April Monthly Wrap Up

 Happy Wednesday! 

Where did this month even go? April flew by for me!

I'm enjoying the start of spring/summer weather, but not so much with the allergies. My allergies have been awful the past few days since it got super cold for a while, snowed (so crazy!) and then it all melted and got warm again and the allergies decided to return haha Honestly, it's just felt like a weird month... I can't really put my finger on it, but I've just been tired and my anxiety's been really bad, the world at large has been annoying at times to deal with, especially on social media. But I'm hoping May will bring some better times and a good reset. 

Writing: The beginning of the month didn't go so well for writing. I procrastinated editing Golden Touch for half the month. I'm making up for it now by diving into micro edits and making sure the story makes sense and everything. It's been tedious work... micro edits and read throughs are my least favorite parts of the editing process, but it has to be done. 

I also started writing a new WIP. It's in the sci-fi genre and I think it might actually be New Adult. Not in the content sense, but the themes and the fact that my MC is out of high school and is nineteen years old is in the NA genre I think. I don't want to say too much else because I'm still figuring out the story and stuff, but I will say... it's been a hard one to write. I fell in love with the idea and the story and the characters. It's a story I really wanted to tell, but the first draft was such a complete mess that I'm almost completely rewriting it from scratch. So far I'm at 32K words which is 2K more words than the first draft had. Yeah... it was a very small, very messy first draft with little to no middle at all haha But as of right now, it's going really well and I'm enjoying the change of pace. I've been writing in contemporary fantasy and fantasy in general for over a year now, so it's been a fun challenge to dip my toes back into the world of spaceships and intergalactic wars and such. 

I don't know if anyone remembers my Dragon Hearted serial series that I introduced on my newsletter in 2019, but I'm replotting that and kind of revamping it all together too. I want to put it on my Kindle Vella and see what happens. I started writing the first episode, but for the most part have just been plotting it out and stuff. Since I finished that first season I've felt really horrible about not ending it and leaving it at a cliffhanger the way I did... so I'm excited to get to pick it back and give it the proper attention it deserves. 

Reading: Apparently I got all read out after March because I read like... one book this month. I finished Enchantee by Geta Trelease. It wasn't my absolute favorite, but it was still a good read and a fun historical fantasy. 

I did finish King of Scars the first week of this month and bought Rule of Wolves but... to be honest, I kind of DNF-ed Rule of Wolves. I was so looking forward to a whole two books about Nikolai and Zoya, but they actually ended up being kind of disappointing to me which is sad. I feel like they kind of ruined Nina's character for me and Leigh Bardugo did not use Zoya and Nikolai's characters to the fullest. Plus I was very unhappy with a certain tragedy that happens in Rule of Wolves. There was some other stuff that happened in Rule of Wolves that annoyed me too. So, overall, I love the Grishaverse but those two books? Not my favorites. 

Life Stuff: What life things have happened this month? Well I passed my driving test and have my driver's license now. I'm terrified to get behind the wheel by myself without anyone in the car with me though so... we'll see how that goes haha I'm taking it one baby step at a time and not rushing to get behind the wheel. It's going to be a slow process, which is kind of frustrating but par the course for me since it took me like five years to get my driver's license to begin with. I don't want to focus on the frustration and anxiety though because it is a huge accomplishment that I got my license and passed the test. It's something I was working toward for so long and at several points thought I would never be able to get at all because my anxiety made it so difficult. So, it deserves celebration that I did pass, even if I still have a long way to go. 

We had Easter with family and that was nice and fun. It feels like Easter was too early this year. Like the thing to look forward to in April happened too early and then the rest of April was just kind of... there haha But we got to go for lots of walks and enjoy the blip of warm weather in the middle of the month, so that was nice. It feels good to wear shorts and dresses again and not have to bundle up when I leave the house. 

I can't think of anything else that happened... April really did feel like a weird month. I procrastinated a lot this month... classes were rough mostly because I lacked motivation and just was not feeling it. I'm kind of ending the semester on a low note which is discouraging. It just was not my semester. The only class I really enjoyed was my Folklore class. The other two taught me stuff I already knew or were just super blah and boring the whole time. Suffice to say, I'm looking forward to my two week break before I start the summer semester. 

Looking Forward to May: 

There's nothing big planned for May as far as I know. I get two weeks off from classes which I am so happy about! I didn't get a spring break, maybe that's why this semester felt so rough. Even just a week for spring break was always really nice to have and gave a good reset, but without even a week off it just felt constant and exhausting. My two Astronomy classes start in the middle of May... not exactly looking forward to those, but I have to get them done to graduate this year, so there's that haha 

I plan finish the final big edits for Golden Touch, do some micro edits and format it in May. It would be great if I could get all that done and be able to get some proof copies before June, but we'll see if that happens. I also plan to start writing episodes of Dragon Hearted and see how that goes and start putting a few up on Kindle Vella. If I keep going the way I do with my sci-fi WIP, I'll probably be done with this second draft by the end of May too. In other words, I have a feeling May is going to be a writing intense sort of month. I'm hoping I'll be able to get lots done during those two weeks of break before my Astronomy classes start. 

I hope you all have a great May and start of the summer! :b