Happy December! November was a whirlwind for me, here and gone in no time at all. I wrote a novel (won NaNoWriMo), read two published books, read one ARC book, and beta read a 146k word mammoth of manuscript! Oh, and I had Thanksgiving three times. Food, food, food!
It’s been a fun month!
Apparently, I can write a full-length manuscript in half a month, which is awesome. It kills my wrists though, so I don’t think I’ll be writing twelve manuscripts each year. Six is more than enough 😉 Check out my post about it if you want some advice on how to make the most of your writing time.
Being published versus self-published doesn’t guarantee a good or good quality book. Of the four books I read in November, The Delphi Effect by Rysa Walker and the (beta read) manuscript by S.E. Drummond were my two favorites. The other published book I read (which I won’t name, but if you’re smart you can guess) was sort of terrible. I was really surprised because it was the third book I had read by that author. While it had good parts and an interesting story, the emotion, romance, and a good chunk of the dialogue were awful: contrived, rushed, unbelievable/unconvincing, and awkward. It was strange because I wasn’t sure if the book was rushed, poorly edited both conceptually and syntax-wise, or if I simply had forgotten how awful the other two books were by that author. Surely I hadn’t though…right? Either way, I’m tired of thinking about it. Moving on.
The last exciting writer-related thing that happened in November was that I came up with an amazing story idea for a science fiction thriller! I’ve only written one sci-fi manuscript so far. I tend to write in the fantasy genre, though I have PLENTY of ideas/full outlines/manuscripts I started years ago that are sci-fi.
I’ve never written a THRILLER though. The word itself is thrilling and just screams ‘play Michael Jackson’ to me. I’ve already started doing research on how to make my sci-fi thriller the best it can be, and I’m really looking forward to getting it out in Scrivener so that I share it with some alpha readers! I’ve been refusing to tell people what the story is about because it has so many wonderful twists and turns in it. The only person I’ve told the whole plot line to is my husband, who lovingly said, “It’s crazy. It sounds like you were on an LSD trip when you came up with it.” We laughed, a lot.
I’m super excited to work on it this month and do a ton of reading, baking, gift-wrapping, and eating! Happy December, everyone!
R.Q. Woodward 
Congrats on the Nano win!
Sadly, being traditionally published doesn’t guarantee a book will be good. I’ve read a lot of books that were not self-published that were decidedly, shall we say, underwhelming. However, the worst books I’ve come across hands down were self-published.
All the best with your thriller!
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I think I’ve read more published books that were terrible than self-published, but that’s mainly because I don’t read as many self-published books. There is one book series that I was BLOWN AWAY to find out was self-published though. Have you heard of The Atlantis Gene by A.G. Riddle? It’s the first in a trilogy and it is absolutely amazing. You can tell he spent a lot of time working on it. It paid off too because he’s sold several million copies of it and every other book he has self-published since. It’s a free read on Prime Reading if you’ve got Amazon Prime 😀
Are your plans to be traditionally published?
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I’ve heard of The Atlantis Gene, but I haven’t read it. I’ll definitely check it out, though. Okay, update that. I bought it, because why not. 🙂
I’m not entirely decided on the trade vs self-publish choice. I confess to being one of these people who would really like the validation of being trade published, and I think I’ll go down that route first, but I’d certainly consider self-publishing later down the road.
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How exciting! Seems like you had a super productive month. It’s always great to see writers who are excited about their work, too. That’s when we’re most productive! Congrats, glad this month fared well for you.
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Thanks! I agree, that excitement is key.
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