Yes!  It ended up being around 55 handwritten pages and 20,000 words!!  I have plenty of room to build and plenty of places to do it in so I’m not worried about my first edit.

I posted on Facebook for Beta readers, and I was pleasantly surprised to find four people willing to read for me. I’m pretty encouraged by this response.  I’ll be starting on the rewrite in two weeks.  I need some time to rest and think over scenes I want to build up.  I plan to make a lot of notes before I actually start the first edit too.

I didn’t realize how much of a confidence builder finishing this has been, but I feel like I’m walking on air right now. 🙂

Now, I’m going to watch movies and British television shows while I take a break.  Te newest season of Endeavor has been released, and I’m eager to get my Morse fix!

I’ll see you on the flipside so mind how you go and don’t forget your towel!

I got up this morning, and I fed the outside cats.  It’s something I do every day, twice a day, like clockwork – sort of.  I don’t feed them at the precise same time every day, but I do feed them twice a day, even on my days off.

After that, I made my bed.  That’s something I hardly do because not only does no one else see my bed but I see no point in doing something up when I’m just going to undo it again later.  Still, I made my bed today.  I looked at it all made up, said “meh” with a shrug and went on with my day.  I felt not one whit productive.

I put on some heavy metal music, threw some laundry in the washer and went to work on GK.  The laundry went in the dryer, and the music changed to opera.  Now, I was feeling productive.  Laundry was done, two  operas were enjoyed, and dishes were put in to soak. GK was moving right along.  I finished with Vice stealing a ship and moved back to Kitya still in her prison cell.  Yes, Vice stole a ship, stay with me here.

Dishes were washed, and I counted all the words I’d written, deciding I’d found a good spot to stop for a bit.

GK is now at 41 pages and approximately, 15,000 words.  Not a bad place to stop.

I’ve been binging on Doctor Who reruns the past few days and am up to the 4th Doctor now. 🙂  I was a child when the first set of doctors were on and then, as I got older, life happened causing me to miss a lot of the show.  Still, I remember all of the 3rd Doctor as well as the 4th and 5th ones.  The 4th played by Tom Baker is still my all time favorite though I must say the 11 Doctor (I count the War Doctor) played by David Tennant is a close second.  I’m looking forward to seeing the newest doctor – played by a woman.

Back to my day.  I binged on Doctor Who until it was time for John Pertwee(3) to regenerate into Tom Baker(4).  I loved rediscovering when the sonic screwdriver first made an appearance, and I must say it looked very much like a tire’s pressure gauge.

I stopped watching television, put on classical music and worked on my Penn Foster Bookkeeping class.  I’m on the first part of the third module.  I got halfway through the module and had to take a break.  I was getting stressed and giving myself a headache.  I really want to make good grades, and this causes me to stress out.  I’m just like that.

I had an early dinner, played on Facebook and watched the third season of Endeavour.  I’m a big fan of DI Morse and later, of DI Lewis so Endeavour with a young Morse is lots of fun to watch.

Now, I’m going back to my studies.  I haven’t come up with anything good for Kitya’s newest scene, but I’m planning her escape.  I just need to come up with something good and plausible. 🙂 Mostly plausible since this is a fantasy story after all.

More to come.

Catch you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel!

So GK is now up to 32 handwritten pages and approximately, 12000 words.  It’s not much, but it’s a great start.  Yes, I’m out of my funk and back to writing since I reworked Vice.

I am doing research on the character by watching the movies and television shows the actor Vice is loosely based on stars in.  No, I’m not telling you who said actor is.  Vice is like him, not him.  There’s a big difference.

I’m moving the story along.  I’ll be beefing it up from the rough draft since it won’t be anywhere near the 65k word count I’m shooting for.  That’s what second and third drafts are for – beefing it up and making edits where needed.  I’ll be working chapter to chapter when that happens.

Still, the patient is going to live so I just have to keep going.  Mind how you go!

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel!

I have been agonizing over my iniability to write of late.  I was in the process of trashing the tripe I’d written while feeling very down when I decided to reread everything else.

As I was reading, I liked the parts I wrote about my ongoing saga with Kitya, but I was hating the parts I’d written about newcomer, Vice.  After some more thinking, sans mark out pen, I thought about Vice.  I wondered if I should keep him or relagate him to a more minor character.

Thing is, Vice is a major co star in this drama just as Angarde was in Crimson Knight.  He is the Knave as Angarde was the Knight.  NO, that was not intentional – for those smart alecks out there.

Unlike Angarde whose scenes were right there with Kitya, Vice has his own scenes with his own costar, Rajinstorm, aka Raj.  Because of this, I need to treat Vice with more respect than I was doing.  He is the focal of his own scenes and deserves to be more fleshed out – more fleshed out that perhaps Angarde was in fact.  I’m still working on that part.

To make a long story short (too late I know), I’ve rewritten the first chapter with Vice in it, and I’m now working on the second.  The rewrites are not only longer, they are not so rushed.  Vice comes out better, more likeable, and less of a joke – in mho.  I’ll continue to work on him and try a lot harder to treat him as the star he is. 🙂

Angarde isn’t in the second book, wonder if Vice should make it into the third? WEG.

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel!  A sonic screwdriver wouldn’t hurt either. 🙂

I’ve been in a funk ever since I got the cast molding of one of my late cat’s feet.  I have never missed an animal like I miss him. He was a major part of my life, especially since I’m a single woman living alone.

Lucien, the cat my baby, Lancelot, had ‘adopted’ as a companion before he passed away, has decided he doesn’t want to be an inside cat.  He prefers to be outside with the rest of his family and be able to roam all over the place.  I feed him and the others twice a day, and I just hope for the best when I don’t see him.

I’ve been trying to write and hate what I’ve written.  I don’t like writing when I’m in a funk, as I’ve mentioned before, but I was trying to power through it.  The end result is almost three handwritten pages, roughly 5000 words, of pure junk.  It hurts my heart to get rid of it, but I hate every last syllable of it.  So, when I can work my way out of this state of innuii I’ve found myself in, I’ll toss it out and start over from the good stuff.

My funk extends to my studies as well. I’m self paced, but I’m still behind the schedule I’ve set for myself.  My last test grade was very low too.  This, after making all As, is hurtful.  I’m going to wait until I’m feeling better to resume my studies.  I’ll just have to adjust my schedule to accommodate.

I have been watching movies in an effort to feel better. I’ve been going for light hearted affairs since I don’t need anything heavy to make me feel worse.  I’ll write about the last two I’ve seen in my next post.

See you on the flipside – and don’t forget your towel!!

I’ve encountered a bump in the road over the last few days with my writing, I’m afraid.

I was all set to get to writing on Friday – one of my two days off in a row – and I got a package in the mail from the vet where I had to put down my beautiful and beloved 5 yr old cat, Lancelot.  He was diagnosed with FIP when he was a year and a half old.  I took care of him until he developed a secondary condition which made him too ill to go on a little over a month ago.  I paid to have a cast of one of his paws made at the same time, and it finally came in the mail.  Getting it broke my heart all over again, and I was a wreck the entire time I was off.  I was still feeling down when I took a test for my Book Keeping class on Sunday while I was at work, between calls of course.

I passed the test, and I felt good enough to try some writing.  I don’t write when I’m down because all I write is junk – a waste of time and resources.

I managed to write 1500 words yesterday, and I’m working on trying to get inspired to write today.  I’m even watching fantasy movies to try to get some magic back.  That’s a different post than this one.  I just hope I can get some writing done and keep to my schedule.

We’ll see….