April 17th to 23rd Schedule and the Easter Special Status

Okay, I forgot to write one of these last week, what with trying to recover from the writing rush of the April’s Fools Special and the stupid flu/cold thingy I caught in its aftermath. I think we’ll be able to go back to a regular schedule for both Wake-up Call and All Right! Fine! I Will Take You! this week, so, fingers crossed.

As to what should happen if I manage to keep my current momentum going and don’t get stuck on anything like, I don’t know, the climax of my first Endbringer fight or something silly like that:

Monday: That was today. We can safely say it’s mostly over. Yay!

Tuesday: Wake-up Call. And me facing a decision that I’ll regret no matter which side I end up leaning on.

Wednesday: I’ve been thinking about the next Puella Monstrum, and, hopefully, something will be worth posting on Wednesday. If not, expect it on Friday.

Thursday: All Right! Fine! I Will Take You! with Iroha likely throwing a (perfectly justified) tantrum.

Friday: Most likely, this will be when I release Puella Monstrum. Otherwise… well, I’ll see what I do if I find myself with unexpected free time.

Saturday: I have to attend a wedding, so this will likely not be that productive of a day, but fingers crossed! (Not really.)

Sunday: The next Wordsworth is basically living inside my head, so I hopefully won’t struggle as much as I did with today’s chapter.

In other news, remember when I agonized over whether or not to release A Pure Knight’s Natural Enemy on other sites? Well, I know that correlation doesn’t mean causation, but I’d like to give a warm welcome to all the new subscribers who’re likely here due to that whole “Once you go green, you never skip on your veggies” thing. Seriously, I’m really glad so many of you decided to drop by, and I hope the rest of my output is also to your tastes. Anyway, the next Orczuma chapter should come out next week.

And that brings us to the whole “What’s up with the Easter Special” thing.

Let’s just say that it is… complicated.

…

Yes, I know how that sounds.

The thing is, I believe I have nailed down why my Specials seem to be so much better than my regular work. Yes, of course, there’s the matter of them being originals, and so I’m not restricted nor frustrated by some of the things that at times chafe my writing with fanfiction, but, more than that, I think I’ve finally nailed down my process, late in the game as it may be.

I usually start with a broad idea, the so-called high concept, which may seem fun or silly in all the right ways. I let it marinate for a bit as I examine it from different angles, take note of possible scenes that seem interesting, funny, or hot, and then I write.

And everything goes off the rails.

But… there’s a method to my madness.

See, I once read Mercedes Lackey claiming that writer’s block doesn’t exist, that it’s just you perceiving something wrong with your work and being unable to push forward. I disagree, but there’s a nugget of truth in this. When I start writing something like One Last Gift, and I expect to produce an entirely doujin-like work with a couple of teens discovering that sex makes for a pretty good present after increasingly outrageous misunderstandings only for it to become a melancholy tale of growing up and learning about how magic and life can at times come together… This is the idea developing on the page.

This is me getting inside the head of a character and discovering a whole lot of questions that I would have never thought to ask, much less answer, from outside of it.

And, if I’m allowed to get a bit whimsical (when am I ever not?), this is when both the characters and the story come alive, unfolding, taking turns and decisions I hadn’t predicted when I wrote a loose outline with a few peppered scenes and gags that I sometimes discard and quite often have to rework entirely.

Of course, this also happens with my fanfiction, but the main difference there is that, once I write chapter 75 of Wake-up Call and am tempted to include a particular shift in Lisa’s inner monologue, I can’t go back to the beginning of it, reread the whole thing, and edit it to make it more consistent with the fully fleshed versions of the characters guiding the process as I make the whole thing more cohesive and fitting of the main themes.

So, basically, part of what makes my one-shots better than my ongoing series…

Is that I can edit them.

Shocking, I know.

But… this brings us to the Easter Special situation.

The thing is, I did have a silly, doujin-like idea for it. My mistake was giving my brain too much time to go over it and come up with unexpected angles.

So, it is currently a project for an entire superhero novel.

On the one hand, I’m kinda excited about it. On the other, I don’t have the time to put everything else on hold and pull another Nanowrimo in what remains of the month.

So, I see a few options:

I work at it during my downtime and post it all at once (keeping you updated on how it is going).

I post the chapters as I write them, and then I edit the whole thing and post the finished product.

I wait until I finish one of the ongoing fics and replace them with it.

I forget about the whole thing and write a short story for Saint George’s Day (which, over here, is a fantastic mix between Book Day and Valentine’s Day).

Yes, I know that the Saint George thing is a complete and utter non sequitur that adds to my already unmanageable pile of projects. Are we going to act like this is surprising at this point?

…

Fine, I’ll drop that idea until next year and pretend I know what I’m doing. Anyway, I’m going to post a poll right now and thank you all for your continued support and feedback. See you tomorrow with more kaiju battles.