Weekly Writing Check-In (2/12/23)
Tinder Saint Progress:
* 6 of 15 chapters complete.
* word count: 18k (projected: 40k)
An excerpt, with some lore building.
“Rashad wasn’t completely wrong. Almost every Ilazkin text had some story or another in it, but there’s layers. The story of Shahsu and Maran is about parts being separated, and bringing them back together. Under it is the construct of the soul.”
He knelt at the center of the room, and was rewarded by the symbol he was looking for. He brushed his hand over it, feeling the raised edges around it. “This one is the whole.” He waved Jinan over. “Wait here.”
Once Vahn saw the path, it was easy to follow. “The soul wasn’t a single thing to the ancients. It had parts.” He found a second panel on the opposite wall. “This one is self. Suad?”
They approached, wary but grudgingly willing. “Is there more?”
Vahn crossed the room to the panel that Rashad had originally found. With the flames illuminating it at the right angle, it was exactly as it had been before.
“What’s that?” Suad asked.
Vahn smiled to himself. He remembered the light slanting through the windows and how the shadows darkened the annoyed knit of Kanna’s brow. “She couldn’t really figure out what to call it.” He tilted his head to the side, studying the lines. “I guess ‘gift’ is pretty close. But…”
“What would you call it?” Sita prompted.
Vahn had almost forgotten she was there. “Instinct might be closer.”
🎵 A Shell In The Pit's Rings in Rings in Rings
This week I managed to be more productive than I have been in recent times, finishing a full chapter. It's only about 3k, but that's a good bit for me since I fell out of my regular daily writing habit last year. It felt really good to write, even if it wasn't my favorite scene and once again suffered from "why do I have so many characters doing so many things always all the time."
It did give me a bit of hope, though. I'm aiming now to try and finish a chapter a week. It might be a bit lofty in my current state, but I want to re-establish a writing routine again. I've missed it, and I need it.
Tinder Saint has been going a bit... oddly, in comparison to my usual way of going about things. Because I had been feeling so low about my writing, I had spent months spinning my wheels and getting nowhere, until I decided "fuck it" and just. Banged out an entire scene draft for the whole story in a few days. But when I did that, it helped me to see things much clearer, and I was able to get excited about the project again. I always avoided doing this because I thought it ruined part of the fun/spontaneity of writing, but it... didn't do that for me. I know what is going on and what happens, and now I can't wait to make it pretty and make it hurt.
I have been skipping a few chapters / scenes that I simply. Didn't feel like writing. And I am typically a very chronological writer. Even now, it's nagging me that I skipped some things. And because of it, I have about two or three chapters that are sitting half finished. I'm thinking I may spend this next week going back to some of those skipped scenes since I have a better idea of what I need in them and I'm feeling a tad more confident in myself since I was able to get some good writing sessions in.
