A book tree, a "group project" poll, & a stream this week!

Look! My book tree lamp!

I’m slowly but surely making over my office space and, with the addition of my lounge chair, needed something that wasn’t as abrasive as my overhead light to read by. (Also I needed more space for books. Now the piles look more purposeful! Lol.)

If you want to see the book tree lamp in action, don’t forget that we have a Patreon Preptember stream on Thursday the 12th at 6:45pm CDT! You can find the link to that here. I’m excited to get to work on some of these character bios. If you have a specific template you use, or a question you always “ask” your characters before you begin writing, please let me know!

When I did the "I Tried Writing Like...Rick Riordan," I remember he had a pretty extensive character profile worksheet that he shared. I might start there.

Also, I need your help!

I’m struggling with one of my “assignments” for this Fall Writing Semester and I’ve decided to truly lean into the “school” aspect and turn this into a group project. (Lolol.)

One of my goals is to figure out exactly what I should name my “series” that follows A Closet Full of Cauldrons. (Book 2 = A Basement Brimming with Bodies!)

For a while, I’ve been calling this my “paranormal professional organizer” story and so, I thought, why not spin it off to be “a paranormal professional organizer mystery.” But frankly, it’s too clunky, doesn’t roll off the tongue, and if I as the writer am getting hung up on it, then I just don’t think it’ll work. (Or maybe it will? Maybe it just needs some fine-tuning?)

Having done some research into cozy mysteries, there are a few routes to take:

1) based on the character’s name

2) based on the small town

3) also based on the location (but slightly more specific, mostly the small business the main character runs)

4) based on a side character or a club or theme or whatever else

So you can see how it's written out on Goodreads, but they also often show the series name predominantly on the front cover:

So on the cover it reads "a Georgia B&B mystery" but on Goodreads this is listed as Georgia B&B #1. I'd argue that's how 99% of the ones I saw worked, too.

Anyways, so clearly there's some wiggle room and ways to play with it. But still, ideally it rolls off the tongue!

Let me know what you think of titling series, generally. If you're writing a series, do you plan on using the title of your first book as the series title (something I didn't include here) or have you come up with a separate name?

Please also let me know what you think of my predicament by voting in the poll! I’ve filled each of the categories in with: our ~culturally magickal~ main character (Eva Greenwood), our border town/region possibilities (Eerie Mountains or Mt. Eerie, though these are both still possible to change), and a few different plays on the “paranormal professional organizer mystery.” Let me know which you think sounds best and/or you can most clearly imagine on a book cover! :)

Thank you so much friends. Hope to see you on Thursday! In the meantime, happy writing!