Planning to make my way through the following TBR over July and August:
Salem’s Lot, Ghost Girl Banana (book club), She is a Haunting, Fairy Tale, When Women Were Dragons, Deraciné (Uprooted in French).
Snowfall Serialization: Horror Short Fiction
There will hopefully be 2 or 3 more instalments of the Snowfall story (featured in Dark Sire in October 2022) with more snow-covered forests, eerie alpine winds, a dead raven, a girl looking for magic and something ancient and undead lurking in the dark.
Organization & Accountability
2023 Q3 GOALS
I can’t quite believe we’re almost halfway through 2023!
If you’re anything like me you may be starting to panic - will you actually finish your draft, will you get your edits done? How are you going to complete everything and keep up with your kids’ schedueles? It’s the end of year madness here - birthday parties, school events, everything and everyone seems to want to cram in an activity in June.
I’ve decided that I need to start being more realistic with my planning. I usually try to take on too much and end up starting MANY things and finishing ZERO. It’s frustrating to be so easily distracted and have your time, energy and focus pulled in so many directions. Creating anything takes time and FOCUS (and a degree of solitude those around you might not really respect or understand).
Inspired by Sarra Cannon’s HB90 Method, I’m going to try and be more realistic about the time I actually have when setting my goals for Q3.
I have 2 young kids and a parent with health issues so carving out time has been particularly challenging over the past 6 months. I’m hoping posting more regularly on Twitter and blogging here will help to keep me more accountable in tracking my goals.
So, here we go, Q3 Goals:
Finish YA Horror Draft by 31.08.2023 (This is a rewrite, I’ve got about 30k of a garbage fire draft out of 70k at the moment).
Reading TBR: Salem’s Lot, Ghost Girl Banana (book club), She is a Haunting, Fairy Tale, When Women Were Dragons, Deraciné (Uprooted in French).
Finish EoE Book 2 by 30.09.2023 (We’ve got about 30k drafted out of 50k at the moment).
Complete 5 Illustations by 30.09.2023 (This will be a challenge for me!).
Complete Horror Short Story (Snowfall) Serialization by 30.09.2023.
Sleep MORE!
Reduce Caffeine and Sugar (Honestly the thing I dread the most as a chocoholic!).
I plan to start posting an accountability thread on Twitter in July, if you’d like to join me in sticking to your goals over the next 3 months you can use the hashtag #art4accountability.
Wishing you a great, productive, sun-soaked summer!
Pen Names...
Mara who?
I am a big fan of pen names but I admit choosing (and explaining) one can be a little awkward.
For people who know you, the question, 'Why not just use your name?' inevitably comes up. Your friends complain it's difficult for them to find your work, others want to know what’s the story behind the name you’ve chosen.
The more I realize just how finite my time and energy are, the more effort it feels like writing under two different names. (I write non-fiction under my real name, you can check it out here.) Anyhoo, here is the story behind my pen name if anyone’s wondering…
Mara was the name of a character in one of the first short stories I wrote. I shelved the story, but the name stuck with me.
I'm very picky about choosing names in general, for my characters, for my kids; I'm afraid of burdening them with a name that will ill-serve them - one ladened with stereotypes or one that will force them to repeat themselves several times - or be stuck with unfortunate nicknames. It's so much responsibility! Mara felt safe for my character - it's a versatile name - present across countries and cultures - it means a variety of things - from 'bitter' to 'woman' to 'joy’, all important words in my opinion! It's reasonably easy to pronounce. It doesn't draw attention to itself. It's ambiguous. It could be from many places. Hence my decision to choose it as my pen name and this website - where I endeavour to post art, stories and general rambling without too much self-critiquing or judgment. A free space.
There you go, the decision behind Mara. The rest of my name is my own. The stress of thinking up a first name was honestly enough for me!
Snowfall
Was very excited to have my short story Snowfall published in the Halloween edition of Dark Sire Mag. Happy my creepy little story found a home in this issue focused on the DARK FOREST.
The Eye of the Ocean 1
The Eye of the Ocean - - Collaborative Project Launching June 2021
Photo by Matheo JBT on Unsplash
I’m thrilled to be a part of a very exciting collaborative project - The Eye of the Ocean is an illustrated novel and highly crafted deck of playing cards designed by Lorenzo G. at Stockholm 17.
Check out the promotional material here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/requiemcards/the-eye-of-the-ocean
Finishing
“Try again. Fail again. Fail better.”
Starting is easy. Finishing, not so much.
I’m planning to use this space to upload work, keep myself accountable and override the perfectionist in my head.
Art is a process, not a product.
So, here’s mine…
