Escaping the darkness

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Alaire and Celestria wanted to escape the darkness together, and so they started running...

The first book in the Magicians series, Cursed With Power, has come a long way when I look back at how it started out. CWP was my first book to be published, my first "baby" to be born into the publishing world. The holiday season is right around the corner, and if you haven't read the book already or have a friend you want to gift it to now is the perfect chance. Save 10% for a limited time and pay $17.06 for a paperback on Amazon.

 

Now if you've already read both books in the series thus far or you're just dying to know what's going on with the third upcoming book... let me fill you in with the details.

It's the 20th day of NaNoWriMo, and there's only ten more days until time runs out on that clock. I am working my hardest to reach the 50k goal, but I will admit I have some catching up to do. Presently I'm at approximately 30k, but I have chapter twelve and part of chapter thirteen to type up tonight. If I had to estimate I'd say that'll take me up to 33 or 34k *fingers crossed*. Despite how eager I am to get this book finished and written out completely so I can revise it until it's ready for publication in 2014, it's not getting any easier. With a full time job, college, and the loving boyfriend I spend time with writing is something I usually end up doing either at early hours of the morning or late hours of the night. Regardless, I remain determined to have it finished.

Good news is that I am working on the masquerade chapter and it's fun and exciting to work out what characters are wearing, how their masks look, and the dances they're doing together. Mind you all of this is happening while the tension is increasing (over a matter I cannot reveal). It's an exciting chapter and there's much more ahead to come.

The next couple of hours I want to spend typing up those chapters I've talked about, so I'll check back in again later on (before NaNo ends hopefully).

Lindsey R. Sablowski

30k in the upcoming third book

Here we are nearing the end of day 13 of NaNoWriMo, and I'm proud to announce that I reached 30k tonight. When I first started this book I had no idea that by November I would already be this close to 50k. As I explained in an earlier post, my goal for this month is to hit 50k for NaNoWriMo, which is why if you look at my word meter on the side it now shows my progress out of 50,000 words. I'll change it back to 70k when we're in December, but for now I just want to focus on November's goal.
 
It's crazy to think I only have 19k more until I reach my goal, and I've been pushing myself even on days when I think "eh, it can wait another day." One of the biggest lessons you can ever learn from writing is that it needs to be done as frequently as possible until it's a daily routine to be a part of your every day. For those of you who are dying for more of an inside scoop on the third book, let's take a look....
First off, I'll say it again... The cover is to die for. You can definitely see a pattern that the books are starting to take on, which was not at all intended and I only just realized myself the other day. So far my boyfriend has been the only one to see the official cover, besides the designer obviously, but he agrees it's amazing.
Now as for the writing, I finished chapter eleven tonight and will be starting on twelve tomorrow morning. Book Three has a lot of new faces as well as familiar ones, so I'm working hard to spend time developing all of the characters. The main character has been such a pleasure to work with, and I am eager to reveal who it is next month. Remember in December you find out the official title and main narrator for the story, which will also help both you and I tweet and/or post about the upcoming book.
What has definitely been interesting in the series is seeing character develop and change over time, and in one of my most recent chapters the narrator talked about all of the changes that had occurred. There are many more intense, attack-filled chapters coming up, and I'm eager to see where the book is going to end because as of right now I don't have an ending planned out. I can, however, promise it will end like any other book in the Magicians series... leaving you wanting more.

That's all for tonight. I just wanted to check in and update everyone with the progress I made. Keep your fingers crossed I reach the 50k marker by the end of this month. Only two more weeks left, so for anyone else participating in the madness... Hang in there!
Lindsey R. Sablowski

Behind the Character: Rostland

Imagine living forever, never aging, and never having to fear death. Tonight I'm taking you behind the scenes with the Magicians series to unveil Rostland.

If you've read the sequel, Shadows and Embers, you've already had the pleasure of meeting Rostland. He didn't make any appearance in Cursed With Power, and since I haven't talked about him before on the blog I thought it was time to shine some light on new characters we're meeting along the journey with our Dark magicians. Rostland is a very unique character; he's an immortal man who has been around since the 1300s. His full back story is discussed throughout the series, but there's much more I can share about him.

Why immortality? Honestly, it was something new. When I was working out ideas for the SandE I thought how interesting it would be if there was an immortal man. Immortality has never been something I have written about before, so I was intrigued to come up with a unique way to make Rostland special. Being immortal also means he's not a Dark magician, so throughout the second book we're debating whether Rostland is friend or foe. Let's face it, an immortal man is definitely someone who should be feared.

Like everyone else, my favorites when it comes to male characters in the series so far are Leal and Alaire, but all the same I love the challenge Rostland brings as a character and also the experience and wisdom he is able to share because of how long he has lived.

Can we expect to see more of him as the series continues? We're about to find out with the third upcoming book, but in the mean time if you haven't already catch up on the first two books.

Progress in the third book:

I've made it up to 23k, and chapter nine is half way finished, needs to be typed up, and then the other half needs to be written. Again it seems handwriting the chapters helps me keep the flow moving along, and I run into less obstacles and distractions. Chapter nine will definitely be finished by the end of this week, and at the very least I'd like to reach over 25k before the start of next week. I already have chapter ten roughly outlined, and that's an action-filled chapter so it should be exciting to work through.

Lindsey R. Sablowski

NaNoWriMo 2013 Begins!

Welcome November! It's the first day, and all of my writing friends have been announcing the start of NaNoWriMo. October seemed to fly by, and it's hard to believe we're already in November. I've been a part of NaNo for five years now. I started back in 2008, writing the story Enjoy the Silence, which I made the horrible mistake of typing up on a typewriter. What was I thinking? Well, clearing I was not. In my mind all that mattered was that I could sit down at my desk with this awesome, classic, old typewriter and write away to my heart's content. Unfortunately, I honestly cannot tell you how much my word count was for that first year. The chapters I did manage to type up are stored away in a folder somewhere. It was a different kind of book for me, since it focused on the story of a girl and her encounter with a ghost. At least I tried something different, right?
In 2009 my selection was a story called Shimmer, which more or less focused on a girl named Allison who discovered she had magic. It wasn't such a great success, and that's all I have to say about that one. That was during the years when I couldn't find a novel I wanted to write and actually finish.

The next year, 2010, I wrote a book titled Stronger. The cover wasn't all that bad, and if you were a follower of my blog at that time I wrote up several posts about it. The story focused on Jocelyn, who was a princess in danger of being killed. She also had her loyal knight by her side, Kerrich, and there was a major twist around the fifth or seventh chapter. 

I'm purposely skipping over 2011 because the novel was not a success at all, and there's no point in me rambling about it.

Fast forward to 2012, and I wrote the first 50,001 words of what would become the second book in the Magicians series. When I was in NaNo it was titled "Punished With Destiny," but you all know it today as Shadows and Embers. I remember being extremely frustrated with finishing for that year, and I can't remember what happened once I hit 50k, but looking back on it I'm glad I reached the goal. It's amazing to see that now the novel is complete and published. 

This year...

My 2013 selection shouldn't come as a surprise. I've been working on the third book for quite some time now, and I'm entering it into NaNo because I have my goal of 70k to reach and NaNo can help push me toward it. Since I promised myself I was going to keep the title a secret until December I can't reveal any details until next month, but now that the book is in the works and I'm serious on finishing it.

For those of you who are participating this year, I wish you the best of luck. NaNo is a wonderful way to finish a novel that you can later on publish down the road when it's ready. It happened for me, it can happen for you. If I can finish book #3 this month that would be amazing, but even if I just reach 50k that's fine because I can complete the other 20k in December.

Best of luck...and let the writing and madness begin!

Lindsey R. Sablowski