Forty years later…

It’s been a thousand years since I posted something here. Well, just over one year, but still. Many many many thoughts for so long, and very little brain power to string them into cohesive sentences. So many things going on in the world, in our country, in our state, our town, our homes, our lives.

You don’t need my two cents on any of it. So, here’s what’s new:

If you don’t already, please consider checking out my Instagram and YouTube channels. Just search for carolesenn. I post original songs, videos about my spiritual journey, and discussions about my family’s life with autism.

Also, if you enjoy wrestling and podcasts, please check out WrestleLifeRadio wherever you get your podcasts. My husband, brother-in-law, and cousin-in-law host it, and my sister-in-law and I are occasional guests.

Also also, I play Dungeons and Dragons now. Like a lot of Dungeons and Dragons. And when I’m not playing Dungeons and Dragons, I’m wishing I was playing Dungeons and Dragons. I need one of those “I’d rather be” bumper stickers. I’m involved in two different campaigns and enjoy DMing one-shots. I’m considering starting a D&D page on this blog where I share short stories I write from the games we play. I love to write follow-ups or journal entries by my characters to share with other players. So nothing for you to read right now, but hopefully soon.

Also thirdly, please please please check out my new Wattpad profile: DayzeeJayne! I’m posting a fanfiction fantasy, steampunk, fluff piece that I’m currently writing called Because He Met Her: In Which Jack Dandy Acquires a Little Sister. It’s the first time I’ve ever shared a WIP, and I’m really excited about it.

Here’s the link, or you can download the Wattpad app for free and search for me:

https://embed.wattpad.com/story/234444062

In all this chaos, ki eezane, be safe my dears,

Carole/Carlyn/Calyse/DayzeeJayne/Carry/Miss Cinnamon/Miss Zen/Carle/Carloe/Crole

To wake, perchance to live.

To live, perchance to write something super important and revolutionary and influential and…at least half-way interesting to the average fourth grader.

I made the mistake of telling my students that, in addition to my completed adult sci-fi novel, I’m also working on several ideas for children’s novels. Notice, I said ideas, not completed works. Now, every time they come to library class or see me in the hallways, they ask, “Is your book finished yet?” which inevitably prompts another student who has yet to hear of this phenomenon to ask, “What book?” This is how rumors get started, friends!

So, I guess I better finish writing something for these kids before they bust. Currently, I’m working on a story targeted at ages 9-14 that takes place in the same universe as my sci-fi novel, If I Should Wake. It stars a young boy named Fox, an orphan from the planet Bennett who finds himself swept up into a world of space pirating, new friends, and new enemies. The problem? I don’t know. I have no idea. No clue. I don’t know what the rest of the story is about yet…so when my fourth graders ask me if my book is finished yet, I say, “Not yet, honey, but maybe by the time you leave for middle school.”

I also have an idea going for a book written by a young superhero sidekick. It’s journal-style, think Diary of a Wimpy Kid. It’s about what it’s like to be a superhero, or at least the Sidekick of a Hero, when you’re only a ten-ish year old girl and your best friend is a boy. Introversion, villains, awkwardness, super powers, etc, etc, etc (Props if you heard Yul Brynner’s voice in your head just now). Again, I have no idea yet where the story wants to go. Just an idea. When I told my students about both books and asked them which they thought I should focus on first, they said, “Make them one story!” Right! Yeah, I can totally do that…

Wake up, and write something, Mrs. Senn!

In the meantime, a little Patronnian to enrich your evening…

Sha ethwinn: I live

 

“The word count is too long.”

“The word count is too long.”

And a small part of my heart shriveled up and died.

Of course I had known that 160,000 words was too long. But…

So began the soul-searching, heart-wrenching, make-me-wish-I-actually-knew-what-I-was-doing-when-I-started-this process of cutting out at least 40,000 if not 60,000 words from my novel.

And somehow…I did it. Hacked it to pieces. Read and re-read and changed so many things that I have trouble recognizing it as the same story I started writing almost 6 years ago.

And yet…

In the process, I realized things like, “Yeah, that is unnecessarily wordy,” or, “You know, that character wouldn’t really respond that way,” or, “That’s cliché and boring,” or, “This scene does nothing to move the story forward.”

I also found words and phrases that I apparently really like and used way too many times without even realizing. For example, people tend to do a lot of “storming out” of rooms. But no longer! Now, we’re confrontational, we stay and fight it out, and we like it. Well…some of us don’t like it. But that just adds to the conflict, which makes things more fun. Win win.

It’s interesting to see how the writer I was 6 years ago has evolved. If I had started this story today, it wouldn’t be the same story at all. Some of the things I wrote years ago are things that I would never write today.

Now, I’m in the process of revising one last (ha ha) time before I start submitting to literary agents.

With a little luck and a whole lot of hope, we might just be the proud parents of a bouncing baby book one day.

ki eezane