You're What Now?

Howdy Strangers!

So, if you've been keeping up with the author page on facebook, or even my character spine here on Backstory Blurbs, or are somehow tangentially involved with me in real life, you have come to know that I am a wildland firefighter. "But Anna," you may say, "I am from the East Coast, and I have no idea what a wildland firefighter is!" Well my friend, as I put it so eloquently on the Facebook page, I hike to the tops of mountains to beat wildfires into submission with a chainsaw and a shovel, and in the off-seasons, I am a government liscensed arsonist.

Lolo Peak Fire, MT 2017

"But Anna," you cry, "what is your actual job beneath that thick layer of sarcasm you have spackled over your words?"

Fall Creek Fire, OR 2018

Well, in plain words, I work long, grueling hours doing dangerous, incredibly demanding work no one else wants to do. It's either 110 or 20 degrees Fahrenheit out, everything is on fire, you very often eat mres for three meals a day, sleep on the ground, don't see a shower for two weeks, and, should the living wage law pass, would make less than a McDonalds employee. It's hard, dirty, and very capable of killing you at any moment in a thousand different ways -- and incredibly satisfying. I like my job. I get to be outside, learn lots of new skills, see cool places, and, best of all, I feel proud to tell people, "Yeah. I'm a wildland firefighter," when they ask me what I do for a living. It is a good feeling to be proud of something I do, to be part of something great.

Anna, on Lolo Peak Fire, MT 2018

The fire community is small, and our organizations still have room to improve, but, at the end of the day, we are a giant extended family of people that give a shit and are willing to work ourselves to death to help protect you and your homes -- sometimes, too often, literally. But we could never do anything less.

Until Next Time,
Anna

The Bones of a Story

Howdy Strangers,

So, in the last year, I discovered a simply magical technique for planning the plots of novels -- the outline. It is something that I never would have dreamed of when first starting to write. How would I know where the story was going that early? But honestly, using a few simple techniques to map the plot, my story telling has vastly improved.

I prefer to read and write character driven stories, so my style may be vastly different from yours or others, but I generally do as follows.

After I design my characters and world, I sit down and map out my character arcs. Where are my characters at the beginning, and how are they going to change by the end of the novel? Does Kyran have trust issues and run away from his problems, leaving others to handle them for him? Well, how can I change him by the end of the novel so that he faces his problems and, just maybe, at least partially overcome his trust issues? With more than one protagonist, Frostfire has the bonus added that both characters bring issues to the table that complicate each other's issues and help enrich the plot.

So, with character arcs laid out, and knowing the sorts of things I need to make these changes come about, I can get to what I call the Christmas tree, the thing I can "hang" these arcs off of. The plot vehicle if you will. It is usually something action orientated, something stressful for the characters. A demon that is hunting the characters, a crazy baddie with a vengeance streak, etc. This supplies a much of the momentum to take the characters forward and creates opportunities for them to change in response -- for better or worse.

Then, there is the last little touch -- the overarching plot goal. It is usually something like "Kyran and Barrett improve their relationship", some broadly arching goal that the plot and characters are striving to reach.

I then take all of those elements and start roughing out a chapter by chapter outline for the novel. Even if things start changing as I start writing the novel, as I come up with better ways of tackling issues, I find it immensely easier to have a rough direction I am working towards than starting with a blank slate, especially when I am writing with a second person. It let's Lauren know what I am thinking and where we are trying to steer the ship of our narrative. 

Have a different method? Share it with us. We would love to hear other ways writers accomplish their craft.

Until next time,
Anna

But How do you Write "Together?"

Hey folks, Lauren here.

As most people do when exciting things happen, I talk about my and Anna's publishing journey to a lot of folks around me. Since Anna is off in the wilderness defending the states from wildfires, there is maybe one person (le boyfriend) who serves as an outlet for my gushiness. So, to spare him being the sole outlet, I gush at work to my coworkers and bosses, who are all very excited, and love hearing about the process.

The biggest question I get is usually, "How do the two of you write together?" A large majority of folks are intimidated by writing by themselves, so imagining two people writing together is just crazy talk.

I started role playing when I was eleven. It was introduced to me on a forum for the anime Inuyasha, and had a "round robin" format to it. It was awkward with so many people on the platform, but I made a few online friends, many of whom wanted to write one-on-one with other people. Some of them wrote segments of the story before handing it off to another person. But my favorite was writing your own character. You write what's going on, what happens, what the character is thinking about, then you tag out. Anna and I work on Google Docs, and to indicate we are finished with our section, we end the paragraph with "(tag)."

Anna writes Kyran. I write Barrett. She writes other characters, I write some. Sometimes she writes my characters better than me, and I will hand them over, or have her advise me on their reactions. Sometimes we share characters, small tertiaries and the like. But even then, you're meshing two separate authors styles together. To keep it from sounding too ragged, we then edit it into a single, uniform style. Anna does this. She has phenomenal editing and work ethic. She polishes it together, then I go back behind her and buff out grammatical stuff, typos, awkward phrasings and the like. Then we do it again. And again. And again. And then something happens in the later chapters that needs to be referenced earlier, so we write a new section. Then we edit it again. Eventually, by the third or fourth time, is when we are ready to start writing queries.

And that's where we are today. Since the grind has begun, the story has never truly been shelved, though. Even as we send out queries, we're still editing, polishing, adjusting, smoothing everything out, trying to make it the best it can be for an agent's eyes to see.

We'll get there! And you'll be here to watch our journey. :) We appreciate you guys.

-Lauren

The Road to Becoming Published

Howdy Strangers,

So I found out after making the commitment to finishing Frostfire and getting it published that writing a book is only the first hill of many on the mountain to seeing a story you create in print. After you finish the book, there is, of course, the editing -- something I find I have a knack for. But then...there is the matter of hooking an agent, and let me tell you, there is an unexpected labor in that. There are query letters to be written, pitches, synopses, cover letters, and every single agent you dig out of the vast world will have a different requirement of what they want. Some want just a query letter. Some want all of the above written to specific formats, fifty pages of your manuscript, and a signed contract for your first born. There is also the self-marketing that has to be considered -- the facebook page, the blog, the author website. It is a little daunting and, at times, frustrating, to have gone through the work of writing a novel only to find out there is more work to be done. 

But the effort is worth it. Frostfire is worth it, and soon enough, you guys are all going to hear about how it finally made it onto a shelf somewhere, and I'll already be on to the next project, one foot out the door, ready to climb the next mountain. That's the mindset you have to have to get out there -- you have to grab onto your dream with both hands and refuse to let go for anything. Be stubborn, because your novel is WORTH IT. Know, in your stubborn little heart that your story deserves to be read, that there are people out there that NEED to read it, and keep after it. Only you can make this happen.

Until Next Time -- Anna

Que?

So WHAT IS Frostfire?

Well, it is a story Lauren and I have been working on since high school. For those of you unaware, that makes the original inception of this story over TEN YEARS AGO. It started as a roleplay literally around the idea of a mage and a demon hunter finding themselves working together. End scene. 

But as the roleplay got longer, and the characters more intriguing, I found myself madly in love with the story that was emerging. Unfortunately, the roleplay ended up getting shelved for a long time for many reasons, but I held onto it. We touched on the idea of rewriting it into a novel more than a few times, and even attempted to do so, but things always seemed to get in the way. That is until last November.

I had not let go of the idea of making Frostfire a full length novel. Underneath all the  rough edges and unfinished ideas, there was something I felt that was really good. My love affair with Kyran and Barrett had still not ended. So I pulled up the rough documents, and started working on them with the intent of finishing it myself. But as I worked, I realized that Lauren may be harboring the same want. I approached her, stating my intent to make a novel out of our characters, and offering to work on the project with her or take it solo while giving her artistic credit for character design. She all but JUMPED at the chance to finally see Frostfire as a finish novel, insisting she was as raring to go to get a novel on the table.

We worked tirelessly for almost a year, writing, editing, changing ideas, rewriting, and so on, until we FINALLY did it. We had a finished novel, and one we were immensely proud of. 

But just WHAT is the novel about? Well, you'll have to wait until next time to hear more.

Until then -- Anna

Quoteable Quotes

“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?”

― Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass

Character Spine -- Anna

>Basic<

Name: Anna Harpe

Nickname(s): Nthurligon, Tefira

Age: ~

Birthday: Feb 24

Gender: Female

Orientation: Ace

Nationality: American

Occupation: Wildland firefighter and aspiring novelist

Family: Mother, father, brother

Pets: Tiana and Jasmine (cocker spaniels)

>Appearance<

Hair: Honey blond, mid-back length

Eyes: Blue

Weight: ~

Height: 5’5”

Scars: Left elbow from broken arm set with pins (broken falling out of a tree),

first two knuckles of right hand from second degree burn,

many other small scars from outdoor work and general clumsiness

Tattoos: None

Clothes:

At work -- green nomex pants, navy t-shirt, leather boots

At home -- varies widely from prim with heels, to butt stomping goth

Accessories:

At work -- leatherman multitool and seal pup knife on belt,

pocket full of pens, sharpies, flagging, and gum,

leather work gloves, extra carabineers, sharp handtool,

and 362 Stihl chainsaw

At home -- laptop/nook, bluetooth keyboard, always full tentacle mug of coffee

Both -- Sass and gratuitous cheer

Piercings: 6 in right ear, 2 in left ear

>Personality<

Habits: doesn’t sleep, drinks “too much” coffee, spends all free time working

on or talking about stories and playing tabletop games, clicks her teeth,

taps her feet, or taps her nail against her mug when thinking.

Description: “Sweet as sugar, but salty as f**k”

Myers-Briggs: INTJ

>Backstory notes<

Navy brat. Has spent all of youth moving around country. Graduated from

Augusta State with a BS in Biology. Plans to get a doctorate. Has worked

in fire since 2013 and traveled around the country for it. Cosplays with friends

and family at conventions in the southeast. Has an obsessive love of Hannibal,

Lovecraft, Tokyo Ghoul, and the webcomic KS.

Greetings!

Hello everyone! This is going to be a platform for Anna and I to share and talk about things that inspire our stories and how the writing in general is going! It could be anything from art or movies to get our muses ticking or a fantastic trip filled with literary ramblings! There might also be the infrequent inside look as to how far along our stories are for interested parties. You all know who you are ^_~

Stay tuned for future updates! Most likely, we'll be introducing ourselves to those who aren't as familiar with us!

-Lauren