Blog - M. C. Lee Books

Writing According to Plan— Or Not

To Outline or Not to Outline, That is the Question

First, there are authors who outline extensively, and authors who don’t outline at all, and every possible range between. All possibilities are equally valid and viable, as long as the author uses a method that their brain likes.

In other words, the answer is “yes.” Outline or don’t, whatever you like.

But if the method you are using isn’t working, go ahead and try something else.

If you normally outline like crazy, but then you’re bored with the story because you already know what happens– outline less.

If you got lost somewhere in the middle and have no idea what happens next– outline more.

If you know where you’re going but you forget things along the way–outline more strategically.

What About Me?

I’ve always said I was a plotter. After all, I wrote a sentence or two of outline for every single chapter (six) I planned for my short story so long ago. Which then grew into an entire book.

Yeah…. not a good outline. Maybe I wasn’t a plotter.

But plotting is good, right? (See how I drank the Kool-aid?) So I tried more plotting for book 2. Which stalled in the middle. I thought plotting was supposed to be easier!

Plotting also eventually saved book 2, after I rearranged a lot of stuff. The whole process of learning helped me develop the plotting system I still use (with a few updates). That system made books 3 & 4 much easier (as easy as it gets, ahem).

For my new series, I added a column for “What goes wrong?” because I was making things too easy for my characters.

So Now It’s Easy, Right? Everything Goes According to Plan!

*wild laughter*

No.

Major things still go wrong. Drama goes missing, beats don’t work out, plot holes appear, characters refuse to do the thing because they don’t want to. Those all require re-plotting on purpose. (I hate that.)

Then there are the accidents, happy or sad. I’ll be writing along, following my notes, and then something happens that I didn’t plan. Sometimes I erase it because it messes up stuff I have to have later. Sometimes it’s better than what I had planned and I still have to re-plot. (The one time I love re-plotting.) Sometimes it’s just different, neither better nor worse for the plot, and I have to decide if it adds anything else to the story. Is it funny? Poignant? Foreshadowing? Linking to backstory? Okay, it can stay.

Sometimes I Don’t Find the Broken By Myself

I have a lovely critique group, and I always get beta readers. And sometimes they’ll twiddle their fingers nervously and say, “You know, I really don’t think this thing right here works. Here’s my reason…”

And then I cry.

Okay, not usually. But I might be sad. And then I start pondering how to fix the broken thing. Sometimes it’s easy. “Rearrange the dialogue here. Add all the reasons there. Put the cause before the effect.” Sometimes it’s hard. “What do you mean, you don’t like the ending??”

But really and truly, I’m grateful to those who find my errors before I expose them to the whole world. I’d rather fix them first.

Well, Should I Plot?

I don’t know. Do you have a plotting brain?

Try it and find out. Remember, there’s no “true” answer, no matter what So-and-So Famous Person says. If plotting works for you, plot. If not plotting works for you, don’t plot. If semi-plotting works for you, then do that.

It’s your story and your brain. Do it your way. Really.

If you want to learn more about plotting, I have a list of my favorite plotting books.

Happy writing,
Marty C. Lee

Minor Reveals

This post is based on a question from a reader. Thanks, Jared C., for the idea.

“What happened to Kolina and Alemana after they escaped from the pirates? Did they ever make it to Ahjin?”

The answer is in the books, but it’s a bit subtle in places for reasons I’ll explain, so here’s the whole reveal.

After their early adventures in Tales of Kaiatan, Kolina and Alemana swam all the way home, collected their stuff, then swam to the island of the gods. Ahjin gave them both jobs among his guards, and they are in Spark of Intrigue as such. You have to look for them by description, because early readers complained I had too many names to keep track of, so I un-named a lot of minor characters. At the time, I hadn’t written Tales, so I didn’t realize that was a bad idea for Kolina and Alemana. Oops.

But in case you missed them in Spark, they are mentioned again in Tales, as minor characters in the last story. Look in Izo’s wedding scene to find them. 😉

And here’s a bonus question for you.

“Do you ever have Easter eggs in your stories?”

Of course I do! I can give you two examples off the top of my head.

In Spark of Intrigue, Nia sees several history tapestries in the library. One shows the war between the Heresa and Tetsuya clans.

In Tales of Kaiatan (and Unexpected Tales), Shara and Hesketh’s romance is almost blighted because of rules laid down after the war between Heresa and Tetsuya.

And in Legends of Kaiatan, which is set farther back in history, the story of Fearless tells of a boy who got drafted into… the war between Heresa and Tetsuya. Yep, they’re all talking about the same war. I had a lot of fun with that one.

My second example is less complicated but more impactful.

In Seed of War, Zefra offers to show Nia the maps of legends her grandparents have, and tosses off the additional information that some of them even have songs with them. She’s just trying to keep Nia from being bored and antsy, and the comment didn’t mean anything in particular.

(The author was just tossing off the comment, too…)

Then in Spark of Intrigue, it turns out that one of those legendary maps and the song that goes with it are the key to solving the mystery and ending the conspiracy.

(Fortunately for me, I was editing Seed while I was plotting Spark and desperately looking for a way to solve my dilemma. And there it was, as a throw-away line. Sometimes authors plan ahead and foreshadow their big plot twists. Sometimes they rummage through the prior books and turn meaningless strands into important threads. Ahem.)

I don’t think I have to tell you about EVERY time I accidentally made myself look smart, do I? Nah… I’m okay if you think I’m actually that smart on purpose. 😉

Happy reading,
Marty C. Lee

Change of Pace

I have written fifty posts about my favorite books. Fifty is a lot. I have decided that the time has come for a change of pace. I’ll still write the occasional book review post, including a “best of [year]” and “research in [year],” but mostly, I’m going to switch to posts about writing.

My old book review posts will remain up for reading inspiration. You are still welcome to comment on them and let me know what you liked or what you would recommend.

Besides the yearly posts, I might add the occasional guest post or random review, as I feel like it. 🙂

If you’ve been loving my book reviews, I apologize for the change, but I hope you grow to love my other posts just as much. That’s all for now, but I’ll have a new writing post in three weeks.

See you then!
Marty C. Lee

How Fast Do I Write?

Short answer: Not very. If you want me to be one of those book-a-month writers, you will be very disappointed.

Long answer…

I started writing my first book in July of 2013.

Yes, that was a long time ago, thank you. It was supposed to be a 6-chapter short story, but it grew. There’s no outlining in this process because I thought writing a sentence or two for each chapter was outlining. Anyway, it took me until March 2015 to finish the first draft of 104K words. It’s shorter now, yes. So 104K in 20 months is 5.2K per month. And then it took me almost five years AFTER THAT to rewrite and edit and rewrite and edit (seven major times and hundreds of minor!) until I was ready to publish in Jan 2019.

5.5 years total for book 1.

I started writing book two September 24th, 2015.

I got partway through it, decided the not-outlining thing wasn’t working, and stalled for a long time while I learned more about story structure and reorganized a large chunk of the plot. In August 2017, I got back into it, finishing in summer of 2018. So that one took three years for the first draft, or roughly 2.6K per month not counting when I was just staring at it, or 3-4K per month only counting the months I actually wrote. Yes, that is still slower than book one for the draft. That’s because by then I knew how much I didn’t know. The editing went faster, though. I published in Sept 2019.

4 years total for book 2.

I started outlining book three in February 2018.

I wrote it from July 2018 to 25 Feb 2019. Eight months for the drafting! Pretty fast, huh? That’s over 11K per month. Definitely getting faster, although I didn’t write down when I started outlining it. And I wrote this one while I was editing book 2 and outlining book 4. It was a grueling schedule. I published in May 2020.

2.25 years total for book 3.

I started outlining book 4 in Dec 2018.

I wrote it from March 2019 to Jan 2020, which is ten months or an average of 9K per month. Still not bad, especially considering that I plotted the last few chapters right before I wrote them. Ahem. That one was published in January 2021.

Just over 2 years total for book 4.

After book 4, I rewrote the prequel story between Jan & Mar 2020, making it much longer and much, much better. It’s still a novella, so two months is totally reasonable. Roughly 9K per month. Then I edited and re-edited ten million times (hey, it felt like it), for a total of 10 months. For a novella. Nope, not fast at all. Republished Nov 2020.

I started book 5 in March 2020.

Yes, during the pandemic. That wasn’t the hard part. My parents moved in with my family in Sept 2019, but we still hadn’t found a new (bigger) house yet. THAT was the hard part. I finished drafting in mid-April 2021. The outlining wasn’t separate for this one, because it was a collection of short stories, so I alternated outlining and writing. 100K in 13 months is an average of 7.7K per month. It was published in September 2021.

1.5 years for book 5.

Time to finish the series.

I outlined AND drafted book 6 from May to late December 2021, plus an extra novella for a reader magnet that goes with it. About 110K in 8 months is almost 14K per month. They were published in May 2022.

1 year for book 6.

Yes, by this point, I was feeling pretty fast as an author. I was also feeling pretty overworked.

I started a new series in January 2022.

In it, I wrote almost two (shorter) books by the end of September. 95K in 9 months, or 10.5K per month. That series isn’t complete yet, nor am I ready to publish.

In April 2022, I started brainstorming ANOTHER new series.

It was more complicated, so it took me until the end of September to be ready to start writing book 1, though I did finish the 20K prequel during that time. My estimate was that I would finish book 1 by New Year’s, but I actually finished December 5th. 75K (before edits) in just over 2 months, or about 35K per month. Yes, you read that right. Three times as fast as ANY of my other books, and ten times faster than the slowest. Wow! It’s still in the editing process as of this post, so I can’t give you the total time.

I still have several books left to write in that series. Will they all go that fast? Probably not, but wouldn’t it be nice?

But it’s not always so smooth.

In fact, I caught Covid in December, stopped writing for almost two months, and have been struggling to get back up to my old speed, much less the new one. Sigh.

But I’ve done it before, so I believe I can do it again, eventually.

So to what do I attribute the increase in my speed?

For the past year, I’ve been studying Clifton Strengths and trying to figure out my own brain. I also discovered Strengths for Writers and the Writer-Better-Faster Academy, which applies the topic directly to writers. And slowly, I’ve been learning. I’ve also spent the past 10 years improving my writing skills, which helps dramatically. And I got an office with a door. Don’t underestimate the the benefit of not being interrupted! With all the changes, I think things are finally starting to click into place. I hope so.

Wish me luck!
Marty C. Lee

Robert Newman’s Mystery Series

Just for the fun of it, I’m doing an in-depth review of an old favorite today. Robert Newman wrote one of my favorite fantasy books, The Shattered Stone, but he also wrote a whole series of young adult mysteries that all start The Case of…

Be warned, these are old books, from the 70’s and 80’s. Granted, that makes me feel old, too… But I just looked them up, and they are available in ebook now, which means you don’t have to hunt them down in old print copies the way I did. (Although the print copies have way nicer covers.)

The series is sort of a Sherlock Holmes off-shoot, in that Sherlock is in a few of the books, but mostly the books are about a young boy and his friends.

In the first book, Andrew’s guardian is kidnapped in London, leaving him all alone. He’s rescued by a girl nicknamed Screamer and her family. Screamer’s brother works for Sherlock as a Baker Street Irregular, and so Andrew starts working for him, too. After helping Sherlock solve some big crimes, Andrew also finds out what happened to his guardian.

Later in the series, a policeman does more of the detecting than Sherlock does, but Andrew and Screamer remain involved.

Why do I like it so much?

The writing is good. (And you shouldn’t take that for granted.)

The mysteries are exciting but still logical and possible to solve yourself, though you don’t have to. And you don’t have to know stuff that’s impossible to know *cough Agatha Christie cough*.

But especially, the characters are very well done. I love Andrew and Screamer and the other characters. And even though the kids do a lot of the mystery-solving, they do it by helping the adults who are actually in charge (unlike some unrealistic young detective stories). The adults, in another plus, are generally loving and intelligent instead of cruel idiots.

The kids in the story are FRIENDS, above all else, and you can tell it when you read the stories. They treasure their friendship and stick together, and that makes for a delightful read.

So, there you go. If you like mysteries with young detectives, try Robert Newman’s The Case of series. Leave a comment to tell me what you think.

Happy reading,
Marty C. Lee

Writing Update: Return of the Fae series

Yep, that’s the name of my newest series. For a while, my brain called it Space Fae, until I came up with the actual name.

This is the series I wrote about in November, that is contemporary fantasy with a dash of science fiction and a great big splash of mythology. My work-in-progress tagline is: What if Earth has legends of werewolves, fae, and other myths because we used to be their colony? What if they’re coming back?

I’m having a ton of fun with the premise, and I plan at last six books in the series, though it’s set up in a way that will let me write in it for as long as I want.

I started drafting book 1 late last September and actually finished in early December, way ahead of schedule. Fastest book ever for me! So I started on book 2 and got four chapters done before I got Covid. Phooey! For obvious reasons, that brought my writing to a screeching halt for a while.

Then I had post-Covid-brain for a couple of months, and I only managed to get two more chapters written. Not very helpful. Even worse, I discovered the plot was scarce in obstacles. Sure, the characters had hard things to do, but they were doing them with no difficulty. That’s great in real life, but not very exciting in a book. Covid-brain didn’t want to talk about re-plotting the book, so I took it to my critique group to ask for ideas.

But trouble intervened IRL…

Sadly, my real life has been enough of a mess that I have not yet had a chance to see if the new ideas will work or not, though I am pretty sure I’ll need to majorly rewrite the last two chapters. Sigh.

Then a couple of beta readers got through book 1 and weren’t excited about the ending. I tried this, I tried that, still didn’t work. So I started pondering (which put book 2 on the back burner). It took weeks to come up with a rewrite that might (no guarantee) work. And I still need to see what people think about it.

In the meantime, I decided the prequel wouldn’t work as a reader magnet because it’s epic fantasy instead of contemporary, so I wrote a new short story that I hope has more of the flavor of the series. And then I rewrote it, because that’s the way it goes.

So that’s where I am right now. Will the new ending for book 1 work? How can I replot 90% of book 2? Is the new short story any good? Inquiring minds want to know, and so do I.

Wish me luck!
Marty C. Lee

Favorite Books of 2022

Here are my new (not reread) four and five star reads for 2022.

Nonfiction

Surrounded by Idiots, by Thomas Erikson (personality/behavior)
Strengths Finder 2.0: A New and Upgraded Edition of the Online Test from Gallup’s Now, Discover Your Strengths, by Tom Rath
Expanding Your Strengths, by Curt Liesveld (personality/behavior)
The Resiliency Advantage: Master Change, Thrive Under Pressure, and Bounce Back from Setbacks, by Al Siebert (behavior)
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, by Yuval Noah Harari (history)
Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void, by Mary Roach (science)
Depression, Anxiety, and Other Things We Don’t Want to Talk About, by Ryan Casey Waller (mental health)
The Astronaut’s Wife: How Launching My Husband into Outer Space Changed the Way I Live on Earth, by Stacey Morgan (memoir)
The Long Game: How to Be a Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term World, by Dorie Clark (philosophy?)
Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts, by Carol Tavris, Elliot Aronson (philosophy, behavior)
The Like Switch: An Ex-FBI Agent’s Guide to Influencing, Attracting, and Winning People Over, by Jack Schafer (behavior)
The Rabbit Effect: Live Longer, Happier, and Healthier with the Groundbreaking Science of Kindness, by Kelli Harding (health, behavior)
Unbearable Burden, by Krista M. Isaacson (memoir)

Writing Books

Understanding Conflict (And What It Really Means), by Janice Hardy
Understanding Show, Don’t Tell (And Really Getting It), by Janice Hardy
Writing Unforgettable Characters: How to Create Story People Who Jump Off the Page (Bell on Writing Book 12), by James Scott Bell
Dialogue: Techniques and Exercises for Crafting Effective Dialogue, by Gloria Kempton
The Heroine’s Journey, by Gail Carriger
Revising Your Novel, by Janice Hardy

Fiction

Earl on the Run, by Jane Ashford (Regency romance. Book 1 was okay, but not as good)
Lily of the Valley, by Sarah M. Eden (Georgian romance)
An Unfamiliar Duke, by Sian Ann Bessey (Georgian romance)
Spirits of Hastings: Terrifying Tales from Hastings, East Sussex, United Kingdom, by The Untruth Seekers (very mild horror)
Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster, by Jonathan Auxier (middle grade historical magical realism)
Dreams of Gold, by Traci Hunter Abramson (contemporary sports romance)
Chances Are, by Traci Hunter Abramson (contemporary romance)
Farilane, by Michael J. Sullivan (epic fantasy)
Bastille vs the Evil Librarians, by Brandon Sanderson
Mystery and More Mystery, by Robert Arthur (mystery short stories)
The Chronicles of Avonlea (historical)
The Spare Man, by Mary Robinette Kowal (sci fi mystery)

How Do I Choose Character Names?

Someone recently asked me how I choose character names, and I had to admit that it varies by series.

Unexpected Heroes

For Unexpected Heroes, my epic fantasy series, I started with baby name sites that had a “meaning” search. I’d type in a meaning that was significant to the culture, then I’d search for names I liked that fit the pertinent alphabet or could be altered to fit. (Yes, for that series, the letters mattered.)

After a while, I got tired of doing a search every time I needed a name, and I made a list of possible choices for easy selection, sorted by applicable culture. That made it quite a bit easier to hunt whenever a new character appeared.

To be fair, only two of four cultures cared about the meanings of their names. One cared very, very much, and one just had a pool of traditional names that they used. The third culture cared about as much as modern American culture, which is to say that some people did and some people didn’t, and choosing by sound was way more important. The fourth culture chose almost entirely by sound, stringing together lots of syllables just for the fun of it.

What can I say? They’re different…

Anyway, since *I* cared about the meanings and it helped me choose, I kept a list of the meanings. It’s on this website, if that sort of thing interests you.

Return of the Fae (in progress)

For my new series, which is contemporary fantasy with a sprinkle of science fiction and large dollop of mythology, I would have originally told you that I chose the human names by origin and random selection and the fae names by ancient-history origin. Which is true…

But when I was answering the question for the person who asked, I realized that quite a few of the names are also inside jokes. Ahem.

Some of them will be explained in the story. Though not immediately.

Some of them won’t. I’m cruel like that. I’ll just enjoy the jokes myself.

No, I won’t be listing the meanings of the names for this series on my website, because they aren’t culturally meaningful. I might list some of the origins, because that would be. But we shall see. The first book hasn’t even been published yet, so I’ve got time to ponder how much I want to tell you and how much I want to leave to amuse myself privately.

I know, I’m mean. Think of it this way—it gives you something else to think about after you finish the story. 😉

Relatively Haunted series (yet to come)

My pen name is working on an adult cozy paranormal mystery series, but I don’t expect publication for a while. But just for the sake of covering all my bases, here’s how I picked those names.

Mostly by random, honestly, with a bit of “origin matters.” Modern characters were almost entirely random. Sometimes I asked people for a name and used that one. Sometimes I used a random generator.

For historical names, I used a random generator set to the proper country, or occasionally did an internet search for names that fit multiple criteria, like country AND religion.

Other than that, I just made sure I hadn’t already used the name (I kept a list) and that it wouldn’t be too much like someone else in the same story. Easiest name choosing ever.

Best Tips

If you’re trying to choose names for your characters, here are some of my best tips.

Decide what’s important to you. The sound of the word? The meaning? The origin? The number of syllables? Whatever matters, write it down.
Try out a few baby name sites and find one that allows you to search by the factors you identified as important.
If not much matters and you just need a name, try a random name generator. You can find ones for regular human names or for fantasy or whatever. Seriously, just search the internet.
Write down all the options you like every time you do a search. It might save you from a search the next time you need a name.
Try not to confuse your readers with names that sound too much the same. If you can make them not start with the same letter, that’s great. If you have too many characters to make that work, at least give them different vowels or different numbers of syllables or don’t rhyme them. You know, make them sound very different.

I think that’s it, folks. There you go, a naming primer. 🙂

Happy writing,
Marty C. Lee

Research Books in 2022 and earlier

Instead of a “category” of book reviews this month, I thought I’d give you a list of books I’ve read for writing research. This list doesn’t include business or actual writing subjects like plot & character, just side topics that I needed to know more about for my stories. I’ll try to remember to post a new list each year. Some of the research is for books not yet released (or written).

Please remember that 3 stars still means I was happy with the book. Also keep in mind that I was rating these on the “useful for research” scale, not on how well they were written.

Weapons

Warfare and Weapons, by Christopher Gravett (3 stars)
Weapons, by Jim Ollhoff (3 stars)
Weapons of Fantasy and Folklore, by John Hamilton (3 stars)
Archery, by Adam G. Klien (3 stars)
Archery, by the Boy Scouts of America (3 stars)
The Crooked Stick: A History of the Longbow, by Hugh D.H. Soar (2 stars)
Longbow, by Robert Hardy (2 stars)
Illustrated History of Arms and Armour, by Charles H. Ashdown (2 stars)
Weapons, by Deborah Murrell (2 stars)
Weapons of Ancient Times, by Matt Doeden (1 star)

Setting & Nature

Desert, by Amanda MacQuitty (3 stars)
Volcano and Earthquake, by Susanna van Rose and James Stevenson (3 stars)
Earthquake, by Jen Green (3 stars)
Escape from the Volcano, by Felicia Law (2 stars)
Surviving an Earthquake, by Heather Adamson (1 star)

Animals

Big Cats and Wild Dogs, by Jen Green et al. (3 stars)
Wolves, by Emma Child (3 stars)

Culture & Character

Hustlers, Harlots, and Heroes, by Krista D. Ball (3 stars)
Handbook to Ancient Greece, by Adkins & Adkins (3 stars)
Between Us: How Cultures Create Emotions, by Batja Mesquita (3 stars) (for a work-in-progress)
The Like Switch: An Ex-FBI Agent’s Guide to Influencing, Attracting, and Winning People Over, by Jack Schafer (4 stars) (for a WIP)

Science & Miscellaneous

Packing For Mars, by Mary Roach (4 stars) (for a WIP)
What Kings Ate and Wizards Drank, by Krista D. Ball (3 stars) (Fun story: her rant against stew made me realize I had a solution for that, which I did use in Seed of War. I found it amusing and satisfactory; how about you?)
Deerskins Into Buckskins, by Matt Richards (3 stars)
Bleed, Blister, Puke, & Purge, by J.M. Younker (3 stars)
The Body: A Guide for Occupants, by Bill Bryson (3 stars) (for a WIP)

I think that’s all for now. You can probably expect to see a lot more space and mythology books next year, if I can’t get enough information on line.

Happy reading,
Marty C. Lee

Writing Update: New Series

Well, to tell the truth, I’ve actually been working on TWO new series. One is adult paranormal cozy mystery (still clean, because I don’t write steamy), and it will eventually come out under a name variant. No worries; I’ll announce it. The second series wasn’t supposed to be started until after I finished the mystery trilogy, even though it’s under my usual name. I didn’t even know *what I was writing next for young adult, so it made sense to work on the other one first.

I did have a few ideas I was kicking around, but they were very different ideas, and nothing was producing plot or characters in my brain. So I kept thinking while I wrote the mysteries. I had plenty of time, right?

Then my daughter read me something off… Twitter? Facebook? Somewhere on the internet that she reads things. It was a “what if mythology is wrong” kind of thing, but I’m afraid don’t remember exactly what it said. I laughed, as one does, and quipped back about how it could be right if such-and-such.

Then I stared at her. I could write such-and-such. It would unite MOST of the ideas I’d been kicking around, which was even better than picking one or two of them. There was enough available material with lots of variety. I could have a TON of fun subverting expectations. I could mash together real-life science and history with very unreal other stuff and have a whole new (fake) history that would (incorrectly) explain so much.

So I decided to go ahead and write it.

The series is contemporary fantasy with a dash of science fiction and a great big splash of mythology, so it’s different from my first epic fantasy series but still feels close enough to be “mine.” (One of the reasons the mysteries are coming out under a pen name is because they are so different. The other is that they’re aimed at adults rather than teens.)

Anyway, that was back in early April. I did some quick concept ramblings and character picking, then I started doing research. Due to the very different sources that I’m mashing together, I had to do a lot of research. Plus, even when it probably doesn’t matter, I like being accurate. I’m nerdy like that.

Good news, though. The way I’m setting it up allows for a very long series, if I want to keep writing it and readers want to keep reading it. 😉

Then I had to do some character studies. Sure, I could just learn about my characters as I went along, like I did with my first series, but that’s a lot slower. It took me eight years to finish my first series, and four of those were just finishing the first book. I don’t want this one to take that long to get started, so I’m working more deliberately. Experience has to be good for something, after all.

Then I started plotting the major beats. That created the need for more research. Sigh.

Finally got through that (for now?), and started working on the more detailed outline. That turned up some major problems. I hate when that happens. So I worked on motivations for the past couple of weeks before returning to the outline.

As of now, I have all of book 1 outlined on my max outlining level, and one chapter for book 2, as well as over half of book 2 on the one-sentence-per-chapter level. (Book 2 volunteered…) I also got the entire prequel novella drafted, so progress is being made.

My tentative plan is to write the new series and submit it to my critique group, leaving the already-outlined mystery stories for when I’m blocked or need a break. Eventually, I’ll get them both finished.

Will it work?

I don’t know. I guess we’ll see. 🙂

Marty C. Lee