This blog tour stop brought to you by the lovely Takako Wright at http://www.tommiastablet.wordpress.com. She is an avid writer of multiple forms and multiple formats. Thanks for this opportunity to join your tour! And here I go answering the following questions:
- What Am I Working On?
My list of goals and deadlines is always growing. I’m working on promoting my novel Ataxia and the Ravine of Lost Dreams (which happens to be free for Kindle today!) by getting reviews and telling people how wonderful it is. I’m editing a different young adult manuscript, At One’s Beast. I’m also attempting to write a trilogy, starting with Camp National Novel Writing Month Project with a 25,000 word goal that is not going very well at all. I’m having plot complication difficulties and am only a couple thousand words in. I did write a connected short story that was my very first attempt as an accomplished writer at a short piece.
- How Does My Work Differ From Others of Its Genre?
Ataxia and the Ravine of Lost Dreams is unique in that it is in first person (I like to do this. I thought that. I said those things. Etc.) and employs my own writing style. The story features a bizarre training landscape for the characters that is a mix of dodgeball, capture the flag, and laser tag that you won’t want to miss!
- Why Do I Write What I Do?
I have always liked to write and only recently have developed enough skills and knowledge to write good stuff that others would care to read (like you dear reader). I write young adult in particular because that is my favorite genre. I love dystopian fiction and have incorporated elements of a dystopian world into Ataxia. I write for myself, essentially, and since there are so many readers similar to myself I know that many others can enjoy my writing much as I have.
- How Does My Writing Process Work?
I have a lengthy list of novel/short story/etc possibilities in google drive that I have been developing over several years and when I am unusually inspired I grab one of those ideas and run with it. Ataxia was born from a dream I had one night about the training landscape and the story followed from there in a very natural way for me. The characters begged me to write sarcasm for them. I write what I see and I saw so many cool things I just had to write them all down. Of course, during the editing process I cut some of the unnecessary parts to make the story a more cohesive whole.
As I write I edit so that my first draft is essentially a fourth or fifth draft and quite nice. After finishing I like to let the story sit so that I won’t immediately recognize every individual sentence. Then I dive into editing, going through several rounds of painstaking readings. I enjoy marking up a physical book during this process and Createspace lets you order proof copies quite easily for this purpose. During this time I will finish the cover and formatting as well so that during proof review I can make sure both the cover and interior formatting are perfect.
If possible I’ll have some beta readers jump in to help and point out anything I might have missed and then copy edit. I copy edit multiple times so that I won’t miss anything ridiculous and voile: finished work of art (aka manuscript has turned into novel).
Rachel Author Barnard 