A Signed a Contract for My Second Novel!!!!!!!

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Big news! Last month I signed a contract with Vine Leaves Press to publish my second novel, Carcrash Parker and the Haven of Larpers, in 2025.  This is the Secret New Novel I’ve been talking about on this blog for literally years.  Vine Leaves published my first novel, MFA Thesis Novel, in spring 2022 and were super-great to work with, so it was only natural that I wanted to publish Carcrash Parker and the Haven of Larpers with them as well.

What’s Carcrash Parker and the Haven of Larpers actually about, you ask?  Well, LARPing (a.k.a. Live-Action Role-Playing) for one.  More specifically, it’s about fantasy role-playing in the real world, with a group of twentysomethings on a quest to rescue a lost Commodore 64 from some bullies in the New Hampshire woods.

Also, it’s narrated in ye olde fantasy English speak, with wizards and maidens and stuff, even though it’s the real world. And the characters talk a lot about ’80s movies.

That’s the bare-bones gist. If you’re wondering why I waited so long to mention the deal in the age of same-day instant internet news, the answer is that I’ve been held up with a little Non-Creative Work Issue that I’ll be talking about in another post.  For now, if you want to know more, read on to find out how the deal happened and what comes next. Continue reading »

March 2023 Novel Update: Third Draft Complete, Typing in Progress…

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The title says it all: last Wednesday at approximately 11:00am Eastern Standard time, I finished Draft 3 of my Secret New Novel.

This comes after several weeks of careful planning, when I counted out the number of writing days necessary to finish Draft 3 if I edited at the rate of one chapter per day.  Though my initial plan was to be finished on Monday, February 27th, some extra difficulties with the final chapters put me behind, so I needed the extra two days to bring the ending up the level I wanted.

The February 27th deadline wasn’t a firm one by any means—it was more of a way to keep myself on track so I could plan the weeks leading up to finishing (which included mostly writing days) and the weeks after I finished (which will include mostly typing days).  So, I made sure to build in a few extra days where I could write in the mornings if I needed to.

Draft 3 is REALLY important because it’s the draft I’m going to send to beta readers (basically, readers who’ll take a look at the full novel draft with an eye for giving feedback).  It also represents the point where I’ll finally, at long last, reveal what the Secret New Novel is actually about on this blog, which is pretty exciting (stay tuned!). Continue reading »

February 2023 Novel Update: Making a Plan, Getting It Done…

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It’s been a while since I updated you on my Secret New Novel progress, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been hard at work.

Back in December I reached a crucial point with my novel: I finished the Second Draft that I started back in August.  The Second Draft solved a LOT of the problems that were plaguing the First Draft, which was really rough and full of holes.  The Second Draft, in contrast, eliminated some unnecessary scenes, fleshed out a lot of vague ideas, and ironed out some major issues that made the rough First Draft, well, rough.

After finishing the Second Draft I took a two-week break for Christmas and New Years, which I also spent getting caught up on miscellaneous projects, tasks, and cleaning.  This was also important because it gave me some space away from the novel and helped me come back to it in January with a fresh perspective.

And that fresh perspective was incredibly helpful. Continue reading »

Here’s What I Got Done in 2022

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So I’ll admit, I’m a little behind on the blogging game: after taking some time off from writing and creative work for Christmas and New Years, I returned to But I Also Have a Day Job last week to write about my New Years Resolutions.

Thinking about the coming year also got me reflecting on the previous year and what I’ve been getting done (I made a similar post for what I got done in 2021 too).  In a lot of ways, 2022 was my biggest year ever as a writer, both in terms of accomplishments, and making positive life changes.  However, it’s easy for me to forget that when I’m busy or having a stressful time, which is why in this post I decided to list out my accomplishments for 2022.

In total, that list came out to 8 different accomplishments—and as much as I love Top Ten Lists in the David Letterman sense, it didn’t seem right to force two more in just for the sake of aesthetics.  It also didn’t feel right to put these accomplishments in order of importance, so instead I’ve listed them out chronologically to form a mini-story of what my creative work year looked like.

So without further ado, here’s what I got done in 2022… Continue reading »

2023 New Year’s Resolutions!!

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Happy (late) New Year, all.  I spent most of December working through a pretty big miasma of, well, stuff.

Biggest of this was finishing the Second Draft of my Secret New Novel, though I also kept busy with some bigger editing jobs, personal projects, and a whole load of Christmas shopping.

All of that combined to burn me out in a pretty big way—I just barely got all of my gifts wrapped in time for Christmas, enjoyed some fun celebrations and holiday gatherings, then spent the last week of 2022 taking it slow, which I very badly needed.

What does taking it slow mean? In my case it meant sleeping in, taking some alone time, and enjoying time with family and friends, in between some light personal and work projects and some much-needed cleaning and organizing.  It wasn’t quite a vacation, since I still did some work, and I even picked up a last minute editing job that a client needed for an early January deadline, even though I’d told myself I wouldn’t be taking on new jobs Continue reading »

December 2022 Novel Update: The Second Draft Home Stretch

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One of the reasons I like posting updates on my Secret New Novel progress is that it keeps me accountable for my own promises. If I make a promise to myself on this blog where people can see it, it makes me take that promise more seriously, so I’m more likely to follow through with it.

That’s what happened last month when I promised to finish my second draft revisions by New Years (or preferably Christmas!) so I can start 2023 off with a fresh mindset on the third draft.

Despite my best efforts, the past few weeks have been really busy, but I’ve been maintaining a steady pace of working on my Secret New Novel draft four mornings a week, with ZERO days missed in December. That’s a new personal monthly best, and I think having the firm end-of-the-year deadline has really helped me get there.

Two other things have also really helped my writing progress this month. One is of course that for Continue reading »

November 2022 Novel Update: Thanksgiving Writing and a New Year’s Deadline

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Heads up for New Hampshire folks: This Saturday, December 3rd I’ll be at Main Street BookEnds in Warner from 12:30 to 2:00pm signing books, talking to customers, and in general just hanging out. The awesome local children’s authors David Elliot and Matt Forrest Esenwine will also be there throughout the day as part of Warner’s Hometown Holidays event.  Click here for more details, and if you’re around, stop by and say hi!

Novel revisions have been going well, which has me in a really good mood.

In late August I finally finished the rough draft of my Secret New Novel, took a week off, then began second draft revisions.  Writing the second draft is eons easier than writing the first draft because I’ve already got a scaffolding of what the novel will look like, and I know the characters and story a lot better than I did at this time last year.  So, sitting down to write every day has been much, much easier.

Still, it’s not all a walk in the park: several chapters, particularly near the beginning, needed to be 90-95% rewritten, and for most of the others I’m still changing 50-70% of what’s on the page from Draft 1.  Fortunately, though, the revision process has gotten easier Continue reading »

October 2022 Novel Update: Organizing Big-Picture Edits

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Happy Halloween, everybody—it’s been a pretty good month for novel writing.

For those who haven’t been following, I finished the rough draft of my Secret New Novel in August, and since then I’ve been revising the draft, printing out each chapter and making changes directly on the page with a pen, after which I type up the edits to make a new digital draft of each chapter.  The process helps me to more easily find areas that need to be cut or changed, but also to look at the novel with fresh eyes when it’s on the page instead of a screen.

Despite my taking a week off from writing in mid-October when some friends visited, I’ve made substantial editing progress this month compared to last month.  That’s party because the first four or so chapters of the draft were in MUCH rougher shape than the rest of the novel.  That meant that when I hit Chapter 5, I suddenly found myself revising faster, finding less to fix, and making more smaller-scale edits than drastic rewrites.

In short, this translates into more pages revised per day Continue reading »

September 2022 Novel Update: Second Draft Revisions in Progress!

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Quick recap: When I last posted an update about my Secret New Novel, it was an exciting one. After a year and a half of methodical research, scheduling writing time, agonizing over plot details, and stepping away for one reason or another, I finally, at long last, finished the first draft!!!!!!!!!!11

While the novel still has a LONG way to go, finishing the first draft was a HUGE deal for a number of reasons:

The first is that, for me, drafting an initial story from nothing is the most agonizing part of the process, and by far the most difficult.  On days when I have to draft something more complicated than a blog post, I tend to spend a lot of time putting off writing and getting warmed up, which translates into less time at the computer actually putting words on the page.  Revising what I’ve already written, in contrast, is far easier, and when I sit down with an earlier draft in front of me that I can look at and improve, I feel less stress and more confidence.

The second reason is that with finishing this first draft, most of the really intense mental brainstorming and creation have already been done Continue reading »

June 2022 Novel Update: Steady, But Not Slow

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For those of you keeping track, in January 2021 I started a Secret New Novel manuscript that I’d been wanting to write for a long time, and that’s a LOT more complicated than my previous work.  Unfortunately, though, I ran into some snags, then took a long break.  Over a year later, I hadn’t even made it to the halfway point of a rough draft—and that REALLY wasn’t where I wanted to be as a writer.

All that’s changed, though, since I left my busy Japanese university job and came back to the States.  After some readjustment and setup time, I set a firm date to start working consistently on the Secret New Novel again: Tuesday, May 3rd.

It’s been nearly two months since then, so I thought I’d answer a really important question: How has it been going? Continue reading »

May 2022 Novel Update: Outlining —–> Drafting

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It’s been a really good month for novel drafting.  But first, a quick rewind….

Since January 2021 I’ve been working on a Secret New Novel Draft that I’ve wanted to start for literally years.  I knew this novel was going to be big—and for a while, I thought it might be too big.  As in, I wasn’t sure if I could do it.

As such, I tried taking time to research and plan the novel first…which didn’t go well, since my research wasn’t focused and much of the story seemed to exist in a murky haze.  I needed to write the story so I’d know what to research, but I also needed to research to write the story.  Augh!!!

So, I decided to jump right into a rough draft and see where it took me with the seat-of-your pants method of writing.  (Writers who do this are commonly called Pantsers, a name I find somewhat ridiculous…)  This allowed me to move forward, and helped me get quite a ways into the draft. Continue reading »

April 2022 Novel Update: My Writing Hiatus is Almost Over…

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As many of you know, it has NOT been a good few months for writing…

When I last checked in on my novel progress back in November, I was facing an avalanche of pressures at my university teaching job in Japan, not to mention a busy few weeks working with Vine Leaves Press getting MFA Thesis Novel ready for publication.  For all of November to December I felt overworked, exhausted, and in a disconnected state of mind.

Then in January and February I spent a LOT of time prepping for my big move from Japan back to the States—mailing boxes home, cleaning out my apartment, and doing a whole lot of packing…which then turned into a whole lot of unpacking, plus dealing with jet lag and social readjustment when I got back to New Hampshire.

March and April, meanwhile, were REALLY big months for MFA Thesis Novel as I set up the pre-order and prepared for the novel launch.  This was a HUGE project Continue reading »