So Far So Good

Like the title says, so far so good... Sort of. I've been doing pretty well this Camp NaNo, though the last couple days I've fallen behind a bit. Today, I managed to catch up, and I'm hoping to write the rest of what I need a little later tonight.

My current word count is 10,500. I still need a little over a thousand words tonight, but that shouldn't be too hard.

I reached and finished the scene where Takfin first talks to Bryin, as well as where Darvel and Bryin first meet, and now I'm working on a scene where Dawn and Quest first come in. It's interesting, and I'm finally getting to the parts where Bryin decides to go off and do his own thing. And those scenes are always fun because basically anything can happen then.

My next big plot point is where Bryin, Darvel, Laine, and Vatan all get stuck in another world. I feel like there will be a lot going on in those scenes because none of those characters get along very well, but it will make writing easy and interesting for me.

Meh. That's all I have for now. I've been pretty busy lately, and having had much time to write. But I'm glad I've gotten this much done anyway. I'll try to have some writing to post with my next update.

But before I end this, here is a list of recent typos from this project.
I mistyped Kent as Kate
Spellcheck changed Vatan into multiple things, none of which were correct
Dawn introduced herself as Quest, and then introduced Quest as Quest
And spellcheck changed Nalfen into Malfeasance

Those are just a few, but I'm always amused when I see them. XD

Here Goes Nothing

Camp NaNo has finally begun! And even though I wasn't able to stay up late and write at midnight, and I slept in longer than I meant to, I still managed to hit my goal for the day! I was fairly productive considering I had to write in between singing since I had a choir rehearsal for the majority of the day.

Anyway, so my overall goal is 35,000 words. (Which may be increased if I'm more productive that I'm expecting myself to be.)

My current word count is 1,436, and I'm still in the middle of writing. Hopefully I'll be able to have all tomorrow afternoon to write, and I'll continue to get ahead of my goal. Mostly I'm just hoping that I can be productive, but not burn out like I usually do.

I'll probably stop writing for the day once I've hit tomorrow's goal, if I don't get stuck before then.

And the current scene I'm writing is... Interesting. XD To be honest I don't have much planned for this rewrite, other than really big plot points. But for the scenes that lead up to those, I'm just sort of making things up as I go along. As a result, I decided that the scene I'm working on was gong to be the first time Takfin and Bryin talk. I usually enjoy writing interactions between those two, so reliving the moment where they meet (even if I've changed somethings) is pretty entertaining. Though, Takfin won't be in this first book as much any more, so I'll have to enjoy their conversations while it lasts. XD

The next big plot point I'm building up to is where Bryin and Darvel meet for the first time. And again, that will be interesting. I'm not quite sure how that will turn out with all the changes, but I'm definitely looking forward to writing that scene.

Anyway, so that's how I'm doing on the first day. We'll see how it goes from here, and hopefully I'll have some more scenes to post soon. Even if I have to take a break from my NaNo project to write one.

To end, I'll interview Darvel and Bryin on what they think about this whole rewriting business.
----

Me: Hello, it's been awhile since we've talked like this, hasn't it?

Darvel: Thankfully.

Bryin: You know, it's really not fair that you don't let me run around like I used to.

Me: *Ignores Darvel* Well, I don't exactly have time for that now, do I? Anyway, I'm sure you both know that I'm rewriting your books, starting with the first one.

Darvel: *Snorts* Of course we know. You've been 'rewriting' them for years now.

Me: Well... Yeah, but... This time is different.

Bryin: Don't you say that every time?

Me: *Huffs* Okay, yes. I say that a lot, but I have a much more solid plan this time, and I'm satisfied with the start of this draft. Which leads me to what I really wanted to ask, how do you two feel about this draft?

Bryin: I don't like it. I think it's pretty awful.

Darvel: *Rolls his eyes* You're only saying that because you're not the only main character in this version, so now you have to share the spot light.

Bryin: What? That has nothing to do with it. I just think she's making things a lot more complicated than they should be.

Darvel: *Raises an eyebrow* Right...

Me: Look, Bryin there's no way I can make this book only about you, so you're just going to have to deal with that.

Darvel: If you made it only about Bryin you wouldn't have as much room to mess my life up even more, right?

Me: I'm not messing it up... Just... Tying up loose ends.

Darvel: You call making me into the villain in the first book tying up loose ends. *Huffs* Authors really are mental, aren't they.

Bryin: I don't know, Darvel. I know you weren't specifically a villain before, but I don't think she's changing much. The only differences are that you have a guy following you around all the time who's supposed to be your guard, but doesn't really like you, and now you can use magic. I think everything else is pretty much the same. At least you're not Vatan. His changes are worse than yours.

Darvel: Just shut up, Bryin. At least my reasons for disliking this whole rewrite are good ones. You just can't stand to lose all the attention you were getting before. You're such a loser.

Bryin: Says the villain. Just remember, the villains always lose in story of good and evil, so it's ovbious that I'm not the real loser here.

Darvel: *Glares quietly at Bryin, while reaching for a dagger*

Me: Well, that seems like a good place to stop! Heh... Thanks for reading. :)

Before Camp NaNo

Before NaNo begins, I usually try to get in a little bit of planning, world or character development, and then some actual writing done so that I'm not struggling to figure anything out right at the beginning. This time I haven't been able to do too much of that because work has kept me busy (and they added two extra days to my schedule this past two weeks... >.<), but I have at least been able to think a few things through, and make some decisions reguarding my story.

I'll be working on my rewrite of Takfin for this NaNo, so I honestly have no idea how it's going to turn out. I've never been very good at following through with rewrites, but I like the direction I'm going in at the moment.

But I'm making a lot of changes in the story over all. So it's taken a lot of thinking as far as how these changes effect the story later on, or even how it effcts the current story. So I figured I would list some of the differences partly for myself so I can keep track of them, and partly so anyone interested could see it.

The first change I've made is in the characters themselves. Bryin, Darvel, and the main antagonist, Vatan, are a lot different. Now for the twins I haven't completely changed their personalities, but some of the character development has been moved towards the beginning. I feel like I've given both of them more motivation, or development as far as their pasts are concerned. Almost like I've gone more in-depth into who they are. Hopefully. XD
As for Vatan, he's a lot younger then I planned for him to be originally. He's closer to the twin's ages and his motivation goes a lot further than just wanting to take over the world. He's much more a person than a villain this time around. And I think I'm a lot happier with that.

And speaking of characters, there was a newer character that I got the idea for late in the series. (Like in the book I'm currently working on now, which is book 7.) His name is Laine, and he's something of a personal guard to Darvel. Though, he actually hates Darvel and is responsible for most of Darvel's angry personality.

Next thing that's changed a lot is the plot as a whole. Darvel is introduced within the first three chapaters, whereas last time he wasn't introduced until about the second book and wasn't important until the third or fourth book. Since Darvel is one of my favorite characters, just like Bryin, I'm glad I figured out a way to bring him in earlier. I feel like he adds a lot to the story and to Bryin's character development as well.
Along with that the first book is going to take place in a new world that isn't Panin. In Darvel, Laine, and Vatan all team up (for their separate reasons) and attempt to get Bryin to hand Takfin to them. After a certain turn of events Laine gets frustrated and then tries to take Takfin away, but only causes them all to be stranded in a world that is unfamiliar to all of them. I feel like the first time I wrote this story, it was very focused on Bryin. Like the whole story was centered on him and there wasn't much else to it. But as I continued to write I added in different characters and stories and Bryin wasn't as important. Starting it like this I feel like I won't have to transition my focus to other characters, and instead it'll be about most of them as a whole. I don't know if that makes sense or not, though...

I think I would have written more of the rewrite if it hadn't been for the new world. I think I may have gotten stuck on ideas, or just didn't want to bother coming up with ideas for a new world, so I just didn't bother. But with NaNo coming up, I convinced myself to figure it all out, and along with that I even developed the magic of my books a little.

All in all, I'm pretty excited to see how much I can write, and where this new story takes me. Even if I had already written it once, everything is so different now, it really is like a new story.

Anyway, thanks for reading! If you have any questions or are curious about anything that I've mentioned, don't hesitate to ask! Also if anyone wants to read any short stories or anything on any of this just let me know. I may or may not feel up to posting a short scene with Darvel, Bryin, Laine, and Vatan in this new world if I can manage to get to that during NaNo. :D

Too Long

Hey! So, as the title suggests, I feel like it's been too long since I've blog. Lots of stuff happened last year, and my focus wasn't really on writing. But it is something I want to get back into, so here I am. :)

I haven't written a ton, obviously, but I've finally gotten a solid start on rewriting my first Wold of Panin book. I've actually lost count of the number of times I've restarted it, and I gave up for a while. But last month I wrote a start I was happy with, the only problem being that I changed a lot of the story. Actually, I change everything but the characters for the first book. XD But the important thing is that I'm making progress. And with Camp NaNo coming next month, I'm hoping to get most of it written so I can move on.

That being said, Camp NaNo is next month! I'm definitely not ready in the slightest, and I've been pretty busy, annnnd I don't have much free time either. But ever since finding out about NaNo, I've basically decided that I'm never not doing it, even if it's just Camp NaNo. (I actually like Camp NaNo more.) Anyway, so I am going to be doing that, and as a result I thought I might try blogging updates about it next month. I know I say a lot about what I'd like to do, or what I'm planning on doing and I almost never follow through, but since I miss writing and blogging, I'm hoping I won't forget about it this time. So, I think I'll try giving an update once or twice a week, Mondays or Fridays, or both, depending on how I feel.

Annnnnd... This has been a post about nothing... >.<

Because I haven't really said anything important, I'll go ahead and just post a little bit of what I managed to write. I was pretty pleased with the way the scene turned out, especially since Kent was originally just a background character I needed to fill the roll of typical bully, meaning he wasn't really adding much to the story. It's pretty different now, though he's still not a major character as far as the series goes, and he probably won't be in the book for more than three chapters if everything goes as planned... Anyway, here's a little scene. Sorry for not posting more often!
------

As they sat in the office waiting to see the principal, Bryin just stared at Kent.

“What?” Kent finally growled, glaring at the floor. “What do you want?”

“Why did you do that?” Bryin finally asked. “I was trying to help you. I’m the one who should have been in trouble, so why did you just go along with that like you were involved too?”

“Because there wasn’t any point in arguing.” Kent huffed, rolling his eyes. “She wasn’t going to change her mind, and it wouldn’t be right to distract everyone else by trying to argue. Which is exactly what you did.”

“Only because it wasn’t fair! Yeah, sure the other people might have been distracted, but she wasn’t failing them, so it didn’t matter.”

Sighing, Kent’s shoulders slumped dejectedly. “There’s no point in arguing with you either. It’s like talking to a wall… But… This wouldn’t be such a big deal if I wasn’t getting an automatic zero.”

Bryin nodded slowly, then stood up. “So this is bothering you… Well, I don’t want to give you any more reasons to hate me, so I’m going to go give her a piece of my mind. Maybe then she’ll at least give you credit for part of the test.”

Kent started to tell Bryin to sit down, but before he even got one word out Bryin was five steps down the hall. “You idiot!” Kent shot up from his seat and ran after Bryin, tackling him in the process. “You’re just going to make everything worse just like you always do!” He huffed once he had successfully pinned Bryin down. “Just… Just stop being so stupid!” He punched Bryin in the face as hard as he could, the pent-up anger all being released in a single action.

Bryin winced, being more hurt by Kent’s words than anything else. He opened his mouth to say something, though he wasn’t entirely sure what he wanted to say. But before he got a chance to say anything, a shadow fell over both of them.

“So you thought this would be a good way to make up for getting in trouble in class?” The principal asked, glaring down at them.

“I-it’s not what it looks like!” Kent said as he hurried to his feet. “I… I was just…”

“Enough.” The principal held up a hand and gestured to his office. “I’ll hear what you have to say in there. As for you…” He looked down to Bryin who was still on the ground. “I just got off the phone with your mother and she said she would be on her way to come get you in thirty minutes. Until then you are to sit in a chair and stay there.”

Bryin sat up and crossed his arms, frowning deeply. “No.” He mumbled, in a worse mood now that his mother was coming to get him. “I’m staying right here.”

The principal sighed. He didn’t want to leave Bryin sitting in the middle of the floor, but it was a miracle Bryin had agreed to sit still at all. “Fine… Just remember that if anything else happens, your mother will be hearing of it before you leave.”

And with that he and Kent went into the office.

When they had finally finished, Kent plopped back down in one of the chairs just outside the office and put his head in his hands. Bryin watched him, feeling bored out of his mind, and went over to him without a second thought.

“Are you alright?” Bryin asked quietly.

“Apparently, my brother is on his way here too…” Kent sighed. “Of all people he has to be the one coming to get me.”

Bryin tilted his head. “Why is he coming instead of one of your parents? And why is it a bad thing that he’s coming?”

“I don’t see how that’s any of your business.” Kent huffed, finally looking over at Bryin. After a moment he added, “My parents aren’t around, and my brother is my legal guardian. And… And I know he’s going to be disappointed with me, so I don’t really want to face him right now.”

“Oh… Yeah…” Bryin cast a glance towards the front doors to the school. “I know what you mean…”

“Mm.” Kent stared at Bryin for a long moment before grunting, “Look, I’m sorry for hitting you back there.”

“It’s fine.” Bryin said, waving a hand dismissively. The tone in his voice said that he didn’t care one way or the other. “But,” Bryin suddenly looked back to Kent, confusion written all over his face, “are you sure you’re alright? Because you’ve never apologized for anything, and especially not when it was my fault…”

“Just shut up!” Kent yelled, glaring at Bryin.

This only caused Bryin to nodded. “Oh, good, you really are yourself. I was getting worried you had been replaced by an alien or something.”

“Ugh, would you just quit already? I’m trying to be nice for once, and you’re not making this easy!”

“Nice?” Bryin snorted, and gave a bitter smile. “Why? Why would you even think about doing that? Don’t you hate me?”

“Because.” Kent looked away, digging his nails lightly into his arms. “Because even someone like you needs a friend sometimes.”

Thoughts?

I am so terrible at being consistent. >.< So I think my last post was last year, and I've basically been up to nothing since then. I'm really not busy whatsoever, other than work, so I don't have an excuse for not posting. But, I am curious about something...

How many people who actually reads my blog (or used to) would like me to continue? I'm thinking about working out an actual posting schedule so that I'll have a better deadline set up, but it'd be nice to know how many people actually want me to start posting again.

And, just because it's been awhile since I've updated what I've been working on... Nothing at the moment. >.< I mean I've managed to finish my sixth book in the world of Panin series, and started on the seventh, and I've also gotten a good idea on how I want to rewrite the first one, but I haven't done much writing this month or last month. And again, I have no excuse for not doing that. But I can never go long without writing, so I just need to stop watching anime all day and work up some motivation.

Oh, but I guess I do have a smallish excuse. My older sister left sometime last month, and since she's basically my other half, it was crazy to think that she'd be leaving. Ever since she told me that she'd gotten an internship at Disney World, it was hard to imagine her being gone for like seven months. So, I think that's played a part in my lack of motivation. *Nods* Yep, sounds good. I'll just blame her. ;)

Anyway, I'll try to come up with an actually post, and post it on Monday. (No promises) If I can work it out, I'd like to write the scene where Calix first meets Phoenix. I know I haven't shown a lot, or anything at all, about these two, but I imagine the scene will be cute...

Yeah... So it would be awesome if you guys let me know if you want to see more, and if not... I don't really care. I'm still gonna post stuff if I can come up with ideas. XP Thanks for reading!

Christmas Tag

Alright, so now that I'm on break, I've gotten pretty lazy... And I really should attempt to do more with this now, but I keep forgetting... But! I am doing a tag now. Leilani Sunblade was nice enough to tag me, and so I'll go ahead and answer the questions now. (Oh, and thanks so much for tagging me, Leilani. :D I love answering these. :) )

Alright, so, first question...

What is your favourite Christmas treat?
Hmm... I really don't know... I guess rice krispies treats and most of the cookies that my mom and sisters make around the holidays. I also make a no bake chocolate oatmeal cookie that has slowly become my favorite. (Normally, people make it with peanut butter, but my family doesn't since my sister's allergic to peanuts.)

Are there any special traditions that your family has to celebrate Christmas?
Maybe? I don't know when, but somewhere along the line my family started the tradition of going over to my grandma and grandpa's house for Christmas Eve to eat dinner and just hang out. We also open any gifts we have from our extended family members. And we also bake a lot of cookies... XD

How do you normally celebrate Christmas?
 Well, first we do the thing at my grandparents house, then on Christmas morning is is a tradition for my younger sisters, (their twins, so they're often refer to as the twins...) the twins, to wake me up, as well as the youngest two. Then we all go through our stockings, which is basically the only thing we're allowed to look through. XD Then, after we've finally managed to pull our parents and the oldest out of bed, we start opening the gifts under the tree. Once that's done, we clean up the mess we made while opening everything, and start thinking about making breakfast. And then basically we mess around with our gifts for the rest of the day and do nothing... Though, we usually watch movies of some sort, because that's a big thing in our family. Last year we went to the theaters, and other years we've rented movie.

Do you enjoy getting presents for your friends and family? Do you buy your gifts or go the homemade route?
Since the first time that my older sister and I have had money around Christmas time, we've been buying gifts for our family. We actually finished our Christmas shopping yesterday. :D I'm not that great at making gifts, so I always just buy them. And, I LOVE buying things for my family. Seriously, it's like the best thing ever. :D (Sometimes I do get gifts for my friends, but I have a big family, so my sister and I often don't have extra money to do that. But this year my two best friends, my two youngest sisters, and I (We're all friends) did a secret santa sort of thing where the gifts were homemade. I drew my friend a picture which she hung on her wall. XD And that was pretty fun.)

Is it cold where you live? Have you ever had a white Christmas?
.... I live in a desert... I've had maybe one white Christmas, maybe? But yeah... Where I live, it's generally not that cold. It usually doesn't get below like... 28 degrees (Fahrenheit) where I live... So it's not really that cold. Of course, we also live semi close to mountains, and it's not unusual for it to snow there.

What’s on your Christmas list this year?
Honestly, not much. XD I'm finding that I don't really want a whole lot of stuff any more... Either that, or the stuff I want is super expensive so I won't ask for it.  My list is also very general... It consists of books, anime stuff, notebooks, and boots.

What’s your favourite Christmas song?
Ooh... Weeeellll... I really like Theocracy's Wynter Fever. Just because it's awesome. XD But, I also like Carol of the Bells by most anyone, and I've also listened to Pentatonix's Chistmas album a lot as well.

What is your favourite Christmas memory?
I'm not sure I have one specific one, but I always love going to my grandma's house for the Christmas Eve thing... Oh, but now that I think of it, I do have a favorite one. XD Last year, my sisters, parents, and I were getting ready to leave, and we were taking a family picture and everything and ended up being really hyper. (That's always fun because we all end up laughing for hours. XD) Anyway, after that we left and we were being all crazy. So we had a very interesting ride back to our house. :D But once we got home, I stood up and saw that I had been sitting on a cookie the whole ride home. (We took some of the stuff home with us.) XD I told my sisters, and we somehow ended the conversation with my being able to poop cookies... XD My family has a pretty weird sense of humor, but I thought  it was funny and laughed for a whole five minutes. But of course, I wanted the twins to hear about it, because they had already gone inside the house at that point. So I burst into their bedroom, exclaiming very loudly that I could poop cookies, but they simply stared at me like I was interrupting something. I was confused until one of the twins turned her phone around, and I realized they had been video chatting someone... So I left their room, laughing even harder. XD Strange memory, but I like it.

What does your Christmas Tree look like?
Here's a picture. :)

The presents under there are mostly the ones I just bought yesterday. :D

What are you reading in December? (Anything festive?)

Well I started The Tournament at Gorlan (The Early Years) by John Flanagan back in November after my grandma bought it for me for my birthday. I'm not finished yet, but I'm almost done. (And it's soooo epic, by the way. XD)

Buuut, I'm not reading anything else, and not something festive.

Are you an organised little elf or are you still shopping/preparing on Christmas Eve?

XD I'm not organized in the slightest. But generally I'm done before Christmas Eve. Other than finishing touches and things like that.

How early do you start to get into the Christmas spirit?

As soon as Halloween is over. XD Christmas is awesome, and I'm not overlooking Thanksgiving, I just love Christmas stuff. :)

Do you make any Christmas crafts? Decorations? Send physical Christmas cards?

Not really... I sometimes make cards and things like that, but it's not really my thing.

What’s the menu for Christmas Day?!

Umm... Turkey? Normally we don't have anything fancy for dinner, but after Thanksgiving we ended up with a lot of Turkey and I think that's what we'll be having this year.

What makes it FEEL like Christmas for you? (Weather, specific tradition, food, smell, person, etc.?)

Ooh. When it gets chilly enough to use a jacket and occasionally my big jacket. And then when my family and other houses put up lights and decorations, and there aren't any leaves on the trees any more, annnd when I smell cookies baking, that's what makes everything feel like Christmas. :D

Do you have relatives coming? Excited? Nervous?

Nope. My other grandma (Not the one who we visit on Christmas Eve) used to live in Arizona, but a couple of years ago she moved in with my family, so we don't ever have relatives visit for Christmas anymore...

What famous Christmas character do you most identify with? (Scrooge, Elf, Tiny Tim, the Grinch, Santa, etc.)

Lol... Let's just say the Grinch. XD

If you were to start a new Christmas tradition, what would it be?

Heh... I don't know that I would start a new one... I like everything the way it is now.

What Christmas movies do you like to watch this time of year or what’s your favorite?

Elf is probably my favorite/the one we always watch, as well as the Grinch. Then there are the older ones that we usually watch, but haven't this year, like Year Without Santa Clause, Frosty the Snowman... Movies like that I guess.

What’s your favorite Christmasy book or book with a favorite Christmasy part?

Heh... I actually don't think I have one... 

Annnnnd... I may or may not tag people later, but seeing as it's late already and I'm pretty tired, I'm just going to leave it like this for now. Buuut, if you're reading this and want to do the tag, feel free! :D And let me know if you do it so I can see your answers! Thanks for reading! :)

Crazy Character Questions (Plus Updates)

Alright, so I'm going to go ahead and post the video Cloaklover and I did (we made it like, last month actually), but first I'll go ahead and let you guys know what's been going on. I really had intended on posting short stories and things like that, but I just never managed it because of school and frustrating things like that. But now I'm on break and I have more time to write and post stuff here! :D

NaNo didn't work out as well as I had hoped, and I failed pretty terribly. Though, I already guessed that's what would happen, and I'm not too disappointed. Though, now that it's over and I haven't really spent much time actually writing my NaNo project, I'm putting that one on hold to go back to Bryin's story. (He's pretty happy about that. XD) And I'm hoping that I can finish the sixth book before school starts up again, as well as start the seventh book. But we'll see how it goes...

As for the short stories and the map, I'll get to posting those as soon as I can. It sort of depends on if I can pry myself away from Bryin's main story again now that I've started back up, and I'm finally getting to the middle/ending of it.

Ooh, and I'm planning on making a couple posts on my art blog soon as well, and it'd be awesome if you checked those out! :D

Annnnd, now. Here's the video!

What did you think of the questions, or my answers? Let me know what you think! Thanks for reading/watching! :D

Oh! I also put up a new poll question!