All the Things I’m Working On

I thought I’d post a status update for those of you wondering what I’ve been working on.

Ashes

I’m happy to report that I finished the rough draft of Ashes, the sequel to Weakness, a little over two weeks ago. I set it aside so I could have fresh eyes when I began revisions, and while I took a break from Felix’s saga I began to write a sci-fi romance.

Sci-Fi Romance

My original intention was just to write a quick, short, simple romance as a way of breaking up the brooding mood of writing about Felix – alas, I should have known better. Once I really started learning about why my romance characters behaved the way they did I realized that their story was much bigger than I’d thought. I also started getting addicted to the world I’d put them in. (Or, perhaps, the lack of world – it’s set off-planet in space.) Now I know it won’t be a quick book and I’ve resigned myself to that.

Revisions

As of yesterday my break from Ashes ended and I’ve begun revisions. Revising is always difficult for me, and I have the recurring problem of wanting to write creatively when I ought to be revising and wanting to revise when I ought to write creatively. It seems I’m always wearing the wrong hat at the wrong time and it takes so long for me to finally focus.

But I still hope to release Ashes on December 25th (no promises, but that’s my goal), so I need to get my edits done.

Non-Fiction

Another thing I’m working on is a short non-fiction book. This had been on my mental backburner for quite some time but during my summer vacation I sat down one day and banged it out. The rough draft is quite messy so it will need a lot of taking in at the seams to be a proper book, and it’s also so short I might not be able to make a paperback out of it (which saddens me, because I love print books), but if you like the content of the “Thoughts” and “God” posts on this blog you will probably enjoy this book. I haven’t settled on a title yet and don’t know when I’ll get around to publishing it, but it does exist now as a work-in-progress.

Research

Soon I need to begin more in-depth researching for the third book in the Nine Lies series. I’ve done a little research for it here and there so far, but I’m notoriously bad at research, and I think this research may be better done in the U.S. than in Korea, so we’ll see how much I can accomplish before heading West again.

Dictation

I’ve also finally jumped on the dictation bandwagon. I never seem to suffer from a shortage of ideas or things to write about, but sometimes my creativity gets blocked because I’m stressed out over time. I hate being interrupted when I’m deep in thought or writing something that I care about, so I prefer long chunks of time to write. In fact, I often find that I write best when I have two consecutive days or more of nothing interrupting me. Unfortunately, I work full time and almost never have more than one day to myself a week. So I’m always trying to think of ways I can write more in the tiny time slots that I have.

I’ve been reading everywhere that one of the key ways indie authors ratchet up their productivity is by learning how to use dictation to compose rough drafts. I tend to be a visual person, so sometimes I just need to type and see my words to think things out, but I’ve also found that some nights I’m too tired to write but I’m not too tired to talk, so I can dictate when I don’t feel up to typing. Another thing I’ve found is that if I close my eyes I can really imagine a scene more vividly and dictate very well. But if I don’t already know what’s going on I really need to type it out to work out what I’m writing, because I process my ideas by writing and seeing much of the time.

I’m already much better at dictation than I was when I first started, though, so I expect that as I get adjusted to it my productivity will increase.

Instafreebie ASH

And all of that is on top of the amazing Instafreebie ASH promotion we just had. If you missed it, don’t fret – sign up here to make sure you never miss another giveaway. I had a great time working with the authors who participated and it was a huge success. If you’re one of the many readers who downloaded our books, thanks so much for showing interest in our work! We hope you’ll stay in touch so we can keep delivering great content that you’ll love.

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