Hello hello!
With recovery on the way and good changes starting to happen in my life, I managed to finish a draft of The Meaning Wars today (July 17th, as of the day I started working on this post). I'm sure some time will elapse before its publication, and the publication of the book, but it feels good to make forward momentum.
In my personal life, I recently finished a skirt pattern that's taken years - inspired by Katniss Everdeen's fire dress in The Hunger Games, making the triangular tiered fringe work was tricky as hell.
Of the Dungeons and Dragons and roleplay campaigns I'm currently playing, one is coming to a close, one is nearly done a major plot arc, with a character's death being very imminent, and yet another is about to begin.
In the world of pop culture, the seventh season of Game of Thrones also started recently. I read spoilers, because George R.R. Martin seems to have no intention of finishing the books and I am curious about what happens to the characters. Meanwhile, The Doctor's 13th incarnation has been revealed as a Time Lady, and Ava DuVernay's vision of A Wrinkle in Time swept me off my feet. Just as importantly, The Adventure Zone podcast's final arc is in progress.
All of this is to say that I'm in a mood to finish things. With Instagram and fashion shoots putting me in a mood for summer adventures, I've been crafting and uploading beadwork for the first time in months and years.
With that momentum, I had the courage to ask my readers how they felt about the change of monthly or biweekly blog posts rather than weekly blog posts (which haven't been happening, as astute readers may have noticed). I don't intend to end my blog, because I often have things to say and think about in public, but figuring out this admittedly more forgiving solution should make that easier.
I am, however, thinking about new stories and new characters - which have only been alluded to in passing, and in private, with friends. Stories I have in my backburner files. My beadwork put me in a salvager mood, and made me want to work on my long-abandoned Nightmare Cycle.
![The Underlighters (The Nightmare Cycle Book 1) by [Browne, Michelle]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51u50JNsCJL.jpg)
Now, I suppose there is a whole cycle of life thing one could go into here, but I'm still hoping that transhumanism will help me avoid having to die at all, so I'm going to dodge that particular topic. Regardless, a life has to be marked by periods of change and renewal, and it's impossible to get something new started without ending something else.
Maybe that means you, as a theoretical writer, gotta let go and write something inspired by a story rather than focused on the main characters of an arc. Maybe that means moving onto a new world and storyline altogether. But it's deeply important to let things end rather than sucking the joy and goodness out of them.
Even the deservedly maligned Supernatural is setting up a spin-off; the show is a living cautionary tale of how to ruin a story. While it can be scary to let go of characters, it's better than holding onto them forever, sucking out every drop of joy from them like a food dehydrator making meat into jerky, and wondering why the story is nothing but a dry, leathery husk of what it used to be. It’s easy to hold onto a story past the completion of its plot arcs, resolutions, and conflicts, and introduce a million Complications and Plot McGuffins in order to stretch things out - but it’s easier still, in a way, to be honest and write ‘The End’ when the time comes.
So give yourself permission to finish that draft, writers. Give yourself permission to change something or re-schedule it if necessary, too. Don't worry about Making The Thing Good Enough. There are only so many revisions that can happen before a story goes from juicy grape to raisin of sadness. And the more you finish, the more you can do, and make, and be.
With recovery on the way and good changes starting to happen in my life, I managed to finish a draft of The Meaning Wars today (July 17th, as of the day I started working on this post). I'm sure some time will elapse before its publication, and the publication of the book, but it feels good to make forward momentum.
In my personal life, I recently finished a skirt pattern that's taken years - inspired by Katniss Everdeen's fire dress in The Hunger Games, making the triangular tiered fringe work was tricky as hell.
Of the Dungeons and Dragons and roleplay campaigns I'm currently playing, one is coming to a close, one is nearly done a major plot arc, with a character's death being very imminent, and yet another is about to begin.
In the world of pop culture, the seventh season of Game of Thrones also started recently. I read spoilers, because George R.R. Martin seems to have no intention of finishing the books and I am curious about what happens to the characters. Meanwhile, The Doctor's 13th incarnation has been revealed as a Time Lady, and Ava DuVernay's vision of A Wrinkle in Time swept me off my feet. Just as importantly, The Adventure Zone podcast's final arc is in progress.
All of this is to say that I'm in a mood to finish things. With Instagram and fashion shoots putting me in a mood for summer adventures, I've been crafting and uploading beadwork for the first time in months and years.
With that momentum, I had the courage to ask my readers how they felt about the change of monthly or biweekly blog posts rather than weekly blog posts (which haven't been happening, as astute readers may have noticed). I don't intend to end my blog, because I often have things to say and think about in public, but figuring out this admittedly more forgiving solution should make that easier.
I am, however, thinking about new stories and new characters - which have only been alluded to in passing, and in private, with friends. Stories I have in my backburner files. My beadwork put me in a salvager mood, and made me want to work on my long-abandoned Nightmare Cycle.
Now, I suppose there is a whole cycle of life thing one could go into here, but I'm still hoping that transhumanism will help me avoid having to die at all, so I'm going to dodge that particular topic. Regardless, a life has to be marked by periods of change and renewal, and it's impossible to get something new started without ending something else.
Maybe that means you, as a theoretical writer, gotta let go and write something inspired by a story rather than focused on the main characters of an arc. Maybe that means moving onto a new world and storyline altogether. But it's deeply important to let things end rather than sucking the joy and goodness out of them.
Even the deservedly maligned Supernatural is setting up a spin-off; the show is a living cautionary tale of how to ruin a story. While it can be scary to let go of characters, it's better than holding onto them forever, sucking out every drop of joy from them like a food dehydrator making meat into jerky, and wondering why the story is nothing but a dry, leathery husk of what it used to be. It’s easy to hold onto a story past the completion of its plot arcs, resolutions, and conflicts, and introduce a million Complications and Plot McGuffins in order to stretch things out - but it’s easier still, in a way, to be honest and write ‘The End’ when the time comes.
So give yourself permission to finish that draft, writers. Give yourself permission to change something or re-schedule it if necessary, too. Don't worry about Making The Thing Good Enough. There are only so many revisions that can happen before a story goes from juicy grape to raisin of sadness. And the more you finish, the more you can do, and make, and be.
***
Thanks for returning to the nest. Leave a comment and say hi! I want to hear from you. Keep up with the new releases by getting on the mailing list. Buy my books on Amazon, and keep up with me on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and the original blog. This is the one and only SciFiMagpie, over and out!
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