♥ Beautiful Silence :: Sena's Writing Blog ♥

Hoooooooly SHIT I just finished Storm Season! 8D And while the word count in Storm Season is higher than that of Horror High (76,416 vs 70,659) they actually both ended up being the EXACT SAME PAGE LENGTH, coming in at 167 each. XD But that's how much denser the text was in SS, I guess, so whatever! I'm still super hyped! <33

Now I just need to EDIT the entire freaking thing, which I'm hoping to get done before the end of the month so I don't have it hanging over my head while I'm trying to work on the NaNo. But it's only the 16th today, so I should be good.

It occurred to me yesterday that in the last sliiiightly less than three months, I have written almost 500 pages (about 484-ish) in this series, not to mention all the other bits-and-bobs of other stuff I've written as well; Snowflakes And Dragons, Coffee Break, etc., and like... 500 pages is TWO novels. I have written AT LEAST two novels worth of content in the last three months, since I went on the ADHD meds, and is this what it's actually like?? To have a FUNCTIONAL BRAIN?? Because WOW. .__.

So maybe, MAYBE I actually have it in me to just... WRITE BOOKS. BE AN ACTUAL AUTHOR. Because I know that my ideas are good, so if I can get them written out like I have with the Horror High (et al) series, I'm pretty much GOLDEN. It's a surreal thought. Something I've strived for and struggled with my entire life. Literally my dream, to share my stories with the world. It's why I got into fanfiction, too.

So I'm going to do TKA for the NaNo this year and attempt 50,000 words in a month, and though I'm sure I can manage THAT, TKA is going to be longer than 50,000 words so I'll have to keep working on it after the NaNo is over to complete it. Or just write 80,000 words in a month. I could just do that. :|

And once I have TKA WRITTEN, then I can edit the shit out of it half a dozen times before finally trying to find an agent that will take me on and hock my wares for me, you know? I'm not 100% sure where to start with that but... I'll muddle through somehow. Because I definitely want an agent if I can possibly get one, rather than trying to sell my book around to publishing companies myself. I'll get way better contracts if I have an agent.

Anyway. Just. I shouldn't put the cart before the horse. Finish TKA first, that's the big one.

BUT ALSO YAY STORM SEASON!!!

I've been off of working on Storm Season the last three days or so, which isn't good. I'm trying to get it AND all the post-SS one-shots finished by the end of the month. But I'm having a HELL of a time concentrating on it right now, I kind of just want to write the one-shots instead, which is a problem because they, obviously, take place AFTER Storm Season, so I don't want to write them and then have to edit the shit out of them when they don't line up with SS "canon", you know? But it's what my brain wants to write right now, and it IS part of what I want to get done by the end of the month, so...???

Right now I have When Lightning Strikes, Ghost In The Machine and Pinfeathers open to work on along with Storm Season, since they're the first three of the post-SS one-shots so it makes logical sense that I would work on them first, right? But I also REALLY want to work on Halcyon Days and Stalagmites, which are the LAST two, so like idek brain what are you doing to me, here?

I'm also tinkering with Where Monsters Come From, which I STRUGGLED with for the longest time and now, FINALLY, am having some luck at writing some scenes?? NOW?? WHEN IT IS THE LITERAL WORST TIME?? I have no idea, really, I just think my brain is trying to kill me or drive itself more insane or something.

On a side note, I really do think I need an increase in my ADHD meds, they're not working nearly as well as they did in the beginning, and that's the thing with me and medications; my body adjusts to them really easily, so I start off fine but then my body adjusts and my dosage has to be upped and my body adjusts and my dosage has to be upped and so on, until I'm on HUGE dosages of (most of) my meds. Looks like the Vyvanse might be the same way, not that I'm all that surprised.

ANYWAY. Then last night I started a short story that I've had kicking around the back of my head since I was like 14. It's called "A Dog Named God" and it's kind of my own personal thoughts on the concept of God, but put in a supernatural/fantasy setting because I can't just write an ESSAY now, can I?

Then I also want to work some more on Chemistry (and Chemistry side-fics, I have one about Violet Parr and Katie Mitchell that's really cute) and get working on Marked again, but first I have to like... READ Marked again because it's been so long that I completely forget where I was going with it aside from the gratuitous smut. :D;;

On top of that I want to finish up some of my old Valdemar stuff (Brothers At Arms, Marionette, Aftershocks, Fallout, Evolution, Of The Deepest Dye, Whipstitch, Outlander, A Dangerous Pastime) and I have a few new ones that I want to get started on AT SOME POINT as well (Heart, Sterling, A MILLION-ONE SHOTS) and the entire Cole and Hadley series that I still want to write, even though I never heard back from Mercedes Lackey about Inside Out (I still have to write the rest of Breaking Point, then Against The Grain, Firebug, Burning Bridges and Birds Of A Feather.)

I also want to write another Black Companion fic, one unrelated to Of The Deepest Dye, but I don't know what for or what the plot would be. Maybe the Star-Eyed coming through with her threat to create black versions of Companions, after all? Black hides and starfield-eyes, instead of white hides with blue eyes? ...oh. Maybe I'll dust off Yasmine and Syril and Jasha and Malicha, that story had potential. Hmm.

Oh, and a couple of Teen Wolf Sterek one-shots (Stupid Love and Carousel Coffee And More) that I need to finish eventually, too. Stupid Love I originally started over a year ago as a gift for Poe, but my brain was such a bag of cats that I just... I was struggling SO HARD to write ANYTHING, and Poe started to get frustrated with me, but I didn't even know how to explain it. The static in my brain, or the bouncy balls. And now they understand THAT part, but not only are we not in contact anymore, but even if we WERE I couldn't send Stupid Love to them because of the TW trauma.

When I posted What Foxes Like for them back in January of this year, I probably did them damage, if they even read it. They probably didn't. But What Foxes Like went over pretty well on AO3 regardless, so I'm looking forward to seeing if Stupid Love and/or Carousel Coffee And More do well, too, or if What Foxes Like was just a one-off fluke.

I have seven post-Storm Season one-shots planned out, but one of them I'm considering just writing as it's own separate fic so that one might not count. :|

Basically, in order: When Lightning Strikes, By Any Other Name, Pinfeathers, Teeth, Hair Trigger, Hunting Souls and Halcyon. Except Hunting Souls has literally nothing to do with the Horror High AU or story arc, it just struck me as a good concept and I wanted to write it and at the time I was working on Storm Season one-shots so it kind of got lumped in with them. I think I'm going to pull it from the lineup and just write it as it's own little standalone fic instead, after I'm done with the entire HH arc.

When Lightning Strikes (formerly Like Feathers, Softly) is about Cas returning to Earth after the ending of Storm Season; By Any Other Name is a Cas/Charlie reunion fic and I don't really have the actual PLOT figured out yet; Pinfeathers is new and very Under Construction stuff; Teeth is a Cas/Garth reunion fic where the boys are up against a tooth fairy and need Garth's expertise; Hair Trigger is a Cas/Jody reunion fic and, like the one with Charlie, I don't really have the actual PLOT figured out yet, and Halcyon is literally just being written for Destiel fluff and smut and not much else. :D;

And I mean, I should NOT be working on the post-Storm Season one-shots BEFORE I've even finished Storm Season itself, but... here we are! So I'm kind of jumping around between all of those (except Hunting Souls, I haven't started that one yet), writing snippets as they come to me.

I'm still very much stuck in the fanfiction setting right now, which is unfortunate because there are so many original projects I could/should be working on, but I plan to set all the fandom stuff aside in November, no matter what, to hopefully get TKA finished for the NaNo this year.

I don't really have a good... track record. With the NaNo. Basically most years I sign up for it and have a really great idea for it and then as soon as November 1st hits? All my muses ABANDON SHIP. I'm not good with deadlines and stuff, which doesn't bode well for my goal of being a published author. I don't write well under pressure, I guess.

But I'm going to try my best this year, and maybe the ADHD meds will help me overcome my previous... difficulties. Here's hoping, anyway! :D;;

SO. Yesterday I actually finished Horror High! It came out to 167 pages, 10 chapters and just under 71,000 words long, and I am BEYOND thrilled with it! To write THAT MUCH in JUST UNDER A MONTH, for ME, is a HUGE deal. I've been struggling for YEARS to write ANYTHING, agonizing over every single word, and then the new ADHD meds and BAM. Suddenly I can write again. It's amazing Vyvanse is a MIRACLE DRUG.

Anyway, so I posted Chapter Two of HH today, here, on AO3 and on my Tumblr, and we'll see how it goes. So far the reception has been lukewarm, but I know I'm a new author to the fandom, I'm writing an AU, and I'm writing top!Dean and bottom!Cas, which is the reverse of how most of the SPN fandom writes them. So it's an uphill battle for me with HH. I don't mind, though, I've got the entire thing written (and edited) and I love it even if no one else does, which I guess is the important thing. I do thrive on feedback and fandom interaction, but in this case I think it'll be okay even if I don't get much of it.

I'm going to be posting a chapter each Friday until I've got the whole thing posted, and I've got eight to go, so it's going to go on for two more months yet. Hopefully people will get on board in the meantime. I want to print a hard copy of HH for myself, just to keep, like I did with Biology, but I currently do not have enough paper to do it, so. Yeah. :|

I started working on Cheap Motel a bit this morning. It takes place roughly seven months after the events of HH and, not gonna lie, I'm basically writing it for the sake of smut. There's some serious stuff and lots of fluff as well, but yeah. Just. Sex. XD;; I'm also going to write Counting Scars, I think, which takes place five years after HH/Cheap Motel (the boys are now 23) and is kind of an intro to Storm Season, but is also mostly just an excuse to write smut. (Sometimes you just gotta write smut!)

But after that I'm going to take a break from fanfiction (mostly) and see if this productivity translates to original works as well, and try to write one or two of my original novels. If I can write original stuff the same way I wrote HH, I can get one written in six weeks to two months. Ish. I'm tentatively planning to work on TKA and/or The Spirit Fighters, but we'll see how it goes. When I'm done that, then I'll go back and write Storm Season.

I've made the executive decision that I'm NOT going to switch to bottom!Dean and top!Cas for Storm Season after all (except possibly for one chapter/scene), I'm going to stick with the dynamic I currently have going. Not because of the jerk-ish review I got about it, but just because that's honestly how I prefer them so that's just how I'm going to continue writing them. (Though I'm not entirely sure about Tying Knots, because it kind of SCREAMS for bottom!Dean. I might deviate when I write that one.)

ANYWAY, yes, so ACCOMPLISHMENTS ARE BEING ACCOMPLISHED AND PLANS ARE BEING PLANNED. WISH ME LUCK.

Not to talk about Horror High again, but I'm going to talk about Horror High again. :D

Mostly because it's the only thing I'm working on at the moment, aside from a few sentences here-and-there in Cheap Motel as well. Basically my brain is stuck in this AU/Destiel mode and I can't seem to get away from it. Not that I necessarily WANT TO, I'm having a fuck of a lot of fun writing HH and plotting the other fics in the series (because I can never just write a stand-alone fic, that would make things easy!) but I also have Bastian from Wander wiggling in the back of my brain, so a liiiiiiittle part of me kind of wants to work on that fic, too. But HH is taking up AAAAALL of my brainspace right now, so I guess Wander will have to wait. XD;;

Anyway, HH is up to 79 pages and 37,010 words and I have given up on trying to guesstimate how long it's actually going to be in the end. Every time I check the page count I go "oh, it should be X# more pages or so" and then I go over that number DRASTICALLY, and I guess another number, and go over THAT number DRASTICALLY, and that's happened half a dozen times now and I just GIVE UP. HH is gonna be as long as it's gonna be, I guess, and I appear to have no control over that.

The other thing about HH is that it is 90% love story and only 10% monster hunting, which was NOT my intention when I first decided to write it AT ALL. Originally it was supposed to be the story of Dean's first solo Hunt (in this AU), with a bit of Destiel on the side. BUT NO. Instead it's FULLY a falling-in-love fic with just a SIDE of solo Hunt, like the smallest little bit, and I am writing so much fluff between Dean and Cas that it is making my teeth rot. Like they are SO in love (even if they refuse to actually say it.)

Also there is the smut aspect, which, originally, when I got to the first part that would have been smut I kind of balked because I wasn't sure if I wanted HH to be porny or not. But there are like FOUR OR FIVE parts that are smutty now, and I can't Fade To Black on ALL OF THEM so I ended up just deciding FUCK IT, PORN IT IS, which was interesting because I hadn't written smut in a looooooong time. :| I mean, I used to write it all the time, and I was GOOD AT IT, and I ENJOYED IT (even though I'm asexual myself; figure that one out), but I sat down to write the first smut scene for HH and I was like "..................................fuck."

I eventually got past it, obviously. There is smut in HH. I've written half of it. (Still have two scenes to write out.) But it was really surreal to sit down and write porn for the first time in years. I guess it all comes back to you, though.

idk I just hope people like this fic when I eventually finish it and start posting it. I'm going to divide it into chapters (it was NOT intended to be a chaptered fic at first lmao but now I'm looking at probably at least 9 or 10 chapters for it, depending on where I divide it) and post the chapters one-a-week on Fridays until I get the whole thing up on AO3, I guess. Also probably on Tumblr, since I still post my fics there, too. I'm nervous about this one, though, because it's my first SPN fic, my first Destiel fic, AND an AU fic to boot. Just hoping it goes over well.

I guess if nothing else I had fun writing it?

EDIT: I was talking about HH with my Mom (without getting too much into it, since she's not into SPN and obviously not Destiel) and telling her that I had two one-shots after it, followed by an actual sequel fic, and she suggested tacking Cheap Motel on to the end of HH as an Epilogue, and using Counting Scars as the Prologue to TRSF, and... I... am not entirely opposed to that idea? .__.;; I can see the benefits. But I also really like Cheap Motel and Counting Scars as actual one-shots, so idk. I'm thinking about it.

EDIT #2: I am considering re-titling The Road So Far to just "Storm Season", both because it takes place DURING A HURRICANE and also because of the STORM OF FEELS that is coming down the line. Also I have a tentative plotline for this fic now, which involves an out-of-place-palraijuq Hunt in Louisiana during hurricane season. Palraijuq are creatures from Inuit lore that resemble huge alligators, only with six legs. "Out of place" because really, the thing should be in the fucking YUKON, by all rights, not Louisiana.

EDIT #3: I also like "Storm Season" because it's alliterative like "Horror High" is and that makes them sort of matchy-matchy. :D