First off, I’m excited to announce that I have a Middle Grade novel coming out in July called DIARY OF A GIRL NEXT DOOR: BETTY, published by Archie Comics as part of their new Riverdale Diaries series!

I wrote the story, which is accompanied by wonderful illustrations by Bill Galvan. It’s in the vein of Diary of a Wimpy Kid and all the other funny and charming Diary-style books that have been coming out for middle grade readers.

I had a blast with this project and I’m excited to promote it in New York this August as part of Bryant Park’s Word for Word series. More details on that as we get closer!

As far as WINTER WILDER goes, I’ve been making progress on that front as well. I was temporarily sidetracked due to a very time-intensive, full-time character design job I had for the last six months. Now that I’m back to my old schedule, I’m putting the focus back on my writing again.

My manuscript is juuuuust about ready to send out. But I don’t want to start querying until I’m 110% sure that it’s as tight as it can be. I’m still working on bringing down the word count to a more reasonable level. In the meantime, I’ve had a few beta readers read it to give me their notes. I’ve gotten some good feedback that I’m going to apply before I send it out. Fortunately, most of the notes I’ve received so far are minor, and the consensus is that my story flows well! I’ve also been working on crafting a perfect query letter, which is another behemoth all in itself!

A while back I participated in an online query letter workshop with one of my dream agents, Holly Root. She gave me some really encouraging feedback about my query. The one thing she mentioned is that I must find a way to present Winter Wilder in such a way that sets it apart from all the other paranormal that’s already out there. I know this is my most difficult challenge. While I truly believe Winter Wilder is different from any of the other paranormal novels out there, summing up why in just one paragraph is a challenge. In other words, I’m still working on my hook.

I also just took another online workshop in conjunction with the Talcott Notch Literary Agency. I was paired with agent Rachael Dugas to fine-tune my first 10 pages, since these are what most agents will be reading in addition to my query. Obviously, I want to make my opening as compelling as possible because I want the agent to request more!

I felt very positive overall because Ms.Dugas felt that my writing was very strong, as well as my voice and pacing. Her notes were fairly minor- mostly adding a little more detail here and there, as well as a couple other minor edits. But, after applying her notes, I feel like my opening is extremely solid, and I feel really excited to get querying!

You might notice that I’ve removed the sample chapters I had posted here previously. While I’m excited to share my work with the world, I was advised by Ms. Dugas to hold back. Obviously, the internet is a risky place to post anything you don’t want to be potentially plagiarized, and while I don’t believe in operating from a place of paranoia or fear, I think given how much time I’ve spent on this project, it’s prudent to hold off on sharing while I undergo the querying process. If I’m unable to sell the book to either an agent or a publisher, I will look at other options such as posting it online or as an ebook… but we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it!

So that’s what’s been going on. Now that my schedule is back to normal I’ll be updating here more often, so stay tuned!

Last year I had a number of freelance projects that kept my schedule pretty full, including some more writing work for Archie, some comic scripting work for another client (can’t say who, yet!), and a little drawing gig for Marvel (Marvel Now What?! #1). A lot of fun projects!

But even though I had a lot of work to do, I am happy to report that I finally completed my second draft of Winter Wilder. It was a major re-haul of the story with a number of significant changes and additions from the first draft. In fact, there may have been TOO many additions, as my second draft clocked out at 115k words!!

That’s a LOT of pages.

Most YA is around the 70-90k range, so in order to be taken seriously by an agent, I need to make some cuts and get it down to around 90k. I’ve taken a short break from it so that I can read it again with fresh eyes and undergo the task of murdering all my darlings, but I don’t think that process will take very long, and I hope to start seriously querying agents within the month.

After working on this project for over 3 years now, I’m ready for it to become published in 2014, one way or another!

For those interested, I’ve updated the Sample Chapters 1 and 2 on this site with my latest revisions. Thanks for all those who have asked me about this project and who have been offering me their support over the years! I think I may have given up a long time ago if it weren’t for the encouragement of others!

Thank you for reading, and check back to see my progress as I start the scary process of querying!

Based on my last, bleak post, you might assume that I have given up on Winter Wilder. Not so!

In fact, the revision process is still ongoing and nearing its end (I hope!).

Late last year, I took part in an online seminar with Mary Kole, author of the book that I have so highly touted, Writing Irresistble Kid Lit. The seminar covered a lot of the material that was in her book, but what I most looked forward to was receiving a critique of my first 600 words by Mary Kole herself. Now, 600 words isn’t that much. It only amounts to about 2 pages.

But I felt pretty damn good about my first 2 pages. Of all the pages in my book, the first 2 chapters are probably my most heavily revised, tweaked, and smoothed. Everyone I have shown my first two chapters to has given me glowing feedback – they love it! They can’t wait to see more! This includes my writing group, who can be depended upon for honest feedback (brutal though it may be at times). Truly, I wished I could send Mary Kole my first two chapters, but I felt that even my first 2 pages were a dependable representation of my writing.

I eagerly awaited Mary Kole’s feedback, already envisioning a scenario where she would cry “I am blown away! I must see more! Send me the rest of your book post haste!”

When, months later, I finally received an email in my inbox from Mary Kole, I could barely contain my excitement to see what it might hold.

And…. I felt rather deflated when I realized she didn’t seem to care that much for my sample, starting with a critique on my much loved first line because it is “unattributed dialogue.” In fact, of all her notes that peppered by sample, only one of them was actually positive.

I felt immensely let down and once again began to question whether I’m on the right path at all. Sure, so many people have praised the first part of my book, but if an agent doesn’t like it, what good does that do me?

Some time later, I took another seminar with another great agent, Holly Root. Instead of a page critique, she offered a query letter critique which I felt would be immensely useful as I am approaching the stage where I am ready to begin querying in full force.

Her feedback was more heartening. She enjoyed my premise and how I portrayed the main character, but her main concern was that my book doesn’t stand out enough among the plethora of paranormal that already exists. She didn’t have any particular advice in that area… it’s clearly just a case of poor timing on my part. Paranormal has already been inundated with material for the past couple years, and right now dystopians are taking over the shelves (and also getting to the point of over saturation).

Still, I will not be deterred! I have been brainstorming how to make my book even more unique – how to really make it stand out amongst all the other YA paranormal that already exists. And I think I may have found my answer, though I don’t want to give it away just yet!

Now I am doing a third pass revision on my manuscript, incorporating all these new ideas and I think then it will finally be ready to be sent out!

Phew, what a process!

I also like that it so clearly has Kole’s voice – it’s very much a book written from the point of view of an agent who knows exactly what she’s looking for, and what she doesn’t want to see.

Since I’ve so heartily sung the praises of this book, it’s all the more ironic that it’s contributed to a personal writing crisis in my head. Each chapter on character, plot, setting, etc. has been like a flashlight pointing at my work, revealing cracks in my manuscript that I didn’t see before.

I’ve been heavily revising Winter Wilder for the past month. At first I was gung-ho about the process. I felt like I had a clear idea in mind of what needed to be taken out, tweaked, and added. I eliminated entire chapters, zapped several superfluous characters, completely reworked the first third of the novel, and I was feeling pretty good that I was nearing the finish line.

But then I discovered the dreaded butterfly effect… that every change you make ripples throughout your manuscript, messing other things up. A paragraph I edited on page 110 would make it so I had to go back to pages 25-45 to make related adjustments, and then to 214-275 to do the same. Then those changes would spawn yet even more ripples and I’d have to dart back and forth through my manuscript, attempting to smooth out all the wrinkles I created. It felt like I was chasing an elusive sprite, a mischievous little demon who danced between the words and mocked me every step of the way, cackling “You can’t catch me! You can’t fix me! Nyah nyah!”

Reading Kit Lit only further crumbled my walls. Does my plot even make any sense? Suddenly my main character seems so bratty and unlikeable, who would even care about her anyway? Is my entire story just plain boring? Is this something I’d even want to read if I were a regular person browsing a bookshelf? With all the high-stakes, super bombastic YA that’s out there my own story about a girl’s literal and figurative transformation and her messed up family seems so quiet, so… meh.

For a few days I couldn’t even touch my manuscript because I hated it so much. I convinced myself that it was a pile of terribly-written garbage and that there was no saving it. I have friends who have been eager to give me feedback, who have been asking me “Sooo.. when can I read your book?”

But, suddenly, I don’t want to show anyone the monster I have created. Because I know they will just point out all the flaws that are already there, starting me in the face. I just want to take my sickly manuscript to the river and drown it quietly. Ok, so maybe I’m being a bit dramatic. But the point is, a part of me wants to give up, and just move on to the next project, which will surely be better… right? Right?

I think part of my despair stems from the fact that these revisions seem never-ending. My beta readers will surely have new critiques and ideas that will have me rework the story even more. And even if I’m fortunate to get an agent, there will likely be even MORE changes to make before the story is ever ready to be pitched to publishers.

It feels so bleak right now, I can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. But I also know this is a normal part of the writing process… that every writer hates their work at one more points, and they simply must keep working at it until they fall in love again and remember why they wrote the damn thing in the first place.

So I will push through this muck and strive to do as many revisions as it takes to make my story the absolute best it can be. Because, as impatient as I am to get the ball rolling, and start querying… I don’t want to blow my chances with a sub-par manuscript. I have to make it as strong as I can.

And hey, I spent all that time making this fancy website. I’m not about to let that go to waste! ]]> https://winterwilder.com/the-low-point-in-my-story-arc/feed/ 2 https://winterwilder.com/3951-words-and-counting/ https://winterwilder.com/3951-words-and-counting/#comments Thu, 08 Nov 2012 03:31:10 +0000 http://winterwilder.com/?p=226 NaNoWriMo just isn’t going my way at the moment. One week in, and I’ve only written 3951 words of my novel. This means I’m approximately 7,700 words behind schedule.Now, it’s not like I’ve been slacking off. I’ve been writing. A lot.

In fact, I’ve probably clocked in close to 10k words in the last week… the problem is, it just hasn’t all been on my NaNoWriMo novel. I’m still heavily revising Winter Wilder, ripping out huge chunks and filling in the empty spaces. My main fear is if I let myself get sucked into my NaNoWriMo novel, I’ll lose momentum on Winter Wilder, and that’s the last thing I want right now.

Another problem: I’m still not satisfied with the outline for my NaNoWriMo novel. A lot of my total word count this week has gone to lengthy outlines, character sheets, and backstory (none of which technically “counts” towards my NaNoWriMo word count.)

When I started writing it on November 1st, I had a plan. I was just going to use the original outline that I drafted way back in 2003. It had a few rough spots here and there, but I figured I’d work through those points as I went along.

So I began writing. And a nagging feeling was telling me that I was headed down a 50k word path of misery. I always listen to my intuition, so I stopped and considered what my gut was telling me. And I realized the old outline just wasn’t any good. None of it. I had to rethink the entire story from scratch, or else I’d be forcing myself to muddle through a draft that would be completely useless.

In some ways, this was freeing, To let go of all these old ideas of what I thought “should” happen, all this useless backstory that simply bogged down my plot, all these cliches and meandering side-plots that had nothing to do with the main story,

I brainstormed with my friend, Will (who originally created the character I’m writing about), on the phone for an hour and we came up with a bunch of fresh new ideas, which got me inspired and excited to start anew with the book.

So I spent the next couple days drafting a new outline, and even writing the first 3 chapters (which is what the aforementioned 3951 words consist of).

I sent what I had to Will and he called me with some feedback, which was very sound. In my eagerness to get the story of the ground, my first chapter gave too much information away, and took away a lot of the mystery. We spoke at length about how my NaNoWriMo novel should really be a mystery story more than anything. The puzzles that the protagonist solves in his adventure should be something the reader can be figuring out along the way as well. More ideas and brainstorms tumbled forth and I took plenty of notes from our conversation with fresh inspiration.

Now I’m working on a third outline that I think will be the winner. But every day I work on the outline is a day I don’t spend writing the actual book. Another conundrum: if it is to be a mystery adventure, I have to make sure the mystery is completely in place ahead of time… that all the clues make sense, that all the puzzles have solutions. I can’t just dive in willy-nilly. It has to be air tight. Or else I’m going to write myself into a corner.

So I’ve decided that even if my word count doesn’t go up as high as I’d like in these first couple weeks, as long as I continue to create a solid outline and work on it as a concept, I’ll be succeeding. Once it’s all in place, I think I can power through the writing and maybe even reach my goal! (That’s my optimistic intent.)

But, ultimately, NaNoWriMo isn’t about “winning” for me. It’s about being motivated, making and sharing progress, and learning new lessons in writing as you go along. The “goal” does indeed motivate me, but the end word count is less important to me than the journey I take to get there.

I hit the section on “Starting Your Story” where Kole lists common clichés for how one, well, starts their story, and I realized, with horror, that the beginning to Winter Wilder falls into TWO of these clichés. The first being “Moving Van: A character in his car, driving to his new house, hating every minute of it.” The second being “Emo Kid: A character sitting and thinking about all his problems”

Crap.

I admit, I’ve been very attached to the beginning of my story. After all, it’s the first thing I ever wrote of WW, and chapter 1 is probably the most polished chapter in my entire manuscript simply because of all the editing I’ve done to it over the past two years since I’ve started working on my manuscript.

I think it’s actually a well-written chapter on its own… but is it the strongest way to start my story?

My gut says NO.

It’s sending me into a mild panic, because here I thought my story was ready to be sent out. I’m panicking because the agent at the Pitch Slam asked me to send her my query letter with my first two chapters, and I went home eager to do just that.

But because of this wake-up call from Mary Kole’s book, I’m realizing that it would be a grave error to send Ms. Pitch Slam Agent my first two chapters as they are now. Which means I need to scramble to figure something else out, and fast.

Really, though, I should be grateful that I caught this error before I sent out my query letter and sample pages. Because of Kole’s book and infinite agent-y wisdom, I have something to gain from all this.

I’m glad I’m figuring this out because, you see, I already thought I had beefed up my first 3 chapters. After reading many books and articles on querying etc., I knew I had to make the first 3 chapters especially strong because they are the “first impression” of any book.

So when I finished my first draft, I took a hard look at my manuscript and recognized there wasn’t enough action in the first three chapters. I was teasing out the fact that Winter is a shapeshifter, but you didn’t actually see any evidence of this in the first three chapters originally.

So I went back and put in a new chapter 2 where Winter transforms, showing (not telling) the reader what she has to go through. There! I thought, I made it more interesting! And I brushed my hands off and considered it done. I figured that as long as I had some good action in the first 3 chapters, I was set.

But the truth that I didn’t want to admit was that, while chapter 2 was definitely much improved and more exciting, chapter 1 was still the same… not a lot happens besides a lot of, well, thinking. If someone doesn’t feel engaged enough to get through chapter 1, they’ll never even make it to chapter 2 where all the action happens.

That’s a risk I can’t afford to take if I hope to attract an agent… and later, a reader.

So with a heavy heart I’ve realized my beautiful, long-winded, melancholy chapter 1 must take the axe. It’s a 2 year old chapter that I’ve been clinging to, carefully tweaking and editing all this time. I’ve cut many other things out of my first draft that I realized weren’t necessary, but I never considered cutting chapter 1.

But it’s got to go.

In some ways it’s freeing, because it means I can really challenge myself to think of a fresh, unique and exciting way to start my book.

I better get to it.

It clocks in at 95,000 words and 365 pages. In other words, there’s still a lot of work (read: editing, trimming, slicing, and dicing) to be done. But I’m not going to think about that now. I’m going to think about how good it feels to have completed a project with an actual beginning, middle, and end. (I can be a notorious project abandoner when shinier things appear in my head. I’m like a crow that way.)

My first step was to print it out and put all the pages in a fancy binder and tape on the lovely mock cover that designer Will Staehle made for me, so I could enjoy the ‘tangibleness’ of my work. If this small physical proof of my efforts feels this good, I can only imagine what it must feel like to hold a published book in my hands.

My next step is to simply admire the binder for a week or more (Sleep with it. Eat with it. Normal, right?) and resist the urge to start editing right away. I need some emotional distance, and I want to bask in this project-finishing glow before the blood, sweat, and tears start flowing once again.

But I knew Winter Wilder would be different. (Back then, it was called “Wynter’s Scar”, later, “Wynter’s Change”). Something about this story pulled at me, kept my interest. I didn’t work on it non-stop as real life, work, and other projects pulled me hither and fro, but Winter Wilder was always the dream project that lured me back again and again into its waiting arms.

When I started working on it, I was part of an awesome writing group of professionals who really gave me some valuable feedback in Winter’s earliest days. (This writing group is still around, we just don’t meet as frequently as we’ve been so busy with other commitments.)

I’d highly recommend joining a writing group if you’re an aspiring author – not only is it an incredible resource, it pulls you out of your hermity-writer-hidey-hole, and allows you to spot things in your own work that you would otherwise have missed.

Back in 2010 I knew I wanted to write a story that was small in scope, but character driven and highly emotional, with lots of family and interpersonal relationship drama. And it had to involve wolves. Because I love dogs, and I love their ancestors.

The premise of Winter Wilder is as follows:

WINTER WILDER is a free-spirited California girl who just wants to enjoy life as a normal teenager. But Winter is anything but normal. She learns she is a Fenris, a shapeshifter who transforms whenever she gets too emotional. After moving to gloomy Westchester, NY, she gets attacked by a wolf, whom she discovers to be her own estranged grandfather. Winter soon realizes there’s a dark history to her family filled with bloodshed, shameful secrets, and fear. Worse, her grandfather considers her to be a threat to everything he believes in and pulls her into a deadly game of cat and mouse.

The stakes get higher when Winter falls in love with Hunter, her grandfather’s legal ward, and she arrives at a crossroads where she must choose fight or flight. But when those you love are caught in the crossfire, the choice isn’t always easy…

Believe it or not, that basic description took me a long time to craft. You think it would be easy to sum up in a paragraph what your novel is about, but it’s actually one of the hardest things to do. Hopefully this story piques your interest and you’ll continue to watch this space for updates as I progress towards my dream of getting Winter Wilder published! ]]> https://winterwilder.com/the-obligatory-origin-story/feed/ 0