Author Journey (August 19, 2024)

This was the week that I was hoping to have the week before, had I not got sick. I was remarkably productive and spent a lot of time going over my plan. For years, I’ve been searching for the balance and now, I may have finally found it!

Author Journey (August 19, 2024)

Favourite Moment!

My favourite thing that happened last week was when I finally worked out how I’m going to move forward as an author and a blogger. I’ve been tweaking my processes over and over again, trying to find the balance that allows me to do everything. Sure, I could stop blogging so much but that wouldn’t make me happy. I could walk away from writing fiction, but I’d never forgive myself. So, finding the balance has been tricky, but I think I’ve got it.

While I was on my extended vacation, I released reviews of Highschool of the Dead in between my regular manga reviews. Doing it that way satisfied my desire to binge shows, and I’m already seeing the benefits of continuing that process with Keijo!!!!!!!! As much as I enjoy watching seasonal shows and chatting in the comments, it’s more of a time commitment and I’m constrained by someone else’s schedule. Focusing on one show at a time allows me to work at my pace and dive into a show that I already love. It also allows me to work my schedule how I want and this is essential for my writing. I’m incredibly excited about the possibilities.

The Week That Was…

After an entire week of only being able to swallow liquids, I was getting desperate. So, I bought a can of chunky soup – steak and potato to be precise and took a chance. Things weren’t perfect, but I finished the bowl and was left feeling much better. As the week progressed, it got easier and easier to eat. I’m not completely back to normal, but I’ve been able to swallow some actual food so I’m much happier. Now, I need to work on getting my energy back.

Right, so let’s talk about the five-year plan! I jokingly talked about South Park’s Underpants Gnomes and their business plan which was 1. Collect underpants, 2. ???, 3. Profit but after doing a lot of research, I’m come to the conclusion that those Gnomes knew what they were doing… kind of. Basically, for a good five-year plan you tend to have a one-year goal, an idea of what the three-year goal will be, and the five-year is basically what you want to get to by the end. You don’t have to connect all the dots as long as the forward motion is aimed at those markers.

So, at the moment mine looks like this 1. Write fiction, 2. ???, 3. Profit. Just kidding. Mostly… I have a lot of unfinished stories. One of them is over 260 thousand words long and was written as a serial. The fun part is that I took a break at the midpoint of the story and didn’t come back to it. Yeah, it’s epic. After pondering what to do with this beast of a story, it came to me in a flash. I’m going to turn it into a web novel. All of the wonderful manga and light novels that I read started life as web novels of some description. I don’t have a fan base as of yet so this seems like the perfect way to get the ball rolling. It also plays on my strengths or maintaining a routine.

For now, I’m basically focused on the year-one goal which is going to be to start publishing a web novel and keep it going. Of course, I’m not going to start publishing it tomorrow. There’s some work I need to do beforehand so I’m giving myself until the New Year to polish up as many chapters as I can. That will give me a chance to see how many chapters a week I can publish without releasing them faster than I can write and edit them. It also gives me time to put together a cover. Already, I’ve split the first-year goal into a four-month goal. And of course, that will then become weekly goals. It’s like planning a trip around the world. I know my first couple of destinations and after that, I have an idea of which direction I’ll go next, but won’t be able to finalise it until much closer to the time. If I tried to plan the full five years, something would go wrong and then I’d give up. I need an idea of where I’m headed and the freedom to make my way there.

Reading, Writing, Watching!

So, that means my goals are changing for the blog too. I only need to complete three anime posts and three manga posts a week to keep on top of things. That’s a big reduction from what I was doing before my vacation but still maintains the post-a-day minimum that I’ve set myself. I’m going to continue with the occasional season review or movie review as a bonus, but only once my writing for the week is done.

Anyhow, last week I watched eight anime episodes and read five manga volumes. I put together a total of twelve posts which is a nice feeling as it means that this week’s posts are all taken care of. Having a buffer also allows me to switch my time to my writing. Basically, everything went to plan and then some. I’d be happy for every week to work out like this.

Anime!

• Keijo!!!!!!!! (Episode 1) – Setouchi Keijo Training School!!!!
• Keijo!!!!!!!! (Episode 2) – The Hip Toss Brings Us Together!!!!
• Keijo!!!!!!!! (Episode 3) – Vacuum Butt Cannon!!!!

Manga!

• Becoming a Princess Knight and Working at a Yuri Brothel (Volume 2) – Service with a Smile
• Gigant (Volume 8) – My Daughter!
• Goblin Slayer Side Story II: Dai Katana (Volume 5) – If You Let Your Guard Down, You Die!

Goals

Tasks	Goal	Completed
Anime Watched	3 Episodes	8 Episodes
Manga Read	3 Books	5 Books
Posts Scheduled	7 Posts	12 Posts
Chapters Written	2	N/A
Chapters Edited	2	N/A
Artwork	Cover	N/A

Aspirations for the week!

I’m not as hungry as I was last week so that’s a big improvement. I also have a much better idea of how I’m going to make progress on both projects. For my chapters for this week, even though I have a lot of the story written, I wrote it five or six years ago and my style has changed since then so I’ll be using what I have as a guide and writing a completely new version. I’m aiming for two chapters a week as that would be one hundred and four chapters a year which will probably work out to two full-length light novels which I can release as well. If it all works out as I hope, I can start to bring some of my other unfinished stories on board. I see this working similarly to blogging in that it will build and build. As to publishing the web novel, I’m probably going with Royal Road, but there are some others I’m going to check out too. I have four months to prepare and I want to hit the ground running when January rolls around.

Anyhow, I know that I went on longer than normal here, but I wanted to get everything down now so I can’t back out of it before I’ve even begun. I’m excited about the changes to the blog and even more so about the potential for my writing. Thanks for reading, I’ve got work to do!

---