so_out_of_ideas (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
so_out_of_ideas) wrote2009-05-08 05:39 pm
so_out_of_ideas) wrote2009-05-08 05:39 pm
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Where do we go from here? (The obligatory end of story thought gathering)
It's been almost a week since I posted the final chapter of One Path. My mourning process is (mostly) over, and it's time to start talking about what happens next. I have a ton of other projects, including collaborations with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
aruna7 which will, in all likelihood, be longer than One Path. For the present, however, I will be taking a partial hiatus from fandom-related activities, especially writing in the Star Wars fandom. I will still be around on LJ, and may in fact, have more to say, but I feel that all of my fanfiction projects are now in a position where readers have closure, and I really need to focus on other things for a while. You can check the author's notes posts that I made yesterday for more information on whichever of my fics that you're following. More on what I will be up to and why is under the cut.
With One Path's ending, I've decided that I want to do something for Nano this year. I know that I also need to work on Bloodkin. Bloodkin is, as I've written before, the project that means the most in my life. I think that it's the most important story that I will ever tell. It's certainly the most important thing that I will ever be given to do, and I need to be faithful to that. The fact is, though, I've reached the conclusion that it's not a good bet for a breakthrough novel. It's likely to take a long time to get picked up, what with the avalanche of (bad) vampire stuff on the market right now. So I can't be putting all my proverbial eggs in one basket. Also, I think that writers who've published a number of novels usually have more creative control or at least leverage to work with editors and publishers who want changes made in their work. I've been thinking of shifting my focus over the next few years so that, while I continue to work on Bloodkin--and hopefully post again for the poor people who've been left hanging by this latest bout of personal crisis/universe re-working, I'd be trying to get some of the other, shorter projects from other genres published.
I care about all my stories, obviously, and I don't decide whether or not to write something based on whether I think it's marketable. I write them because they get in my head--and sometimes in my blood--and I need to tell the story, pure and simple. Some of them, like Strike Four, really aren't ever going to be publishable. I don't seem to be one of the lucky individuals who can write what's hot just because it's hot and then sell it when it comes to my stories. But I do have enough projects that I should be able to pick and choose which to focus on--at least to an extent. Sometimes they just take over, like One Path did.
There are a lot of stories I'd like to tell. One of them has been in my head in one form or another since I was eleven. That's more than 20 years, and that's kind of scary. That one, called Incarnation, is probably marketable. Another one, which I got the idea for 10 years ago and had to put on hold, has stayed with me and will have to get written one day even though I doubt I'll be able to sell it to the owners of a certain toy franchise. I'm in no great rush to start another epic fanfic right now, though, so it'll just have to keep brewing.
The bottom line for me is that I will be 33 this year, and being aware of that has also made me aware that my grandparents--who are pretty much the biggest and most important influence in my life--are not getting any younger. I'd like to publish at least one--hopefully more, but at least one--book before they die. I've already lost one set of grandparents. Both of their deaths, but especially my Gram's, really affected me, and I know that I would never be able to forgive myself if I lost either of the two remaining grandparents before I had a novel in print and the only reason for that was because I was busy writing fanfiction or something else that I knew would never make it to print.
So I went through and narrowed down my choices of projects that (1) I really felt passionate about and (2) were relatively short. The Tarreos novels were at the top of the list, and they have the added benefit of the fact that I don't see many fantasy novels set on worlds modelled after the American Old West. Usually, it's ancient/medieval history that gets borrowed from as a backdrop for fantasy, or in recent years, there's been an explosion of genre-bending and urban fantasy stuff. So, I think the premisse is just weird enough that it'll be able to stand out, even in a fickle and ever-shifting market.
aruna7 which will, in all likelihood, be longer than One Path. For the present, however, I will be taking a partial hiatus from fandom-related activities, especially writing in the Star Wars fandom. I will still be around on LJ, and may in fact, have more to say, but I feel that all of my fanfiction projects are now in a position where readers have closure, and I really need to focus on other things for a while. You can check the author's notes posts that I made yesterday for more information on whichever of my fics that you're following. More on what I will be up to and why is under the cut.With One Path's ending, I've decided that I want to do something for Nano this year. I know that I also need to work on Bloodkin. Bloodkin is, as I've written before, the project that means the most in my life. I think that it's the most important story that I will ever tell. It's certainly the most important thing that I will ever be given to do, and I need to be faithful to that. The fact is, though, I've reached the conclusion that it's not a good bet for a breakthrough novel. It's likely to take a long time to get picked up, what with the avalanche of (bad) vampire stuff on the market right now. So I can't be putting all my proverbial eggs in one basket. Also, I think that writers who've published a number of novels usually have more creative control or at least leverage to work with editors and publishers who want changes made in their work. I've been thinking of shifting my focus over the next few years so that, while I continue to work on Bloodkin--and hopefully post again for the poor people who've been left hanging by this latest bout of personal crisis/universe re-working, I'd be trying to get some of the other, shorter projects from other genres published.
I care about all my stories, obviously, and I don't decide whether or not to write something based on whether I think it's marketable. I write them because they get in my head--and sometimes in my blood--and I need to tell the story, pure and simple. Some of them, like Strike Four, really aren't ever going to be publishable. I don't seem to be one of the lucky individuals who can write what's hot just because it's hot and then sell it when it comes to my stories. But I do have enough projects that I should be able to pick and choose which to focus on--at least to an extent. Sometimes they just take over, like One Path did.
There are a lot of stories I'd like to tell. One of them has been in my head in one form or another since I was eleven. That's more than 20 years, and that's kind of scary. That one, called Incarnation, is probably marketable. Another one, which I got the idea for 10 years ago and had to put on hold, has stayed with me and will have to get written one day even though I doubt I'll be able to sell it to the owners of a certain toy franchise. I'm in no great rush to start another epic fanfic right now, though, so it'll just have to keep brewing.
The bottom line for me is that I will be 33 this year, and being aware of that has also made me aware that my grandparents--who are pretty much the biggest and most important influence in my life--are not getting any younger. I'd like to publish at least one--hopefully more, but at least one--book before they die. I've already lost one set of grandparents. Both of their deaths, but especially my Gram's, really affected me, and I know that I would never be able to forgive myself if I lost either of the two remaining grandparents before I had a novel in print and the only reason for that was because I was busy writing fanfiction or something else that I knew would never make it to print.
So I went through and narrowed down my choices of projects that (1) I really felt passionate about and (2) were relatively short. The Tarreos novels were at the top of the list, and they have the added benefit of the fact that I don't see many fantasy novels set on worlds modelled after the American Old West. Usually, it's ancient/medieval history that gets borrowed from as a backdrop for fantasy, or in recent years, there's been an explosion of genre-bending and urban fantasy stuff. So, I think the premisse is just weird enough that it'll be able to stand out, even in a fickle and ever-shifting market.