How April's Camp NaNoWriMo is Going for Me (Part 2)

Click here to read Part 1. 

Greetings Adventurers, 

This is the final part of the series about my adventures in Camp NaNoWriMo for April 2023. Next year, I may do something similar if I am working on a project that I've already talked a lot about. But in terms of posts relating to Camp NaNoWriMo, you can look forward to hearing about the project I am working on in July, sometime soon. 

My Writing 

On April 14th I got to my word count goal! The story is far from finished and I still have a lot of work I need to do in terms of writing it. But it feels good to have a better version of it written than my first attempt at the third draft. It still needs a lot of editing and rewriting, but I am getting closer

     in terms of publishing. 

 However...I am going to have one of my standalone books be my debut novel, since this novel lands on a cliffhanger and is a part of a series.

 In the meantime, I finally rewrote the summary. The original summary I had written was from 2018, so it was outdated. Here is the new summary:

“Arisias” is the only thing Horatio remembers after waking up from a coma. He doesn’t remember who he is or what happened to him before the accident. 

At the same time in Dragons' Province, two detectives are working on solving the case of the murdered royalty. It’s unclear who the killer or killers are, for a different person is always seen leaving the scene of the crime. Will they be able to find out who or what is behind it all, before it is too late?

(Two pages from my writing notebook from 2016) 

I feel the story is becoming clearer and clearer, though it is very different from the first draft. I found the first page of the notebook I had written about the characters, when I first created them. They were so different then. And it's interesting to see how it evolved. I don't know what younger me would have thought of the story as it is now, but the fact that I've been able to work on it for so long and have not given up is an accomplishment. 

I do, however, have a to-do list of things for the story from writing this. I figured out some world-building elements, which I will now need to decide how to fit in. And I need to redesign one character's clothes--while I may end up using them somewhere else in a different project, they now seem out of place in this story. They were inspired by 18th century clothes, and most of the other characters' clothes are inspired by Ancient Greek and Irish culture. 

However, I am not going to completely forget about the clothes: they will be reused somewhere else. I have done this before with other story elements. For example, Ophelia's former boyfriend, Austen, ended up getting a project of his own, which I hope to explore sometime. And a character who changed appearance wise, but is still in the story, had their appearance used by another character in a different story.  (Admittedly if someone heard this out of context, a person using another person's face would sound incredibly weird.) 

(Image from wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evelyn_De_Morgan#/media/File:Cassandra1.jpeg)

In the writing group I am in, there was a fun exercise to "post artwork that reminds you of your project." It reminded me how much of my project-- character wise was inspired by Pre-Raphaelite art. Besides being inspired by Tauriel from The Hobbit (movies), Arisias took some inspiration from a painting when I first created her. And more recently, there are paintings that remind me of her, one of which is posted above. 

(Image from wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_William_Waterhouse#/media/File:Waterhouse,_JW_-_The_Sorceress_(1913).jpg)

I even found some paintings that remind me of Ophelia, in particular this one by John William Waterhouse. 

The writing challenge I mentioned in the previous post has helped a lot with understanding my characters more. I not only figured out the relationship between Karleon and Salissah, but I also figured out the inner workings of other relationships that they have with other characters-- which is great. 

What I've Been Reading and Watching 

While in the past I have read fantasy and murder mystery books to get into the mood to write, now I am mostly reading classics. I'm currently rereading Jane Eyre. It's fun to delve back into it since it has been a year since I read it. (The last time I read it was for a book club.) It's nice to read about the characters again, and I also am appreciating the descriptions in the book, upon rereading it. I particularly enjoy the gothic elements spread throughout, with the red room, and Jane thinking she sees a figure in the mirror.

I've also been reading Middlemarch and watching the BBC adaptation. I love George Eliot's writing style, and it makes me want to read more books of hers. I will have more to say about it on a later date. 

And I've been loving watching the Sleepy Hollow tv series. I started watching it recently and am on the second season.

(Fan art I did of Abbie). 

 I love Abbie's and Ichabod's friendship. While the main story is nothing like Irving's story, they sprinkle elements of the original story back into it. 

I also love the aesthetic of the title sequence. 

So, from reading Jane Eyre and watching Sleepy Hollow I may have gotten ideas for my gothic novels. 

Anyway, that's the end of my posts about April 2023's Camp NaNoWriMo. I am looking forward to July's. 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------How has been April been? Have you been reading or watching anything good recently? 

-Quinley 

My Art from The February Faces Challenge (2023) | Part Three

Click here to read part 1 and part 2. 

Here is the final part of The February Faces Challenge. It was a fun challenge and I am glad I did it. I think I will do it again next year, since it helped me draw more of my characters. 

  Here is the official (optional) prompt list: 

Day #19 Eyewear, Ocean Guy adjusting his glasses.

Day #20 Cheeky, I didn't do cheeky in the traditional sense. I instead drew Matilda from Dolls of Wax, Eyes of Glass feeling embarrassed. And I drew attention attention to the blush in her cheeks.  

Day #21 Thoughtful, I decided to draw Marigold. She's a character from The Mystery of the Body Thief my fantasy/murder mystery, and I decided to give her an outfit redesign. 

Day #22 bald, I drew Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation as he was the first character that came to mind with the prompt bald. 

If anyone is wondering, I haven't seen the new show Picard. I am disappointed in what I've heard of it. It appears to have gone dark and grim, when instead I feel as if it should be optimistic like Star Trek usually is. In my opinion, they should have gone in the direction that the Leverage reunion show did, which was to have a light-hearted (and similar) take on the characters coming back together. Otherwise, it feels like Star Trek discounts Picard's character arc, that was brought on in particular by Q in "Tapestry." 

Day #23 on the telly, I decided to draw a news show, that would appear in the world of my super hero characters, airing a story of about a villain covering the city in slime. 

Day #24 hat/headwear, this is a drawing my character when she became the Mother the Elements. I picture this to be when she was younger and had found her purpose as a goddess. This is a drawing of the moment when she is about to put her circlet on her head. 

Day #25 old, I drew Elvin the Silver, a wizard Dungeons & Dragons character of mine. 

He was inspired by Gandalf from Lord of the Rings. 

Day #26 Silly Face, This is another Dungeons & Dragons character of mine, Jinx. I figured this would be a face he would make if he saw something insane happen in one of the campaigns. 

(Which does happen most of the time, whether he does it or another player's character does).

Day #27 self portrait, because I didn't feel like drawing myself (I did though enter in a self portrait contest last year, so I am not entirely against drawing myself), I felt like drawing one of my characters holding a self portrait of themselves. So, I drew Gaia, a Tiefling, holding a portrait of herself that I drew in 2020. Combining new art with old art. 

Day #28 sleeping, I drew Kira for this one. On her bed is her phone which is playing an audiobook, and the portal to fairyland is open.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Which drawing is your favorite? Have you played Dungeons and Dragons? 

-Quinley 

How April's Camp NaNoWriMo is Going for Me (Part 1)

Since I have talked about the story I am writing for April's camp multiple times, I think I will talk about my writing process in this post. If you want an (up-to-date) post about the details of my novel, The Mystery of the Body Thief, you can check it out here. 

This Camp NaNoWriMo I am focusing on the third draft of my novel, The Mystery of the Body Thief. I had initially planned to write the second book, Becoming the Body Thief's second draft. But I realized I did not plot out the second draft's plot, which could cause me to fall into one of the pit-falls of the first draft--having the characters aimlessly wandering. (I usually plot out my stories, but in that case I made the mistake in forgetting to plot and improvised it most of the way.)

My plan instead then is to work on Becoming the Body Thief during NaNoWriMo in November, so as to give me time to re-plot it and create connections between episodes. And in July, I will be working on The Haunted Sketchbook.

My Writing- 

There are two storylines going on at the same time, which I ignored in my first and second write through of the story. This time around, I am giving the characters equal attention. There is a mystery in both of the plots, and I need to give clues to the reader in both of these without revealing too much. So, I am using detective shows I've seen with plots like that for inspiration. 

 Since the first day of Camp NaNoWriMo was yesterday, here are some things I've been thinking about while writing this draft. My goal for this camp is to write 20,000 words worth of rewrites for this story, and so far I've written 3,218 words. 

I have been looking at Greek and Irish castles as models for the castle that Arisias lives in. Greek and Irish culture were the inspirations for my elves in general, and their religion. I don't want it to look fully Irish or fully Greek but a hybrid. I don't want someone to react to it like "oh, the elves are Irish" or "oh, the elves are Greek" but instead for there to be a mixture of both cultures, so that it becomes its own thing. This is a challenge, but it's going to be a fun one. 

(Fiáina the goddess of nature in festive clothes). 

I've been also working on a holiday related to the goddess, Fiáina. I only have one holiday figured out for that world, and that is the Festival of Magic. I want to make another one. It's not simply there to show world-building; rather, it has a purpose to the plot as a whole (that I can't reveal because of spoilers). So, I want to pay attention to what rituals would happen during that festival and what mythological importance it has to the goddess. And, I should add, this song by Spiral Dance was an inspiration to me for the holiday: 

Spiral Dance's music in general has reminded me of my fantasy world, so it is neat that it inspired a holiday for my world as well. 

I have been continuing to improve the descriptions of my elves.(I mentioned last time that I was working on this.)  I've been avoiding mentioning that they have pointy ears. While it may eventually be mentioned off hand, the part of my elves that is important is not that they have pointy ears, but instead that they are deeply connected to nature--even if their duties do not lie in the protection of or caring of nature. So far, it has been going well, but like the writing I have done with description for my other stories, I am going to make several revisions before I get a perfect draft. 

This year, I am also doing a writing prompt challenge, which involves getting to know your characters better. The characters I am doing it for are: Karleon (The God of Mischief), Salissah (The Goddess of the Moon), and Ophelia. 

Responding to the prompts has been helpful in understanding the characters more and also allowed me to get into Ophelia's backstory. I felt as if I had not thought a lot about it, which is strange, because I feel I should have given it more attention, since she has been alive for so long (being an elf). What I've found out about her backstory has added nuance to her character in the current story, and how her past affected her, since in hundreds of years a lot can happen. And if some humans aren't comfortable with events that happened in their past, elves are likely to have some past regrets too.

I am also exploring Karleon's and Salissah's friendship. When I first made them, I thought they'd be enemies, but they ended up becoming friends. (Karleon is not on good terms with Fiáina; however, when around their devotees, they act more as colleagues even if they're not on good terms.) In regards to Salissah's and Karleon's friendship, I guess they became friends because wit (what Karleon has) and wisdom (what Salissah has) work well together. 

While I am not currently writing  All is Not Lost For All Will Begin Again, I am working on the characters and the world.  I've been doing a ton of research for it, but I've been thinking about two characters: Veraly and Seth. The story has many main characters (as opposed to only one), so, it is going to be a good challenge to plot out the series. The world itself is still in its early stages in terms of world-building (unlike Arisias's world). I have an idea about what I want to do with it, but I have not figured out everything yet.  

(Moodboard for Veraly. Images from Wiki commons, Pixabay, and Pexels.  The template I used to make this mood-board was made by Ayzrules). 

As for the characters, Veraly is a performer and Phoenix's (adoptive) sister. She has water magic and enjoys performing arts of different kinds. I've been thinking about what creative things she does and how those creative things affect how she views the world. 

And Seth is a shapeshifter spy. He's also incredibly religious, and the reason why he is doing that is due to that world's religion. An object important to their religion was stolen, and he has to find it. 

And I want to figure out how he feels about being a spy given that he is religious: how he handles it, whether there is guilt from it, and things like that.

Both these characters I am trying to develop more, so hopefully I will learn more about them too, along with their world. Even though I am not writing their story at the moment, I thought I would share. 

Playlist for The Mystery of the Body Thief 

And also since I shared the playlist I made last year's camp, here is the playlist for the novel I am currently working on. 

  Fun (Non-Writing Related) things- 

 * In March, I went to an online S.J. Tucker concert: it was so fun. And as a songwriter myself, it was fun to find out that she too was inspired by books in writing her music. Since the concert was collaboration with a library,  there were a ton of book recommendations that came with the songs she sang. 

I've previously never found a way to go to concerts for the singers I love (since they are either in a different country or don't do concerts at all), so finding out about this was so fun and I am glad I went. It was a fun way to celebrate spring equinox. She ended up playing "Rabbit's Song," which was a song that served as an inspiration for Karleon's myths in the myth collection and was one of my favorites of hers. And I was introduced to some new (and unreleased) songs that I had never heard before. 

One of these was "Kashkash," which was inspired by a book, In the Cities of Coin and Spice. 

*

(Image from wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/As_You_Like_It#/media/File:Rosalind_-_Robert_Walker_Macbeth.jpg)

 I attended and participated in a dramatic reading of As You Like It and read some parts in it (Rosalind, Celia, Orlando, and a few others). I had not read or seen the play in a long time, so that was fun. It was fun to perform with a group again and to play different roles. It makes me want to try to get Rosalind or Orlando as a part in a full production of As You Like It sometime. 

And that's the end of part one!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------How was your March? Are you doing Camp NaNoWriMo or another fun activity this April? 

-Quinley