My Projects: Ridgeline

Hey friends! Now that I finished Ridgeline’s first draft, I’m ready to share a bit of it with you! I’m sooooo excited! 😀  

I’ll give you a brief preview of the project in this post. You can read the rest of it on the official page, here.

For those who don’t know, Ridgeline is my WIP that I’ve been working on since July. The page is dedicated to whatever info I chose to share regarding the story, including my progress and a few character profiles.

Stats

Working Title: Ridgeline 

Genre: Low Fantasy

Length: 68,757 words.

Stage: On Break

Elevator Pitch:

A snarky immortal joins the human race in an attempt to save his decaying immortality. Before he can find the knowledge he needs, he’s pulled into the lives of three humans and their desperate efforts to survive an apocalyptic war.

My 9 Somethings for September

Hey friends!

I hope life is treating you well! My month was a rather calm one but not without its quirky happenings. 🙂 Welcome to my 9 Somethings for September!

Something Related to Writing

I’m done with Ridgeline!

*yells from the rooftop* *dances in the rain* *throws glitter that sticks to my wet hair*

This story is one of the most natural books I’ve written yet. I outlined but didn’t force myself to stress too much over scene structure and theme, like I’ve done before. There’s a bunch of issues (it’s the first draft, after all), but I’m still thrilled with it. 🙂 The current word count is 68,757.

I also had a major breakthrough regarding Rook’s new book, Ceasefire. The story had been missing a certain something I couldn’t name, but when a new idea hit me, the whole thing came to life. 🙂 Was I brainstorming when I should have been writing Ridgeline? Maaaaaybe.

I’m planning on writing Ceasefire during Nanowrimo. 🙂

I had two articles published on SE this month!

Don’t Let Pressure Kill the Joy in Your Writing and How to Use Details in Action Sequences. *beams with pride*

Five Free Resources to Help You Survive the Brainstorming Process

Free resources are fantastic for boosting your creative juices while making friends with your wallet. Here is a list of five epic resources I’ve tested out myself to help you brainstorm.

#1. Trello

This tool kept me sane during the initial stages of Ridgeline brainstorming.

Trello is a collaboration program that lets you create boards and fill them with cards. While brainstorming Ridgeline’s plot, I could create a board for each scene, add a few cards, and rearrange them with a simple drag. Trello lets you upload files and pictures, add comments, and much more. Though I don’t use it for Ridgeline at the moment, it was still a massive help for organizing my scattered ideas.

Tip: I’m obsessed with personalizing my accounts. I discovered early on Trello lets you change the pictures behind your boards. Though it doesn’t let you upload your own, it gives you a nice selection to choose from.  All you have to do is open your menu and find the “Change Background” option.

I added a few pics so you could see what a board looks like with photos.

#2. Color Note

This app has saved the lives of hundreds of ideas. I’ve used Color Note at all hours of the night when that annoying burst of inspiration hits and I fumble around in the dark for a place to write my ideas.

Don’t Let Writing Be Your Identity

Hey friends!

Over half a year ago, I published this piece on Kingdom Pen at the start of the new year.  As a Christian, it’s still a struggle for me to remember my identity lies in God’s grace, not my writing, so this article is still something I deeply relate to.

That said, I thought I’d tweak it a bit and share it with you today. 🙂

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Fiction writers are extraordinary people. They slave away at their craft, earning their talent through years of hard work and endless dedication. They pour emotion and soul into their manuscripts. Their stories naturally become a part of them.

As fallen artists, we often associate our identity with our work. We don’t realize it, but we attempt to measure our value by the quality of our writing, our place in a certain writing group or stereotype, or the approval of readers. Misplaced identity grows harmful thought patterns that drain our joy. Writing becomes a drain, not a labor of love.

Harmful Pattern #1: Comparison and Jealousy

This is a trap many writers, myself included, fall into without a second thought. We read the work of others on a regular basis, whether we’re critiquing, beta reading, or casually flipping through the pages of a book. Sometimes the characters are extremely vibrant, the settings practically breathe with life, and the themes leave us speechless. We unconsciously hold another writer’s product beside our own work-in-progress. Our characters whom we adore suddenly seem mediocre at best, flat at worst. Our settings are cliché and our theme is only meaningful to us.

You Know You’re a Fiction Writer #4

Writing is a solitary craft, but that doesn’t mean we don’t want to relate to others (especially other writers). That said, here are 18, “You know you’re a fiction writer” statements I hope you can connect to (and perhaps laugh at 😉 ). 

You Know You’re a Fiction Writer…

1. When you pity your characters at the start of your story because you know what they’ll go through later,

2. When you thought writing was for introverts but realize in order to sell books, you must meet lots and lots of people,

3. When you are one of the most unproductive human beings to ever stare at a computer screen,

4. When you pause at stop signs for an extra second or two because you have to document an idea before you drive on,

5. When you steal your friend’s phone to text yourself ideas because you don’t have yours within reach,

6. When you write something like, “The people were depressed because they were sad” and realize you should have picked another career,

7. When you write something like, “He walked into the room with the stride of a man wishing for death and the broken nobility of a dethroned king hiding behind his eyes” the next second and wonder if both those sentences came out of one brain,