July Writing Updates

Balancing disappointment with hope and excitement.

Thank you, thank you, thank you! You were so supportive and helpful with my cover reveal last month. I cannot begin to express what your support means to me!

REACH is off with the fabulous Caitlin Miller for LINE EDITS. This is the next step in the process and I cannot believe we’re here!

As I wait for REACH to be returned, I’m drafting book two. The working title is Rising, and each of the titles is a play on a phrase involving the word stars (because scifi and stars just go together in my mind). I’m at 26,000 words in draft one (goal for this draft is 60,000, with a final goal of 80-85k words) and really excited about the way the story is developing! You might hate Llama by the end of book one (oh…did I just tease something?) but you will NOT hate her by the end of book two.

A GUEST BLOG POST

I don’t share a ton about my faith on my author Instagram account. It’s not that I’m uncomfortable sharing my faith on the Internet, it’s that REACH is written for secular or Christian teens and adults to enjoy.

What I do want is for my book to find its way into the hands of faith based readers and secular readers alike.

Several years ago I hosted a Catholic Women’s podcast called Heart Home Faith and had a guest who has since taken off in the Catholic sphere. She was kind enough to let me write a guest blog post for her and it’s launching this week! If you’re Catholic and/or interested it’s here.

https://totalwhine.com/2024/07/22/if-then-nfp-and-dreams-for-catholic-women/

Polar Bear Summer

Polar Bear Summer is my middle grade novel that has been in a peer review contest. The contest involved posting the first five chapters of your novel, getting feedback and peers scoring your chapters based on a rubric. At the end was a small press publisher ready to offer at least one of the finalists a traditional publishing deal, with an advance.

I could see my scores and I did really well. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough and I wasn’t a finalist. I know from seeing my scores that I was very close to the finalists, but falling short really, in a word, stinks.

I felt peace this week when I decided to complete this manuscript and query, or submit to small presses that accept unagented subs. Middle grade is a more difficult market to self publish in, but I believe in this story and it’s need to be in the world. So I’ll start there and see where it goes!

As luck would have it- my friend Bethany’s Substack just listed a bunch of small presses that are open to accepting MG novels and a few of them sound like what I’ve got might be a good fit! Thanks, Bethany!

Polar Bear Summer is just over 10,000 words right now, with a target goal of 36-40,000 words. It was inspired by the photos of polar bears that took over an abandoned weather station.

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

Here’s the pitch:

Eleven year old Annette George lost more than her mom to illness- she also lost her ability to speak. Annette’s meteorologist father is so busy trying to escape his grief that he forgets about Annette and her own wishes. Without asking her, Dr. George accepts a weather and climate research position on a remote island in the Hudson Bay and a permanent job after in Churchill, Canada. Mostly ignored by the adults, except for the older pilot and assistant, Chris, Annette discovers the research island is home to a mother polar bear and twin cubs. When disaster strikes, Annette intervenes, setting both bear and girl on a journey of self discovery. Will Annette’s heart heal after losing her mom, or will the polar bears she’s come to love break it open anew? 

How can you be an advocate when you can’t say a word?

Photo by Eva Blue on Unsplash

Full plate, Full Life

Seeking Joy and finding peace

I had an experience recently where someone was rude to me. I have spent my entire life with chronic anxiety. Even though this rudeness really had nothing to do with me, it was enough to push me into a spiral because it wasn’t just words. It was words while I was also waiting on test results for my baby, and terrified about what the results could mean. I was pre-worrying, but that’s been my go to for thirty four years. If there’s a way to worry, l find it.

There are two happy parts to this story:

First, sweet baby Paxton is great! He’s doing fantastic and the blood tests came back completely normal!

Second: In the end, this was actually a great boon to our family. I realized I needed to make a decision- one where I let anxiety and fear of never being good enough for everyone rule my days, or one where I reach out with both hands and seek the joy that is in my life.

For the past weeks, I’ve been looking for joy and have found more peace and less anxiety than ever before.

Where are you finding joy today?

Thanks for being here!

Olivia