Happy Dance Time!

See that? Those are all the 3x5 cards I made for the different scenes in Misfits! (91 in total) Phew. I am so excited that's done! It was a lot more work than I was expecting, and I hit a lot of real-life speed bumps, so I thought I was going to be done with this step a loooong time ago. Now that I have it all organized...its time to tear it apart! I'll explain more about that on Sunday (with pictures!) That's tomorrow's project - and I've been looking forward to this since sometime in November when I wasn't even done with the story yet.

I'm also super excited because I made some real progress in reaching a title for the story, and in figuring out the sequel, all this morning! It's been a big day obviously.

I've known all along that this book was ripe for a sequel, and as I wrote the last couple of chapters it became clearer than ever, but I've never really known what the sequel was going to be about. Today, as I reread and outlined, I found several things that were just too much new information to be including in the last chapters of the book, especially with all the other realizations my characters were coming too. I started jotting down things like "use in the next book," and before I knew it, I realized I just given myself a major driving force for the sequel.

This book is all about my characters finding each other. Yes there's a quest that they're on, and that's very important too, but the quest is really there to drive them getting to know each other and learning to work together. The next book is also going to have some sort of quest to it (that part isn't figured out yet) but the focus for the characters is going to be growth. I'm going to have each one of them gain new abilities (some magical and some probably not), and grow as individuals along the way. I don't know much more than that, but that's more than enough to get me excited!

I've also figured out that Misfits (which is what my band of adventurers is) will be part of the series title. Each book title will have something to do either with the quest, or with the personal challenges facing the group. I know that sounds vague, but it's still a big step forward! I'll keep referring to this draft as Misfits for the time being, just to avoid confusion, and let you all know if I get something more concrete.

~ Ruthie ~

Ps. How is your writing going?