Update | Running Out of Time

June 6, 2022June 5, 2022 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ Leave a comment

“One part at a time, one day at a time, we can accomplish any goal we set for ourselves.”

— Karen Casey

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Update time!!! I have no idea what I’m doing. I haven’t even drawn up June in my bullet journal yet, which means, in my mind, it hasn’t really started.

I’m still chasing deadlines. When I planned my year, I told my lovely writing buddies that I didn’t want to be sitting in June and July and panic over the three deadlines I have given myself in July. I would have to make sure to write at least one, hopefully, two, of those stories earlier on so there wouldn’t be any stress… Guess what! I haven’t written any of them. I’m starting now! But that means I’ll have to do a lot of words these next coming weeks if I’m gonna make it, and my head isn’t really with me. I’m sure it’ll be fine, but my attention span is flaky, and there is a lot of worry in my personal life. My mother in law isn’t doing well, and it’s hard. It is what it is, though, and we’ll just have to make the best of what we have.

Since the last update post, I’ve written 39.833 words. A pretty good month, if you ask me. It leaves me on a total of 147.208 words so far in 2022, which is 58.88% done of the 250.000 words I said I’d do.

If I keep the same pace as I have so far, I’ll be done with the 250.000 words on November 1st. My daily average is 943 words. I guess I could do better there, but a lot is going into this that doesn’t add any words.

So far so good. Now I just need to make the deadlines LOL

Update | Change of Plans

May 2, 2022May 2, 2022 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ Leave a comment

“Success in life is not how well we execute Plan A; it’s how smoothly we cope with Plan B.”

– Sarah Ban Breathnach

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It’s update time and my plan has gone to hell LOL Part of me is relieved. I was supposed to have submitted a Hugs or Kisses story by the end of last month, but… I was writing, and I was in a great flow, and then I hit 11k and the either-or stories have a max limit of 12k and I was nowhere near the end. So I emailed JM and said I won’t be able to do it.

I would’ve loved to continue on that story but since I still have other deadlines, I put it aside for now. I’ll get back to it later because I really liked writing it, and I’m 11.322 words in, so…

I haven’t decided if this means I won’t do the either-or stories or not. Since I’ve written them all as a series it would feel weird to jump ahead, though they are pretty much standalone so I guess I could. We’ll see.

Right now, I’m writing on a Dozen story. It doesn’t have a title yet – I hate when stories don’t have a title, there will always be some panicked moments right before it’s time to submit it when I desperately try to come up with something. Anyway, JMS Books is turning 12 in July, so there will be a lot of stories that have something to do with 12, much like we did when JMS Books turned 9. I wrote Nine Stones then 😄

And after that, I’ll tackle Holly’s August story. We’re moving forward, people!

Since the last update post, I’ve written 25 092 words, which brings me up to 111 988 words so far this year. I’m 42.95% done, though we’ll see about that. I think I’ll need more than the 250 000 words I’ve written as my goal to get all the stories done. Time will tell. If I keep the same speed I have now, I’ll have written 250 000 words by November 25 – I think I’ll need them sooner than that LOL

Read Around the Rainbow | Weird Internet Searches

April 29, 2022April 29, 2022 ~ Ofelia Gränd ~ 24 Comments

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It’s time for the second Read Around the Rainbow post! The theme this time is internet searches. Countless times, I’ve been chatting with author friends, and we’ve all been muttering about how we hope the police won’t ever check our search history, so I know I’m not alone in thinking that LOL Shall we dive in?

Weird Internet Searches

Everyone googles… I bet those who write historical stories google a lot of legit things. I’m so in awe of those authors because I would never have the patience to fact check. And I’ll let you in on a little secret. The reason I often write paranormal is that I make the rules. I create a world; I set the rules, and no one can tell me I’ve got my facts wrong. The main reason is of course that I like it, but I would lie if I said the freedom and the minimal research weren’t part of it.

But, when you have rampant werewolves running around, strewing bodies left and right, you need to know a little about what’s happening to those bodies. Even when werewolves rule the story, some things have to match our world or the reader would feel lost.

Death Some time back, A.L. Lester and I were talking about bodies, so I sent her the link to a blog post I wrote many years ago. I had a quick glance at it now, and I was a little confused because I researched how long someone would survive in an air-tight room, the signs of suffocation and so on, but I don’t mention that in the blog post, so it must’ve been at another occasion.

Anyway, the internet searches… Have you ever looked at body farms?? They bury bodies or parts of bodies and research what happens. Some are left in the open, some a buried, and the scientists dig them up at different stages of death to have a look.

I’m so glad that’s not my job!

The blog post I wrote is a cheat sheet of the different stages of death. It took me to several weird sites around the internet. Several.

Last summer, there was a run-over magpie on the road outside the church in the village. It was a sweltering day and the smell… I walked past and thought to myself that I should memorise it so I could add it to a story if I’ll ever need the stench of a dead magpie – weird writer brain, I know – but it’s impossible to put words on. I hurried along, holding my breath because yuck! Also, where are the foxes when you need them? They hunt my hens, so why can’t they clean up the dead birds? Normally, they do a pretty good job of that, so it must’ve been that there had been too many people around for them to get close.

Anyway, let’s leave death behind us and see what the others have been googling: