As of late I’ve been trying my best
to eliminate distractions, and prioritize. My attention has been divided on
side projects for so long I’ve been forgetting what my main project was
supposed to be. At the moment, I have two finished novel drafts on my hard
drive (and backed up on flash drives, don’t worry). I’ve also been working on
this blog, and I’ve been developing a webcomic. I found myself at a crossroads
after finishing the first draft of the second novel; and I’ve finally chosen a
path. I want to buckle down and focus most of my effort on my upcoming
webcomic. I’m organizing my priorities. Anyway, I’m going to do a run down on
all the projects I’m juggling right now; more so I can keep track of it all.
Priority
1: Loose-Headed Harry
This is my webcomic. Earlier this
year I finally had enough money to buy a good tablet and an art program, so now
I’m finally ready to make it a reality through digital art. It’s based on a
comic I used to draw in High School. It was originally a gag comic where this
unfortunate, bullied teen gets decapitated in gruesome and creative ways. The
new incarnation will be something much deeper; a dramedy that explores themes
of bullying, and examines and ridicules the American education system. It is
set in an exaggerated reality. I liken it to the kind of worlds Johnen
Vasquez’s works are set in, such as in Invader Zim and Johnny the Homicidal
Maniac. It’s reminiscent of the way I looked at the world as a teen, where the
teachers are all sadists participating in a conspiracy to make the student’s
lives a living hell. It goes back and forth between fantasy and realism.
Anyway, I’m going to have to come up with a good summary of it. That’s always
the hardest part when it comes to writing; actually explaining what your story
is about in a few sentences.
I’ve chosen to make this project my
main focus. As it stands, I think this is the one project that I have the
highest chance of being able to monetize. And that might mean fewer blogs.
Priority
2: The Flutterbudgets of Oz
As I mentioned, I have a finished draft of a novel sitting on my hard drive, it's the first book in this two-part series set in L. Frank
Baum’s land of Oz. I can do this because it’s public domain. It’s high-brow fan
fiction, essentially. I spent all of last year and the beginning of this year
writing it as my primary project; it was something I was just motivated to
write. I had to write it. I’m currently waiting to see how it’s going to be
published, but the prospect of it getting published looks promising. I’m going
to remain a bit tight-lipped on this project for the time being, but you’ll
hear all about it from me eventually. The sequel to the first book is one of my
current side projects; and I’m well aware the first book probably has a lot of
editing to be done, as any finished draft does.
Priority
3: This Blog: My Memoir
I started this blog as a means to
cope with a deep depression, and it has helped. It’s my memoir. I’ve somewhat
given up on the idea of actually trying to traditionally publish a memoir. It’s
hard enough to publish fiction. It might be fun to self-publish a memoir
someday, whenever I have enough money to throw away doing that, but until then
I’m better off just posting my memoir here, and hoping Blogspot doesn’t cease
to exist or a solar flare doesn’t permanently knock out the internet. Features
like the Years in Music and Birthright Armenia Reflections blogs are something
I write because I enjoy it, whether a lot of people end up reading it or not.
Another reason this blog exists is to boost my portfolio. Every writer has a
blog somewhere that they can guide literary agents to. So that’s also what this
is. It’s been taking up a lot of my time though. Those Years in Music articles
take a lot of time to write, and I don’t make any money doing it, nor do many
people even read them. I don’t think people want to read about music they’ve
never heard of or wouldn’t like if they did hear it. I don’t write for the
money, of course. But society being what it is, I need to gain imaginary
numbers with my work to be permitted to continue doing it.
The
conclusion I’ve come to is the blog is going to have to take a back seat to the
comic, and is even a lesser priority than the Oz novels, at least right now. I
do still want to write for the joy of writing, so I’m not going to stop
blogging completely. Writing is still a good therapy for me so I will keep
doing it.
Priority
4: The Immortal Tales
This is the novel series that I’ve
wanted to write since I was a teenager; following a group of immortals
throughout history as they do their best to prevent a mask that is possessed by
a malevolent dragon spirit from falling into the wrong hands. It’s historical
fantasy that gradually becomes urban fantasy as it gets closer to modern times.
The first book in the series was to take place in the Kingdom of Urartu
(ancient Armenia). I have a finished draft of the book, which last year I
actually was trying to send out to literary agents with query letters, with no
luck. Now of course you can send queries to hundreds of agents and get dozens
of rejections before anyone says they’re interested. That’s expected. I
actually had two agents say they were interested before they never contacted me
back again. I waited, and waited. I got more and more rejections. And as I did,
I grew more and more discouraged with the whole publishing world. “Oh, think
about how many times J.K Rowling got rejected”, they all say. It’s like playing
the lottery. Now I’m thinking that starting the first book in the series in a
setting that the average American has neither heard of nor cares about probably
isn’t the best thing to do from a marketing standpoint, and is probably why I
was getting so many rejections. If I want this series to be published by a traditional publisher, I have
to start thinking like them, as difficult as it is for me to get into that mindset. So instead I’m going to have a story from later in
the series be the first book. This one takes place in contemporary times, in
America. The Urartu book will be kind of a prequel that gets released later.
Now, I just have to write the next book. Sigh…I’ve been too busy with other
things. Worst case scenario with this series (besides it never getting written), I could end up self-publishing it, and probably selling two
copies a year because I have no money to market it. Might as well put it online for free and ask for donations,
really. Anyway, this project is on the back burner right now.
Priority
5: Everything Else
There are other art and writing
things I do, but, they should be the lowest priority at this point. I’m
probably going to end up doing some of these anyway, but I shouldn’t devote too
much of my energy on them. Another thing that should be included here is social
media and such. I need to go on Facebook and Reddit less often.
Will I be able to keep these
priorities in order? I’ll try. But as a result, I’m probably going to be
posting on the blog less often.
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