Dragon’s Den Blog

Wednesday and Thursday I was too tired and sore to write. I worked on other things like promoting and such. But no writing. This of course always makes me a bit grumpy.

Today was a work from home day. So I took a short nap after work. I was worn out. I still am but I managed to write 2500 words tonight. I’m up to a bit over 55K. I’m pleased with my progress but my brain is too tired to finish the current scene.

I’ve got to introduce more of the human women and some of the T’mbarian males. There’s twenty in the scene technically but they won’t all be named. It will be a crowded scene and some gossip will be shared but nothing verifiable. I think a short sex scene after. Then P’lar will be called away.

Not sure how my climax will go yet. I think it will come to me once I’m through the rest of these scenes. I KNOW the final scene. I’ve seen it in my head for quite some time. I know how it will end.

I’m off to bed. I’ve got a half dozen things on my to do list for tomorrow so it will be a busy weekend. Hopefully I can finish this story off this weekend. I think I know how the second book will start but… after this one, I need to do some editing of other stories before I dive into book two. I’ve got the ending for book two and parts of the rest of it… But for now, I need to finish book one.

Chapter 10 is finally done! Tonight I was writing and things were going better than I expected but research distracted me. Then I scheduled some promo events and one thing led to another.

Fortunately, I still wrote nearly 1700 words. I finished off the chapter with some sexy time teasers. I’ve got the ideas for the first three sections of the next chapter and I’ve written the ideas in the manuscript. From there we’ll see what the characters decide.

The good thing is I’m at 52,600 for total word count. My chapters are running around 5-6K so this should be about 58K by the time I’m done. I know she will be hurt… maybe bad enough to die. I’m not sure yet. Bad guy will be revealed. All the details aren’t clear yet – but this is normal for me.

I know what the second book will involve, I’m just not sure how it will start yet. While this first book has to end on a happy for now, I also want it clear she’s not all in. He is and in book two, he’ll prove it.

Tomorrow is an in office day for work so I have to get to bed shortly. I doubt I’ll do much writing over the next two days, I’m usually in too much pain. However, I’ll see how the days go.

Today has been a rough day. Our weather has gone from hot and humid of summer to gray and gloomy with thunderstorms. I love thunderstorms but my joints don’t. Now I don’t know if it’s because I got cold while I worked in the kitchen or if I was going to have a flare no matter what but mid-morning, I realized I was done.

I couldn’t get warm. My pain level skyrocketed which meant I had a headache and was nauseous on top of the pain. It was a rough day.

Ken took over peeling and slicing apples. Vicki basically tucked me into my recliner with three blankets and I took naps. Short and often interrupted with pain. It took several hours before I felt warm. My pain level is still pretty high but not as high.

I managed to writing for a couple hours. I got 3K written and the story is up to 47K. I’ve got 1 or 2 chapters left to write and then I’ll be done.

Tomorrow, I need to go through emails (I’m weeks behind) and do a bunch of book related tasks. Once those are done, I’ll be writing. My hope is to finish the last two chapters but I’ll see how my pain level is and how the day goes.

I feel like I got stuff done today at my day job. That’s always a good thing. Now tomorrow will be a day full of meetings and training. It will be a lot of busyness but not a lot of accomplishing things. These are the hardest days. I like to tick off the boxes on my to do list.

Tonight, I finished introducing one of my alien races. Janine got propositioned by the leader of a new world. I got quite a bit done tonight – a little over 3K written taking me to about 45K (just under) for the overall story. I want to ramp up the danger…. but the characters aren’t telling it that way.

So I’ll stay true to my characters. I know there is big danger coming. I’ve got a couple of things cooking but I think this lull needs to happen because I think the ending will be fast paced. I also want some extended writing time. The story is right there in reach.

One thing I want to do is go back through and read it all again. I have a spreadsheet so I can keep track of characters and words and so on. But I know I’ve missed some secondary characters. I think they’re going to be important. So I want to make sure I capture them on my spreadsheet for later.

The weekend was super busy with canning, freezing, and so on. We got a lot done in two short days but it left me exhausted. I didn’t write a lot. I got a bit done here and there but not a lot.

Tonight, we ended up having a late dinner. So people hung out with me longer than normal but I still managed to get a couple hours of writing in.

I’m at almost 42K in the book and tonight I wrote a little over 2700 words. I finished two scenes and started a new chapter. I think this chapter will be them being chased from one planet to the next. But I’m not sure because it just depends on what the characters tell me.

I feel like it might be a bunch of short scenes with them being in danger of capture until they get back to T’mbar. I’ll see where the characters take me. But it’s shaping up nicely. I like the two characters.

Hopefully this week is a bit less crazy and I’ll get some good writing time in. I’m not holding my breath but I am hopeful.

I don’t like mornings on a good day. Today – Saturday! – I was up at 6 am to shower and dress. I do not like 6 am. It is too light to be last night and too early to be today. But we went west to visit the apple orchard my parents went to near Gays Mills.

I drove. Vicki shopped. Alicia and her friend followed in Alicia’s car. We went to the orchard where Vicki got a bushel and half of apples. We went to Rural Route 1, our favorite popcorn place. Then we went to Peck’s – a road side stand for fresh produce. Now that sounds like a little truck or wagon with produce on it. That’s not what this is.

It’s an open market with a ton of produce, games and activities for kids, and more. Vicki picked up tomatoes and sweet corn. My car was full but not packed in.

Today when we got home, we cut up most of the apples and made applesauce which is all in the fridge. Tomorrow we’ll work on canning it. We’ll also be dicing the tomatoes to can. Ken will take the corn off the cob so we can freeze it.

After Ken and Vicki went to bed, I wanted to write. So I pulled up my computer and wrote a scene. Now I’ve got all these dynamic ideas for my story but I’m so tired my head hurts. I did manage to write a couple of scenes (about 1800 words) but I’m too tired to think of all the details of aliens and so on that I need to create. I think it will be an early night for me.

I hope tomorrow I can make some good progress with this story. I have a bunch of things to get done though so we’ll see.