Fiction

“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.”  –Annie Dillard, The Writing Life

 

That quote marked a turning point in my writing life, so many years ago. I realized I couldn’t be a writer unless I was writing. And so began an ardent journey to reverse engineer my goals into the daily steps that lead there.

It was around that same time that I began writing an annual holiday short story to give away as gifts. Later that same year I started work on a novel inspired by a set of travel ads run by Kindle. Over the years, I wrote seven drafts and submitted it two coaches, who both said, in very different ways: this story doesn’t work.

Writing fiction is my BIG DREAM. One does not give up on the big dream. One keeps going.

My current fiction WIP is a YA Urban Fantasy novel about a teenaged boy who is waiting on a second liver transplant but gets literally stuck in a book. I began it in April 2018 and put it in the proverbial fridge in October 2018, to let the completed outline marinate and so I could focus through the end of the year on three other major works:

  • the book proposal, interviews and research for my creative nonfiction book
  • book launch marketing in advance of The Brave Learner, by Julie Bogart of Brave Writer,  CEO of the company where I work
  • Co-authoring a book on the Plot Clock, a plotting concept designed by Joyce Sweeney and Jamie Morris

I spend my days writing, working for a writing company, and editing and planning writing. I hope crafting award winning fiction becomes a more active part of that someday, but for now, it seems I’ve been tasked with other pursuits.