Writing #9: Progress

For those of you who aren't aware I am scheduling some posts ahead of time, so if I don't have time to write new blog posts in the next month or so I won't be inactive. Quite a few of these are poetry installments, because I had a bunch to write, but I don't want to only post one type of thing so I'm breaking it up. 

If you missed the post on my author page, below you can find my timeline for my first book.

-Finish the first draft of my untitled Alice RH by October 1st. I believe this is about twenty thousand more words.
-Complete the first round of edits by October 15th. Before I start the first round of edits, I'll make the official outline for Book Two.
-Second round of edits complete by October 25th. 
-Cover Reveal by October 31st.
-Beta Readers (around 10) from November 1st to November 20th
-Complete Final Edits by December 15th.
-ARC readers by December 20th. I'll be honest, I haven't decided about this step quite yet. Obviously when we get to this point I'll let everyone know.
-Pre-order? I am known for my impulsive decision making, so if I have a complete novel, I may just publish it.
-Publish by January 31st, 2018.

It's currently August 25th, 2017. I'm scheduling this to go up August 31st, but I thought I would talk about the progress I've made up to this point on Alice. 

• I picked a cover model for Alice. She's perfect, blonde hair, blue dress and all. 
• Since August 13th I've written 11,975 words (as of the 25th of August) the unedited document is currently 33,408.
• I'm working on in depth character descriptions and some world building. 
• I have a playlist for the books. You can find it here Alice Spotify Playlist
• I have the outline complete, and I'm currently mentally planning the outline for book two. 
• I have a few ideas for the title, I'm not going to share quite yet, but I'll make an announcement when it's complete. 

Honestly that's about it. This post is somewhat short, but I just wanted to do a quick check in on my progress. 

Taila Out

My Links

Hey Everyone! Quick Post here, I know someone of you may want to find me on other types of social media that allow for different kinds of interactions. Below you can find ALL of my links!


Personal Facebook - This is my personal Facebook account, if you send me a friend request, be sure to send me a quick message and let me know that you found me through this blog.

Author Page - This is my Author Page on Facebook, where I post everything about my books, blog posts, and more.

Twitter- I don't use Twitter a lot, but I'm hoping to start using it a bit more.

Instagram- I post pretty regularly here, lots of nerdy stuff, selfies, and my dogs.

Pinterest- I have a lot of character inspiration and nerdy stuff on here, and I'm fairly active.

Main Tumblr- I'm really active on Tumblr, but lots of nerdy things, funny things, and more.

Side Tumblr - aesthetic pictures and the like.

You can find me on Snapchat at tailaren

Feel free to contact me at any of these places, you can also send me an email tailacantrell21@gmail.com . Please keep messages, comments, etc. PG-13 and kind.

I think that's about it everybody!

Taila Out

Am I an Indie Author?

Warning, odd post ahead, have fun!

For those of you who know me personally, saying that I have control problems will come as no surprise to you. For those of you who wish to know me, welcome, I have control problems. I learned to admit this early on in my life, I am not necessarily ashamed of this affliction, but I'll admit that on occasion it causes me some trouble. I have two modes: the first is the aforementioned need to be in control, I will happily accept "bossy" or "bitchy" as substitutes, as they are often thrown around by people who are upset with me. The second is quite the opposite of my natural instinct, I stay completely silent at times I should probably speak up. The conundrum of Passive vs Aggressive.
It is quite contradictory, huh? My theory is that all humans are this way, but I can only truly speak for myself.  I would never claim that I am a naturally passive person, but I force myself into this state to avoid confrontation with people that I care about. I'm sure you can imagine exactly how often this causes me problems.

In terms of writing, it was recently brought up to me that I could publish through the "traditional" routes. For those of you who don't know, my first book should be coming out some time in the next four to five months. I am self publishing, for a few reasons, if you'd like I will make a full post on that subject another time. One of my biggest reasons, is creative control. Now, I am entirely capable of taking criticism, but I am not willing to allow anyone to force me to write something I don't want to, to make deadlines for me, and the like. Unpublished authors do not do well in the publishing industry. If you do not have an audience why would a company take a risk on you. Even if your work is the very best, it doesn't make strategic sense. I do not expect to ever make six figures on just writing. I would love for millions of people to read my books, but I would give them my work for free, because it's what I love doing. Making money doing what I love is great, and I hope in the future at some point I can support myself (reasonably) through writing. If it never happens though that's okay.

A big reason I started up this blog was to build an audience, I want people to read my work. I make no money off this venture, I probably never will, but if even five people start to follow me, and read my future books it is worth doing. I enjoy sharing my journey with people.

So now we come to the title; Am I an Indie Author? Yes I am, and I am proud. I put a hell of a lot of work into writing. I am not the best, I will never be the best, but it's what I love, and that's enough. You can try to shame the way I do things, but I know this is the correct path for me right now. If someday a opportunity arises for me to publish more traditionally I will consider it, but until then my accomplishments are not less, because I published my work myself.

Taila Out.

Writing #7: Sex

Hey everybody! I'm back with a new post, this week's should probably be considered 18+, but I'm not your parents, so there's that. I will try to be as family friendly as possible, but let's be honest I'm not really family friendly anyway. Be aware that none of what I'm saying applies to erotica, since I am not discussing it today. Let's jump right in. 

Lots of novels, romance or otherwise, have sex in them, probably because sex is a natural part of our lives. But how many people actually read those sex scenes in detail? I am a skimmer when sex scenes happen, not because they make me uncomfortable, hut I do not usually pick up a novel to read the sex, so I skim it quickly before continuing the story. Most books I read these days seem to have at least one or two (hell maybe more) sex scenes, I assume this is the getting older phenomenon, as I mature to read new content, the content matures.

I think the first book I ever read that was "adult", that didn't just imply sexual things were happening, was Acheron by Sherrilyn Kenyon (my favorite book of all time, and one I couldn't recommend more highly. As a trigger warning it deals with sex, consensual and otherwise.). I read it over the summer between middle and high school, and it shaped a huge part of who I am now, allowed me to be much comfortable with sex, although that is a post for another day. My point in bringing this book up is this; Sex in books can be good and move the plot along, show the way characters interact and more. As a writer I struggle with it.

I did a poll not long ago on a group of readers, and the majority said they prefer the "dirty" details. I found myself in a bit of a conundrum, in my novels (most of them anyway), I deal with sex in a open and free way, but I still use the fade to black technique. While the sex may be advance the story in some way, allowing the characters to grow together (you can't talk about sex and not sound dirty, leave me alone) I'm just not sure how to write sex scenes in a way that doesn't make me laugh at myself.

A part of this problem for me comes with the Alpha Male/Damsel in Distress trope that is rife in our culture these days. I have known some "alpha" males, and let me tell you I wasn't falling to their feet, I think I was far more prepared to pepper spray them. This trope to me perpetuates gender stereotypes in the worst kind of way. Relationships should be an equal exchanges, at least in an ideal world, there's no reason that the "damsel" can't support or protect her man, or that the "alpha" can't need to be supported and loved. The point being, because of the idea that men are "in control" and women are "submissive" I find it difficult to write sex scenes that people will like. There is nothing wrong if this is the relationship someone has, but it isn't the only type of relationship people have. This should probably be a rant for another day, but I'm going to leave it here.

I know that you don't always have to write for your readers (I don't), but understanding the demographic that you're writing to is important, and so I find myself having to decide whether or not I want to be classified as YA or if I want to research how to write a good sex scene that doesn't make me laugh. I've been reading a book about this subject by Diana Gabaldon, and it has been somewhat helpful. I don't know what I'll do in the end, but you can stay tuned.

Taila Out!

Random #1

I decided I was going to start a new series, to share some random thoughts with you guys. It may or may not have anything to do with writing, I guess we'll have to wait and see. I like the idea of sharing some thoughts with no particular rhyme or reason. I may talk about things I've been enjoying lately, or something I want to rant about, honestly it could be just about anything. Let's jump on in.

First things first, I have to talk about Halsey's new album, it's been out for a few weeks now, and let me tell you I've been listening to it on repeat. I enjoyed Badlands, but Hopeless Fountain Kingdom is 10x better. I literally love every single song on the entire thing. 5/5 stars.

On a totally different topic, I've heard multiple people talk about how you don't have to give a fuck about what other people think, and I have to agree. However, in this case of a few of these people, I think I may do them some good to think about how others may feel. If the things you do effect people around you, you should probably take them into consideration. Don't give a fuck, respectfully.

Lighter topic, I have three different people helping me with my writing, and I couldn't be more thankful. It's amazing to have people who are excited about your work, and helping you meet your goals. I think I'm still mostly on track to have my first novel out in January or February.

I have two eight week old puppies, so my house is a riot all the time. I posted a picture the other day of Gracie trying to help me type. Her sister, Harper is far less demanding, but more likely to bite your toes. I love my dogs, and the often help me cope with anxiety and depression.

I think that's about it for today, I'll be back soon with a new post.

Taila Out.

Writing #6: Self Care?

As some of you may know I recently went through a month long writer's block, due to a specific story. I was pushed out of this, because I had the honor of participating in Stormy Day Reading's Book Bash (look them up on Facebook and their book blog, they're awesome). Before I was invited, I hadn't written a single word since late June, but I decided I wanted to make some new teasers, and do a fun segment, that you can find on my author page. However, to do any of that I had to push past my creative block, now I will admit I reused a couple of the teasers that I had already made (although I updated them a bit), but I have found some of my motivation to write again. Although I still haven't been able to pick up the project I originally stalled out on, I've written a couple thousand words on a different project that I'm pretty excited to share.

Over the last couple of days I've gotten sick (ear infections, I'll probably have to have surgery again soon), but tonight I'm feeling a bit better, and I sat down with the intention to add words to one of my books, but I found that I had no idea where I wanted to go. My character doesn't know what to do next, and to be honest neither do I. She was supposed to make a very, very clear point to a certain male, but I while I still want to see how the scene plays out, I don't know what words to use to make it happen. It's so incredibly frustrating to find myself unable to write once again. I desperately want to have my first book out in January, but I don't feel like I can accomplish menial tasks, much less finishing a book.

I started this blog with three intentions; 1.) I wanted to share my journey, struggles and all with my family, friends, and anyone else who found they were interested, 2.) To help keep me somewhat accountable, if I say I'm gonna have a book out at the beginning of next year to enough people, maybe I would find that energy and motivation to do it, and to be honest that has worked some. 3.) To rant, when the frustration of writing became to much for me to handle on my own. Most of those reasons are totally selfish, and I have no problem admitting it, I needed the help, I still do. Lots of it. I am naturally a introvert, and I find it hard to talk to people that aren't running around inside my own head, but I knew when I started this, that I wouldn't be able to finish a book without help, and now more than ever I find that I need inspiration, motivation, and most of all someone to talk to. Even if that's just a bunch of strangers on the internet.

At this point, you've either quit reading, or you're majoring confused by the title. Well, allow me to explain, when I sat down to write this evening, I did a couple of things first, I slapped a face mask on, turned on Halsey's newest album, and spent a moment or two scrolling through social media. All of that may seem irrelevant to the post I've made so far, but it isn't. When I don't relax, and center myself, I can't write, I'm sure that's true of many authors. I think relaxing is probably important to many things beyond writing, but that's a post for another day. I often don't take care of myself, especially when it concerns my stress level, but I know if I want to write, I have to take care of myself.

With that I think I may put my computer away for the night, and rest, tomorrow is a new day (cheesy I know, don't hate me). I believe I'll feel better with rest and recreation (here I come Netflix).

Taila Out.