptation series by KC Lynn. The main series follows a group of retired Navy Seals finding love in a small town, starting with a friends-to-lovers story. These books always feed into my love of heroes rescuing the girl and alpha holes. So I added some of those elements to this series, but I wanted to make sure that the women in this series had the autonomy and strength to save themselves. The first book will actually follow the youngest daughter of the family finding love with her childhood best friend before her four older brothers and her widowed father get their romances. So far, I know she's witty, intelligent, and just as capable of killing someone as the rest of her siblings, and I'll leave it at that.
Finally, I want to start editing and redrafting Project FMTM. After I finished, I wanted to let it marinate for a while so I can come back at it with fresh eyes. Then I can make note of things I want to change, keep and add to the story. I also made up a chapter treatment template in Notion that I've been dying to try out, so I can't wait for that.
Overall, I have a lot that I want to accomplish in this second half of the year, and I think it is all doable.
If you're interested in keeping up with my progress towards these goals, follow me on Instagram and check out my highlights for all my projects so you can see the progression from draft to draft.
Until next time, don't forget to write the story you want and read the books you want because life is too short to do otherwise.
XOXO, Ivey
