“This is where you’ll be going,” the Whale says, pointing with his flipper to the screen.

You stare at the screen obediently–AA attentively. It’s not you who’s going, after all. You just got back from a mission.

“We’ll need you, Cow.”

Of course. Good thing Cow faces are naturally docile. You flick your ears instead of giving voice to your frustration or objections, especially when the Whale continues.

“And a Wolf.”

The Wolves had played that awful trick on you, the one that nearly got you eaten–AAtorn apart– by monsters. You’re not looking forward to working with them again, so soon after just getting back to the ship. 

“Don’t give me that look,” the Whale says, eyeing you. 

With a flick of your ears, you lower your head, glancing out of the corner of your eye to the nearest Wolf. They’d shouted and howled when the Whales had decreed they allow other species on their starships, so much so that the Whales had assigned one of themselves to each ship. You were lucky—and hard-working—to get this position, and you weren’t going to let it go without a fight. Even to a Wolf. Especially to a Wolf. 

You turn and get ready to Matt down to the planet. 

“Investigate the Beacon, and come back,” the Whale says, his voice following you out of Command. 

As you hurry, your mind races. The Beacon was likely some kind of call of help, but from who, and why? And why did the Wahle send you, instead of a team of Wolves? Wolves were fast and they were cunning, and they worked incredibly well together. Just not so well with the other species, sometimes. 

You shove the Wolves out of your mind, focusing on your task. Ignoring the Wolf who joins you in the Drop Room you steady yourself, ready for anything that’s to come. 

Or so you thought.

You gasp, a bellow escaping your throat even as you flounder in the marsh. The Wolf isn’t doing much better, struggling with the Matt in his jaws. Your stomach twists as you know the solution, but you don’t like it. Still, it’s better than losing the Matt, and being stuck here forever. 

“Climb on my back,” you grumble. 

There’s no sassy—AA sly— response from the Wolf. Instead, he just splashes over to you and climbs up, his claws digging into your hide. Your skin twitches but you try not to respond, a fear coiling in your gut at what other trick the Wolves might play on you if you act like prey. You think they’ve gotten past that, but how do you know for sure? You don’t want to risk testing it. 

Your hooves are sucked deep in the squishy mud of the marsh, but worry fills you for more than just the ground that doesn’t want to let you escape. The Wolf lays on your back, panting heavily as you slog on, on all fours. Twisting, you catch a glimpse of the Matt, relief uncoiling some of the streets wound in your belly.

“Stop it,” the Wolf growls breathlessly. “The Matt will drop.”

Muttering to yourself you slog on, until finally you meet dry land and can get back up on two legs, as the wolf drops to his own feet, holding on to the Matt. He shakes himself, and you do likewise, watching him with something akin to interest. The Wolf’s eyes are wide and rings with white. If you weren’t sure you were wrong, you might say he was..frightened.

“Come on, we need to find the Beacon,” you remind him gently. 

He nods, eyes never leaving the marsh, and his shivers before turning to follow you. You lead the uncharacteristically quiet Wolf uphill, nostrils flared of the scents that will tell you where to go. As you walk, you wait for the Wolf to help out, to give some direction, but he says nothing. 

You prod him. “This is the way to the Beacon, right?”

Shaking himself again, he looks down at the Matt. Then he looks back at you. Your blood chills. 

“We’re stuck here, you stupid Cow.”

You wait for the next words to fall from his muzzle, dreading them and hating them before they were even born. He looks back at the marsh, his ears flattening. “IF I had let go, the submersion would have destroyed the Matt, or we never would have found it in the murk. So I hung on to it. And look. Do you see any lights?” He thrust the box in your face, and you recoil naturally. 

Shifting your weight, your hooves stamp on the solid ground, as if reassuring yourself that there was something solid in the universe. Reassuring yourself that there were safe places in this nightmare. 

The Wolf continues, his voice filled with bitterness. The Matt’s lights have all gone out, and you know that’s bad, know what he’d going to say, but you wait for him to say it anyway, some part of you denying it, wishing that if he just didn’t say anything, it wouldn’t betrue.

“The Matt’s lost it’s lock. We took it too far out of range. We can’t get back.”

“We’ll figure it out. The Beacon is still out there.”

“They’re not going to send anyone after us. We have the only working Matt. You want to stay here while they repair the one hat ware broken?”

“Well, maybe. How long will that take?” 

“With the materials on board? Years.”

You shake your head and continue one. The Wolf hesitates, clear by the lack of sound following you, and then he runs to catch up, his paws crunching the leaves underfoot. “We’re stuck here!” he shows, as if you hadn’t understood.

“I know. There’s still the Beacon.”

“Don’t you understand?”

“I’m still going to do my duty. I may be just a stupid cow, but I’m not afraid of some hard work. I’m not afraid to finish the task. And I’ll figure out a way home on my own if I have to.”

After all you were given a mission. Investigate the Beacon, and come back.

And that’s exactly what you intend to do.

---

Coming in at 1,033 words, this did not end up where I thought it would. I had two ideas in my head for the plot for this short, and this ended up taking a third route, though I’m intrigued where we ended up. The worldbuilding keeps developing, which is always fun.

I’m hoping I can edit down some of the internal to add some external, maybe resolve this conflict somehow, but we’ll see. I don’t know what will happen next but I’m curious to discover it.

I struggled writing this, unsure and with no words coming at some points, very different from my first experience with Writer In Motion! But that’s been my writing in a nutshell lately. Words were delayed in coming to mind, and sometimes my fingers had a mind of their own, and wow the typos to fix! But that’s what this is all about, after all: the journey from first draft to final draft!

It’s been through editing with me. It’s been through CPs. It’s been through an editor. And now, it’s the final draft.

But first, let me show you what it’s gone through since the last time you’ve seen Space Cows.

So I sent it to my editor, Jeni, who sent it back three days later with the following note: “OMG I loved this! I didn’t have much developmentally, and only a little in terms of copy or line editing. Great work! Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.”

Needless to say there was much squee-ing on my part. And then I opened it up. “A little” means 49 changes logged in track changes, in case you were wondering. Here’s what it looked like:

 

Like I did with my CP feedback, I read through it all, nodding to myself, and then let it sit for a bit. Then I got to work. I completely agree with Jeni’s suggestion to switch the tense from past to present, though that left me biting my nails through the rest of the revisions afraid I might have missed a tense change! It does give much more immediacy, though, which is so worth it.

Most of the other comments were fixing commas and rearranging sentences or adding paragraphs for more impact, and I followed almost all of them. Some fixing sparked other changes, to maintain flow.

I did have to stop and think though, as she recommended I deleted the phrase about cannibalizing the ship. I liked how that went along with the cooking of the meat, but it could be too much too. It also is a lot of short phrases in one sentences, which can feel choppy. 

I did it though, because of the choppiness. It didn’t add enough to justify the jumpy rhythm. So here’s my final draft, with never-before-have-I-written-in 2nd person present tense, at 902 words. Enjoy!

You lie among the scraggly brush, your rasping breath loud in your ears. Roars shatter the night, closing in around you. Sandy, barren land stretches between your meager cover and the Drop Site, concealed in the rusting remains of a small ship listing to starboard on a sandbank. Nothing the monsters can understand.

Breaking cover, you lunge for the derelict. The packed sand crumbles beneath your hooves as if plotting with your pursuers to slow you down. You stumble, pattering a staccato beat. The scent of your own fear clogs your flaring nostrils. It’s a wonder the monsters don’t smell it too. 

Or maybe they do. 

They swarm out from the brush, and a strangled squeal rips from your throat. It seems to drive them ever faster, their huge splayed feet grabbing the sand you struggle on, throwing them forward with ease. The primitive creatures never stop, never need to rest, and their eyesight is better than yours. They’d seen you watching them, and they didn’t take kindly to that. 

That moment is frozen in your mind: the flapping hides of the dead creatures they tied around themselves, their swinging limbs, and their eyes gleaming in the dark. Fodder for nightmares, should you be lucky enough to have them later. 

You gallop across the sands and through the tide that tugs at your hooves, as if the water too conspires to drag you down. Do the monsters compel all of nature to do their bidding? You shiver, your hide twitching and jumping. It can’t be. Such a thing would be magic, and everyone knows magic is for children. Just silly superstitions. Believing in magic would be as likely as you hunting and killing some poor creature. Ridiculous.

You fling yourself into the derelict. It has no door to slam in the monsters’ faces. You lunge across the small ship to grab the crate the Wolves had sent down for your return, the crate which holds the Matt and makes this rusting boat the Drop Site. It bangs against your knees as you haul it back to the entryway and push it into place. It’s too small to block the opening, but there’s nothing else, only a few planks peeling away from the interior wall. The ship screams, too loud in your sensitive ears, when you pull the planks away and slot them into place. They rattle and shiver when you shove the crate against them. There’s no way they’ll hold. 

Hoping you’ve at least bought yourself enough time, you open the crate, scanning the instructions. The Wolves set up the Matter Teleportation Device, but they didn’t tell you how to use it.

This was supposed to be an easy mission. Drop down, catalogue the natives, and Matt up. No one was supposed to get hurt. But the Wolves, likely thinking it a prank, didn’t set the Matt up with a verbal or physical passcode. The crate holds a sensor, along with a hoof-friendly lighter, kindling, and two slabs of raw meat. You recoil, even as you read the Wolves’ instructions: the Matt will initiate automatically when the sensor detects cooking meat. 

You stare in horror. Who is this? Surely not another Cow? Could you live with yourself if you cooked another Cow?

Some prank, forcing a vegetarian to cook meat in order to return to the ship. To safety. You curse the Wolves and their set up. 

But whoever this is, they are already dead. You dying too will not bring them back. Bile rises, and tears flow from your eyes and down your sensitive muzzle. But you aren’t ready yet to die. 

Fumbling, you grab the lighter, drop it, and grab it again. Your hooves tremble as you struggle to work the simple tool. 

Something slams against the ship and the planks jump. You lunge to hold them up, muttering prayers under your breath. Of course, there’s nothing in the starry expanse to pray to, but desperation drives out reason.  

You are going to give the Wolves an earful if you see them again.

Finally, a flame lights, just as the barricade slams against your back under the weight of the monsters. Screaming in wordless terror, you scramble with your hooves on the slick flooring, but there’s no good footing. Maybe if you had massive flat feet like the monsters do. The lighter drops from your grasp onto the kindling. 

The kindling catches, lucky for you. 

Hairy arms snake in through the holes in your barricade, scratching at you with blunt nails as the fire flares brighter. Another weight bounces against your back, and roars echo all around the derelict. Fortunately, the metal isn’t rusted all the way through. 

Shallow, quick breaths puffing out of your mouth, you drop the meat on the flames and waft the smoke toward the sensors. Your stomach turns, nausea rising. The things you’re willing to do to survive are horrifying. You are disgusting. 

As the stench of cooking meat fills the cabin, the monsters outside pause, snuffling around the edges of the planks. And then, they throw themselves like a wave at the barricade. At you. 

Your eyes widen and you shriek… 

…and disappear, safely Matted up to the ship. 

The Wolves consider the mission a success. After all, you survived. Even more, in one single exposure to the concept, you taught the humans how to harness fire. 

You taught them to cook their meat. 

 

Check out the other Writer In Motion participants!

– K. J. Harrowick http://blog.halon-chronicles.com & http://kjharrowick.wordpress.com

– Jen Karner http://www.SyllablesandSass.com

– H.M. Braverman http://hmbraverman.com

– J.M. Jinks www.authorjmjinks.com

– Melissa Bergum (will be posting via KJ’s site)

– Thuy Nguyen http://www.tmnstories.com

– Kristen Howe https://kristenswritingendeavors.wordpress.com/

– Kathryn Hewitt https://spinningmyyarns.wordpress.com/

– Sean Willson https://www.seanwillson.com/blog/

– Paulette Wiles http://www.paulettewiles.com

– Talynn Lynn inkinthebook.blogspot.com

– Ellen Mulholland www.ellenmulholland.com

– Steph Whitaker stephwhitaker80.wixsite.com/swhitakerwrites/

– Sheri MacIntyre https://sherimacintyre.wordpress.com

– Jessica Lewis https://jessicalewis2227.wixsite.com/authorjessicalewis/writer-in-motion

– Susan Burdorf https://writingnotes.home.blog

– Dawn Currie https://dawncurrie.wordpress.com

– Megan Van Dyke http://www.meganrvandyke.com

– Ari Augustine https://bookishvalhalla.com

– Fariha Khayyam http://www.farihakhayyam.com

– M. Dalto https://authormdalto.wordpress.com/blog/

– Sheryl Stein http://www.wrekehavoc.com

– Belinda Grant https://belindagrantwrites.wordpress.com

– Coffee Quills https://coffeequills.com

The amazing editors:

Jeni Chappelle https://www.jenichappelleeditorial.com

Carly Hayward https://booklighteditorial.com

Maria Tureaud https://twitter.com/Maria_Tureaud

Justine Manzano https://www.craftquest.org/

 

Hey you- you’ve checked out the rest of the Writer In Motion Posts, right? As well as the other fantastic writers joining me on this crazy adventure? Great. Way to go!

So this weekend, I got my feedback on my silly Space Cows back from my Writer In Motion CPs. I opened it and read it right away because that’s the sort of person I am. Otherwise, I stress about all the awful things that are going to be in there and oh no they hated it and I suck as a writer etc. Reading it right away clears up those doubts.

The next step for me is to walk away and let it sit. I normally let it sit for a week or two before using the suggestions. This allows me some distance so I’m not defensive. That way I can look more objectively at the critique and use it or not based on its merits, not on how offended I was by it. Taking only the compliments and throwing out the critiques does no good, nor does automatically throwing out critiques I don’t agree with. I have never and will never get a MS back from critiques that’s clean. As you can see, even my short garnered 30 and 40 comments (and I gave as many back in return, even though I loved the stories!). There’s always, always, something to improve.

In this post, I’m going to share with you what my MS looked like after the tender loving care of my CPs. Hopefully this will help, seeing how marked up and ravaged my story was (and spoilers: that ripping it apart is going to make it so much better!).

Now, after I came back from my break, my first thing to do was to go through and mark down on my copy anywhere there were agreements. Even if I don’t agree with the suggestion right away, when there are agreements, that illustrates a potential problem. Sometimes a beta reader will make a suggestion that’s super wacky and out of left field (which can also be fun) but if multiple people make the same suggestion, it’s probably not so wacky.

Right away, I saw two: One is the word “howls” is applied to the monsters, but since I have Wolves later on, that can be confusing. I whole-heartedly agree with that sentiment and will be changing that. The next point of agreement is “derelict”. Derelict is often an adjective, but it can also be a noun, something neither of my CPs were aware of. I tend to use archaic sort of obscure language, so if I want to keep derelict as a noun, I need to accept that readers might stumble over that word. Both CPs pointed it out, after all, and they both rock.

The next step is to transfer comments to my copy that may not be agreed on, but with which I agree. I’ll be changing those, after all, since I agree with them.

The final step is to think hard about the remainder of the comments- not the praise, but the suggestions. I need to decide whether to keep those or not. The praise is great, but I rarely do anything with it, because really it’s just letting me know what I’ve got right. That’s important, but if I’m not planning to change those bits, I’m not in danger of breaking something awesome. The one exception to the ignoring of the praise is when one person praises something and another person suggests a change. Then I’ve got to think hard on that, too.

When I’m utilizing suggestions from my betas and CPs, I never want to dismiss something based on my own pride. I have learned, however, to keep in mind the feel I want to create and my own vision for my art.

After I transferred everything I was going to think about or keep, I have this:

 

 

Now, I’m ready to make my changes, which I will post in the next couple days and then send off to my editor, the amazing Jeni Chappelle!

 

 

Check out the other Writer In Motion participants!

– K. J. Harrowick http://blog.halon-chronicles.com & http://kjharrowick.wordpress.com

– Jen Karner http://www.SyllablesandSass.com

– H.M. Braverman http://hmbraverman.com

– J.M. Jinks www.authorjmjinks.com

– Melissa Bergum (will be posting via KJ’s site)

– Thuy Nguyen http://www.tmnstories.com

– Kristen Howe https://kristenswritingendeavors.wordpress.com/

– Kathryn Hewitt https://spinningmyyarns.wordpress.com/

– Sean Willson https://www.seanwillson.com/blog/

– Paulette Wiles http://www.paulettewiles.com

– Talynn Lynn inkinthebook.blogspot.com

– Ellen Mulholland www.ellenmulholland.com

– Steph Whitaker stephwhitaker80.wixsite.com/swhitakerwrites/

– Sheri MacIntyre https://sherimacintyre.wordpress.com

– Jessica Lewis https://jessicalewis2227.wixsite.com/authorjessicalewis/writer-in-motion

– Susan Burdorf https://writingnotes.home.blog

– Dawn Currie https://dawncurrie.wordpress.com

– Megan Van Dyke http://www.meganrvandyke.com

– Ari Augustine https://bookishvalhalla.com

– Fariha Khayyam http://www.farihakhayyam.com

– M. Dalto https://authormdalto.wordpress.com/blog/

– Sheryl Stein http://www.wrekehavoc.com

– Belinda Grant https://belindagrantwrites.wordpress.com

– Coffee Quills https://coffeequills.com

The amazing editors:

Jeni Chappelle https://www.jenichappelleeditorial.com

Carly Hayward https://booklighteditorial.com

Maria Tureaud https://twitter.com/Maria_Tureaud

Justine Manzano https://www.craftquest.org/

 

Hopefully you’ve been following along with the Writer In Motion awesomeness! Check out the prompt and my process, such as it is!

And now, the unveiling: This is where my brain took me. And I ran with it.

 

You held my hand, gripping with such strength I feared my fingers might break. But I returned the grip as the howls rose around us. The Drop Site was in front of us, but between it and the bare scraggly brush we crouched in for meager cover, nothing. Just barren land. And the Drop Site? Concealed by the rusting remains of a small ship, listing to starboard on a sandbank. Nothing the monsters around us could understand.

The howls were getting closer. You lunged for the derelict, breaking cover. I had no choice but to follow you, and we ran out onto the packed sand that crumbled beneath our feet as if conspiring with the monsters to slow us down.

You stumbled before me, and I tucked my arm under your elbow to haul you upright. Your hooves pattered out a staccato beat, emphasized by the fear I could smell wafting from you. The fear the monsters could smell too, I bet.

And here they came.

They roared out from the brush and you gave a strangled squeal. It seemed to call them on, to drive them ever faster. They howled again, beasts with huge splayed feet that grabbed the sand we struggled on, that threw them ever forward, ever closer to us.

“Run!” you shouted, and I ran. I stopped looking behind me, tried to cut out the sight of the flapping hides, swinging limbs, and eyes gleaming in the dark. They could see better than we could, we’d discovered.

We galloped across the sands and through the tide reaching up to lap at our hooves, as if the water too conspired to drag us down. Did the monsters compel all of nature to do their bidding, to help them at their task? The idea sent a shiver down my spine. It couldn’t be. Such a thing would be magic, and everyone knew magic was for children. Just silly superstitions, is all.

You flung yourself into the derelict, and I leaped in behind you. No door to slam in the monsters’ faces, so I scrambled about, looking for anything to barricade the doorway. You head to the front of the cabin, searching for the supplies the Wolves had sent us. It seemed a cruelty now, the way the Wolves had set up the Matter Teleportation Device. We called it the Matt-Porter, or just Matt for short. Now, it felt like a mat in the fur, tangling and irritating, growing too something that could injure.

This was supposed to be an easy mission. Drop down, catalogue the natives, and Matt up. No one was supposed to get hurt. I grabbed a piece of plywood and slammed it into the doorway. It was barely big enough—any bend, and it would give way. I propped it up with my body, praying that it’ll be enough.

That’s how desperate I was, you see. I knew there was nothing in the starry expanse to pray to, but somehow I prayed anyway. I don’t even know who I prayed too—the stars? The universe? Science and reason themselves? I didn’t care that it made no sense.

You had found the matches, fumbling with them. Too long, it was all taking too long! Curse the Wolves and their set up! Couldn’t they have used a button, or any other type of sensor? But Wolves will be Wolves.

And yes, you see, I cursed. I’m sorry about that but you see, I wasn’t in my right mind.

Finally you dropped the match to the kindling, just as a weight slammed against my back and I screamed. I scrambled with my hooves on the slick metal flooring, but there was no good footing. Maybe if I had massive flat feet like the monsters did.

The kindling lit, fortunately for us, but I couldn’t leave the barricade. I couldn’t let go, or the monsters would get in at us. They’d get in at you.

You hesitated, looking at me, while the fire flared brighter. Another weight bounced against my back, and the howls rose up all around the derelict. Hairy arms with nimble fingers reached in at use from the portholes. Fortunately the metal wasn’t rusted all the way through.

“Drop the meat on! Waft the smoke toward the sensors!” Hopefully the Wolves set the sensors to maximum sensitivity! They probably had a laugh as they set up the Matt, the meat-lovers they were. Make the vegetarians cook slabs of meat if they want the Matt to pick them up. Drop them down with sensors that will detect the smell of cooking meat and tie the Matt into them automatically. And of course, the most devious of all, don’t let the Dropped team know until they’re already down—send them with written instructions so they can’t object.

Well, when we got back up, I’d give them an earful.

Another weight slammed against my back and arms scrabbled around as I desperately pushed the plywood closed again. Fingers pinched my hide and I squealed again.

Maybe you’d give them an earful.

The smell of cooking meat filled the cabin, turning my stomach. The monsters smelled it too, apparently. They stopped trying to beat their way in, giving me a moment of wonderful, blissful relief, though we could hear their noses working.

I leaped from the plywood, too afraid that it would bend too much and send me crashing outside with the monsters. I leaped to you, and you put your arms around me, and the monsters came roaring in.

I shut my eyes.

“Have fun?”

I opened my eyes. One of the Wolves was standing before us, his muzzle wrinkled in a broad smile.

“That wasn’t funny! We were almost eaten alive by monsters!”

“What? They’re not monsters! They’re just primitives,” the Wolf said. “It would have taken them some time to do any damage to you anyway.”

Shaking, I check my arm, where the monster had grabbed me. If the monster had been a Wolf, I would have had a great slice in my arm. Instead, I had only shallow scratches.

“What did you learn about these… what did the Whales call them?” the Wolf said.

“Homo Sapiens.”

“Ah yes. Primitive?”

“Quite primitive. But good with their eyes, and fast,” I said.

“Well, not so much fast as they just don’t stop. Do they never need rest?” you said, quivering like a leaf.

“Well, look at this! They may be primitive, but they’re intelligent. We left a sensor down below—have a look.”

We turned to the screen, leaning past the Wolf for a good look. And that’s when we discovered that we had accidentally taught the Homo Sapiens to cook their meat.

The Wolf laughed. “Not too bad, Cows. Not too bad. We’ll set a course for our home planet now, no worries. You deserve your rest.”

 

I already have plans for this. I experimented with almost 2nd person, and morphed into 1st. I think I want to see if I can stick the landing on 2nd, just for fun. But that only works if the narrator is telling the story to someone who’s gone or lost their memory or something. And the ending sucks. And I want more tension. And all of that can be fixed by committing to 2nd person and letting something tragic occur. Embrace it.

In the editing phase.

 

 

Check out the other Writer In Motion participants!

– K. J. Harrowick http://blog.halon-chronicles.com & http://kjharrowick.wordpress.com

– Jen Karner http://www.SyllablesandSass.com

– H.M. Braverman http://hmbraverman.com

– J.M. Jinks www.authorjmjinks.com

– Melissa Bergum (will be posting via KJ’s site)

– Thuy Nguyen http://www.tmnstories.com

– Kristen Howe https://kristenswritingendeavors.wordpress.com/

– Kathryn Hewitt https://spinningmyyarns.wordpress.com/

– Sean Willson https://www.seanwillson.com/blog/

– Paulette Wiles http://www.paulettewiles.com

– Talynn Lynn inkinthebook.blogspot.com

– Ellen Mulholland www.ellenmulholland.com

– Steph Whitaker stephwhitaker80.wixsite.com/swhitakerwrites/

– Sheri MacIntyre https://sherimacintyre.wordpress.com

– Jessica Lewis https://jessicalewis2227.wixsite.com/authorjessicalewis/writer-in-motion

– Susan Burdorf https://writingnotes.home.blog

– Dawn Currie https://dawncurrie.wordpress.com

– Megan Van Dyke http://www.meganrvandyke.com

– Ari Augustine https://bookishvalhalla.com

– Fariha Khayyam http://www.farihakhayyam.com

– M. Dalto https://authormdalto.wordpress.com/blog/

– Sheryl Stein http://www.wrekehavoc.com

– Belinda Grant https://belindagrantwrites.wordpress.com

– Coffee Quills https://coffeequills.com

The amazing editors:

Jeni Chappelle https://www.jenichappelleeditorial.com

Carly Hayward https://booklighteditorial.com

Maria Tureaud https://twitter.com/Maria_Tureaud

Justine Manzano https://www.craftquest.org/

 

So I decided to join a project called Writer In Motion, an idea born from Jeni Chappelle, KJ Harrowick, and others. The idea is to show the transformation process from a first draft to a final draft, because so many of us writers feel a bit bad about our own work, while we’re comparing our first drafts to published final drafts of other authors. The fact is, my first drafts suck and normally no one gets to see them period.

This will be an exception.

I cannot make promises on my final draft. If you want to see a stellar story, check out the other authors participating too!

Here’s how it’ll work:

Jeni has given us our prompt, this lovely picture by Casey Horner at Unsplash.

I will write a story inspired by this picture, coming in under 500 words! (I know, yikes!)

On June 15th, I will subject you all to the unedited first draft, right here on my blog, and I’ll tweet it using #WriterInMotion.

On June 22nd, I’ll post my first revision right here. These will be self-edits, things I have fixed using my own brain after looking it over and reading it aloud (always an important part of my revision process!)

On June 29th, I’ll post my third draft. This will incorporate revisions based on CP feedback from the previous revision (and previous week).

On July 7th, I’ll post the final draft here, after incorporating feedback from an editor.

 

This is very similar to how I normally edit, except I go through several (5+) rounds of editing with CPs and my writing groups, since I haven’t yet had the funds for an editor. Hopefully it’ll be helpful to see the revision process, and I know I am looking forward to seeing what others come up with from the prompt as well as how awesome the story gets as these excellent writers polish their drafts!

Here’s the list of participants as I’ve found it:

– K. J. Harrowick http://blog.halon-chronicles.com & http://kjharrowick.wordpress.com

– Jen Karner http://www.SyllablesandSass.com

– H.M. Braverman http://hmbraverman.com

– J.M. Jinks www.authorjmjinks.com

– Melissa Bergum (will be posting via KJ’s site)

– Thuy Nguyen http://www.tmnstories.com

– Kristen Howe https://kristenswritingendeavors.wordpress.com/

– Kathryn Hewitt https://spinningmyyarns.wordpress.com/

– Sean Willson https://www.seanwillson.com/blog/

– Paulette Wiles http://www.paulettewiles.com

– Talynn Lynn inkinthebook.blogspot.com

– Ellen Mulholland www.ellenmulholland.com

The amazing editors:

Jeni Chappelle https://www.jenichappelleeditorial.com

Carly Hayward https://booklighteditorial.com

Maria Tureaud https://twitter.com/Maria_Tureaud

Justine Manzano https://www.craftquest.org/

The second wave (some of us jumped in late!)

– Steph Whitaker stephwhitaker80.wixsite.com/swhitakerwrites/

– Sheri MacIntyre https://sherimacintyre.wordpress.com

– Jessica Lewis https://jessicalewis2227.wixsite.com/authorjessicalewis/writer-in-motion

– Susan Burdorf https://writingnotes.home.blog

– Dawn Currie https://dawncurrie.wordpress.com

– Megan Van Dyke http://www.meganrvandyke.com

– Ari Augustine https://bookishvalhalla.com

– Fariha Khayyam http://www.farihakhayyam.com

– M. Dalto https://authormdalto.wordpress.com/blog/

– Sheryl Stein http://www.wrekehavoc.com

– Belinda Grant https://belindagrantwrites.wordpress.com

– Coffee Quills https://coffeequills.com

 

Oh, and what am I doing this week before the first draft? I’m gonna stare at this picture in between Windward edits and let my subconscious do its thing. I can already feel the wheels turning, and I love the evocative feel of this prompt! It’s lovely. This means I also have to avoid looking at these other blogs, because at this stage in my creative process I can’t let someone else’s ideas in, or they’ll stomp my idea-buds to bits without ever intending to do so. This is why I’ll never be able to co-write.

But you! You can go look. So browse, and have fun!