Yes, I still write fiction.

I recently posted in my personal blog a brief post about the fact that I do, in fact, still write fiction. I realized later it might be a good idea to have the same sort of post here since this is, in fact, my writing blog. So here is a little information about my fiction-writing life.

I've been working on the coffee house book (working title: Prasad(a)) a little lately, and I'm looking forward to spending a good deal of time with it next week. I've adjusted my work schedule around so I can fit more fiction into it, and I want to get as much work done on Prasad(a) as I can before November. (That will definitely be a crazy month, since Hubby and I are going to try and visit my family for Thanksgiving in addition to my attempt to once again write 50,000 words of fiction in 30 days. Insane, perhaps, but possible! I finished in about four days last year.)

I've missed writing fiction, so I'm specifically setting time aside to work on Prasad(a).

Don't get me wrong--I love freelancing, and I'm happy it's my career, but my passion is fiction. I love it. I always have. Even in my personal journal I have more scribblings of characters and scenes and notes about stories I've started than personal journaling. Some of my favorite college memories were in my short fiction writing class or working on assignments for my short fiction writing class. I just heart writing fiction.

I reworked the outline for Prasad(a) recently, and I think the new outline will work much better for what I'd like to accomplish (as well as easier to write!). I'm toying with the idea of reworking it again, but I'd like to get a bit more work done on it first since my newest idea would just be an ordering adjustment that wouldn't really take rewriting. Plus, I don't want to get so caught up in tweaking the outline that I'm not actually getting any writing done. I can be a bit obsessive-compulsive when it comes to organizing my thoughts, and I don't want to spend all my writing time working with my outline and background information.

I do have to decide how to present the story. Originally, I was going to write it as a collection of scenes and character sketches that could be a collection of short stories or as one larger story when read from beginning to end. This concept appealed to me because I thought it would be fun to write, and I loved the challenge of writing the story in such a way to let the scenes fit into the story as well as stand alone. However, since reworking the outline, I'm not sure if I should continue with that original presentation idea, or if I should write a more traditional novel with what I have. Or perhaps some combination of the two ideas.

I don't want to reveal too much about the story since it's still developing, but I will say the more I work on it, the more excited I am to write it. Now that I've developed a stronger theme, the writing flows better, even when I jump around to write different sections. It's also helping me keep my thoughts together a little bit better while I'm working on background information, which gets me to working on the actual story quicker, which is important since I promised a dear friend I'd send her a bit of the story for her amusement.

The writing is going well, but I'm afraid I'm not capturing enough of the coffee house's atmosphere on paper. I have a pretty specific image in my mind, so I'm trying to accurately translate that to prose without the text turning purple on the screen. I know I'm still in the rough draft stages, but I don't think it's coming across the way I want. I wish I knew of a little indie coffee house nearby I could use for further research and inspiration, but most of the coffee houses around here are all a little more...corporate. Too bad I can't just open my own coffee house around here. Maybe someday....something like The Ink Stained Mug or something equally as writerly.