A little update on me. I’m feeling a lot more calm and settled these days since taking the pressure off of finishing The Crimson Witch by March. It’s actually made me more drawn to my manuscript and made me more delighted to work on it. Funny how that works…
I’ve shared a few goals for this month with one of my writing critique partners so I thought I’d share them with you as well. More accountability can’t hurt right? Where I last stopped writing, I had realized that my plot had some hiccups. These past few weeks I’ve been re-reading what I’ve written so far on The Crimson Witch to get my bearings about what plot changes I need to make.
So, my first goal for March is to finish my re-read. Second, I’d like to go back to the drawing board on my plot and make adjustments on some of my scenes. Last, I want to do a little re-write on chapters 1 and 2. This shouldn’t be too difficult since I know there’s not a ton that needs fixing in those chapters.
I’m trying to go a little easy on myself right now to avoid the dreaded BURN OUT. I will check back in with you in April and let you know how I did. You’ll have full permission to send me to the stocks if I don’t meet my goals.
I don’t think it’s any secret that writing has been hard for me lately. Not just because of my time constraints, but it also takes a certain mind set and a state of flow. In today’s post I thought I’d share with all of you a scene that I found particularly difficult to write.
*Spoiler Alert: I’m going to be discussing scenes from The Dark Ruler. If you haven’t read that book yet, you might want to skip to the end of this email to avoid any spoilers. But also, why haven’t you read this book yet? *Side eye*
Allow me to transport you to book #3 in the Camilla series, The Dark Ruler. I wrote this book back in 2020 and there’s a scene where Camilla is captured and sold as a slave. It’s a pivotal couple of chapters in the middle of the book that sets up Camilla’s situation for the remaining book.
After being captured she meets a woman named Gracine and her baby, Dasante. Camilla bonds with Gracine and the two help each other while going through the horrors of the LilyAye slave trade.
Before writing these scenes I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to happen. Camilla being sold into slavery is a major plot point so it was something I knew was going to happen from the get-go, but when it finally got to the nitty gritty of writing these scenes, I found it really difficult.
Suddenly I was like, oh wait, I have to actually write from a first person point of view of what it would be like to be captured and sold as a slave. But I wanted these scenes to be raw and visceral.
Anyone who’s read any of the Camilla books knows that her life has not been easy. I had written Camilla through many difficult things up to that point, but this felt different. I found myself stopping and starting several times while writing.
The slave trade was booming in LilyAye. Camilla was caged with Gracine, Dasante, and hundreds of other captured people in squalor conditions. Then one particular part of the scene really got me…
Babies are a hot commodity in the LilyAye slave trade. At one point, Camilla witnesses Dasante being ripped from Gracine’s arms and taken away by the slave traders. How could Camilla possibly comfort Gracine after something like that?
Nothing ends happily in these scenes. Gracine and Camilla are separated the next day when they’re both sold at the slave block and we never find out what becomes of these characters. It’s a harsh reality for Camilla to witness. Ultimately it serves as motivation for her to take down the ruler that allows (and profits) off of this horrible practice.
Even knowing what was going to happen in these scenes and the importance of them, I still found it so hard to write. It was on par with having to write the death of a favorite character. Even if you’re not a writer, as a reader you know how difficult these scenes are!
Although I have some tough scenes ahead of me in The Crimson Witch, I’m dedicated to get them written. Let me know if you found the scenes with Gracine and Dasante as difficult to read as it was for me to write, and if you haven’t read The Dark Ruler yet, you can go check it out HERE.
Thank you for listening as I share some of the parts of being a writer. Talk to you soon.
Emily
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