2021 Writing Project Updates

Hello, everybody!

Are you surprised to see me back here? Well, me, too. Not because I didn’t intend to write more blog posts—because I do—but because it’s been two months since the last one. I will be getting back into this on a more regular basis (two posts a month is my new 2021 goal) and hopefully hosting more writing challenges as well, starting in May or June.

“So, what have you been up to, and what are your plans moving forward?”

Well, I’ve still been working on my manuscript from November.

“But it’s March!”

I know. I know it is. However, some things were brought to my attention by my writer’s group, and I needed to work to resolve them. So, each chapter—of which there are 27—is getting a new format and a bit more information added to them to provide some conflict. There has also been a fleshing out of the universe in which my characters live, and some changes made to the personality of one of my main characters. The manuscript is nowhere near polished and ready yet—though I am getting close on the chapter restructuring—and I anticipate that I will add roughly 12,000 more words by the time the restructuring of the chapters ends.

“So, Marlyse, where is your word count at now?”

Well, I’m glad you asked. Currently, I’m at about 135,000 words which means I plan for my manuscript to top out at just under 150,000 words before I’m ready to really do some heavy editing and beta reading on the manuscript. I’m anticipating that there will be quite a bit of cutting when I dive into that stage, too.

I believe that I mentioned before my husband’s suggestion that I try to traditionally publish the book that I’m working on now, and I am still undecided if that is the direction I will go. I think I also mentioned that books in my genre tend to top out at 90k words by the industry standard, and trying to cut a third of my book scares me. So, I don’t know what will happen with this one yet. The story is leaning a lot more toward fantasy than I ever thought it would, which is fine. I like that. I just wasn’t ready for how much writing that would mean, but I don’t hate that either. My manuscript is just a wild beast right now, and I have yet to tame it. But that’s what editing is for. I’ll get there eventually. I hope.

That brings me to the future.

“What does that hold for you?”

I’m planning to have all of the restructuring done by the end of March. I’m going to let that manuscript sit for a bit so I can come back, ready to edit, with fresh eyes. So, on April 1st, Camp NaNoWriMo begins, and I’m going to challenge myself to write 50k words in April, split between two different projects.

“That sounds like a ton of work!”

It might be, but let me elaborate.

April is National Poetry Month. I have another poetry book project that I’ve been working on since the first of the year that I would like to release over the summer. It’s called Dear You and will be a collection of poems written as letters to ambiguous people on various topics. It’s a book that I hope will resonate with many different people. I will be happy if, in the end, each person who reads it feels like at least one letter in the book is addressed to them. My goal for this book during Camp will be 20,000 words and should get me through most of the 30 poems I’ve planned to write for the book.

The other project for April’s Camp NaNoWriMo will be my fictional book about a wedding that will be based on true events. This is an idea I’ve had for about a year now, and I want to begin working on it. The story itself will not be too long. At least, I’m not anticipating for it to be too long. I’m hoping for a short, snappy, humorous book that can easily be read in a day or two. The biggest part of that project will actually be the supplementary book that I’m hoping to put with it, a guide to planning weddings for brides that haven’t researched weddings or don’t care much about the details. The supplement will walk brides through what they have to do to get married, things they might like to consider as they’re planning, and ways to pull off weddings without a lot of effort. The supplemental book won’t actually be part of my 30,000-word goal for April, but I’ll still be adding ideas for it as I write the main story.

After April, I’m relatively undecided. I will, of course, pick back up on the book I’m working on now and polish it up, and I’d like to do some more writing challenges as I’d like to release a Halloween book this year as well as a few children’s books and maybe a short Christmas romance novella. However, I’m trying to take things one step at a time, so I’ll be looking more into details for writing challenges and other books as April draws to a close.

The other big, newsworthy thing you should be aware of is that the audiobook for The Secrets Behind My Eyes is nearly finished. It is under review by ACX currently, and once it has been approved, I will announce that it is available on my social media platforms as well as here on my blog. So, keep your eyes peeled for that if you’re interested in audiobooks.

Outside of that, watch for a newsletter in your inbox tomorrow, and keep your eye on my social media as I’m going to start posting there regularly again. I want to share some snippets of things I’ve been working on from my current manuscript, my poetry for Dear You, and details about the research I’ll be doing for my wedding book, I Must Be Tripping Wedding Bells. There will also be videos featuring snippets from my audiobook for The Secrets Behind My Eyes and maybe a few from Unfettered as I begin to work on recording that, too.

As always, thanks for checking out my blog and reading my posts. I can’t wait to get back into more regular updates! Until next time, have a great day, and I’ll be back again soon!