{"id":82,"date":"2015-10-05T19:52:45","date_gmt":"2015-10-06T02:52:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/?p=82"},"modified":"2015-10-05T19:52:45","modified_gmt":"2015-10-06T02:52:45","slug":"september-2015-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/2015\/10\/september-2015-update\/","title":{"rendered":"September 2015 Update"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"September<\/a>

September 2015 Update<\/p><\/div>\n

You can feel them: the winter winds, creeping over the mountains hoping that you won\u2019t notice them. Outside my window, it\u2019s snowing. But in these parts of Canada, it always starts snowing in October. There\u2019s no reason to believe this year will be any different.<\/p>\n

This is the Year<\/h1>\n

But for me, this year will be so different than any other year. For this year is the year I become an author! As I eagerly make my way through one of my favourite books \u2013 Clive Barker\u2019s The Thief of Always<\/em><\/a> \u2013 I find my spirits lifted despite the fact this is a dark tale of childhood. For you see, only Barker\u2019s tales have been able to give me the chills since I can remember. And it’s this beyond-the-pages touch that I hope to convey into my readers. If I can give them the chills or influence them after they’ve set the book down, then my work here is done.<\/p>\n

This month, I\u2019ve spent my time in the R&D side of writing \u2013 I\u2019ve read more ghost stories and horror than I can shake a stick at. In fact, I crashed my Kindle (twice) with overuse from the books, and read more Wattpad entries than I care to admit. All in an effort to find one thing: lines, passages, statements \u2013 anything that sent a shiver down my spine.<\/p>\n

My Plan for Thrills and Chills<\/h1>\n

With Below<\/em> written, edited and waiting patiently for cover art, Book 2 (title: Whole<\/em>) is a hair\u2019s breadth away from first draft. My goal for the series is to take the underlying tone from dark paranormal fiction into horror. I told myself to wait until the third book before I let loose with the true horror genre, and I\u2019ve been writing those horror scenes in handfuls lately. Using the books and stories I\u2019ve been researching, along with a love of Asian horror movies, I\u2019ve been piecing together the remaining three to four books of the series using skipping stones of stories that either struck fear into my bones or sent a shiver down my spine.<\/p>\n

\"Servant<\/a>

Passage from Servant of the Bones<\/em> by Ann Rice (and my vulture talon fingernails)<\/p><\/div>\n

Needless to say, I haven\u2019t been sleeping too well these days. Whether it\u2019s ghastly children hiding under the tablecloth, or a frightening spectres crawling out of the television set, or a vampiric house trying to eat its occupants alive \u2013 they\u2019ve all left their mark, and they all made me sleep with the bathroom light on more than once. It\u2019s such an interesting concept \u2013 being able to influence the reader or watcher so deeply that they\u2019re effected even after they turn off the movie or put down the book. And that\u2019s what I want to do: to be able to continue influencing my readers even after they\u2019ve put down my book.<\/p>\n

I know it\u2019s vain of me to compare myself to other established and well-published authors, but those are the ones I strive to be like. Stephen King, Clive Barker, Ann Rice \u2013 these are all horror-genre writers I\u2019ve loved well before I decided to be a writer myself. Stephen King instilled in us a raw fear of clowns with It<\/em>, Clive Barker taught us that the whims of childhood can lead to horrors beyond our imagination with The Thief of Always<\/em>, and Ann Rice was rockin\u2019 the vampires well before they sparkled and in-explicitly kept repeating high school with her Vampire Chronicles<\/em> series.<\/p>\n

These are my role models; these are the authors whom I strive to become.<\/p>\n

The NaNoWriMo question<\/h1>\n

With my goals set firmly in my mind, there\u2019s still another question which plagues me: to NaNo or not to NaNo<\/a>. October is NaNoPlanMo <\/a>\u2013 National Novel Planning Month, though I’m more of a pantser <\/a>than a plotter by nature. I\u2019ve NaNo\u2019d for the past 3 years now, finishing two of those years with novels (one of which is Book 2 in my almost-published series, The Rose Cross Academy<\/em>). This October, I\u2019m still struggling with whether I have enough time to compete in NaNo, or whether I should focus my energy on publishing my first novel. November is, after all, my goal publishing date for Book 1.<\/p>\n

An idea popped into my mind while watching the news, of all things. This idea I thought I could take to NaNo in November and give it flesh and bones. It\u2019s a modern take on Stephen King\u2019s Carrie<\/em> but told in novel form. My main character, Becca, is an outcast at school and gets her revenge on the classmates who torment and torture her by calling upon ghosts and nightmares to do her bidding. I\u2019ve chosen the title as simply Becca, also as an homage to King\u2019s Carrie<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I like the concept and I\u2019ve planned out a few scenes, but I\u2019m still on the fence about whether I will have enough time to write the novel in November. Nothing\u2019s stopping me from giving it a shot, but at the same time I don\u2019t want to get anyone\u2019s hopes up. It\u2019s a tough story to write, and due to some unique reasons.<\/p>\n

NaNo 2015: ‘Becca’<\/em> (maybe!)<\/h1>\n

I want the tale of Becca<\/em> to be a unique one, and I want the horrors to happen during the day. Night time haunts are clich\u00e9-ic and predictable; the dark figure in the window, the screams in the nights. But when was the last time you were scared in the daytime? I want the horrors to be everywhere; no where is safe from Becca and her nightmares. You\u2019re not safe shopping at the mall, you\u2019re not safe walking home from school on a busy street. Right in broad daylight is where Becca will strike, which is where I want the thrills and chills to live. You\u2019ll never know if it\u2019s safe to take that selfie or open the mailbox. You\u2019ll never know if one of Becca\u2019s horrors is coming after you.<\/p>\n

\"blah\"<\/a>

And then he blah’ed all the way through the plot<\/p><\/div>\n

But then what happens at night? This is where I\u2019m tripping up, actually. It\u2019s easy enough to instill a sense of uneasiness in a dark house at night, but that\u2019s too predictable. I struggle with how to make the night just as chilling as the day without getting into the corny aspect of the horror genre. I don\u2019t want things hiding under the bed or in the closet \u2013 these concepts have been done to death, pardon the pun. And you\u2019ll expect to see reflections in the mirror or the darkened windows of night. But what about a dark figure in the hallway? In the reflection of your soup spoon. Would that be out of the ordinary enough to bypass the horror cheese-and-wine platter? We\u2019ll see.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also the problem with proving to the world I\u2019ve actually written this story. I\u2019ve juggled with the idea of uploading the story chapter-by-chapter to Wattpad<\/a>. I could do that as well with past NaNo projects, I guess. My only issue is uploading anything which isn\u2019t edited or proof-read. My first pass at the draft is straight-forward: \u2018he did this, then he did that\u2019 – with no emotion and very little narration. Then there\u2019s the bullet points left over from those rare moments of planning. Oh! And let’s not forget the \u201cblah\u201d entries which need to be fleshed out. All of these things I can\u2019t in good conscious upload for public consumption.<\/p>\n

The Updates<\/h1>\n
\"Winter\"<\/a>

Too late!<\/p><\/div>\n

And so with that, we come to the end of what has been a long and rambling blog post. I\u2019m still in wait mode for cover art for Book 1 (Below)<\/em>, and Book 2 (Whole<\/em>) is still growing past my initials estimates. I\u2019m really delving into the horror genre, so I\u2019ve been reading all my old horror faves from my teenage years as a form of research. Half our jobs as writers is to read, and that has been my job this month.<\/p>\n

October will be a month of many decisions and many milestones. I want to try to make another YouTube video, as painful as the first one was. Here\u2019s hoping the stars align enough for me to get some work done!<\/p>\n

Halloween is coming! (Let’s avoid a corny Game of Thrones<\/em> reference here)<\/p>\n

Halloween is my favourite holiday.<\/p>\n

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

You can feel them: the winter winds, creeping over the mountains hoping that you won\u2019t notice them. Outside my window, it\u2019s snowing. But in these parts of Canada, it always starts snowing in October. There\u2019s no reason to believe this year will be any different. This is the Year But for me, this year will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":85,"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-82","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\/10\/2015-09-Update.jpg?fit=600%2C501&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6odz9-1k","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":131,"url":"https:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/2015\/11\/october-2015-update\/","url_meta":{"origin":82,"position":0},"title":"October 2015 Update","author":"Rissa Renae","date":"November 2, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"It\u2019s almost here! 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And also reading a lot. I think it's the reading that's been taking me away from the social aspect of being a self-published author.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Updates"","block_context":{"text":"Updates","link":"https:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/category\/updates\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/QnFairyFarts.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1166,"url":"https:\/\/www.rissarenae.com\/blog\/2021\/10\/autumn-on-the-west-coast\/","url_meta":{"origin":82,"position":2},"title":"Autumn on the West Coast","author":"Rissa Renae","date":"October 27, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"As you may know from a previous post, we packed up the family in July and moved from the foothills of the Canadian Rocky Mountains to settle in the foothills of the North Shore Mountain range--aka the greater Vancouver area. 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