The last few months have been crazy busy for me, and while they've been productive in some ways (pleasantly so!), they haven't always been as productive in ways that I wished them to be. Such is life. Ever-onward!
Art Updates
At the end of May, after an absolutely wonderful excursion to Lightning in a Bottle with a close friend, I returned home and had to put our young cat down. Over just a few days he'd developed the onset of Wet FIP, which is a terminal illness, and we were not expecting our furry companion, who was just a year old, would have to leave us so soon. In the wake of this tragedy, I started sculpting a memorial piece I plan to give to my mother.
It's a quite a bit different than my usual sculptures, but it will be a freestanding lattice hummingbird with a saddle, who is taking our dear kitty, Augie, skywards onto their next great adventure. I have a short story that will accompany the sculpture once it's finished as well, but in the meantime I hope you enjoy some of the work in progress shots of the sculpture leading up to where it now stands.
It's not quite done yet, but the sculpture part is getting close. The sculpture includes real amazonite gemstone eyes for the hummingbird, a labradorite on her chest, and then glass eyes for the kitty.
More Art Created with The Help of One or More Reviewed Products
The last few months have been a mix of many things, and by and large, I've actually been regularly creating a decent amount of what I'd consider "smaller" art pieces. Many of these were the results of needing to review items and art supplies for sellers, and I've been having a lot of fun with them! In particular, I've enjoyed the more stylistic creatures I've been creating in one sitting. They aren't my usual style, but I really have loved creating them! I haven't done a lot of work on my bigger projects aside from the hummingbird, but I do home to make some headway with my "Sashah's Song" sculpture over the next few months too.
I'm not going to link all the reviews (since that isn't the purpose of this blog), but if you have questions on any particular ones, just let me know and I'd be more than happy to let you know! The captions below list what materials were being reviewed for each piece.
Novel Progress
After spending the last two years or so working diligently on
Secrets of an Accord, which I'd intended to be a sort of origin story for how two main characters in the series got to know each other, I realized that all my careful planning was for naught because this really was the third book in the series, and the more I though about it, the more I realized it would be silly to publish this particular novel ahead of other novels, only to follow them with prequels.
So over the last few months I've been working to find a nice stopping point for myself on that book (which is quite far along), so that I could take a step back and look at the novels and stories I'd planned as part of a greater series and reorganize everything and start re-planning things so that there was a better overall flow.
So far that has been going quite well! I don't have a lot to tangibly show for my planning aside from a bunch of notes on note-cards and bits and pieces in my private wiki and Scrivener documents, but things are slowly moving forward, and I've finally gotten to the point that I can resume work in earnest on the first book of the series. Thankfully, it's a story that's already gone through two full drafts, and while there are undoubtedly changes as I move forward, it felt really nice and comfy opening up an old Scrivener document and finding a completed outline looking at me at the ready:
The Apprentice of Rook.
It's also been fun (and challenging!) trying to pin down some of the overall flow of the novels, but at this point, there looks to be around eight of them, but who knows how much that will change as I push them forward.
Tentatively, this is what I've named and numbered them (all of which are subject to (undoubtedly) change):
- Book One: The Apprentice of Rook
- Book Two: Crystalline Whispers
- Book Three: Secrets of an Accord
- Book Four: Song of the Wild Ones
- Book Five: Hand of the Lion
- Book Six: Journey to the White Forest
- Book Seven: Rising Storm
- Book Eight: Claws of Fortune
But, well, that's where things stand as they are! I'm pressing forward with The Apprentice of Rook and will be working on this third version of the text for the next few months, and will continue onward and upward! While I will still be doing some Amazon reviews, I'm also trying to review less on a weekly basis to ensure I have enough time to really sink myself into my writing, and I'm hopeful so far! I've been getting up early each morning to get a few hours of writing in before work, and it's been absolutely wonderful to keep those creative vibes flowing on a regular basis.
Thank you again for joining me on this journey, and I hope you have a wonderful week!
