B.A. Franc's Blog

I spent three days away from my kitties in the heart of Decatur, GA

Recently, I have been down a rabbit hole reading all about writing retreats and the various forms they can take: solo, paid, group, residency. One day, I hope to participate in every known variation, but the easiest for me to embark on would have been the solo, and once I’d gotten that idea into my head, I was itching to do just that.

So imagine my utter delight when a friend offered her very own home to me to give it a try! The timing couldn’t have been better, either, as the following week, Arlen and I would be heading out on vacation, and I knew that hardly any writing would get done in that time. I eagerly told my friend “Yes! I’d love to come housesit while you’re away and give this whole solo-retreat thing a try.”

Before I dive into the nitty-gritty, day-by-day play of how my solo-journey went, I just want to give a bit of an overview on the area in which I stayed and how that lent itself to this particular project, the amount of time I had, and whether I believe the entire trip was worth it (hint: it was).

Where I Stayed:

My friend’s home is located within a charming little area of Decatur called Oakhurst, near the city of Atlanta. You wouldn’t feel as if you were staying in a major city, though, as this particular area is quite, filled with tree-lined streets, and a mile walk from a charming cafe called Oakview Coffee.

Not only is this the ideal writing environment for me as I need lots of quiet, calm, and the idea of coffee as a special treat for accomplishing major writing goals, but the story I am currently working on (Project: Magic) revolves heavily around the environment and how nature can weave its way through the lives of a small town. I hadn’t realized just how much inspiration I was to draw from where I was staying prior to my visit. But it turned out to be the most perfect place to stay as the neighborhood was filled with front yard gardens, flowers blooming everywhere, a restorative community garden only two-miles away, and little plaques to denote the various trees lining the sidewalks.

Looking back through the photos of those few days away, my camera roll is filled with primarily plants, plants, and more plants. Good thing, too, as my main character happens to be a conservationist.

How much time I actually had to write:

My retreat was really quick. I only really had one full day of writing time, flanked on either side with days of travel, settling in, and loading out. Still, in that very brief amount of time, I was able to knock out six-thousand words, two full chapters, and the outline for the next several chapters to come.

Was it worth it?:

Hell yes! 10000%, it was completely, totally worth it. Even if I hadn’t been so generously gifted the use of my friends ultra-cute home for free, I still would have found the act of paying for that uninterrupted time in which to simply be with my story so, so worth every cent.

And with that, let’s dive into what I actually got up to over the course of those three days of my first solo-writing retreat.

Day 1

On the 45-minute-long drive to my friend’s house, I listened to the special playlist I’ve been refining specifically for Project Magic to help better get me into the darker mood of the story. Once I arrived, I snagged the house key from my friend and bid her adieu, unloaded the few food items I had brought into the fridge, and began settling in.

My friend’s home is so freaking cute! I found it difficult not being inspired.

I did this by looking up places in which I could walk such as the coffee shop, reading a bit of Botanical Poisons and Curses as research for my story, cancelling some lingering appointments that were weighing on my mind, and doing a short round of yoga. It was also around this time that I realized I had brought along the wrong charger for my phone. Such a Brittani-move. Before it died, I figured I would walk to the coffee shop, just to be sure I knew where it was.

Already, the ideas for my story were flowing from that initial walk to and from the coffee shop and also through my friend’s backyard. Before calling it a night, I planned out the scenes in which I wanted to tackle the following day, my biggest writing day, and then rounded off the evening watching a light-hearted rom-com.

Day 2

I was determined to take this writing retreat a bit on the easy side. I don’t do super well with stringent goals or days mapped out to the hour. Instead, I find I am most productive when I simply follow my own natural inclinations. Something that doesn’t always come easy, but this retreat proved to be a great time in which to practice.

I took the morning especially slow, diving in to writing morning pages (something I never seem to find time for at home), meditating in order to check-in with myself, making a small cup of coffee, and then easing in to my first 40-minute writing sprint of the day. I did this around 6:30 A.M. at the little kitchen table with the window open, cool air coming through, and the sun not yet having cracked the sky.

After another, less-productive sprint out on the porch swing, I decided to walk to the coffee shop with nothing but a few books (my botanical curses book and a gardening book of my friend’s) and a notebook. I hadn’t expected to do much at the coffeeshop but research a bit as I was feeling tired from such an early start coupled with a poor night’s rest, but I wound up writing even more of a particular scene entirely by hand!

Just a few snapshots of the various plants/ scenery that caught my eye on my many walks to and from the cafe/ community garden.

Feeling invigorated by my writing and the coffee, I decided to walk to the Oakhurst Community Garden which another friend who lives in the same area told me about. And oh. My. Goodness. It was the most PERFECT place I could have ever gone on this particular day, while working on this particular project. I’d have stayed all day long if I hadn’t gotten hungry or needed to pee after an hour or so. I made plans to return the following day with my car and laptop so that I might purchase plants and write beneath the shade of one of their many, beautiful trees.

I returned “home” sweaty and hungry so I made a quick lunch, transcribed what I had hand-written at the coffee shop, connected some dots within the scene, and wrapped it up entirely. Three-thousand words had been written, and I was ready for a nap.

For the rest of the day, I took it easy and recharged my creative well. I did this by lying on the couch with my eyes closed for around 40-minutes, reading more garden books, laying outside and watching the clouds meander by, and finally, walking to a friend’s house around the corner for a homemade meal. It was by far, one of the best days.

Day 3

I had a slower start after a much needed, super deep sleep (woohoo!). I followed pretty much the same pattern as the prior day with the morning pages, meditation, coffee, and two, less productive writing sprints. Because the words weren’t flowing as easily, I headed back to the cafe, this time, with my laptop in hand. I spent several hours outside on one of their many benches writing, sipping coffee (a delicious maple-spiced oat-milk latte, perfect for autumn), and watching all the cutie-patootie dogs wandering by with their owners. in the end, I clocked another three-thousand words and scene for my novel.

At this point, I was still unsure if I would spend another evening at my friend’s home or head back to my own home. I was very much playing things by ear. All I knew was that I wanted to head back to the community garden, which is exactly what I did.

A few of my favorite things, all spotted at the Oakhurst Community Garden

I wound up sending the rest of the morning wandering around, observing the various plants and interconnected spaces, purchasing plants for my own garden, and trying to stay out of the way of volunteers tending to the freeform garden beds. It was on a bench, settled into a shadowy alcove where I both decided I would head back to Arlen and the cats and got bit by some unknown bug that left a burning sensation against my skin. Whoops! I hadn’t realized I was so close to another organism’s home. My apologies.

In the end, this writing retreat was more than I could have ever hoped for. Writing six-thousand words in anything less than at least a week is an absolute feat for all but the most prolific of writers. On a good day, I tend to aim for around only one-thousand words, and even then, I am mentally exhausted. But this particular adventure left me feeling invigorated overall. It propelled me to break through the stagnation and confusion I had been feeling previously with where my story was headed. It narrowed my focus while simultaneously opening up so many potential avenues for my main character to travel.

Would I take a solo-writing retreat again in the future? Absolutely! In fact, I am already planning a dual retreat with my editor early next year. But aside from merely putting more words on the page, I was also gently brought closer to myself during these three days. I was introduced to a lovely community garden that is working so, so hard to create a sustainable landscape and keep the creek that runs through the area clean. I was so inspired by this space that I have even signed up to volunteer with them this autumn and winter!

It’s like the cherry on top of a perfect sundae.

On Processing Unnamed Emotions

This long-form poem was originally written and shared via my newsletter on November 1st, 2023

I stripped the cosmos clean today.

In my garden, where there once stood large swathes of orange fireworks bursting through green now lays barren and empty, not unlike myself. Have I stripped myself of color, or has it been stolen from me? The news I received yesterday has left me feeling bare: bare of feeling, bare of direction, bare of thought. Should I be crying? Why do I feel empty, instead?

I stripped the cosmos clean today.

My hands move of their own accord, through the cold and frigid air. The wind bites at my nose and cheeks, but I hardly register the chill. It’s not unsurprising to me, this feeling of nothingness. I’ve never been one with the talent to properly identify what it is I think or feel in any given moment. As a child, my thoughts and feelings were of little importance. Why would I understand what I felt or wanted or needed, then or now, if what I voiced was always deemed wrong? The only time I notice the depth of my freeze is when I touch my lips to my husband’s cheek, filled with so much warmth and life and love.

I stripped the cosmos clean today.

Along with the zinnias and the marigolds and the tarragon. All would have fallen to tomorrow’s frost, so I picked every last beautiful bloom. But what does that say about me? That I chose to bring in only the most stunning of the flowers while leaving the others to endure the freezing temperatures. Is this how I view the people in my life? My own family, my father? Did I cast them aside because they no longer served me without extending another chance for them to make things right?

No.

I may not know much—about myself, how to feel things in the moment—but deep down, I know that I often extend more chances to those who do not deserve it. Who will look at the extra chance, crumple it into a ball, and walk over me time and again. Deep down, I believe in the innate good of all, the humanity of all. So I offer up second and third and fourth and twentieth chances as if my heart didn’t break with each one freely given.

I stripped the cosmos clean today.

Will I remember this moment, this uncertainty of emotion, when I watch the color drain from the cosmos in the dye bath tonight? Will it leave me when I piece together the tapestry of the seasons colors into a quilt or will I forever be reminded of my numbness, my confusion, my heartache?

I stripped the cosmos clean today.

And all the while, I couldn’t stop asking if my father deserved these emotions. He will never experience them or help guide me through them. But I know that if I were to ask, many would say “Yes, of course, he is your father after all,” without missing a beat. But of course, this is where I have to disagree.

Instead, my answer would be, “Yes, of course, he is human after all.”

And no matter his imperfections of faults or inability to protect me in the ways I most needed as a child, he still deserves comfort and care. I can acknowledge that he likely did his best for me when I was young while also holding true to the notion that his best simply wasn’t good enough. Wasn’t what I most needed.

I stripped the cosmos clean today.

And then I talked to my friend, Annika. I spilled out the quiet musings of my heart, which she held tenderly in her own. She reassured me that nothing was wrong with me, that I am likely unable to process these complex emotions because I don’t feel safe to do so.

When will I ever really feel safe, though? I live in a body that does not recognize safety, it having been stolen from me at a young age. Logically, consciously, I know that I am safe. But physically, subconsciously, my body has not received the memo. It remains in a constant state of hypervigilance, and I do not yet know what it will take to show my body that it is safe. What is it going to take?

I stripped the cosmos clean today, and now my room is filled with bright orange fireworks waiting to ignite.

Weekly Excerpt

I actually wrote A Daisy in Lily’s Valley as a way to help me work through some very large, nameless emotions that had cropped up because of my battle with undiagnosed chronic pain last year. So, it is no surprise to me that so much of what I wrote then still resonates with me today as I sink deeper into my own thoughts, trying to process the emotions that will not come.

Until next time,

Brittani “B.A.” Franc

From the Archives

This post was originally published as a newsletter on October 12th, 2023

A quote I often repeat to myself in times of envy AND self-doubt.

This week, I have struggled to sit down and write this particular newsletter. Not because I have nothing to say, but because in doing so, I will reveal my incredibly flawed self. My envious self. My contradictory self.

My human self.

Lately, I have been feeling an intense mixture of envy, self-consciousness, and self-doubt with regards to my debut novel. I have managed to tame these feelings for the most part, but they rear their heads most vehemently when I pop on to social media to do one thing (answer messages) but find myself scrolling, instead.

A handful of examples shine brightest in my mind with regards to feeling these “negative” feelings, and they are all related to other authors who are, more-or-less, traveling along the same path as I. These authors have landed major, traditional publishing deals, secured movie rights to bring their stories to the screen, or garnered thousands-upon-thousands of people “shelving” their upcoming novels via Goodreads.

It is wild that these feelings bloom so readily inside of me, triggering that nasty inner voice of mine who immediately springs up to tell me all sorts of lies like:

You aren’t good enough.

Get over yourself already and promote your book.

Don’t bother telling anyone about your story, it’s not nearly brilliant enough/ beautiful enough smart enough to mean anything to anyone.

This inner voice of mine knows all of my pressure points, all of the spots in which I am the most vulnerable. It whispers lies, telling me that no one is going to read my novel, much less enjoy it. That the negative reviews are going to dominate and that it was a frivolous endeavor to partake in.

But what I find funniest about all of this negativity (aside from the fact that most of what my inner voice spits at me isn’t remotely true) is that my feelings towards these milestones I see other authors reaching. . . those aren’t even milestones I necessarily wanted to reach myself.

I was never interested in landing a traditional publishing deal. I didn’t even try for one. I set out from the beginning to self-publish because I really wanted to get my feet wet and experience every. single. aspect that goes into crafting a novel, from start to finish. It was also really important to me to make this a collaborative process and to support other independent artists who connected most with Emiliana’s story.

I also didn’t set out writing this book in order to make me famous or land a movie/ television deal. And though I do think it’d be incredibly sweet and wholesome to see Emiliana’s story on screen, I also love the purity of books. I love that this story will live on forever through other people’s imaginations. That the world of Lily’s Valley can be built up in a unique and individualized way inside of your mind. That you might connect with a specific line of dialogue or find hidden meaning in the smallest of descriptions.

And finally, my goals for this novel have never been to reach thousands of readers. Would it delight me if thousands of people connected with the story that has lived inside my head for nearly two years?

Of course it would!

But my goals have always been relatively modest. I’d love to simply break even. Self-publishing is quite expensive, but I have absolutely fallen for the process and would love to continue writing my little stories every now and again. By breaking even, I would have the means to continue doing just that (I already have my second novel planned and ready to write!).

So, to break even would be marvelous. But if only 20 people ever purchase this book, I will be absolutely over the moon excited! 20 people, reading my story? A story that I pulled out by strands from the inside of my brain? How marvelous!

Instead of allowing my envy and self-doubt to continue to fester, or my nasty inner voice to take root and spread, I am taking the advice my friends and I bandy about, and that is to celebrate the small wins. Celebrate the tiniest thing that you did today that may not seem to be that big of a deal to others, but is a really big deal to YOU.

Today, that might simply mean celebrating the fact that you got out of bed and took a shower 10 minutes earlier than yesterday, even if your goal was to wake up 30 minutes earlier. Or celebrating the fact that you made yourself a home cooked meal once this week. Or that you called up your insurance company to sort things out when you loathe chatting on the phone.

One small step. One tiny win. That’s all that we need to move forward.

Novel News

In an effort to celebrate my own small wins, here are some things that have made me smile with regards to A Daisy in Lily’s Valley:

I have 9 followers and 5 people who want to read my book on Goodreads! That means there are 5 people who may have a real, physical copy of my novel sitting on their shelves next year.The final edit (sans proofread) is complete and the physical novel has been formatted. By Monday of next week, I will be placing an order for a copy of my book, and soon after, I will hold it for the very first time! I am very much prepared to bawl at the sight.Weekly Excerpt

I was having coffee with some friend’s this past weekend about my discomfort around promoting my novel (as it feels very conceited of my to do so) and one of them gave me the idea to share a small line from my novel. Just to become more comfortable talking about my work and hopefully getting you as excited about this project that means so much to me.

So each week, I will be sharing one of my favorite lines or small passages from A Daisy in Lily’s Valley, with bonus excerpts shared to paid subscribers. To start, I thought I would share the opening line of the entire novel:

And finally, here is a little encouragement/ testimonial that I recently received from my editor:

Until next time,

Brittani “B.A.” Franc

Until now

I’ve had this post on my mind for ages now. Literally, months and months. It has been swirling through my brain, but for some reason, I keep failing to show up and put it all together.

Thank goodness I have minor bouts of insomnia, otherwise I think it’d have perished in my drafts folder for another year or two or ten.

When I originally went about publishing – and subsequently printing – my debut novel, I was hyper-focused on every single detail. I wanted to keep every aspect of what went into my novel (aside from the actual writing of it, which only I could do) tied to local artists and small businesses. I mean, how could I hold up a story that has small businesses that come together to form a community at its center and not support as many of them in the actual making of the novel as I could?

Early on, I knew I was going to find an offset printer to print the physical copies of the book, instead of going the route of print-on-demand services. In my mind, at the time, it just made sense.

Unfortunately, after a year of trying and trying and trying to find local, indie bookstores to carry my printed novel, I started to realize how high a mountain I had created for myself to climb. Many smaller bookshops (and bigger ones, too!) prefer to order through Ingram’s wholesale site in order to keep their accounting as streamlined as possible, instead of ordering directly from authors or individual publishers. That’d be a lot to keep track of and, as a small business myself, I totally get. It’s just not something I’d thought of at the start of this whole process.

I also realized that I’d unwittingly created a barrier for anyone located outside of the U.S. to purchase a physical copy of my novel. The cost of shipping was simply too high.

So, after a year of going back and forth with things, I finally decided to list my book via IngramSpark, a print-on-demand service. . .even though I still have several printed copies of my novel literally lining my bookshelves at home.

What I didn’t know is that by listing on IngramSpark, my work was automatically listed on Amazon without much choice from me *sigh* If anything, this is what I had been trying to avoid the entire time. And I’m still not 100% sure about this decision. I have my reservations about Ingram as well. For one, it feels as if they aren’t entirely transparent. I listed my book at a standard 40% discount to retailers only to find out that when you list it as 40% on the IngramSpark side, your book is only offered at a 20% discount to retailers on the retail side (and I only know this because I also own my own online bookshop and was able to see through their wholesale channels that my book was listed at the lower 20%).

When asked about this, I got back a response from Ingram:

This is all fine and good (though I wonder who else is in their supply that require an additional 15-20% cut of the book price??), but I wish it were more well known to indie authors. I doubt I am the only one to assume that listing at 40% would entail a 40% discount to retailers. Or am I just super dumb and missed exactly this somewhere else on their site?

Now, the reason I was against listing my book specifically on Amazon was well. . . they are kind of the antithesis to the small, local bookshop. And I really wasn’t interested in my helping them make any additional money.

This isn’t to say that I am sitting over here in judgement against anyone who shops on Amazon (I still purchase things through them! Books even! Especially ones by indie authors I can’t find elsewhere) or authors who have published on via Amazon’s own Print-on-demand services. I know that as indie authors, our options are limited, and Amazon has really paved the way for so many otherwise unknown authors to go out there and make a name for themselves in an industry where they may not have been able to otherwise.

I just personally didn’t want to have my products listed there.

But here I am, writing this post about how my book is now available via Amazon, despite my best intentions, and so, I am choosing to look at the brighter side of things.

For one, I was able to bypass having Amazon actually print my books. Instead, they simply have A Daisy in Lily’s Valley listed and will only be paid a small portion of the sale instead of the sale plus a cut for the printing, too. I’ve also decided to not list a copy of my eBook via Ingram or Amazon just yet. I still feel weirded out by letting either company have all the data inside my actual book. Instead, I am sticking to having my eBook available via my bookshop, Untitled Thoughts (the format IS compatible with Kindle, Apple Books, and Kobo. Basically anywhere you might want to read my eBook, you can!), and Kobo, which is a brand I truly admire.

Listing my book with Ingram also means that my book is now open internationally, via Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other major retailers, yes, but also to international indie bookstores! So, if you have a bookstore in your neighborhood that you LOVE and want to see my book there, let them know! Put in a special request for A Daisy In Lily’s Valley and let them know it’s available via Ingrams wholesale site. And if they stock it in your store, send me a pic! I’d love to see how far this story might travel

I am 1/4 of the way through

July 9, 2025

Give or take. I’m not actually certain how long this novel is going to be. From the looks of it, I am guessing pretty long, especially considering I have plans for my main character to travel to four different countries, including her country of birth. And considering I have a lot to say with this novel.

I have just finished writing all of my main character’s primary interactions in one of the four countries (yay!), but not all of her time spent in these various places will be given equal weight. Hence, I have no idea if I am actually a quarter of the way through writing.

Throughout this novel, I am exploring a couple of different themes and ideas, but the one I am most interested in diving deep into is trauma. I am curious to explore how trauma shapes us as well as those we interact with and our perception of the world as well as its inverse: how another’s trauma might shape us, in turn. All the while keeping a bit of beauty and hope woven throughout. I don’t want this to be a trauma-dumping story.

It’s just. . . I am so interested in how trauma and heartache builds itself upon our skin, layer by layer. I want to explore how unearthing trauma takes on a spiraling form for most people, how we might notice a layer of our trauma, work really hard at fixing the issue or moving past it, only for the exact same issue to arise again. Only this time, it’s buried deeper, revealing a hidden part of our first layer of trauma we hadn’t be ready to examine closely that first time we noticed it.

And around and around we go until we find – if we are lucky – the center of our pain with roots that aren’t so easily pulled out because they have threaded themselves throughout our very being, the core of who we are. It’s wild to think about, isn’t it?

Photo by Daniel Tafjord on Unsplash

July has been a really wonderful month to start writing. Thus far, I have not only managed to stick with my near-daily writing goal, but I’ve also felt the creative energy surging. It’s almost like that thing that happens when you start working out and it becomes a habit and one day you wake up craving your yoga mat or treadmill or whatever.

That’s the space I’m in right now. I am itching nearly every day to sit at the computer and see what unfolds.

Which is great because I’m not entirely sure what’ i’s going to unfold for me.

I had a lot of ideas at the start of this novel, but as I work my way through it piece-by-piece, I’m seeing things change, seeing ideas fall away and others gain momentum. That is equal parts thrilling and terrifying.

Thrilling because the doors are wide open and I can go practically anywhere this this story.

Terrifying because I truly thought I knew what I wanted this novel to be in its entirety. I knew what I wanted A Daisy in Lily’s Valley to be, from start to finish. And I had similar ideas bubble up to the surface for my Project Magic story. But I’m quickly realizing some of those initial ideas I had no longer feel true or correct or honest for this cast of characters.

Photo by Matthieu Jungfer on Unsplash

Instead of fretting too much, (breathe, Brittani) I keep reminding myself to simply show up to my laptop every day, write in the general direction I think I want to go, and let things unfold from there as they want to naturally. It really is all I can do. To put my trust in the process and hope it sorts itself out the further along I fall into this new world.

Wish me luck?

On returning after a long break

July 2, 2025

Wow, where did the past three months go? I turned around and BAM! it was already July. I think part of my disconnect is because Summer arrived a bit later for us than usual. I was fully prepared for rising temperatures back in early May, but with all the rain, we managed to stave off the worst of the heat until right now, here in July.

As you can imagine, life has really come up a lot this year. More specifically, it has bombarded me with its presence the most over the past four-to-six weeks. This has required a shift in my energy and my focus, one that left my writing waiting like a lonely puppy in the corner.

It also doesn’t help that I greatly overcommitted myself throughout the month of June, and as it came to a close, I found myself trying to disentangle from all I had promised I would do. A feat of monumental proportions for a recovering people-pleaser such as myself. Thankfully, I know some really amazing humans and every one of them was so understanding of my need to withdraw inwards in an effort to recalibrate.

It’s funny, though. Literally the very first week of my newly cleared schedule, you know what my brain did? It looked at the freshly opened days and immediately said, Huh…I’m weirdly available. I should probably fill up these empty boxes with tasks and meetings with friends.

Uhm, no brain, that’s not why we cleared everything out to begin with.

It’s been approximately a week and a half since the great calendar purge of 2025, and in that time, I have managed to bring myself back to the things I find most important, one of which is writing.

While I took my first baby steps towards the abandoned puppy in the corner that was my writing practice, I simultaneously picked up my own novel after having set it aside for just as many months. I was surprised to find myself growing more and more inspired to work on my second novel the deeper I fell into A Daisy in Lily’s Valley. Doing so almost felt as if I were reading someone else’s work, except there were memories attached to each chapter, each scene. And those memories helped to remind me just how far my novel came from that first draft. That it didn’t come out perfectly, it took a lot of refining and layering to get it to the place I wanted it prior to publishing.

I’ve also found that I am currently in a headspace where I don’t mind admitting. . . I think I might be a pretty good writer. I mean, if I came across my work in the bookstore (and it wasn’t written by me but someone else), I’d pick it up and really enjoy reading it. I’d fall in love with the characters and the subtle humor and the invisible words hidden between the printed words on the page. And that feels really weird to say out loud, but also deeply true. Which is kind of thrilling.

So, with my re-read of ADILV done and my calendar almost entirely blank for both July and August, I have set a new goal for myself: To show up to the page and write.

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

I’d honestly love it if I could manage to write every single day, but I’m not sure that is a realistic goal; instead, I’m aiming to write maybe 5 or 6 days of the week. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be writing my next novel, either. My goal is to simply show up to my computer and let whatever needs to come out come out. Yesterday, that meant writing the general outline of my monthly newsletter. Today, it looks like sitting down with a cup of chocolate mint tea and finalizing this blog post right here. Tomorrow I might section off the entire day and dedicate it to navigating my character through her next big adventure.

The point is, it doesn’t matter what I write, just that I fall back into the habit of writing.

And it’s kind of funny. Looking back at when I wrote that first draft of ADILV I realized, this is about the same time I had come back from a writing break then, too. Perhaps this is a big part of my process? Taking a few false starts before diving completely into the work and uncovering the juicy center of the story. I guess I won’t know until I start on my third book, but that is quite a ways away.

When writing doesn’t come easy (which it never does)

March 24, 2025

I have been steadily working on my second novel, yet it feels as if I have made no progress at all. I’ve been terrible at keeping track of my word count as it slowly rises, primarily because as I write, everything shifts. I write a chapter set in the present only to discover I need many chapters of the past to be written first, so I go back and begin writing the past only to discover I am summarizing events that need to be more concrete. They need details and texture and context.

I glance to my word count board, marveling at the fact that I have been able to shade any of the squares in at all. How many words have I actually written? How many of them belong inside the actual novel and how many of them are merely fodder for the tale I am attempting to write into existence?

It doesn’t help that I’m not entirely sure how long this second book of mine will be. When I began writing ADILV, I had the idea of crafting 30 chapters. The number simply appeared to me one day. I liked it, the roundness of it. And I was able to work backwards to approximate how many words that would entail. I looked up average novel word count lengths. I assumed I wanted roughly 300 pages of words to tell Emiliana’s story. I did a little math and came out the other side with a clear goal in mind of 90K words.

In the end, I wrote something like 120K words and a total of 32 chapters. Not as elegant or beautifully rounded as the number 30, but those extra two chapters and words were necessary for the story.

Beginning this process a second time, I feel as if 90K words or 30 chapters is way too constricting. There is, quite literally, an entire life I wish to share between the cover pages. A life that spans multiple countries and a layering of nuance and a transformation of the person at the heart of the story, from where she begins to where we begin to where all of us eventually end.

Image via Unsplash

It’s frightening to think of the scope of this project. I fear it is too big of an idea, too large of a story to attempt to convey, but also. . . do I have enough? Will I be able to find the fine line between writing an unlikeable character who you are rooting for, deep down? Can I capture the nuance I hope to imbibe or are there too many ideas happening at once? How can one life be boiled down to a small fragment, an essence distilled and packaged and shared in an easily digestible manner?

These are questions I hold with me every morning I show up to write, but I won’t have the answers until I actually do the writing.

I keep showing up to the page and it keeps feeling hard. Harder than I remember it being the first time. Harder to pull the words from my brain and organize them beautifully and meaningfully on the page.

That is, until I stumble upon a set of old notes buried in a slender notebook. Notes about all the little things I felt I needed to change with ADILV that I have long since forgotten, the memories of writing my first novel worn until smooth and seamless, as if I had always been capable of simply touching my fingers to the keys of my laptop and allowing gold to pour out of them (not that I actually believe my first novel is perfect, but that the feelings of writing were somehow better then than they are now).

The feeling is similar to when I have spoken to my best friend about giving birth to her children, especially her first. She has said, time and again, that after awhile, the memory begins to fade as does the pain, to the point where it all feels like a blur and not as terrible as it likely felt in the moment. Instead, a new story begins to take its place, one of all the highlights of the day, until there is nothing but a shiny glow to the memory.

That is how it currently feels, as I struggle through this second attempt at writing. It feels as if my first attempt was an utter fluke, that it was so easy and magical and glowing and because I cannot seem to capture those exact feelings again, I must be doing something wrong. I must have lost all ability to write and will have to settle for whatever piddle comes out of my brain and lands onto the page.

Image via Unsplash

But the notes I found in that slender little notebook suggest otherwise. They remind me of the two months I stopped writing ADILV after having read The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. My insecurity had grown so large, knowing I would never write something that magical, that beautiful, I simply couldn’t bring myself to the page. Even though I had sought out the book specifically because an alpha reader had mentioned my writing was reminiscent of that exact story.

That little notebook reminded me of all the days I spent crying over the keyboard, frustrated at not being able to get the words exactly right, instead leaving big chunks of page highlighted and in [little brackets]. It reminds me that I didn’t spend every. single. day writing. That there were loads of breaks in between. That there were months of re-writes and tweaking things one way only to bring them back, playing tug-of-war with myself and my editor.

Writing is hardly ever easy. You have the story, living inside of you for months or years at a time. It wants to breathe, but when you try to give it oxygen, it shies away, unsure how to go about using it. So you must coax it out, little by little. Some days it laps up your offer eagerly, words pouring out in a never ending wave of inspiration. And other days it looks at your offer as if you are crazy, why would it ever wish to breathe on the page?

Thanks but no thanks, come back never.

This month, I dont feel as if I have caught my stride. I’m trying, but more days feel like the story is rejecting the oxygen I am offering it. Still, I have managed to write over the course of 10 days for a total of ~6K words. A little is better than nothing at all. And as I continue to show up, to dress up for inspiration as Elizabeth Gilbert once suggested in Big Magic, it does get easier. More ideas flow towards me.

I am ready, butterfly net in hand, to capture them for a later date in which writing is easier and the oxygen is being taken freely.

It may be my second, but it hasn’t gotten any easier

February 14, 2025

Every writer’s process is different. Some have sweeping epics spanning multiple books sitting inside their brains waiting to burst forth and land on the page. Others find inspiration in the humans they meet and the funny things they say or do. And still others are struck by what feels like lightning but calls herself inspiration, an entire idea fully formed and ready to go (a bit rarer than the rest, but still, I’ve heard it happens).

For me, all of my stories have so far come to me in the same way: a character pops into my brain, waves a little “Hi, Hello, how are you?” and quickly turns on her heel, beckoning me to follow.

A Daisy in Lily’s Valley literally sprung from a single note, quickly typed into my iPhone that reads:

Long, soft, wavy muted red haired MC with freckles with a shy personality who loves to bake

That’s all I had to go on. I didn’t know who this girl was or why anyone would want to tune in to her story. All I could do was follow her along, pen and paper at the ready, and see what she revealed to me.

The same has happened moving into my second novel and even third. Yep. I hadn’t even finished writing ADILV when a new raven-haired character with anger simmering beneath her skin and magic in her bones had appeared to me, not-so-patiently waiting or her turn at telling her own story. And while I was following her along, collecting more questions about her than I had answers, a third character cropped up with her own story to tell.

One of seven of my mood boards for my current novel I’ve entitled “Project Magic”

And so begins my writing process.

For now, I will focus on my angry, raven-haired goddess as her story is the one I am focused on telling next. And my, what a story it is to try to tell.

I’ve been following her around for the better part of a year and a half, asking questions, getting glimmers of responses and ideas about who she is, why she is so angry at the world (and herself), where her biggest struggles lie, and on and on and on. It took me some time to understand the overarching narrative that she hopes to tell, which themes she hopes to brush upon, and what nuances she hopes can be honored. To be honest, every day that I write about her, I am taken by surprise.

At first, I thought I would start where she currently resided: her own present day. But I quickly learned that this was a mistake. I couldn’t capture her anger or her sadness or her mixed up frustrations at everything and everyone, including herself. I needed to go back. To peel back the layers that she has built around her that she doesn’t even realize are there. To see those gauzy layers of self being added slowly, one by one, throughout the course of her life.

And it really hasn’t been easy. She is making me do the work.

But through every hard day, I keep reminding myself of a quote I recently came across online.

Photo courtesy of https://reklinzing.com/2019/11/13/your-first-draft-vs-sandcastles/

This quote really helps to remind me to take the pressure off of myself on getting the first draft absolutely perfect. It’s not going to be perfect. It’s likely not going to be very good at all. It’ll have a lot of stops and starts and blank pages and {INSERT SOMETHING HERE}s. That’s simply the nature of first drafts.

You don’t know the story until you start to tell it (an idea inspired by a Terry Pratchett quote), so why put all this extra pressure on yourself to get it “right”? There isn’t even a right to get!

So that is where I am currently. In the middle (or, quite honestly, barely the beginning) of the messy first draft. Written at a halting pace on my typewriter, Willow because it keeps me distraction free and lends the same vibes I hope this novel will transmute to the final page somehow, someway. I can’t even tell you truthfully how much of it I have written, at least not in word or page counts, seeing as I’ve gone analog.

What I can say is that it’s fully formed enough to play on a near constant loop in my head, like brief stills captured from a movie. I have just enough to be frustrated in knowing everything that is going to happen and wanting to share it with you, but not knowing how it all actually happens. My office wall is covered with loose ideas and snippets of scenes and interactions between characters and a notes app that gets filled again and again.

It is all there, waiting inside my brain for the perfect set of circumstances before finding the words on the page. Those circumstances are happening. Slowly, ever so slowly. But they are happening. Magic is turning and showing up, little by little.

I can’t wait to share more as it does.

It may be my second, but it hasn’t gotten any easier

February 14, 2025

Every writer’s process is different. Some have sweeping epics spanning multiple books sitting inside their brains waiting to burst forth and land on the page. Others find inspiration in the humans they meet and the funny things they say or do. And still others are struck by what feels like lightning but calls herself inspiration, an entire idea fully formed and ready to go (a bit rarer than the rest, but still, I’ve heard it happens).

For me, all of my stories have so far come to me in the same way: a character pops into my brain, waves a little “Hi, Hello, how are you?” and quickly turns on her heel, beckoning me to follow.

A Daisy in Lily’s Valley literally sprung from a single note, quickly typed into my iPhone that reads:

Long, soft, wavy muted red haired MC with freckles with a shy personality who loves to bake

That’s all I had to go on. I didn’t know who this girl was or why anyone would want to tune in to her story. All I could do was follow her along, pen and paper at the ready, and see what she revealed to me.

The same has happened moving into my second novel and even third. Yep. I hadn’t even finished writing ADILV when a new raven-haired character with anger simmering beneath her skin and magic in her bones had appeared to me, not-so-patiently waiting or her turn at telling her own story. And while I was following her along, collecting more questions about her than I had answers, a third character cropped up with her own story to tell.

One of seven of my mood boards for my current novel I’ve entitled “Project Magic”

And so begins my writing process.

For now, I will focus on my angry, raven-haired goddess as her story is the one I am focused on telling next. And my, what a story it is to try to tell.

I’ve been following her around for the better part of a year and a half, asking questions, getting glimmers of responses and ideas about who she is, why she is so angry at the world (and herself), where her biggest struggles lie, and on and on and on. It took me some time to understand the overarching narrative that she hopes to tell, which themes she hopes to brush upon, and what nuances she hopes can be honored. To be honest, every day that I write about her, I am taken by surprise.

At first, I thought I would start where she currently resided: her own present day. But I quickly learned that this was a mistake. I couldn’t capture her anger or her sadness or her mixed up frustrations at everything and everyone, including herself. I needed to go back. To peel back the layers that she has built around her that she doesn’t even realize are there. To see those gauzy layers of self being added slowly, one by one, throughout the course of her life.

And it really hasn’t been easy. She is making me do the work.

But through every hard day, I keep reminding myself of a quote I recently came across online.

Photo courtesy of https://reklinzing.com/2019/11/13/your-first-draft-vs-sandcastles/

This quote really helps to remind me to take the pressure off of myself on getting the first draft absolutely perfect. It’s not going to be perfect. It’s likely not going to be very good at all. It’ll have a lot of stops and starts and blank pages and {INSERT SOMETHING HERE}s. That’s simply the nature of first drafts.

You don’t know the story until you start to tell it (an idea inspired by a Terry Pratchett quote), so why put all this extra pressure on yourself to get it “right”? There isn’t even a right to get!

So that is where I am currently. In the middle (or, quite honestly, barely the beginning) of the messy first draft. Written at a halting pace on my typewriter, Willow because it keeps me distraction free and lends the same vibes I hope this novel will transmute to the final page somehow, someway. I can’t even tell you truthfully how much of it I have written, at least not in word or page counts, seeing as I’ve gone analog.

What I can say is that it’s fully formed enough to play on a near constant loop in my head, like brief stills captured from a movie. I have just enough to be frustrated in knowing everything that is going to happen and wanting to share it with you, but not knowing how it all actually happens. My office wall is covered with loose ideas and snippets of scenes and interactions between characters and a notes app that gets filled again and again.

It is all there, waiting inside my brain for the perfect set of circumstances before finding the words on the page. Those circumstances are happening. Slowly, ever so slowly. But they are happening. Magic is turning and showing up, little by little.

I can’t wait to share more as it does.

June 20, 2023

It’s been one month since I last wrote about how my novel is coming along. The process of creating a book seems both painfully slow and incredibly fast-paced. I am often torn between looking at my calendar, knowing that the majority of edits will be completed by October (which seems a million years away) and the day-to-day work that feels as if it is piling up. 

Currently, Maria (my editor) and I are on the final round of the developmental editing process. With this part of editing, Maria has gone in to my story and taken a large-picture view of the characters, setting, plot, and pacing and given me her recommendations on how I might improve any of those given areas. This part of the editing process was probably the one I dreaded the most. After having held my story for so long, it felt vulnerable to hand it over for another’s eyes with the sole purpose of telling me everything that wasn’t working. 

Maria made the process so easy, though! She gave really incredible, constructive feedback and took incredible time and care with my novel, as if it were her own. Every single suggestion she made was golden and we wound up incorporating many of her ideas.  The ones we didn’t incorporate were namely because the sections she had suggested ideas for were sections where my intention was not coming across clearly. In those instances, Maria helped to make my words shine so that my original intent was no longer lost. 

So, where does that leave me and A Daisy in Lily’s Valley now?

As of today, I am incorporating the last few minor edits into the manuscript as well as writing my Author’s Note, Acknowledgements, and Recipes that I had always planned to accompany Emiliana’s story, being that her entire world revolves around her gluten-free baking. After that, I will pass my manuscript back to Maria where she will start the 6-week long process of copy/ line editing. This is where she will be looking at the story on a line-by-line basis to ensure that the sentence structure is varied enough, my point is coming across clearly, and that my grammar/ spelling is accurate. 

While she is off doing that, I will begin to format the actual novel for both print and as an e-book. I should also be hearing back from my cover/ interior illustrator (yay!) and will need to complete a few random tasks. These include: assigning an ISBN to each of my books, choosing a pen name, getting my book up on Goodreads + StoryGraph, and developing a *better* marketing plan, as I am currently winging it. 

There is still so much to be done before the book is back in my hands, and even more to do once the copy/ line editing phase is complete. It feels overwhelming at times having all of these moving pieces flying about. But at the same time, it is so exciting to be able to chart this new path forward. And once I have done it all once, I will be better prepared for the next book 

What sorts of things would you like me to talk more about in my next book update entry? Feel free to leave me a comment below!