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I've been thinking about Transcendence a lot lately. It's been over four months of querying already, which is hard to believe. Publishing is a slow industry, and I know this is just the start of the journey, but it's still not going quite like I had hoped. So yesterday sent me soul searching. 

In the back of my mind, I always knew there were a couple select artistic choices that some beta readers weren't 100% on board with as well as my own general feeling that my writing just isn't as strong compared to some others. That second one, I mostly chock up to being too close to the project. After reading it eighty times, anything will start to lose its luster, and readers did love the thing...

but the fact is that if I'm not catching the eyes of agents, there's little hope of getting it in front of readers in a big way. 

So, back to the drawing board. I think I'm going to pump the querying breaks briefly and pause to run through another line edit. That's not to say I haven't already been through this countless times, but I'm going to give this one more major polish before I leave this up to everyone else.

Wish me luck!

Querying, querying, querying...

I recently got some more input from my critique group and my editor, and I revamped my query letter before sending out another batch to a handful of agents I'm really excited about. Sending those out always feels like wishing on a dandelion and scattering the seeds to the far-flung reaches of cyberspace, just hoping to land in the right place at the right time. 

In other news, we took the kiddos to Arizona for some sunshine over spring break. It was a great retreat from the cold and snow. Let's hope that translates to some motivation to keep Ascendance rolling forward while I wait for these queries to do their thing!

In January, I found myself busy, busy, busy. As my writing group says, I was "making progress on words," and that's a great thing! They just weren't all my words. 

Querying continues. Slow and steady!

I'm still working to wrap my head around Ascendance, my prequel to Transcendence. I think I'm almost there. I just need to get that engine push-started, and I'll be barreling through the first draft. 

But most of my month was spent beta reading THREE books for awesome fellow authors. They all took the time to read early drafts of Transcendence and help me make it so much more than it was, and they all managed to come to me at the same time! Ha ha. First was James's middle grade/young adult fantasy. Then came John's sci-fi romance reimagining. And I just finished up Elizabeth's fantasy romance! These were all so fun, and I'm eager to someday shout about their books from the rooftops, because they've got great things in store for you all once they publish!

I'm feeling refreshed, energized, and inspired coming out of January, and all that is going to be poured into Ascendance. (Sorry, light sci-fi book... you'll have to wait.)

Happy new year, everyone! Here's hoping for a year full of family, friends, good health, and happiness. 

With that, it's time for the obligatory new year's resolution!

Considering it took me three years to complete the first draft of Transcendence, and fourth year to get through the second draft, and fifth year to get through the third and fourth full overhauls, I'm eager to improve my dedication to this craft as well as my consistency and speed. With three young kids and a full-time day job, I'll never be one to rapid release even one book per year, but I can surely write basically every day. 

My personal goal this year is to write an average of one page per day - that's about 250 words. After a year, that adds up to 90,000 words, which is basically a full novel. For reference - the first draft of Transcendence ended up at 80,000, and after a lot of edits, it currently sits at about 105,000. A page is such a small chunk, but it really is about "how to eat an elephant." One page at a time. 

Anyway, wish me luck! Right now, I'm back to looking at Ascendance (the prequel to Transcendence with a whole different cast of characters, but a story line that's just been hinted at previously). 

Best of luck with your own goals for 2024!

It should come as no surprise that my queries (so far) are still floating somewhere out in cyberspace. I understand querying can be a very long, not to mention difficult, process. It is all about getting that perfectly tailored letter to the right person and it popping to the top of their stack on the day they are in the mood for it. Fingers crossed, especially as things hopefully pick up after the holiday season!

In the meantime, I've been straying a bit from the Alaerian lands of Transcendence and Ascendance and toying with a new idea. For the time being, this concept of a generation ship and terraforming has caught my interest. But even though I am an engineer, and Andy Weir makes my jaw drop with every one of his books, this won't be a HARD sci-fi, if I complete it. Expect just as much adventure and shenanigans as with Transcendence... just maybe on a slightly different backdrop.

And speaking of Transcendence and Ascendance, I stumbled across R. A. Salvatore about a week ago only to find 1) he totally published novels with these titles about 20 years ago, and 2) he's going to be re-releasing them in 2024. I had honestly never heard of these, and when I was first researching my proposed titles years ago, these were nowhere on the radar. *headdesk* Now, I'm facing the realization that I may end up having to rename mine. But who knows... 

I'm so thrilled to announce that Transcendence is ready to query! For the non-author folks out there, that means that the manuscript is complete and perfected to the best of my ability, and now it's time to see if there is a literary agent out there who's interested in representing me and hopefully selling my book to a publishing house. After working on the project with just my editor and sharing with only a handful of (amazing) beta readers, it's so strange to throw it out there to the world. 

There's no knowing how quickly I may hear anything from anyone, but stay tuned! 

And then there's Ascendance. While writing Transcendence, the historical backstory of the world and the events surrounding a specific watershed moment really took shape in my notes. Characters formed, and their story needs to be told. I'm in the very beginning of the process, but I'm hopeful that things will snowball for me as they did with Transcendence. Once I got rolling and really discovered the characters, it was like they were leading the way, and I was just along for the ride.