Stories, stories, stories, and bread! But mostly story news about my novella, novelette, and short stories.
Writing Life Updates: October 2022
Category: Works in Progress
How I Write: A New Story a Day
August is my short story challenge month, where I attempt to write a short story (+1,500-words) every day. I wanted to share how I'm able to write a new story within an hour a majority of days.
Oh! Look What I Found!—Bookbindings
This month I'm working on revising (so many things lol), but one of those things is a short story! It's a secondary world fantasy where a young library page goes in search of her sister and the other girls who have gone missing from the city's library. As you can imagine, books and libraries play a huge part in the story and its themes.
How I Write: Using Scene Cards to Tell a Story
On index cards sometimes just on a dry erase board or poster board, writers build a story just by its scenes. Instead of writing it out word by word, they draw or sketch it with images or words. Sometimes it'll just be something as simple as 'The Bad Man Dies' and some sketch of how the scene should look or take place.
Oh! Look What I Found!—Sentient Houses
Last month, I worked on a novelette set in a smart house. and this month I've been working on a short story whose main character is a house. The house of a killer who's kidnapped a new victim. The house and killer have an interesting relationship, you could call it a friendship. But what is a friendship when one of the parties lives and kills inside the other?
How I Write: Spreadsheeting a Novel
One of my favorite steps in the writing, editing, and revising process is spreadsheeting my story. Spreadsheeting a novel is when a writer or editor takes a story and breaks it out into a spreadsheet summarizing the story on the scene level.
Writing Life Updates: June 2022
I feel like I've been heavy in this cavern of learning and consuming over the past month. I don't think I've made any big sales, though I did hear back about a story being held for further review. Bittersweet news. I hope the story gets accepted, but if it doesn't, it getting held means the story is doing something right.
Oh! Look What I Found!—High Tech Cabins in the Woods
I'm currently editing (a lot of stuff!) a novelette about a newly married couple's honeymoon at the groom's supposed haunted cabin mansion in the woods. One of the main characters comes from a rich and well-off family with MANY properties, but none as famed, hidden, and haunted as their summer cabin tucked into the woods.
Oh! Look What I Found!—Holes and Readers
I haven't been researching anything exciting for work the past few weeks. My job has me doing a lot of research, but not on anything you fine reader would be interested in reading about. It's all boring business formation and state statures. Exciting to me, but not too many people. So, instead, I'll give you an update on the book process and where I'm at with my editing and nailing down the hard part of the story.
Oh! Look What I Found!—A Book at the End of a Tunnel
My process of writing a book in a week and a bit about the horror novella.
Aigner Loren Wilson Writer & Editor 