It has been a few months since I lost wrote a blog post. I have read quite a few books since the last time I checked on my blog. I have also returned to college to finish up my English degree with creative writing emphasis. I took a long break from school, but it is really nice to be back! It has been exciting and has really helped my writing in surprising ways.
One of the classes I took was on war literature. In the start of The Gemstone Collector, the young adult fantasy book I’m self-publishing by the end of next summer, the main character Zephyr, is still feeling the effects of the war that happened ten years ago. I didn’t expect a class on war literature to help me out with my current book. Learning anything and everything is very helpful for writing. Like recently I went axe throwing and my instructor went into the physics of throwing axes, so that is great to use in a fantasy novel! Now I can say I have experience throwing axes. Although I was very bad at it, but it was fun.
Since I last talked about The Gemstone Collector, I have hired a freelance editor who did a developmental edit. I am starting to go through those edits. I plan on doing a few rounds of developmental edits. I want to make sure this book is the absolute best it can be. I’m actually having so much fun adding to the world I have created and coming up with ideas and plot twists I didn’t have in the book before I sent it to my developmental editor!
There is a lot of talk in the writing community discussing which is better, editing or drafting. I can’t decide which I like better. They are obviously both needed, but I think they are both so fun! It’s fun to draft and think up of a story on the spot, as I’m not an outliner, but it is also gratifying to improve your story and make it better in every way possible. They both have their time and right now, I can’t choose which one I enjoy the most.
Now on to the books I’ve read. I read a lot for school from September through December this year. A book I read for my war literature class was Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. It was the first Virginia Woolf book I’ve read and I definitely found it fascinating. She has a very stream of consciousness style of writing, at least in Mrs. Dalloway. I also studied indigenous author Lee Maracle in my Native Literature of the Pacific Northwest class. She was a member of the Stó:lō Nation and she is a very powerful and prolific writer. I would recommend looking her up!
As far as books for fun that I read I loved Rachel Griffin’s new book Bring Me Your Midnight! It was so fun and had the perfect seaside witchy vibes! Rachel Griffin is another author I would highly recommend. I’ve read all of her books and they are excellent and so fun! I’ve also read Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros, which I ended up loving! I read it while I had a bad cold so it really kept me entertained. I got sick for the first part of July. It was weird to have a cold during the summer. I also read The Dragon’s Promise by Elizabeth Lim. That sequel was so good and I feel like it’s hard to get sequels right, but The Dragon’s Promise was even better than the first book Six Crimson Cranes and that was very good!
I have read so many more books I could talk on and on about, but I will leave this blog post here and write something new in January of 2024! How are we already to 2024? That seems wild, but also pretty cool! I hope everyone has a great new year and that you get to read lots of great books and make progress toward your writing goals or creative projects!