Happy Friday, everyone, and welcome to National Novel Writing Month, otherwise known as NaNoWriMo!

(For those of you unaware, this is a month-long challenge designed to make writers go insane and lose lots of sleep while trying to cram out 50,000 words in one month. Why everyone loves it, I have no idea. XD)

During NaNo, Julian over at Saver of Memories is once again hosting her 5-Part Shared WIP Tag! This week’s topic is “General Questions.”

Okay, here’s my attempt at a blurb:

Faye Grenswick has a secret: She belongs to the diminishing race of Xi, known for their mental powers. Unfortunately, they are also highly persecuted. If she told anyone of her ancestry, she would lose everything in her life, including her job at the magical Xylem Garden. However, when she accidentally releases a dangerous criminal from his binds, she has no choice but to leave her life and maybe, just maybe, trust the criminal.
Prince Rowan also has a secret: He doesn’t want to be matched. But he has no choice in the matter - all kings must have a queen. His potential wife, Erin, will do almost anything to become queen. The situation gets even more complicated when a figure from Rowan’s past arrives at the castle, threatening the truth of everything he thought he knew.
Faye and Rowan don’t know each other, but they have a common purpose - keep the throne of Kianda safe. But this might just prove harder than either of them thought.

For now, my working title for this story is "The Silver Sword," because SPOILERS. :)



This is rather interesting. Usually, when I get ideas, it’s nicely hand-wrapped, with a conflict, characters, and a villain all rolled into one. This time was different.

The idea for Faye to release a criminal came from a Band trip to Nashville, TN my freshman year. We were touring some weird hotel that had a lot of plant life in it, and we were all kind of bored. At one point, I noticed that in the middle of the greenery, there was a creepy door than led down into darkness. I wondered why it would be there, in the middle of a garden, and Faye and the criminal (who’s name is Whit) were born.

Rowan and Erin's story used to be about a girl who was matched to a prince, but fell in love with the prince’s brother instead.

Yeah, it’s changed a lot from where it used to be.

I knew that both stories were set in the same world, but each tale was missing something, and I wasn’t sure what it was.

So one day I decided to combine them together. And voila.

(As a side note, I don’t really regret combining the stories, but Rowan and Erin's story had a rather unique aspect to it that I had to cut in the Silver Sword outlining process.



Um . . . I walked around a Nashville hotel.

That’s about it, come to think of it. Most of the “research” I’ve done involves Google and my imagination (like, for instance, what a spear wound would be like).

I’m not an adventurous person, okay???



I’ve been thinking about this story a lot recently, and ever since combining the two storylines I’ve really wanted to write it.

I also didn’t have any better idea for what to write, so I just picked it and went with it.



Usually during, but I may just make stuff up just to hit my first-draft word-count. I’m not really sure how I’m going to handle the research portion yet. I’ll figure it out. ;)

Haven’t done any research, but it usually consists of me Googling stuff.



So, I have a different way of “plotting.” I figure out the major points of the story, but don’t plan any more than that. It usually turns into one big mess.

I’ll probably write a post on this one day, but my basic plotting process is this:
1. Get a story idea
2. Wait two or three days to make sure this is a good idea
3. Go outside and play around with a basketball while I figure out scenes. (Sometimes moving around helps me think.)
4. On nights when I can’t sleep, role-play certain scenes that are emotionally charged (because if they’re physically charged, I just wake up more)
5. Repeat steps three and four until I know most of the book by heart.
6. I don’t write it down for some weird reason.
7. Six months later, I regret not writing the story idea details down.
8. Repeat for the next idea.



Definitely type. I edit things too much while I’m writing to hand-write the draft. (And I usually wear out my pencil erasers.) I’m pretty sure my Spanish teacher is sick of seeing 5000 scribbles on my homework assignments. XD



Unfortunately, no. But that’s a good idea!



I honestly don’t know. “Faye” just came to me; it seemed like a good healer name.

“Whit” is actually a play on words, because - get this - Whit has a sense of humor. Get it? He’s witty?

(Just pretend that my sense of humor is funny and move along...)

“Erin” is an Irish word for “peace,” since at one point I was trying to base Kianda on Ireland. So is “Rowan,” which means “red-haired.”



One theme that will come up in the duology (oh, did I forget to mention that this is going to be a duology?) is forgiveness, like in the Inhumans. But others are self-acceptance, teamwork and relying on others, giving second changes, and that good will always win out.

As for how I find themes, I’m honestly not quite sure. They’re usually just there and come with the characters. *shrug*

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Well, there’s the first part in the Shared WIP Tag! Here are the others who are doing the tag:

Jules @ Saver of Memories
Ceci @ Ceci Creates
Lisa @ Inkwell
Gray @ Writing is Life
Julia @ Lit Aflame
Jem @ Jem Jones, Writer
Melissa @ Quill Pen Writer
Brooklyne @ Showers of Blessings
Ariel @ Scribes and Archers
Keturah @ Keturah’s Korner
Sarah @ Pen of a Ready Writer

Definitely go check out their awesome stories, and don’t forget to check back with all of us next week, because the next segment is about MAIN CHARACTERS.

-Nicole