With holidays finally over and the decorations put away (well, mostly) it’s time to get back to being a productive author. Unless I have a deadline looming, my writing usually gets shoved aside around Thanksgiving in favor of school holiday activities, Christmas shopping, decorating and general merry-making. But now without the soft-glow of twinkle lights to distract me, it’s time to roll up my sleeves and get back to work.
This is the first time in my career as an author that I am faced with starting a project not related to my YA series and I gotta day, it feels a bit like running in traffic naked. While I have quite a few projects that I’m eager to start, I’ve grown extremely comfortable in Dani Truehart’s popstar world complete with the characters I know and a built-in audience. But much like a well-crafted story, life isn’t very interesting if everything is calm and happy. We love the angst of conflict, the stress of not knowing whether the characters will succeed or fail, and the triumph of a battle well won.
Top Gun Maverick wouldn’t have been very interesting if the entire Air Force was behind Tom Cruise from the jump and his team destroyed those unsanctioned uranium enrichment plants without a hitch. Those poignant flashbacks of Goose and all the opportunities that were lost with his death, the bittersweet reunion with an ailing Ice Man, Maverick’s fraught relationship with Rooster…plus those death-defying flying scenes! The delicious tension of Maverick’s fates (career, love, Rooster’s friendship) hanging in the balance were cruicial for that movie.
So its times like these when I stand at a crossroad scared and stressed, that I try to remind myself that the unknown is just a part of life. Instead of dawdling indecisively at the intersection of change, worrying about which road will lead to success, I’ve got to make a decision and take that first step down the path to get my writing back on track.
So next week, I’ve cleared my schedule. I’ll be back in front of my sparkly pink laptop, building the script for the Dani Truehart television treatment. I’ll be taking it one page at a time (or sentence, or word…). I admit that it’s kind of a cheat that my new project is one that I’m so familiar with, but I’ve never written a television treatment on my own before so there is still plenty to learn. It’s both intimidating and exciting. Plus, I know a great writer who can help guide me once I’m ready to edit (Jimmy, that’s you).
While I’m working on the treatment I’ll also be researching my next two projects. I’m itching to get started on another book, but I know I need to complete this treatment first, ideally before the third book comes out in spring. So for now, in-between script writing, I’ll settle for researching topics like gnomes, the arrest procedures and penal codes for the city of Los Angeles and dragons. And if you’re a transgender woman who would like to educate this author on your experience in modern society, I’d love to listen.
It’s a pretty diverse range of topics which is what makes these new projects intriguing and more than a little frightening. It’s a big risk to write outside my known genre, but it’s something I want to explore because these stories keep tugging at my imagination.
So if I don’t pick up the phone or answer a text between the hours of 9am-2pm most week days, know that I’m probably at my computer, tapping away at the keys. Hoping 2023 is productive and successful for everyone!
Happy Tuesday💻📚