{"id":49,"date":"2015-09-01T19:58:05","date_gmt":"2015-09-02T02:58:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/?p=49"},"modified":"2015-09-01T19:58:05","modified_gmt":"2015-09-02T02:58:05","slug":"august-2015-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/2015\/09\/august-2015-update\/","title":{"rendered":"August 2015 Update"},"content":{"rendered":"

Phew! August has come and gone so quickly. So much has happened this month. The last week of the month was spent home-bound for much of southern Alberta, which unfortunately didn’t translate into a lot of writing time. It’s strange – when you’re bored out of your skull because it’s too unhealthy to go outside in the middle of summer, it’s amazing how much you don’t do.<\/p>\n

We Didn\u2019t Start the Fire<\/h1>\n
\"Smokey<\/a>

Smokey City<\/p><\/div>\n

The biggest life event of August was that the city survived horrible smoke levels that were off the charts. Fires in Washington State and British Columbia socked in much of southern Alberta. At one point, air quality in Calgary was a whopping 28 on a 1 to 10 scale (methinks the scale needs to be revised, n’est pas?) Many of us were relegated to homes and offices with the ventilation turned off while temperatures ran up into the mid-to-high twenties (75-80F). Smoke choked the skies and choked our lungs, and I’m not even kidding about that. I couldn’t go outside without a scarf tied around my face. And even then, I would cough for half an hour once getting back in doors.<\/p>\n

Websites!<\/h1>\n
\"Sometimes<\/a>

Sometimes we have bad dreams…<\/p><\/div>\n

I\u2019ve launched my author website, www.rissarenae.com<\/a> . Whoo hoo! The blog is up and I\u2019ve put up a little teaser for Book 1. Still lots to add to the site, but I\u2019m taking it all in baby steps. I\u2019m kicking around the idea of starting a vblog on YouTube<\/a>, and I’ve already set up a Facebook page<\/a>. Social media is a lot to keep up with, so this is gonna take some getting used to.<\/p>\n

\"Rose<\/a>

Rose Cross Academy website<\/p><\/div>\n

In addition to the author website, I\u2019m setting up a website for the series I\u2019m writing. The series is called the Rose Cross Academy series; central to the storyline is the aforementioned academy \u2013 a high school which trains its students to hunt and extinguish demons. I\u2019m building up a university-esque website, www.rosecrossacademy.com<\/a>, to serve as both a marketing tool and an informational site for the series.<\/p>\n

Book 1 is still waiting patiently for final artwork. In the meantime, I\u2019ve been polishing up Book 2. I\u2019ve hit my word count, which I\u2019ve been using as a basis for determining how complete the book is. But at 83,000 words, the manuscript is still not complete. This was something I was hoping to finish up in August. Now, I\u2019m thinking this book may hit close to the 100,000 word mark (my editor better prepare herself!)<\/p>\n

There will be a Book 6!<\/h1>\n
\"Book<\/a>

Book 5 Storyboard Snipit<\/p><\/div>\n

Book 5 grew an ending this month! So now that means I’m going to have to write a Book 6 in order to end the war that\u2019s brewing all the way back in Book 1. I\u2019ve also come up with an ending for the series. When exactly the series will end in its entirety remains to be seen. Six books? Eight books? It\u2019s strange to be thinking about the end of the series when I\u2019m still waiting to publish the beginning of the series. However, when you take into account the fact that I\u2019m a Pantser and not a Plotter, having a goal is a good thing: the light at the end of the literary tunnel is no longer a freight train.<\/p>\n

The Statistics<\/h1>\n

I love my statistics \u2013 that\u2019s the Gold in me coming out. I know it bores the snot out of most people, so I\u2019ll try to contain myself. Other than Book 2 hitting the word goal of 83,000 words, most of the effort this month went to the websites and my experimenting with whether or not I\u2019m going to be starting a vlog.<\/p>\n

It’s looking like September may be fairly quiet. Still, I haven’t made a decision on NaNoWriMo 2016 yet as I’m aiming to publish Book 1 in November. Ahhh, so many decisions to make, and I still have to remain gainfully employed through all of this. I don’t know how most authors do it.<\/p>\n

Later!<\/p>\n

– Rissa<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Phew! August has come and gone so quickly. So much has happened this month. The last week of the month was spent home-bound for much of southern Alberta, which unfortunately didn’t translate into a lot of writing time. It’s strange – when you’re bored out of your skull because it’s too unhealthy to go outside […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":54,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[8],"class_list":["post-49","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-updates","tag-updates","post-preview"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/2015-08-Update.jpg?fit=604%2C500&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6odz9-N","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1142,"url":"https:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/2021\/09\/a-change-of-scenery-moving\/","url_meta":{"origin":49,"position":0},"title":"A Change of Scenery – Moving","author":"Rissa Renae","date":"September 25, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"I think we can mostly agree that COVID-19 has changed the landscape of the modern workplace. 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