Long Time, No Post

I came to the site to update one of the book pages (I'd noticed a mistake and wanted to fix it before I forgot about it), and it hit me how long it's been since I did a blog post. Two months to the day, in fact. Yikes!

Anyway, February was very productive. I started two new stories - one urban fantasy with werewolf main characters (those are SO much fun!) and a novella that's part of the Mysterious Ways series. I also added a good chunk to From the Heavens, also part of the MW series. February also brought the publication of my latest short story series, Alpha - which is continuing to publish, one story per week, through part of this month. The Complete Collection is available in paperback already, done in February.

March ended up being way less productive as I battled the tail end of the winter blahs. I did manage to get the second book in the Otherworlder series (Visions) ready for publication and the third book (Specters) off to my first reader. For April, I've turned my attention to finishing the final book in that series (Destiny). I did the cover in March, but I'm not yet happy with it. When I am, I'll upload it to the medieval fantasy page of this site. Formatting for publication is a "limited brain function" exercise for me, so at least I was able to use the March "creative dead zone" constructively to some degree. *G*

I have Seasonal Affective Disorder, so March and September and I tend not to get along too well. March is definitely the worst. It feels "darkest before the dawn", and my energy, creative flow, and oomph go on vacation for that month without me. Thankfully, I've dealt with that long enough (all of my life) that I know better than to fight the flow. So aside from the writing-related tasks I mentioned above, I vegged in front of the TV and read books I knew I'd enjoy (which means, I re-read books I've already read that are my favorites). Plus, I got a mountain of crocheting done. Two shawls, about 30 dishcloths, 2 large doilies, and the start of a small doll. ... Yeah, I think that covers it. Not bad for about 3 weeks, eh?

Writing for me is like any other art form for many other "artists". It ebbs and flows. Sometimes the creative flow is strong and moves so fast I'm not sure I can keep up. Other times, it moves at an easy-to-follow but rapid pace. Still others, it stops altogether and my mind rests. Until I started tracking my daily writing, I had no idea how consistently this happened. I used to fight it, but I learned that only made things worse.

I'm not one of those writers who can FORCE myself to "write every day" without serious repercussions. When I do that, it makes writing hard, steals the fun from my work, and stifles creativity. If I hadn't been tracking my numbers so closely, I wouldn't have realized how badly doing that crushed my writing spirit. Once I realized what was happening, I stopped.

Now? I go with the flow. I have unproductive days and even weeks, but when it flows, it really goes. I hope to write 500,000 words this year. Totally doable, I've done it before. I'm already at about 110,000 at this point. Behind overall, I know, but I also know I can catch up very quickly when stories flow well.

All writers have hurdles that cut into writing time. Health issues, family, jobs, life's other distractions and demands. Life gets in the way in a variety of ways. We can either learn to work with them or make ourselves crazy trying to fight against them.

What kind of hurdles do you face? Have you learned to work with them, or are you fighting against them?