I'm Done With Roller Coasters

This past week has been a bit of a roller coaster. Mostly a series of downs, but just enough ups to keep the “ride” going.

Last week, a coworker lost her dad after spending a week in and out of the hospital with him. I feel her pain, and I am so sorry for her loss. I'm glad I was able to be there for her. But a selfish part of me is exhausted from working nearly two weeks straight, Sunday through Saturday. My only time off was a snow day on the 2nd, and a half-day the following Friday. It's been mentally draining, and I'm a bit burnt out.

On top of that, I found out last week that a college friend of mine, who I knew was struggling with his depression, committed suicide. Another light gone needlessly. Another circle of survivors left behind wondering “What If” as they rack their brains wondering how he could have been saved. A lot of emotional drain to add to my mental exhaustion.

My friend is deeply missed, and probably more so than he ever fathomed. It saddens me that I've already advocated this so many times on this blog, but I will keep doing so until there is no longer a need.

You ARE loved.

You WILL be missed.

You ARE NOT a burden.

I know it's hard to ignore those dark voices in your mind telling you otherwise. I know that every day is a struggle to quiet those negative thoughts. However, you should know that there IS help. Please, PLEASE, ask for it.

And for those of you who think “Reach Out” is pathetic advice, because OF COURSE you would reach out if it was that easy, please read this article on HOW to do so when you're struggling.

And print yourself this image:

I'm actually going to share that link again, because it's so important:
10 Ways to 'Reach Out' When You're Struggling with Your Mental Health.

Keep trying to fight and hold on. Your life does have value. And I will keep using the limited platform I have with this blog to tell you that over and over again.

As one could probably expect with the week I just had, I wasn't really in the mindset to write anything this week. I still haven't come up with an akuma idea. I didn't finish editing all fifteen chapters of “Peeping Tomcat.” I didn't succeed in my goal(s) for Writers’ Huddle's winter challenge.

Progress was made, though. Mostly with reading.

Trying to avoid in-depth thinking while still escaping reality for a bit, I managed to finish off "Oblivion." It was definitely a strong second novel by Ali Luke. You can hop on Amazon to read my full review, but the long and short is this:

• Her already good writing improved.
• I loved the character development she had, including getting me to finally sympathize with Mark!
• The pacing was a lot more intense in this installment.
• I still think, much like in "Lycopolis," Kay – clearly the main hero – doesn't get enough page-time.
• I will always think there needs to be more Brandon, even though I understand why that wouldn't work from a narrative standpoint.
• My only critique is that the climactic fight scene has so many players and locations involved, along with multiple POVs. It gets a bit confusing at parts as to what exactly is going on. That's the only snafu for me, though.

All-in-all, while I had a similar thought with “Lycopolis,” I truly feel like “Oblivion” would make an awesome movie. Perhaps that can be a WIP for next year: a fan script adaptation. It would be good practice on how to cut a story down into 120 minutes of film. Finding what is truly essential, and how to visually showcase things that are perhaps easier to explain on paper. Might be a fun exercise.


I managed to download the Kindle app onto my dinky netbook so I could get started on Ali's concluding story “Dominon.” I'm about two chapters in and still firmly hate the set-up of the Kindle app. I don't know if e-books are more enjoyable to read on an actual tablet, where they are taller than they are wide, but trying to read on a computer screen means each page is only a couple paragraphs long. I'm not a fan of constant clicking to advance pages. If I had to read an e-book on my computer, I'd much prefer PDF files that I can read in Adobe Reader. The formatting is better for me, and I can just scroll down through the story instead of clicking "next".

It is kind of sad when it's a more enjoyable experience – when it comes to formatting and ease of reading – to go through fanfiction downloaded off of AO3, compared to the clunkiness of the Kindle app.

Oh well, at least I can now read Ali's latest book. I WILL be buying it again, though, if she ever opts to have a print version like she did with the first two. So, come on, Ali! Make double the profit off me!

It wasn't all reading to avoid daily drain this week. On Sunday, as a last-ditch effort to conclude my week with SOME progress, I went back through chapter ten of “Peeping Tomcat.” I then continued on to chapters eleven and twelve. I tried expanding both, but neither hit the 3000 word mark, so I ended up combining them. This dropped my over-all chapter count for the story back to fourteen. I still have the last two chapters to conquer, as well as going back to chapter nine. Also, after going back through what needs to happen in the ninth chapter, it may split into two: the akuma attack itself, and the aftermath of it before Adrien decides he HAS to confess to Marinette.

So, I have three, maybe four, chapters left to go before it's done. Not bad, really. The story, as is, surpassed the 51,000-word mark. Granted, I probably could have had the whole thing done in the six weeks if I really pushed, but about 80% done isn't all that shabby either. I still have enough that ChibiSunnie and Cyhyr should be able to get the basic idea and give me overall notes. And as for chapter-by-chapter notes, I'm far enough ahead that I could get started with those on just the intro chapters, and still publish the first chapter on April 6th, as I originally planned.

Right now the real sticky wicket is that both girls are really booked with their own lives. While Cy reassured me that she was super excited to start reading the story, and was antsy for me to be done so she could start reading, I also don't want to distract her too much from what else she needs to do for her own career. And Chibi is so nose to the grindstone right now to get her own story done that she barely has five minutes to eat. I know that she has to wait until May to start reading. I'm hoping that I can still get started on my postings and that she can jump in to help with the ending of the story.

My biggest concerns are as follows:

1. The first chapter is about ELEVEN pages long! I feel like it's just too long, but I don't know where to cut, or if I should chop it in half and have it be two chapters, or what to do with it.
2. Out of the first ten chapters, just about all of them average between 3500 and darn near 7000 words! Then, from the eleventh chapter on, I'm struggling to hit 3000 words! This story seems so unbalanced.
3. I still fear that I'm too inside Adrien's head, and that I'm making the story more complicated than it needs to be.
4. As it's my first fanfic within this fandom, I always fear I don't have characters in character, or the situation believable.

But I'm so close! Even if it ends up being a flop, I am sooooo close to having a 50,000+ word story DONE! I'm so close to actually completing a multi-chaptered story. I'm so close to being able to do something I never do outside one-shot stories: cross off a WIP from the list of stories waiting to be finished. This is a major milestone for me.

So, yay! Thanks to the reviewers and favoriters of the “Peeping Tomcat” teaser chapter and “The Birth of The Mimicker” for keeping me excited for this project. Thanks to Chibi and Cy for cheering me on and volunteering to beta. Thanks to my mom for always having my back. Thanks to Hubby for indulging me. Thanks to Ali for hosting the Winter Writing Challenge in order to keep me focused. Thank you all! I love my support group! Group hug!!!

Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.

Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.

And while I'm on this high swing, how about I finish by wishing my sister and my god-son belated birthdays! Hope you both enjoyed yourselves!

Now to go relax for a couple days. Recharge. And get some more work done!

Painful Week

This week didn't go well.....

I am still trying to figure out that second akuma attack chapter. So far, I came up with about four potential akumas, but none of them would work with this story. At least I have something for other fanfics. So, silver lining, I guess. Doesn't help with last week's goal though. Meh.

I've been trying to "research," as it were, other akuma options. I watched a few episodes again to try to remind myself how the akumas are already used canonically. I also spent about four hours flipping through fanart and fancomics, as well as read about five different fanfics, to try to see what others do for their akumas. I know I did this already back around November, but with potentially new stories, I was hoping I'd have better luck. Sadly, it's the same now as it was then: virtually no fanfic writers attempt to have an akuma attack.

Most ignore them completely. The writers that acknowledge them tend to just deal with them "off screen." Only a small few actually have Ladybug and Cat Noir fight akumas, and when they do, the akumas don't seem very canonical. It's fine, that's what fanfiction is for, but it doesn't help me try to come up with something more "true-to-show." Most fanfic-original akumas are either generic superhero villains, such as a wolf-man who is out to protect the stray dogs of Paris, or they are complete fanservice, such as a slighted lover who is now playing cupid and forcing people to fall into intense lust with each other; creating random make-out sessions in the street. Or the akuma is a complete political statement, such as a guy who gets angry about being "friend zoned" and tries to force Marinette to fall for him, claiming to be the "nice guy" while borderline sexually harassing our brave heroine. Sadly, I have yet to find an original akuma that feels like something Zagtoons and/or Thomas Astruc would actually create. So my week of research hasn't been much of a help in that regards.

I did find a few new writers that I'm now following, and one or two new fanart/fancomic artists that I'm keeping an eye on. In that light, the research was a win, I guess....

On top of the lack of inspiration or proper guide, I put myself on bedrest most of the week. Apparently, I'm now an 80+ year old woman, because I threw out my back while picking up a piece of paper this week. Yup. I was moving a bunch of heavier things around the store with no problem. Then, fast forward about a half our, and I bent down to pick up a piece of paper the delivery team left on the floor. Somewhere in my bending down and standing back up I pinched a nerve or pulled a muscle or something. My lower back has been throbbing all week. I've been slowly cutting back on both pain killers and time off my feet as the week progressed, so I know it's healing, but it still kept me sort of laid up.

Normally, especially because I have a laptop, you'd think I would get MORE writing done, since I can't really do anything else, and I'm in one place anyway. However, I've been sleeping more than I would like to admit. Probably my body trying to heal. The pain, or the meds to dull it, also kind of fog my head. That, plus the lack of progress in my research, really kept me stumped.

What it DIDN'T keep me from is reading. That's been my main distraction over the past week: reading Ali Luke's second book Oblivion. While someone like Rick Riordan either stays equally good or falls into an uncharacteristic slump, Ali definitely improved on an already great writing style. I have been completely drawn in, and have to purposely stop myself after x-chapters or x-minutes, otherwise I would devour the whole book in one sitting. Not great when I'm trying to savor the stories, and I also would fall further behind if I just avoided everything with reading.

I have more-or-less been doing precisely that anyway, though.

"Should I write?"
"Yeah, open up the file."
"I can't think of anything."
"Give it another five minutes."
"I think I'd rather read more Oblivion, perhaps that will inspire me."
"Oh, okay.... I'll write later..."

And yet later never arrives. Does it ever?

At least I have the fun privilege of being able to fangirl about a book and its characters with the actual AUTHOR of said book. So, that's cool. She seems to get a kick out of my gushing about her work, and I'm having fun being able to freak out to the person who WROTE THE THING I'M FREAKING OUT ABOUT. That's just awesome to me.

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by Birdman, Inc.

Another silver lining? I DID write/edit this week. I just polished chapter ten a week early, and then jumped over to chapter twelve to polish that one up too. I didn't do nearly as much writing/editing as I would have liked, and it was all for the "wrong" chapter(s), but it was better than no writing. Right?

OH! And speaking of which, I did manage to get something written before the close of February! About two hours before writing group, I went to take a shower. Man, I'm loving how my mind can wander in the shower - one benefit of my hair being so long it takes darn near ten minutes to wash! - because, much like the instant realization of the Lucky Charm I wanted to use for my one chapter, I also came up with a story for February.

I haven't played "Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild" yet, and it's been a little while since I've seen Hubby play it. Yet, that was precisely what popped into my head. I was trying to figure out an akuma, and somehow Link the silent protagonist, and his canonical reasoning for it in BotW, were what came up. Remembering the plot/canonical facts and events in BotW, presented via Link's lost memories and Zelda's diary, I wanted to show Zelda rage at Link for staying silent.

I practically had the whole thing written in my head as I showered and dried my hair. Managed to just barely get it poured out onto the page by the time it was my turn to read at group. My chapters for "Peeping Tomcat" are long. I will never get ahead of my posting schedule since writing group is only every OTHER week. I was excited about my BotW fanfic, written vaguely enough that it could be mistaken as original work. So I decided to not read any more "Peeping Tomcat" at writing group, and read that instead.

Granted, we only had about five minutes left of the meeting by the time I was done reading, so we couldn't really afford long critiques, but I did have a lot of people comment about how they enjoyed it. How it COULD have been original. How powerful and emotional it was. How a lot was said in such a short amount of time.

Why can't I write like this all the time? With such succinctness?

Anyway, since I wasn't sure if it would still be considered fanfiction to everyone, I went ahead and posted the story on fanfiction and original works sites alike.

"One Last Hope"

On DeviantArt     On FanFiction     On FictionPress   On Archive Of Our Own

The story has received only one review - "Good story obviously" - and a small collection of faves since it went up last Wednesday. By far not one of my most well known pieces, but I'm still proud of it. I think I'm most proud of being able to keep Link's, Zelda's, and Ganon's names out of the story so that it CAN be reworked, with only a little bit of tweaking, into something original. I might have to think about adjusting it to fit a Gyateara story someday.

I have yet to read a continuous, multi-chapter, WIP at writing group, and it bums me out that I had that opportunity with "Peeping Tomcat," but I think it's best for me and the other members if I just stick with these short one-shots and pick up generic critiques on my writing voice that way. We'll see where I go from here.

The big thing is to get back into writing my own stuff; to continue work on "Peeping Tomcat," but the struggle is kind of real. My one co-worker has had a family emergency that has kept her out of work all last week, and it looks to be keeping her on leave this week as well. So I haven't really had a day off except for Friday when the store was closed due to over three feet of snow in less than 24-hours. I also don't have as much down time at work as I thought I would, or I would normally get with said co-worker, so not much writing has been going on there.

I hope it's just the first week - maybe two - of the month that's shot, and not the whole month itself. I'm going to try to finish the writing challenge strong. Cheer me on, won't you? It helps.

2018: Year of the Writer

It's that time of year again! When I use any excuse to try to hit the reset button. To be fair, though, in regards to my writing, I haven't been doing so bad. I haven't been doing as good as I would have liked, but I haven't been doing bad either.

This past week was probably one of my worst weeks, actually. Ironically. Between a day or two of being in a deep, angry funk for no apparent reason, Hubby trying to cheer me up, Valentine's Day at-home date-night followed by an actual date-night late in the week, and ironically Writers' Group, taking up all of my evenings, I didn't get much writing done. I also had no time at work, even during lunch. Mostly because lunch was the only time I had to get any reading done to not fall behind there.

So, I'm on par with where I want to be with my reading challenge at least.

Writing time, on the other hand, took a back seat this past week. Instead, Hubby and I had a "bad movie night" and watched a couple of movies on Netflix with some terrible reviews. We then watched "Black Panther" at the local theater on Saturday. Yesterday we watched the live action Fullmetal Alchemist movie on Netflix. Backtrack to Friday, Hubby had us watch "Z-O-M-B-I-E-S" on Disney Channel. It was cute for what it was, a Disney Channel Original movie. It did give me a new song addiction, which I happen to be listening to now:

Quick explanation. In Z-O-M-B-I-E-S a lime-soda induced explosion at the power plant created zombism. For me, the lime-soda is important for explaining why the zombies all look like Batman's Joker cosplayers. Anyway, the point is, in this movie, zombism is more a mutation than the reanimation of corpses. They still have superhuman strength, are aggressive, and crave flesh - more specifically, "braaaaaaaaiiiiiins". However, the government was able to design Z-Bands, wristbands every zombie wears that calms their flesh-eating urges and their aggression while also dropping their strength to average for humans. Now that zombies are "normal" they can live side-by-side with humans, sorta, they're stuck in the zombie slums called Zombietown. The story then follows the attempt to integrate zombie teens into the "normal" high school.

Again, it's cute. A bit heavy handed in putting exposition in dialog, and late in the movie, during a song the main character Addison sings, they visually recap the movie YOU JUST SAW in a flashback montage, which Disney seems to be big on lately. Those were the two main flaws I saw, but otherwise I'd recommend the movie if you have Disney Channel.

Back to my writing though.

I didn't give myself a lot of time to just write. Instead, this week was more "self maintenance" week, trying to spend time with my hunny, figure out why I was so randomly angry all the time for two days, taking long showers, and watching non-serious movies as pick-me-ups. It was important to do this maintenance, because I definitely feel much better this week.

I did manage to still keep my chapter-a-week pacing, though. At this rate I will never have all of "Peeping Tomcat" set to send to my betas by mid-March. However, most fanfiction writers only have a detailed outline, will write a chapter a week, edit THAT chapter, and post for weekly updates. So, I'll be sort of ahead of the game because I'm trying to have the whole story done first and edited as a whole entity. That way, if something later in the story adjusts something earlier in the story, I can do so instead of trying to dance around plot holes.

You know, like what I did with What Is Truly Meant To Be. I knew what I wanted for this story. I had a fairly detailed outline for it. I knew what would happen in each chapter. I did what most other fanfiction writers do: write a chapter, polish it, post it, work on the next chapter. Then I discovered the devil is in the details. Once I got into the actual nitty gritty of dialog and inner monologues, I stumbled upon plotholes I had to fill. It would have been a lot easier to have written the whole thing out, found those plotholes, and changed the earlier chapters to avoid them, instead of trying to pull a solution out of a hat later on, after I couldn't change things. Lastly, writing chapters took me way longer back then, so updates weren't nearly regular enough. And I eventually fell away from the story.

I want to avoid "Peeping Tomcat" falling into the same pattern as this last major project I was working on. Which is why I want to have it completely done before I started my weekly update postings. However, it looks like I'm going to fall into a sort of half-way between the two. I should have the first ten chapters done by the end of the Winter Challenge, which means I'll have all but the last five chapters edited. I might even get as far as the eleventh chapter, actually, since chapter ten is already pretty close to the best I can do without beta notes. That's over 60% of the story re-written/edited and ready for my betas. I also have a fairly firm grip on what I want for the tail end of the story, complete with the chapters already having a first draft written thanks to NaNo.

I could send the girls the first two-thirds of the story as edited as I can get it on my own, and then a detailed synopsis of the final third so they know where I'm going with the story. They should be able to give me notes on each chapter and the story overall based on that. I'll start posting the finalized chapters on time, and I'll have about two months to finish the last four or five chapters, get them beta'd and then polished, before I would fall behind. I should be more than capable if I stick with my current pace. In fact, I should have a month leeway to start working on "One and the Same." I probably won't be able to start posting it the week after I complete "Peeping Tomcat" though, unless I lock myself away for a weekend or something and just write the whole first draft in one go.

We'll see how everything goes. I do need to work at a faster pace, but for right now, I like the rhythm I have, and it is an improvement over the past. I'm happy, and I can work to increase my productivity for "One and the Same."

I might even have something to read at group again.

I've been avoiding it for a couple of reasons. First is that my betas haven't read any of the story yet, so I don't know what their input will be, and I don't want to read the same chapter multiple times to the group. Second reason is that my chapters are LOOOOOONG and I'll probably take up at least 45mins of the two hours we meet up every other week. It could even be as much as a full hour, and I feel like that is taking too much of everyone's time. Especially if I do that fifteen times. Third is because no one is into the fandom. They seem to enjoy the story anyway, but they also seem kind of hesitant to critique. Mostly they just have questions on how x-y-z works, which I guess does help because it means I need to explain things a bit more so non-fans could enjoy it. I just need to figure out the happy balance between non-fans enjoying the story, and possibly be tempted to watch the show based off the story, and not putting in so much explanation that the fans get bored, since they knew all of it already. My final reason is that it's 15 chapters, read every other week. I won't be done reading the story to them until around September. I should be done posting the chapters online by then. Any critique they would give me would be moot unless I wanted to go back and update chapters already posted and read. So it would just be me reading for the sake of having a captive audience for my story.

On the flipside, though, I'll be doing a second Miraculous fanfic right after this one, am I truly not reading anything at group for a year?

I mean, I still want to post something new every month, so maybe every other writing group I'll read that? I need to write something for this month still....

I dunno. Thankfully, we ran out of time last group, so I didn't have to worry about whether or not I wanted to read something. Instead, I tried to pass the turn over to Omnibladestrike.

YEAH! Haven't seen that name for a little bit, huh? Well, he's writing again! Check the above link to see his latest. He's been coming to writing group too. This past Sunday was supposed to be the first week of our writer's dates, but it was mostly me reading his latest edits and then five hours of us watching YouTube.... we're good at this.

But he's writing again, and regularly! So exciting! And I'm not doing too shabby either. ChibiSunnie has been working really hard on her first children's story, and she should have at least the bare bones, if not the whole thing ready to publish, by the end of the college semester.

Over at Writers’ Huddle, last year's winter challenge was basically week after week of all of us going "yeah, I wasn't able to do much :(". This year's winter challenge has more people, and most of us are commenting about our progress. Even those who were sick, taking care of sick family members, were on vacation, or were otherwise distracted from their writing - much like me this past week - are commenting about getting SOMETHING written at least.

So, perhaps 2018 will be a good writer's year.

I guess I need to get started on chapter 8 to find out.

Shoving That Boulder Along

I'm a day early, but Happy Valentine's Day to you all. Romantic, platonic, familial, communal, or otherwise, I hope you're feeling some extra love this week.

I would appreciate a little extra love from my Muse this week in order to help me catch up with "Peeping Tomcat".

My second week of the Writers’ Huddle Winter Writing Challenge went about as well as the first one. Prior to the challenge starting, I had the following break down:

1. Chapters 6 and 7 redone and ready for my beta readers by the close of the first week: February 4th
2. Chapters 8 and 9 set for my betas by close of the week: February 11th
3. Finish chapter 9 if need be, touch up on the mostly fine chapter 10, and start chapter 11 by close of the week: February 18th
4. Catch up week if I need it, but still have chapters 11 and 12 done by close of week: February 25th.
5. Chapters 13 and 14 by the end of the week: March 4th
6. Chapter 15 before I need to head to my mom's to visit my sister: March 9th

After the challenge started and I knew I had to work chapter 5 in as well, my new goals look like this:

1. Chapters 5 and 6
2. Ooooh kaaaay.... how about 6 and 7?
3. Chapters 7, 8, and start 9?
4. Here's hoping I can finish 9 and just quickly polish a few words here and there in chapter 10.
5. Shoot! I need to get chapters 11, 12, and 13 taken care of!
6. Race through chapters 14 and 15; taking no more than 2 days each. @_@

I have a feeling that come March 12th, instead of sending a completed manuscript to my betas, I'm going to just send the first half of the fanfic along with a detailed outline for the second half. That way they can at least start giving me notes so I can still have my story posted "on time."

Oh! That's right! I shared on DeviantArt, but not here. I have a tentative publication date of Friday, April 6th, or even late Thursday night so it's available all of Friday. With the help of my two betas Cyhyr and ChibiSunnie, I should have the first chapter polished and ready to go by that April publication date. Then I'll polish a new chapter each week, and post said chapter every consecutive Friday... or Thursday night, whichever one I decide on. If I can at least be far enough ahead in my edits/writing to keep up with this schedule, then I'll finish off "Peeping Tomcat" about mid-July. I'll then start posting "One and the Same" on a weekly schedule as well.

That means I not only need to be ahead of the game in my weekly posts for PT, but I also need to have at least the first few chapters of OatS ready to go. I have no clue how large that story is going to be, but, if it doesn't carry me to the end of the year, then it should at least carry me long enough for me to polish up that Devon/Trish battle fanfic. Then THAT will be my final post of the year. Given the plan of FINALLY doing the Varekai fan-novelization over this year's NaNo, since I pushed it aside last year, I should get that polished and set to go March/April 2019. That's quite a ways away, though, so let's focus on PT, shall we?

As I mentioned, Cy and Chibi both offered to beta for me. Cy is actually a Miraculer as well, so she's going to be my main beta reader for this project. Chibi hasn't had time to get into the show, and she's also pretty booked with her own writing and schoolwork. However, she's always been a beta reader for me, so she's keeping that hat on, as it were. Since she knows my writing style and voice, she'll help assist me with that. Plus, she's my gauge on how well people outside the fandom might understand and/or enjoy the story.

So, can we take a brief time out to thank these two ladies for taking what will probably be massive amount of time helping me figure out this story? Likewise, can we thank my writing group for dealing with my kooky fanfiction I bring every meeting? No one is ever in the fandoms I write for, but they are good spirits and let me read anyway. So, thanks, everyone, for indulging me.

Hacker Girl Facebook Sticker
by Birdman, Inc

Oh, speaking of thanks and indulgences, I actually co-won the raffle for the first week of the writing challenge. I've got an Amazon $10 gift card, and I'm itching for a book to spend it on. Anyone know if I can use Adobe Reader to read e-books I purchase off of Amazon? I don't have an e-reader, and there are a few people over at Writers' Huddle that have digital-only books up on Amazon. Although, it might be cheating a bit, using my winnings to support them....

Anyway, I joked that, thanks to the raffle accepting anyone who checks in, even if they don't hit their weekly goal, I got rewarded for not figuring out my story.

I guess that was the encouragement I needed, though, because I DID figure out the rest of chapter 5 shortly after. Actually, once I published last week's post, I hopped in the shower. I was barely in there three minutes when I figured out the Lucky Charm I needed to finish the chapter. Bam, just like that. It almost felt obvious. The rest of the chapter fell into place quickly after.

Problem was, I still had to work on chapters 6 and 7 this past week, and I didn't even start them until Wednesday since I wanted to get chapter 5 done first. I wasn't worried though, because chapters 6 through 8 were already written. I assumed I only needed to clean them up a bit. Much easier and faster than the "writing from scratch" chapters I had just completed.

I even stated in this blog a few weeks back, "at least chapter 6 is a fun one of Cat spying on Marinette yet again, so that one should be quick to revise/edit."

I then READ the chapter!

Good lord, it was bad.

It was obvious that I had written it about half-way through NaNo, and after the emotional and mental drain of losing the first half of my story. I was rambling; trying to get words on the page in a frantic attempt to catch up. I spilled everything from my head onto the paper. Adrien was trying to figure things out, and so I was too. It wasn't pretty. And it was long!

I.... uh.... I don't know if I improved it at all.

See, the problem with chapter 6 is that it would be a lot easier in a visual medium than a solely written one.

Chapter 3 starts five days after chapter 1; five days after Chat Noir accidentally spies on Marinette. Chapters 3 and 4 show Adrien's dynamic with Marinette. I try to keep it about par with the show in regards with Adrien's contradictory crush on Marinette. On the one hand, it's super subtle: more than willing to kiss her during a film their friends are taping, the constant need to call out her name to get her attention whenever he sees her, the constant touching of her shoulders, the glances he gives her later in season 1, the friggen SLOW DANCE in season 2, and even how he looks at the lucky bracelet Marinette gave him. It's easy to just look over everything as "he's just really friendly/comfortable with her" or even "he knows she likes him, so he's subconsciously flirting back." It's so subtle, it's kind of obvious that he doesn't realize he likes her. On the other hand, while the crush IS super subtle, it's just as much BLATANTLY OBVIOUS to anyone who's looking for signs of him crushing on Marinette. I point out the same reasons.

Anyway, my point is, chapters 3 and 4 of PT are supposed to set up that subconscious crush on Mari, so that late in the story, when he finds out she's Ladybug, the reader doesn't feel cheated that he realizes he likes her. The reader already knows this, it's ADRIEN who didn't, and struggles as he wonders if he likes her for her, or does he just like her because she's LB.

Chapter 5 is the akuma attack, which sets up the next chapter.

Chapter 6 takes everything that Adrien, and therefore the reader, learned from that day - chapters 3 through 5 - and applies it to what Adrien discovered throughout the week of spying on Marinette. These things combine to give Adrien the epiphany that Marinette and Ladybug are two sides to the same coin; Adrien not realizing how close to correct he really is.

It wouldn't work if he had this epiphany before chapter 3, and he wouldn't get it in chapter 6 if he hadn't watched Mari for 5 days already. Likewise, I can't really show the days in chronological order between chapters 2 and 3, because by themselves, the observations CN makes don't really move the story along; therefore, they aren't justifiable as their own chapter.

Which leaves revealing CN's week-long spying observations to chapter 6; making it a "recap chapter" as CN flashes back and "montages" the previous three nights. Because he's recapping each night, I can't really add any dialog without slowing the recaps down too much. Instead, each night is restricted to three or four short paragraphs. After the recaps, Adrien needs to have the epiphany that makes the chapter worth keeping in. He does this by using the information he gathered from the five nights of spying, and comparing his new view of Mari to how he views LB. This is more internal dialog since he can't talk to anyone about it, aside from Plagg, who is currently in the Cat Miraculous giving Adrien the power to be CN.

All-in-all, it was almost all show, virtually no tell, and there was no dialog, which just makes the whole thing jumbled and feel like it's rambling. I needed dialog, and I needed a better feel for the whole scene I was cutting down in the recaps. A way to know EXACTLY what would stick out.

So, I spent the week actually doing a LOT of writing. I wrote out the whole scene - from both Adrien's POV and Marinette's - for Adrien and Mari finding Alya and Nino after the akuma attack. I wrote the scene where they decide to forego the rest of their outing, and instead head home, complete with Adrien walking Mari home. I made sure to set the scene of Adrien asking Nathalie about showing Marinette's portfolio to Gabriel. I then wrote out what fully happened each night CN peeked on Marinette.

Once all that was figured out, I then cut every scene down to the aforementioned three or so paragraphs to recap. I also added some dialog this go, which helped a little. The whole thing still feels like a rambling, god awful, jumbled mess. However, it IS better than the original go. I'm sure I can cut down 6800 words to something more manageable....

Poor Cy and Chibi....

Even though I spent the whole week writing pretty much every moment I could steal away, I STILL couldn't catch up on my challenge goal. All because I'm writing a bunch of stuff that does help me better understand my story, like when I wrote The Birth of the Mimicker, but it doesn't add a single word to my actual story.

I did manage to finish chapter 6 by the close of the week, so yay to that. I just need to work on chapter 7.... and 8.... and create a second akuma attack for chapter 9... all before Monday. I can totally do this....

It's not like it kept me almost two full weeks to figure out an akuma, their powers, the Lucky Charm, and how the villain was going to be defeated... Simple.....

Eh, at least I'm keeping pace in my reread of "Lycopolis."

I should probably get back to working on my novel, though. But first, one last group hug with all of you.

I love each and every one of my readers, so thank you all lots for showing me love back! Happy Valentine's Day!

Hacker Girl Facebook Sticker
by Birdman Inc

Darn These Lucky Charms!

My posts are surpassing 100 hits again. I think the Miraculers are back. So.... Hi again, fellow Miraculers. You won't really find any new info on Miraculous Ladybug here, but you're welcome to stay.

Since I'm talking Miraculous anyway, I have to talk about "Peeping Tomcat." It's..... a slow process. Last week was the official first week of Writers’ Huddle's Winter Writing Challenge. By the end of the first week I wanted to have chapters 6 and 7 edited, revamped, rewritten, whatever I needed to do to have it set for my beta readers in March.

I'm STILL not done with chapter 5 though. I wanted that done before even starting the challenge.

It's the darn Lucky Charm! I just cannot figure out what I want to do for it! I mean, granted, it also kept me a while to figure out my akumatized supervillain, but once I figured that out last Monday I was on a roll. The rest of the chapter worked out fairly well. I was able to salvage some descriptions from the first go at this story I did over NaNo. I'm just stuck on what to do for a Lucky Charm.

For those unfamiliar with the show, Ladybug's main power that she uses to stop every akuma is called Lucky Charm. She's gifted an item that is used to stop the villain long enough for her and Cat Noir to retrieve and break the akumatized item; releasing the person from Hawk Moth's hold and returning them to their civilian form.

These Lucky Charms always force Ladybug to think outside the box. For example, she used a towel Lucky Charm as a makeshift hang-glider; a large packing box to trick a Santa Claus themed villain into thinking he was getting a present, which allowed LB to be close enough to snatch the akumatized item; a spoon as a makeshift fishing hook to tangle the villain and lift him off the ground; an oven mitt as homemade handcuffs; a shoe box as a projector promoting a show the akumatized villain wanted to stop; a power strip as a second yo-yo as she fought five attackers at once; and the foil inner lining of an ice cream bar wrapper as a reflective surface to see through illusions.

More often than not, she has to MacGyver her Lucky Charm into something useful, such as the aforementioned spoon being duct taped to her yo-yo which in turn was attached to Cat Noir's baton in order to make a fishing pole. The shoe box was combined with someone's glasses, a promotional poster for the show the akuma was trying to stop, and the headlights from a nearby bus. The oven mitt was combined with an already existing oven mitt, a belt, and a bracelet.

That's part of the power. Once Ladybug has her charm, she scans the area for clues, which flash in red with black polka dots. Once her vision gives her clues on what other objects she'll need to combine with her charm, she has to mentally put it all together herself.

The combinations she has to come up with in the second season are even more involved. She has to combine a unicycle, multiple rake heads, and Cat Noir's baton for the most recent episode. The one before that she simply gets a motorcycle helmet, and, thanks to her Ladybug Vision, is able to figure out that Cat's baton, three directional street signs, a bus, a bench, a tipped over motorcycle, and two light posts are all needed to stop the villain.

So, in order to stay true to canon, I need to think of something presumably useless for her to get as a Lucky Charm, and then figure out how it's obviously the only way to stop the akuma.

I CAN'T THINK THAT FAR OUT OF THE BOX!

So I've been stalled for two days now. I have a lot of the post-Lucky Charm Use chapter done, but I can only do so much. The way the akuma is stopped could affect small bits of the back end of the chapter. Plus, I'm missing a huge chunk if I don't have her using the Lucky Charm.

And this is just the first akuma attack. I have a second one planned in a few weeks, and at least two more for the sequel. How am I going to do this!? How can my brain not be this creative?

HOW DOES ASTRUC AND HIS TEAM FIGURE THIS OUT 26 TIMES PER SEASON!?

It's no wonder that just about every other Miraculous Ladybug fanfic I've come across has avoided akuma attacks. If they do have them in, they're fought "off screen" with the characters just reflecting back on them. Or, they do fight the akuma, but the fight "fades out" with a simple "Ladybug got her Lucky Charm, figured out how to use it, and saved the day" sort of thing. OOOOOR the even rarer, Ladybug doesn't even use the Lucky Charm to defeat the akuma.... which isn't really accurate at all, because without the charm she can't use her ultimate power of Miraculous Ladybug, where she restores everything to how it was prior to the akuma attack.

I have yet to come across a fanfic or fancomic writer who has attempted to actually think of a Lucky Charm and how Ladybug uses it. Am I the only one brave enough to try? Or have others tried, but failed so miserably that their stories aren't all that well known?

If you are in the fandom and have either read - fic or comic - a story where a Lucky Charm is shown and used, or if you yourself have written one, could you link me in the comments section? I won't steal the idea, but it might help to see how others accomplished this herculean task.

I wracked my brain so much that I actually had quite the interesting dream last night. Sadly, I've been up for a few hours now, so it's not as vivid as when I first woke up, but I was still too groggy to write it down then.

It started off as a Miraculous dream, with Adrien/Cat Noir and Marinette/Ladybug as the main characters, but as the dream went on they morphed into mutants. I think "Glitches" is feeling a bit left out that I haven't worked on anything original since July.

I just have patches now, but the dream started with the heroine being abandoned on a small and remote island. I'm talking super small, like only a couple miles long. Like if Manhattan was still uninhabited. It's a bit blurry now, but either she was abandoned there in an attempt to find an important artifact, or she was left there as bait for the hero who had the artifact, or she was left there in order to ransom the artifact from the hero. One of those three.... Somehow she gets off the island and back home, which looked a lot like Main Street of my home town. I'm sure my mother will have a field day knowing that..... Anyway, apparently before being left on an island, the heroine had roomed with someone else. Again, it's vague since the heroine started as Marinette, but she's living on her own with a roommate, so she's somewhere between 14 and 20.... Really narrowed things down, huh?

Either she made it home and was captured again, or she was "rescued" from the island by the villain, who, along with the hero, resembled Adrien? Either my mind couldn't decide what it wanted, or I'm dealing with an evil twin.... The villain is the same rich boy that Adrien is, but instead of being humbled and isolated by it, the villain uses it to give himself power and entitlement. So.... Chloe.... The villain is "gifted" the heroine by his mother, who is the true villain of the dream. The boy is also given a short sword, which I guess was the artifact the heroine was abandoned on the island for. The son used the sword to mildly sexually assault the heroine. Doing things like threatening to cut her clothes off - he doesn't - and sliding the blade across her exposed skin, which is quite a bit since the mother first forced the heroine to dress in a bare-back dress with long slits up the sides to help expose her legs. At some point, the villain falls asleep, but does so without attempting to first restrain the heroine. This is the part of the dream where I, as the dreamer, thought that maybe the kid was only doing idle threats to seem tough in front of his mom, but in truth, he's not bad. Perhaps he purposely "fell asleep" with the heroine free so she could escape without his mother realizing he let her go.

She steals the sword and races home, but the front door is sealed shut by the police. Yes, I know the police don't actually do this, but I dreampt that they bolted her front door closed along with posting a police notice. Anyway, she breaks in and sees that her house has been ransacked, and her roommate is missing, as is the stray dog they had taken in just before the heroine was brought to the island. Distraught, she wanders her house to try to find any way to contact help and figure out why the police think she's some dangerous criminal on the lam - as indicated by the police notice on the front door.

She finds her cellphone - don't know why it was left behind; dream logic - and tries to call her roommate to see where she disappeared to, is she safe? Before her roommate could answer, there is a whimper at the front door. It's the stray lab they had taken in prior to the start of the dream. Except, he has a couple of people with him. One is the heroine's roommate. Despite the rain, they look dry and pristine. The roommate, who greatly resembles Scarlet Witch from the X-Men comics, admits that she's a mutant and a telepath. They talk about how the heroine - who doesn't really resemble Marinette anymore at this point - is actually a mutant as well, and the roommate was originally there to try to watch over her like a secret guardian. She apologized for failing at her job of protector..... and that's about where I woke up.

I'm not sure what I can grab from this, but it was interesting enough that I might have to tap back into this dream in the future for story ideas.

Now, if my mind could help me figure out a Lucky Charm, that would be great. Either that, or it did, and now I have to figure out how Ladybug uses a short sword to stop a clone army and get visors off the villain..... and she has less than four minutes to MacGyver it all together before Cat Noir transforms back.


On the reading front, I'm nine chapters in my "Lycopolis" re-read, and I'm happy to be reading about Brandon again. I don't know why, but he's my favorite. He's just so quirky, and such an oddball. Maybe he vaguely reminds me of my husband in college? Hubby doesn't have the number thing that Brandon has, though.... Either way, I still say "more Brandon" and hope there is plenty more in the other two books.

I've figured out that if I read at least two chapters each day - an easy task since they seem to average at about five pages; quick read - I can finish the book with a week to spare in the month. Might be able to get a jump start on "Oblivion."

NuaNia Facebook Sticker
by PRANEAT

Alright, this is going to be dangerous, but back to Tumblr and Pintrest to see if other Miraculers have ANYTHING that might inspire me with this Lucky Charm thing so I don't fall even farther behind than I already am!

Starting the Winter Writing Challenge

Well, my writing schedule is already shot. I wanted to finish up chapter four of "Peeping Tomcat" by the close of last Tuesday, that way I could spend the rest of the week reworking my original akuma idea and have chapter five re-written. I would then be all set to start Ali's winter writing challenge over on Writers’ Huddle. Granted, I'm still ready and participating, but now I'm already a week behind where I want my goals to be. It's a good thing I foresaw this and worked in a "catch-up" week...

Chapter four IS done, but it kept me until Friday to do so. I then spent the weekend wracking my brain to try to rework my first akuma of the story. Originally, it was going to be Ms. Popular, a villain with an evening gown over the signature bodysuit. Her akumatized item would be her copy of Chloe's sunglasses, and in raising the sunglasses to expose her eyes, Ms. Popular would have a Medusa-like affect. She would have three "settings", as it were, where she could either freeze a person like Medusa, or she could project cattiness on women to make them fight each other, or she could make mindlessly faithful protectors out of men.

I still like the character design, even if I don't
like the character build....

All-in-all, I was never all that excited about this build. It seemed too complicated, too convoluted, and I had no idea how her powers actually worked. Plus, catty women and male protectors seemed a bit archaic thinking....

After tearing the build of this akuma down and starting from scratch, not liking where that went either, and repeating the process, I think I FINALLY have something I like. It kept about four different reworks, and about five days of constant ponderings in the back of my mind. I rewatched episodes, I listened to music, I tried looking up some akuma OCs others have created, I read Miraculous fancomics, and I tried to find a way to create something that felt like it fit in the Miraculous universe.

Finally, last night I decided to just take it slow step by slow step. All of the akuma supervillains got their powers and name based on why they had negative emotions. Hawk Moth uses the last few moments and reflects them back in his verbal contract. I needed that. Perhaps then I'd know the akuma better.

This worked wonders! Why didn't I think of this months ago!?

I still used my OC Louise Fabron, and she was still obsessed with Chloe. So, I started where Marinette and crew met up with Louise in the mall and told the story through Louise's POV. In "Peeping Tomcat" Louise gets irritated with Marinette and runs off. The next time we see her, she's already in her akumatized form with no true knowledge as to what happened.

So, I instead I used this writing practice to follow Louise to figure out what caused her to become so upset, what the akumatized item was, and what Hawk Moth said to her. The whole thing more-or-less took the path I was expecting, but also gave me more insight than I could figure out just trying to play everything out in my head.

As with Ms. Popular, Chloe is still the catalyst with cruel words causing the negative emotions that attracted Hawk Moth's attention. The copy of Chloe's sunglasses was still the akumatized item. However, now Louise has a villain name that sounds better and feels more at home in the Miraculous universe: The Mimicker.

Her powers are pretty neat too. I still need to figure out the other main components, though. Such as how Ladybug and Chat Noir figure out that the akumatized item is the sunglasses when they aren't being used as the main villain weapon. I also need to figure out what Chat Noir is going to use his Cataclysm power on, as well as what Ladybug's Lucky Charm is going to be, and how it's going to be used to stop Mimicker. So I still have quite a bit of work ahead of me.

In the meantime, though, the hardest part of coming up with the villain in the first place is done! Added bonus is that I liked it enough as a second teaser for PT that I posted it, which achieved my goal of at least one new thing posted each month! I also could potentially read it at group tonight. Whoo!

"The Birth of the Mimicker"

On DeviantArt           On FanFiction

I'm going to have to adjust my weekly goals for the writing challenge, but I'm still aiming for about one chapter a week, if I can't sneak in two. So my goal is to have this akuma attack chapter re-written by the time I head out to watch the Super Bowl at my friends' new place.

While I was wrestling with what to do with this akuma-attack chapter, even debating skipping over it and writing it last, after the rest of the story was figured out, I decided to fill my free time with my frantic reading of "Ender's Game" in order to finish in time.

It kept me the better part of six hours on Friday to do it, but I managed to finish re-reading in time to both get a book read in January, as well as return the book without having to renew it.

One down, about eleven to go....

I'm still taking issue with Card's timing inconsistencies.

According to "Ender's Shadow", between point A of Bean's arrival at Battle School and point B of the Bugger War ending, Bean aged from five to seven, possibly eight, there was a little confusion. So it kept around three years.

According to "Ender's Game", between points A and B of Bean's estimated arrival based on context clues, and the definite end of the Bugger War, Ender aged from seven to eleven, going on twelve. Which means the same span of time took four or five years.....

GAAAAAH!

Tanuki Facebook Sticker
by Yanare Ku

H-how!? There is a scene in "Ender's Game" between Ender and Bean that is copied over into "Ender's Shadow" almost verbatim. Which means Card HAD to have re-read "Ender's Game" in order to get it nearly exact. It's obvious that he also wrote down notes of key points in "Ender's Game" to reference in "Ender's Shadow", so how is it that neither Card nor his editor noticed that there are two years that just disappear in "Ender's Shadow"!?

I mean, I get it, in writing "Ender's Shadow" Card could have realized that things are more realistic or more dramatic if they happen in a slightly different timeline than he originally wrote. He had been writing for an extra decade by the time he penned "Ender's Shadow" and honed his craft more. It makes sense that he'd want to tweak some things.

BUT THE TIME FRAME OF ENDER'S GAME WAS ALREADY ESTABLISHED, AND FOR A DECADE!!!! No. Sorry, you deal with the holes you created or the slow pacing you had! You don't retcon everything! No!

Blue Cat Facebook sticker
by Kangaroo

On top of the time inconsistencies that were bugging me, Card completely messed with me when, during the last two chapters of "Ender's Shadow", he IGNORED WHERE A CHARACTER WAS! The character of Colonel Graff, in two different chapters, ends up being in two places at once if you compare "Ender's Game" to "Ender's Shadow".

NOOOOOOOOOO!

Dan from Dan Vs
Created by by Dan Mandel and Chris Pearson

All-in-all, both books are quite enjoyable. Just.... never do what I did. Never try to fit them both in the same timeline. It just doesn't work. PARADOXES!

*ahem*

Okay, I'm all better now. Sorry.

I have Ali's book Lycopolis at the ready to start on Thursday. I could always start today, or even two days ago, but I figured I could use the week down-time from reading to help me figure out my own story.

Reading is important to writers. It helps us grow and helps our minds wander and explore. However, it's not much help if it's used as a procrastination tool....

I just need to continue with the flow I created last night when I wrote "The Birth of the Mimicker" so I can stay on track with everything: avoiding zero-days, keeping up with the winter challenge, have "Peeping Tomcat" done by mid-March, have a new story posted every month, and keep up with my reading.

Wish me luck. Or, more accurately, discipline.

Prepping for the Winter Challenge

I was so close, guys! I almost had two chapters re-written and edited within a week!

Well.... technically it is two chapters. However, it WAS one chapter before this week..... I don't know if that's a win or a fail.....

After last week's post, I attempted to finish chapter 3 of  Peeping Tomcat. The problem is that in Ali's attempt to rescue my corrupted NaNo file, she, sadly, couldn't do anything for chapters two and three. I had completely lost them when I lost my novel half-way through November. I did manage to remember enough of what I had written to quickly bullet the plot points I wanted to hit again, but the magic was gone.

So, while the majority of the rest of the story will be revisions and edits, chapters two and three had to be from scratch. I did manage to get chapter two done last week. I think it works, but I also don't think it had the same draw of the original. I feel the same way with chapter three. I'm hoping any who never read my original version - which is everyone but me - will really like the chapter, and that I'm just a debbie downer for no reason.

Aside from the magic not quite being there the second go, chapter three created another hurtle.

Originally, the chapter had Adrien, Marinette, Alya, and Nino taking the subway to the mall in order to watch a movie. On the subway, Adrien attempts a conversation with Marinette, which results in him offering to show her drawings to his father to see if he had any advice for a promising novice designer. The chapter originally concluded with the group at the movie theater, a few fluffy Adrienette moments, and a big Adrienette moment interrupted by an akuma attack.

Chapter four was then the attack itself, and Ladybug and Cat Noir taking the akuma down.

Well, in my attempt to add in more action and dialog the second go, chapter three went on for quite some time. Just passing 3000 words, I decided to end the chapter with Adrien's offer to show Marinette's drawings to his father.

This meant that all the Adrienette movie watching scenes and the lead into the akuma attack didn't make the cut.

So, I realized I needed one more chapter between three and four. My full project is now set at fifteen chapters instead of fourteen, but who knows if I'll have to split more chapters like I did to three? This thing could be twenty chapters when I'm done....

Well, I decided that if the Adrienette movie moments were going to be their own chapter, I had better make sure the chapter was properly filled out. My first run at this story introduced an original character - Louise Fabron - as an original akuma design. Problem was, she was an OC. No one knows who Louise is, what she looks like, how old she is, what her deal is, etc. Plus, the way she gets akumatized is that Chloe teases her about copying Chloe's style in a vain attempt to try to be popular. There was no way of Adrien knowing this without witnessing it, and if he witnessed it, why would he then just go about his day to watch the movie with his friends?

I had to find a way to set up Louise, introduce her to the reader, set up what Chloe was about to do, and hint at why Louise was going to be akumatized without it being obvious to the characters. I think I did it alright. We'll see if my betas will have any advice once I pass it over to them.

Either way, it introduced the new character, established a potential reason why she goes after Chloe once akumatized, didn't throw up any real red flags telling the characters they should be ready for an akuma attack, and filled out the chapter a bit.

And yet, perhaps it filled a bit too much. I tried, I really did. I hid in my room from about 9pm until a little after 1am, but I just couldn't finish the chapter. Mostly it was because I was looking up reference pics and reading the Miraculous Wiki to make sure my facts lined up with canon. I also stopped for a half-hour to watch the new episode that aired on Sunday. The rest of the time was spent writing, and editing as I went. I wrote out a sentence, didn't like how it worked, went back and rewrote the action. I then went about a paragraph in, didn't like the direction it was going, and started that paragraph over. Rinse and repeat.

I'm now at the tail end of the chapter. If I really pushed, I probably could have finished it last night. However, it WAS after 1am, and my eyes were burning. I haven't even looked at what I wrote yet. Who knows if it's even comprehensible? So, that's my task for today: finish chapter four, and start my rework of Ms. Popular so I can get through chapter five.

Yeaaaaah, that chapter is probably going to be a complete rewrite, but we'll see how much of it I can keep.

To try to help me motivate myself to stay on top of my edits, I joined Ali's winter challenge over at Writers’ Huddle. For those unfamiliar, it's a six-week personal challenge. You set up your own six-week goal to try to hit, and then check in each week with your progress. As a reward for continuously striving for that goal - succeed or fail - any who check in go into a drawing for an Amazon gift card. The reward is nice and all, but the accountability of people knowing what I'm trying to do, and watching for me to check in with progress does really help push me to keep on top of things.

So, my challenge is to have "Peeping Tomcat" done and sent to my beautiful beta volunteers by the end of the six weeks, which happens to be my sister's birthday. So technically I have to finish before that weekend so I can have time to visit her, and also peek in on my godson to wish him a happy birthday as well.

Yes, this also means that my betas get PT mid-March instead of mid/end of February like I wanted. However, it's clear that I'm taking longer with this project than I anticipated. Plus, if they can get me notes by the end of March, and I can get revisions/edits done for at least the first chapter in a week or so, I could start posting at the beginning of April, which is still within my predicted schedule. I could do this. Hopefully.

Right now my break down is like this:

• Finish up chapter 4 today
• Get the akuma attack figured out so I could get chapter 5 done by the end of the week.
• Monday is the start of the challenge. I'm aiming to have chapters 6 and 7 done by the close of the first challenge week: February 4th. At least chapter 6 is a fun one of Cat spying on Marinette yet again, so that one should be quick to revise/edit.
• Week 2 of the challenge will be chapters 8 and 9. The problem there is that chapter 9 is a second akuma attack. During NaNo I had nothing planned for the akuma, so I skipped over the chapter, only jotting down bulleted notes on key things that needed to happen. Which means the hardest part of writing Miraculous fanfics still needs to be figured out and written. I might not be able to complete that the same week I edit another chapter.
• Week 3 I want to make sure chapter 9 is done, if I couldn't complete it the week before. Thankfully, chapter 10 is what I used as the teaser preview chapter of this whole project, so that shouldn't need too much editing. I aimed to also have chapter 11 edited, and possibly started on chapter 12.
• Week 4 needs chapter 12 done, and then chapter 13. This should be my "catch-up" week if I haven't made it to chapter 13 by then.
• Week 5 will be when I edit the last two chapters of Peeping Tomcat, assuming I haven't had to split any other chapters in the rewrite process. Then it's off to the betas!
• Week 6 will be "catch-up week" to make sure PT makes it to the betas if I hadn't sent it yet. I'm assuming I'll fall a bit behind. Mainly because I'm a slacker despite my best efforts, but also because my re-write projects always seem to be bigger than I give them credit for. Finally, I do have that resolution to post something new at least once a month, and I haven't even THOUGHT of writing anything but PT this month. I need to pause and work on a nice prompt or something this month, and again next month. That will probably slow my editing progress down a bit.

So that's my challenge. What do you think? Is it challenging enough? Is it too daunting? Do you think I'll make it? I'm really hoping to push so that I can. Deadlines. I have such a love-hate with them. At least I'm better at them now than I was in school. Trying to write a 50,000+ word novel the night before wouldn't go well.....

The other thing that might slow my writing progress, though, is the fact that I still have to finish up Ender's Game. This week I've kind of put the book on pause. In part it was so I could spend the time writing to try to catch up. In part it was because I got to the point where Ender and Bean interact, and I want to sit with both books and read the same scenes twice - once in Ender's Game, and once in Ender's Shadow - in order to see in real-time the differences a POV change makes.

I have to admit, though, that part of the reason I stepped away from the book is because it was annoying me. Ender's Game annoyed me the first time I read it too, but for a different reason. Originally, it was because, in order to make sure Ender was at his peak when they most needed him, the adult military used as teachers at Battle School and Command School did cruel things to Ender that no kid should have to endure. I was pissed for Ender and wanted to smack the teachers, even if I understood why they had to do what they did.

This go, though, I'm annoyed because of a pet peeve of mine: chronology. I'm huge on timelines and timing; making sure things line up like they would if it were real life. Not so much anachronisms. I don't pay enough attention to when things came about, unless it's glaringly obvious like a digital watch in the 1920s. For me it's literal timing.

Does a story claim that a trip took way longer than it should without explanation as to why? Did a character reference something that happened months ago as if it was only a week or two? Does it take one character longer to do something than another character claimed it took? Can the characters not agree on what day of the week it was? That sort of thing.

You may have noticed me complaining about stuff like this in the past.

In "Ready Player One," I was pulled from the story a couple of times when the narrator stated that it was a different day of the week than it should have based on context clues. Something like Wednesday being only three days after Friday if you put the in between events in order.

In an episode of "The Office," which takes place in Scranton, PA, a pregnant character comments about driving to Allentown, PA for a Lamaze class. However, if anyone has ever driven from Scranton to Allentown, they would know that even on the turnpike it's at least a forty-five minute drive. Was there really no closer Lamaze classes? Did the writers just go "the only PA cities people know of are Scranton, Philly, Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, and Allentown"?

In Miraculous Ladybug, the heroes only have five minutes after using their powers before they are forced to transform back into their civilian selves. And yet it seems to be five minutes real time instead of show time. For instance, in one episode, Ladybug is on the roof of a hotel that's about twenty stories tall, and she has one minute left before she transforms. She somehow manages to race down the stairs to the ground floor and still have time to briefly talk to Cat Noir before hiding in a closet so he wouldn't see who she really was. This is possible because in real time there's a cut between Ladybug running through the roof exit door and her running out of the ground floor stairwell. From her realizing she had a minute left and the actual transformation change it was almost exactly one minute real time. There is no way, even with her super powers, she was able to get down the stairs in the split-second needed for her to also hold a conversation with Cat before her minute was up, in her time.

In Ender's Game, things seemed fine for the most part. The only real hiccup thus far is that at the beginning of a chapter two of the teachers are discussing the fact that Ender had been in the program for a year and a half. Later that same chapter, presumably within days of the earlier conversation, Ender's older sister Valentine mentions that Ender had been in the program for two years. It's easy enough to explain that away though, since Valentine is ten or eleven at the time, and even though she has the mind of an adult, it's easy for a child to just roll the years over; if it's past the half-way mark it's closer to two years than one, so he's been gone two years.

The snaffu comes from Card's inability to properly link Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow within the same timeline.

I specifically took longer to read Ender's Shadow so I could take notes on the main elements from Ender's Game that were referenced. That way I could know where Bean was in relation to Ender when I re-read Ender's Game. Going back through my notes, Bean was placed in Battle School just before an attack on Ender. In Ender's Game, the attack referenced happened a day or two after his seventh birthday. Then it jumps to Valentine celebrating Ender's eighth birthday, which meant clearly nothing of any note happened to Ender for a solid year, even though the first six chapters or so covered only a year in Battle School. Cut back to Ender and he's now about nine and a half and is getting control of Dragon Army. Again, it's odd that nothing of note happened to the kid now for 30 months when something major happened to him nearly daily the first year he was in Battle School....

Anyway, if Bean did arrive just before the attack on Ender, as it's implied, then Bean turned five right around the same time Ender turned seven, making them only two years apart. Yet, Bean is only six, having been at Battle School barely a year, when he was asked to put together the roster that eventually became Dragon Army. It's strongly implied in Ender's Shadow that Dragon Army was then formed, and Ender given control, within weeks - at the longest - after Bean created the roster, which he gave to the teachers only a day or so after being given the assignment.

This means Bean is six when he joins Dragon Army.... but Ender's nine and a half.... which means there's now a three-plus year difference between the two. Not only that, but Bean being asked to create Dragon happened about a year after he started Battle School. If he joined right around Ender's seventh birthday, then when Valentine was celebrating Ender's eighth birthday it would roughly be Bean's year anniversary with the school, and he'd be asked to create Dragon. What happened to the other year between Valentine's celebration and Ender being nine and a half and given command?

The whole thing makes my head hurt. How did Card miss this!? He obviously went back through Ender's Game in order to pick out the scenes where Ender and Bean interacted in order to get the dialog and actions right. It would make sense that he just re-read Ender's Game in order to take notes on what he wanted to include in Ender's Shadow. So how did he lose a year in the process!?

While I calculated that Bean was pushing eight by the end of Ender's Shadow, even the teachers called him six, to which Bean responded "I think I'm seven..." So, Ender's Shadow covered two, maybe three years. And yet it covers three, possibly four, years in Ender's Game for the same points: the attack on Ender through the end of the Bugger war.

HELP!!!! I can't seem to push past this and get back into the story. However, the month is drawing to a close, and I need to get this story done in order to still try to get a book a month read. Plus, it's due back at the library on the 27th, so either I have to renew it or I have to be done by Saturday. Technically, I have to have it done by Friday since I won't be able to get it to the library on Saturday, and I don't know if it will be considered late if it's in the overnight box the evening it's due....

Oh, and in other news, it seems I'm back to my "normal" readership of about 20-some hits per post. The previous couple of months of 500+ hits per post was most likely people looking for Miraculous season 2 info. They probably realized I don't have it and gave up. I haven't had more than 30 hits per post all month. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted, and I know that the 20-30 of you who do keep popping in genuinely want to know what I have to say.

So thank you.

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