Tag: novel writing

To Write, You Must Read

To write, you must read. Simple right? Like any skill, it requires building those muscles, learning from example, immersion in a new concept, but as I started to brainstorm a new novel project, my tank was empty. I had concepts, settings, character types, but the world building through dialogue and metaphor…it was pretty bland. Not what I expected!

When I began work on Udal Cuain in the summer of 2016, the story poured out of my mind. I had to carry a notebook around, for the small pieces of plot, personality, and setting I found welling up throughout my day. Names were easy to determine, as well as the dramatic conflicts. Why does it feel so different? Well, I remembered something when I picked up Six Crimson Cranes by Elizabeth Lim – to be a good writer, you must read other stories. In 2016, I wasn’t sewing, knitting, or gardening; I was reading in my spare time. I was still watching movies and TV shows regularly, instead of how I spend my time now watching far too many YouTube videos.

Although I have read a lot of books, it’s past tense. I have not been a consistent reader for years now. Honestly, since 2021, my reading has dropped off. We moved from a town with an incredible library to a borough with a library that is so underwhelming, and on the verge of losing its funding, that I have not been reading new things, nor have I discovered new authors. I have a few books on my TBR list, books that I have bought with the intention of reading, but instead have become bookshelf decor. It’s disappointing.

I used to have a Kindle, where I would buy books on sale for $2.99, sometimes splurging on a full-price one if it was intriguing enough. I would borrow a book a month, and browse the free section for something fun to pass the time. A book I remember finding on a sale that became an absolute favorite of mine was ‘The Shadowy Horses’ by Susanna Kearsley. I found this book initially in high school, reading it before work and during breaks at my summer job. I found Susanna Kearsley again, books upon books of her work at my local library in Meadville. They had a fantastic selection, with a monthly rotation of featured books and new authors. This is how I found Elizabeth Lim – her debut novel, ‘Spin the Dawn’, was a featured YA selection with a stunning cover that drew me in.

I miss the rotation of books and the lack of consumerism. The books were picked by the librarians, books that I could borrow and return with the option of buying. Now, if I want to find something new, the best affordable option is Thrift Books, but it lacks the in-person ambience of a library. Kindle helped me find some great twisty thrillers during the time that the mid-2010s. Remember when Gone Girl, Girl on the Train, The Wife Between Us, and An Anonymous Girl? I used to love these twisty books. There was a fantastic emergence of fantasy around this time, too. I remember finding endless YA fantasy series on my library shelves – I miss that time in my life, diving from adventure to the next. A good story connects us, inspires us. I forgot how important it is to be immersed in stories to be a good storyteller.

So I have picked up reading again. I am forcing myself to put down my projects, and the Animal Crossing, which I didn’t play before when I was reading often, and to read again. It’s going okay. The moments I give myself to sit and read are magical, like I remember, and I think I’ve already had better ideas since reading again. I wish I had kept a list of the books I read in the 2010s; it’s a bit of a blur. Maybe, with a little research, I can find them again and share my favorites with you?

I hope you are enjoying your summer (or winter if you live in the southern hemisphere) and that you have a good story to escape into today. Thanks for checking out my corner of the internet today. I hope to see you again. ❤

Rediscovering Fiction Writing

I’ve decided to get back into fiction writing! It’s been a long time, so long I almost forgot how to begin. Because of how fuzzy my creative brain has felt, I’ve been stuck in the confines of what feels familiar. I’ve been wanting to go back to what I made before. At first, I wanted to bring back Udal Cuain from memory. The bits and pieces of the characters still live in my mind, but upon trying this without my manuscript – it is a bit daunting, near impossible to remember what I wrote 6 years ago. I considered rebooting it in a new story. I could fix the decisions with the plot that irked me, revising it into a thing, but at that point, why not just branch out to a new world and new characters that embody who I am now as a writer instead of what I was. And so here we are, and I’m excited!

The Writing Prompt

Since about October 2022, the pull to dabble in fiction has returned. This was in part from a close writer friend who challenged me with a writing prompt. She asked me to write about my favorite garment from fashion history and write a story from the perspective of the person who invented the garment. I began to research, to study, to not just pick a garment but pick several and then try to place them in a world with character. There were so many evolutions to this! It was an endless pit of inspiration.

With some time to dream and consider, my first choice was the corset – it is the ultimate historical fashion garment to me because of the craftsmanship, the foundation it created for silhouette and style, and truly to challenge the many people who use it as a scapegoat in the fight against the patriarchy. If only they would do some research (I’m talking to you BBC and Netflix). I ran into a problem – what iteration of the corset would I focus on? Should I include stays? How much is too much detail? Yeah, it was a bit too broad for the kind of historical mind I possess.

My friend suggested I narrow my wild mind down to one era, my favorite era of fashion history. What is my favorite era of fashion history? Well, I broke that prompt too! I could not decide between the 1890s, 1910s, and 1690s. I blame the fantastic fashion history content of Nicole Rudolph’s 1690s-inspired Winnifred Sanderson costuming, Bernadette Banner’s 1890s-inspired garments, and Bernadette’s 1910s Mary Poppins Jolly Holiday Lingerie Dress. My little fashion nerd heart was too enthralled to choose between them. I waded deeper into the idea. Maybe social and cultural norms would flush out the true winner. A character, if I placed her into these time periods, what would her life look like? Could she be a fashion designer like I strive to be or would limitations be placed on her talents?

If she would be prevented by society to make clothing openly, what story would there be to create? I realized I was approaching the prompt from the wrong point of view. It is not if she would be making clothes, it is in what context. A home sewist? A professional seamstress for a rich or royal family? Were women head tailors? Yes, yes they were until the mid-19th century and Frederick Worth changed the industry to a male-dominated designer world. With the right context, there was a bit more wiggle room. She could be a tailor.

There was that curve ball though, I was supposed to write from the perspective of the designer who invented the garment. And this is where my historically trained brain couldn’t seem to get out of its own way. Although I wasn’t finding a credited person for these garments, I was afraid of misrepresenting the history. If nothing else, the fashion industry has built itself on a shady foundation of misappropriating cultures, using questionable materials, pushing toxic beauty ideals, and mistreating its workers. My gut was scared of what romanticizing a garment could do to the real history at play.

Razor Clams and Melancholy

Alright, so what now? Well, I thought, what about the Alexander McQueen Razor Clam dress sketch literally tattooed on my shoulder? I mean isn’t that my ultimate garment? Isn’t he the one designer that captured my imagination? Yes, yes he was. I found security in knowing a rich history of who and how this piece of art came to be. It was safe yet true to my love for fashion design. This dress has always taken my breath away. There is something unbelievable about its construction, yet undeniably beautiful in execution, like a character in a fantasy novel standing before you with a real flying bison and bending to prove it.

I didn’t realize for years that it was made from real razor clam shells, I thought that the shells were 3-D printed. Understanding the realism captured by the use of real shells makes this dress so full of life and story. Literally, these pieces could not be here without a whole story of their own, from their former life as the home of razor clams, amidst the ocean waves to the cleaning and preparation to be sewn one by one into one garment. The time and care required to make this garment is extraordinary. I thought about my own connection to the sea, picking up seashells along the beach. Walking side by side with my Grandma, talking and stopping to discover every little gem of shell and sand. It was our thing. From Marco Island to New Smyrna, to St. Augustine, to Nags Head – we combed those beaches soaking in the memories of time, we can never replace.

I thought about McQueen and his close relationship with his own mom, and the pain that hung over him after she passed away. I pictured in my mind a day of walking the beach, with the razor-clam shells washing up. Could he have been a shell seeker like me? Could he have been as inspired to create as Grandma and I did with our favorite shell finds? Stringing them onto necklaces. A little souvenir of our walks together. As I wrote, the pain and loss washed over the words a melancholy snapshot took form on the page of a heartbroken fictional character making this dress out of heartbreak for the one he loved. The process was awful. As I wrote, tears slipped down my cheeks and I hated it.

Our Creative Well

The next time my friend and I met to discuss our writing progress, I told her of my switch to the Razor Clam dress and how what came out of my writing broke me. I was in a melancholy cloud missing the flurry of indecision compared to this. In all this chaos, I learned an invaluable lesson. As my friend phrased it, I tend to create from a place of sadness. I seek out the dark and dismal places in my brain to feed whatever I am making, like a tortured artist drinking absinthe or the despair of Poe, I am drawing upon the wrong thing to write from and therefore, my projects hurt me. The same thing happened during the Udal Cuain project. It got dark, and I couldn’t live in that world anymore. She challenged me to find a new place to rely on while I write, to create from a place of joy instead of sadness. It’s changed my whole way of creating as I mentioned in #17- Bad Writing Habits.

Where do you create from? Is it a place of joy or of pain? It’s an interesting thing to consider, and can definitely affect your tone, plots, worldbuilding, etc. I think the biggest takeaway from this process of failed writing prompt drafts was to reinvigorate my brain to imagine worlds from a simple inspiration, and to begin the path of research and brainstorming for characters, stories, and plots less traveled by the current influx of fantasies, thrillers, smut-tok, superheroes, and meta-storytelling. We need new kinds of stories. With that in mind, I’m excited to keep moving forward. I hope you join me on this journey.

Locations in Udal Cuain

Udal Cuain was a story of many locations, each with a key purpose and strategic place on the map. When I began writing this novel I found the easiest way for me to develop the setting was to make a map of the places and ideas I had in mind. But where to start? As this was based on some historical structures and locations in Ireland, referencing the Irish map was a great place to begin!

Sketching the Map

The setting of Udal Cuain was set in western Ireland within the ancient kingdom of Connachtha during the Early Medieval period. Connachtha was one of the historic provinces within ancient Ireland – Ulster to the North, Connachtha to the West, Munster to the South, and Leinster to the East. So looking at four kingdoms, with Meath at the center, the spiritual center of the Druid Celtic faith, the story had a world to research and emulate from the evidence that survives of these kingdoms.

With a title like Udal Cuain, which means “tossed around by the sea” in Gaelic, I settled on Connachtha because it is on the rugged coast of the Wild Atlantic Way. It is also one of the kingdoms on the western side that my family is not connected with. I have family connections to the Munster region and Ulster region, and I wanted something unfamiliar and neutral for these fictional characters. It left the door open to interact with Ulster and Munster if I changed my mind.

County Galway’s geographical features stood out for its port and bay with small islands, perfect for a fictional island to exile my characters on. The Burren of rocky terrain to the south along with the Shannon River provided some interesting options for a secondary chieftain’s home base and the key feature – the Aran Islands at the mouth of the bay. With these three I planned my three smaller fictional kingdoms of warring chieftains:

Galway of the O’Connors

The O’Connors’ kingdom, which I placed at the location of Galway’s current city, was supposed to be a well-established chieftain dynasty, that had many enemies and allies. I wanted the kingdom to be both strong; and yet on the tipping point of losing it all because of the internal strife. I wanted their kingdom’s fortress and main structure to be stationed at the Galway city current location, with the idea that the O’Connors’ land would cover the coast around the bay to the Connemara Bog and down to the Burren at the south so that they had room to farm, hunt, and keep livestock. They would also have access to building materials, road networks to interior Ireland, and the mountains. There would be a connection to Ireland’s spirit within the people and leaders. They would also be connected to the land and there for the Tuatha De Danann, the mythology of Ancient Ireland.

I chose this location because it had a long history in Ireland, but had room to explore imagined locations. Galway doesn’t have historic anchor points for this period, like Newgrange or Glendalough. It allowed me to invent without clashing with the established places or treading on the stories of real people. It also has great geography. The bay provides natural resources like fishing, trade, boat building, etc. It would make sense to have a marketplace there and an imagined fortress. To the interior, there are forests, meadows, mountains, lakes, waterfalls, and rock for quarries.

Aran Islands of Murtagh

The Aran Islands to the far west of Galway Bay, an outpost of the Irish language during the centuries of oppression by the British, and a population decimated by the famine, I wanted to make these islands a key player in my story. They have many stories to tell, but in Udal Cuain, I wanted to bring them back to life as a powerful seat of trade. A necessity to the kingdom of Galway and the enemy to the North, the impending Vikings. I chose to make the Aran Islands kingdom a rival to the O’Connors, with an imagined trading kingdom built around the ancient fort of Dun Aonghasa. I also saw this as a choke point for the Galway kingdom of the O’Connors, they must keep tensions cool with Chieftain Murtagh in order to keep their own economy going and allow free use of the Ocean beyond. Yet as in relationships, this is easier said than done.

Limerick

Limerick on the Shannon River served as a connection to the Viking Age. This city was a settlement historically conquered by Vikings, in Udal Cuain it is a place of cross-cultural influences. There was a historic kingdom in the story, the Ui Neills, that one character is closely connected to. Yet with the changes that took place within Ireland during the Early Medieval period, the Ui Neills, are faced with Viking invasions. I chose to use this location as a place to see the impact, good and bad, of Viking settlements in Ireland. This played a key role in Ireland’s structure historically, with Dublin the capital city being established by Ivar the Boneless. In my fictional setting of Udal Cuain, I wanted this Limerick settlement to explore the Norse and Celtic cultures, while pondering the pain, the greed, the bloodshed.

Searbh

The Island of Searbh is completely made up, yet inspired by the small islands in Galway Bay. Searbh, being a fictional island in Galway Bay was a blank canvas to create my own hub of the story without needing to adhere to established geography or history. Searbh served as an exile and prison for the characters sent for their crimes against the O’Connors, used mainly by Chieftainness Tearlag to reinforce her agenda. The name Searbh in Gaelic means bitterness, that was what I wanted this island to encapsulate, a bitterness of landscape and mindset. The exiles have bitterness in their daily life as prisoners, but it also bleeds into their relationships and attitude toward survival on the island. I wanted to create a place that could be seen as hopeless, or potentially a powder keg of motivation.

These locations form a triangle around the Island of Searbh, furthering the message that the characters sent here are cornered by the adversaries, yet an unlikely alliance might be within reach if they can get off the island. From Searbh, you can see Galway, yet you cannot reach your home. It is psychological warfare. The Aran Islands are beyond sight, but the hope of finding an ally in Chieftain Murtagh lives on in the minds of exiles of their potential support and refuge against Tearlag. Searbh’s location and removal from the actual kingdom with its society and drama, makes Searbh a place of escape from reality. Here the exiles can both dwell and escape the reasons that brought them here.

There aren’t many resources on Searbh and so they are dependent on their captors to stay together, they also learn to adapt to a new life. The exiles learn new skills and have to get creative. Strangely enough, there are many relics on this island, like it has a life beyond what the exiles understand. I wanted there to be a mysterious undertone to the place and toe the line between reality and delusion and the psychological warfare gets in their minds.

If you were going to design a map for an upcoming novel how would you design it? Would you reference a real landscape or would you design purely from the depths of your imagination?

Conn’s Journal – Bringing a Dead Character to Life

Something I knew I wanted to capture in my novel Udal Cuain, was the deep world of lore that literary classics such as Lord of The Rings, the Hobbit, and Harry Potter present by creating books within books. Such as There and Back Again by Bilbo Baggins, Quidditch Through the Ages by Kennilworthy Whisp, or Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander. But it had to fit the world I had created in Udal Cuain with the type of literacy and availability of books, according to the time period.

I settled on a private journal that would make sense in the world of a Cheiftain living in Viking Age Ireland, that although Ancient Irish had a spoken language mostly, a brief written language of Ogham based on trees, they did have the influence of monasteries and with it written language and booking making availability. Especially if that Chieftain had studied with monks and was interested in cultures other than his own, a wanderlust and curious man, a recorder of history, both good and bad that could lead to secrets being recorded, that others did not want. A cause for his death? Perhaps! This was my jumping-off point for creating an active character in a story, where this character had already died.

In Media Res

Because I was a novel writing novice I wanted to be as slick and tricky as possible, at times writing myself into a corner by joining the story in media res, jumping into a story in the middle of the narrative without context. This left me with a problem, how do I tell the stories I need to tell without lengthy flashback scenes that may confuse the reader and muddy the plot?

Insert a lost journal. Found by a key character, with similarities to Conn. This character, who is one of the main characters, is named Kinvara. Kinvara is a misfit turned hero, through her pure spirit, she is chosen by the faeries to be their advocate and right the wrongs of her fellow clan. It is she who finds the journal after Conn’s death when she is in exile on Searbh for treason against the reigning Tearlag, widow of Conn. Kinvara desires to understand why her family and their allies were driven from home to this island, and why her parents would align themselves with Riordan and Saoirse, the ones accused of treason by Tearlag when they seem to be such bad people.

Kinvara like Conn, observes people, and so by choosing her as the character to find the journal, it is like we get to experience Conn in these situations and resolved a problem I did not anticipate – How do I make Conn a relatable character when he’s dead? How do I make the reader see his side? By making Kinvara a foil of Conn, her experience with the secrets she discovers inside Conn’s Journal allows the reader to understand who he was. How Kinvara reacts to the information both shows her value system and Conn’s and allows Kinvara to be a fly on the wall of events that apply to her but gives her the knowledge of such information that would not be available to her character otherwise.

It eliminated for me, the need to create an omniscient narrator. Something I wasn’t interested in.

Sowing Seeds of Story

Now came the task of integrating the two. How should this book, Conn’s Journal be presented in the story of Udal Cuain?

I pondered if it should be in reference only, or maybe a separate book? But that felt like I was putting a burden on the reader to seek this out when I didn’t know if anyone would care enough to do so. I don’t have a writing pedigree to fall back on, I’m an unknown writer that may not be engaging or worthy of devoting so much time to, so I thought about how to make the journal part of the chapters.

Integrating the pieces of Conn’s Journal into the chapters seemed like the most efficient option for the reader, if it exists in the story without requiring the reader to look up an additional source, I believed the reader would be more engaged, and more likely to read Conn’s Journal. This was a great strategy, I believe because this opened a new framework to chapters. If I wanted to reveal something from the past, instead of having the characters talk about it, I could paint a whole scene with action and foreshadowing, so that it was like the reader was reading Conn’s Journal like Kinvara and experiencing the story from her perspective, but also Conn’s perspective.

This plan provided a great opportunity to reveal more about the secretive O’Connors and fact-check what son Riordan, daughter-in-law Saoirse, and wife Tearlag were presenting to the characters in the story and telling the reader. It allowed me the chance to experiment with unreliable narrators, which was a lot of fun, and use the tool of dramatic irony.

Because of the seasonal framework, I discussed before in Ancient Irish Calendar, I had a concise way to show the reader when Conn’s Journal took place. His entries could be dated and set in a specific season or month that could be referenced before or later on, like a hyperlink. But, this could be more layered, Conn may have written about an event in his early life that was set in the calendar framework, and I could demonstrate when Conn did this writing later in life with an entry dated so that the reader could feel like Conn was a three-dimensional character. Just as in life, I wanted my characters to feel human and humans have memories triggered by events that are extremely personal in nature. We connect the dots in our own way, and I wanted Conn’s character to have the chance to tell his own story.

Thank you reader for allowing me to muse and reflect on this work with you. I truly miss the story within the story I created with Conn. What do you think about this writing technique? Would you apply it to your own work? Do you enjoy when authors employ in media res, dramatic irony, or books written by their characters? Should dead characters stay dead? It’s a lot to ponder.

Ancient Irish Calendar

An important part of the world I desired to create in my novel Udal Cuain was a sense of place. Since I chose to set my story in Early Medieval Ireland, also known as Viking Age Ireland, I strove to create a world that didn’t feel like our modern age but instead steeped in a culture unlike the modern North American one I know as familiar. A simple way I found to create this complete world was to research and incorporate the Ancient Irish calendar of months. The structure of this calendar looked a little something like this:

Geimhreadh (Winter)

Samhain (November), Nollaig (December), Eanair (January)

With Samhain celebrated the night between the last day of fall and winter, signifiying a new year.
Later on in Nollaig the Winter Solstice was celebrated.

Earrach (Spring)

Feabhra (February), Marta (March), Aibrean (April)

With the festival of Imbolc, for fertility and planting, celebrated at the start of Feabhra.
The Spring Equinox was recognized in Marta.

Samhradh (Summer)

Bealtaine (May), Meitheamh (June), Iuil (July)

With the festival of May Day being celebrated on the first day of Bealtaine.
Summer Solstice recognized during Meitheamh at New Grange

Fomhar (Fall/Harvest)

Lunasa (August), Mean Fomhair (September),
Deireadh Fomhair (October)

The Lunasa festival being celebrated at the start of the harvest.
At the end of Deireadh Fomhair, Samhain night signified the end of the year.

Already this calendar has a different rhythm than our own, with the months with each season divided one month earlier than we do now. It is a calendar that reflects the agricultural tempo of the ancient Irish society and helped the Viking Age world I was writing about feeling like it had structure. These months are unique, based on a lunar structure with names that correspond to what’s going on within the season compared to the Gregorian calendar, our modern system, which is mathematical and accounts for the passage of time the Earth takes to orbit the Sun. Understanding how and why we use things is important to consider when creating a new world or awakening an ancient world within a story.

The people who created this Irish calendar understood the passage of time in a different, yet similar way to what we understand it. We have religious and cultural festivals, recognize four seasons, and even celebrate Halloween to this day. So there is common ground, and you will find your own common ground in your projects if you choose to add a calendar to your fiction world-building!

Passage of Time

I provided source materials to bring this structure into the story in a natural way, there was a separate section devoted to this calendar like an appendix to a book. Because of how complex the Gaelic language is, having the visible calendar to reference with the names corresponding with their meaning helped me keep it straight as I wrote and added a nice layer to the story, a touch point the characters could reference naturally in dialogue yet the reader could have the knowledge to understand the meaning behind these sometimes foreign words. I enjoy little details like that.

I think it’s why I enjoy Harry Potter, Avatar the Last Airbender, Star Wars, etc. I like to lose myself in a story and wander far into the world, a calendar is that little extra punch that pulls me in even more to a time and place. So when I was writing a character I fancied the idea of being able to think about that character’s understanding of time.

  • What were they looking forward to?
  • What would signify change or normalcy in that character’s life?
  • How could I take the research of Viking Age Ireland and synthesize it into a story that would feel tangible?

I came back to the passage of time and by illustrating that in the story with these seasons, sprinkling little details of the season, the weather, the natural processes that come with winter, planting, harvest, summer sunshine, and all the ways we as humans make sense of that.

Cultural Significance

Holidays and festivals are key to our lives, and so were they for the historical world I was reimagining. They are connection points for characters. Opportunities to naturally move the story forward with action sequences, unexpected plot twists, or just an excuse to bring all your characters together in one scene that is plausible. It provides a way to understand the world from different perspectives and how these characters view their customs and cultures. Generationally, characters may see these moments differently. Introverts and extroverts will experience the spectacle and parties in their own fashion.

With Udal Cuain, Samhain played a big role in framing the year because of how culturally significant this festival was to Ancient Irish culture. They literally believed the separation between the living and dead grew thin on this night, if their deities were not pleased bad spirits would come to harm and the world may cease to exist the next day. It was not just a night of spooky characters, it was a serious event, and as humans, it explores our own feelings of fragility in the greater universe. Mortals versus immortal forces. This is a fantastic source of natural tension in a story, and as the dead could come back to visit their loved ones it brought a source of mystery to the story.

Two main characters, former Chieftain Conn, and Princess of Inis Aran, Caoimhe were deceased by mysterious and suspicious means in Udal Cuain, but one Samhain they each came back, one to haunt and one to heal. It was a blast to write and I highly recommend playing around with a structure like this in your own unique way.

I hope this dive back into the world of Udal Cuain and the research I did to create this novel, serves to inspire you. Even as I write this, I feel an itch to get back into fiction writing. It is such a challenging yet rewarding art form, and so necessary to our human hearts. Stories make us who we are. Dear reader, thanks for taking time with me today. I wish you all the best.

#6- Novel Writing Novice

Udal Cuain was my first novel. It combined three years of research into a long novel that took two and a half years of devoted world-building to create a complex story set in Viking-age Ireland. This world had maps, multiple kingdoms, Old Norse and Ancient Irish culture, and thirty characters to keep straight. It was an amazing mess to make sense of, all while pushing my non-fiction background into the world of imagination!

What did this project teach me?

Carrying a notebook with me was a game changer for my creatively scattered brain, but when the mood struck I had that little notebook at the ready to jot down anything that came to mind. I learned that my brain is okay with working in a non-linear structure, even with plot planning and note organization. I was fine with having a stream of consciousness on the page to reference, all while flipping through my notebook to find that one detail I needed to pull a scene together. In doing so, I would take notes in a way that sometimes repeated previous messages but built upon them so therefore when I began to write a chapter I had a headstart on the flow of the story. This process worked well for me. Now, I don’t imagine it would work well for organized people, so don’t use this as a template, instead find a notetaking system that is in symbiosis with your mind to enhance your creativity. It really works!

The Visual

A huge source of inspiration for me was Pinterest. When I had an idea for a character or location, I would search for inspirational images of character visuals.

  • Character physical traits
  • Costuming and accessories
  • Setting images based on the environment I had in my head
  • Castles, boats, battle scenes
  • Stylized images of a detail – waves crashing, blood dripping, a bird flying, fire

When I was feeling stuck, Pinterest pulled me back into the scene and the ideas would flow onto the page. The photos and artwork shared within that platform truly inspire creativity, like a scrolling mood board. It was one of the driving forces for what Udal Cuain became, in good ways and bad, but more on that later on.

To the Library

What ultimately keeps the process going though, is research. This may seem like a no-brainer, or this may seem bizarre depending on what type of writing you are thinking about making. Even in the case of a pure fantasy tale, the world can still draw inspiration from what we see in the world we live in. By taking the time to research, there was more of a harvest when it came to transforming ideas into storytelling. In some ways, the historical discipline I learned in college, I believe is better categorized as a skill of creativity than a cut-and-dry practice, because those muscles of interpretation can be applied to the art of storytelling.

By gathering that pantry of details, I learned to think ahead of where the current story was and become acquainted with where we were headed. I researched the world of Ireland in the early medieval period along with Norse history during that time to understand what the aesthetic was and how people in a look-alike world could have functioned to give my characters a rooted flair. I dug into language – Ogham, Gaelic, and Old Norse to understand the culture deeper. I researched clothing, weapons, religions, warfare, house-building techniques, tools, technology, cooking, sports, festivals, farming, etc. It was an involved process.

The Familiar

I chose this type of setting because it was what I was familiar with. I studied Irish History in depth in college and at home, my heritage comes from this part of the world and so getting to know my ancestors brought incredible purpose to this project. I think that is ultimately what I appreciate with deep sweetness looking back on what is essentially a failed project, it connected me when I felt disconnected. Finding a world, a plot for your tale, or even a character type that pulls you into a familiar place I would say based on my own experience is a fantastic way to dive into world-building. Go forth and create with confidence because the world needs storytellers as unique as you.

#4 Muirin Project

If you create something, have success, and walk away was it worth it? Let’s explore that together.

In 2017, I had a blog called Muirin Project where I shared poetry, artwork, personal essays, historical research, and my own very detailed historical fiction novel called Udal Cuain. The title of the novel was a Scottish word, Udal Cuain, which means to be tossed around by the sea. The name Muirin is an Irish word meaning born of the sea. At the time of writing, my life could be described as being thrashed around in confused seas and I was searching for a way to emerge out of the chaos and be “myself” again.

I did not understand why my life was drifting into this stormy sea. Previously in 2015, I was on a high of happiness with life falling into place. College surrounded me with friends, a purpose, mentors, and a mail room job I loved it because I interacted with so many people on my mail runs. During the summer I had a painting job and time with family, who at the time was close-knit with my grandparents as anchors. In 2013, I built a close bond with my fellow female history majors, helped start the first history honors society, and was provided the opportunity by my history mentor to explore dress history. I met my husband and we got engaged in 2015. The same year I graduated with honors and was accepted into a grad program in fashion merchandising.

Due to budget cuts, the program was cut from the degree offerings. I quickly learned like many of us did in the 2010s that the job market was not good, especially in the rust belt. As I stared down my wedding, I was spending my days being an assistant for a local painting company, the only girl on the job site being talked down to for doing man’s work and being harassed for my faith. Meanwhile, my hair was being destroyed by the paint sprayers’ overspray, which had always been my source of confidence. It was the deep end, no longer in the Christian bubble I had blossomed in, and I was feeling underwhelmed by adulthood. In 2016, a week after I got married, I was fired from that job with no explanation, along with my husband who was also let go. We were newlyweds with no future, at least that is what it felt like.

We rallied and searched for jobs, anything and everything, without success. I got interviews but was always missing the right experience like I was chasing an invisible carrot on a stick. Three months later, my grandpa had dangerous surgery for a broken neck, which he never recovered from but placed him in a nursing home where he remained until he passed away. The surgery took such a toll on him that he wasn’t the same and neither was my grandma. In the wake of his surgery, my “close-knit” family imploded into a civil war, I chose the wrong side by not picking a side and was no longer welcome anywhere. It was a deep murky sea, I felt like I was drowning.

A mentor suggested I take my writing skills from college and put them to good use with a blog and some creative writing to build a resume of experience.

So Muirin Project was born along with Udal Cuain, my way to make sense of all these things I did not understand. I clung to this hope of writing myself out of my misery, and so I wrote and wrote. I worked all day, every day to feel alive again. I wrote a hundred chapters and planned a three-book story. I created maps, character profiles, a journal from a character to foreshadow, and a calendar, and studied Gaelic to make sense of Viking age Ireland. It was a fantastic escape! I wrote for two and half years straight until the characters felt like familiar friends in a cozy world only I lived in and survived by gigs and temporary jobs. I gained a following and a community through the process of sharing. It gave me the confidence I needed to feel like a capable adult again instead of a failure.

I am proud of all that this messy time was able to accomplish. Muirin Project, as my mentor said, would help me land my first real job as an app manager producing content and managing people. It was the real adult job I needed to feel like a provider instead of a burden. Because of how much I grew and life blossomed out of this period, I will forever be grateful to the murky sea for how it taught me in the struggle and built a hunger within me to do more with a confidence I didn’t have before the storm.

In the process of success, seasons change and this is where things got tricky. During this time life led me through a season of moves, a short bout of homelessness, job stress, emotional burnout from family abuse, and waves of depression and anxiety. All these distractions, especially work, pulled me out of my little Udal Cuain world. The site became a burden in my mind, another pressure instead of a joy. And so I stopped posting with the intention of going back. A month passed, and then 6 months, then a year. Then I forgot the characters, and it faded into something I used to do. I ultimately closed the site and let go of my notes from Udal Cuain. It became the thing I was instead of the thing I am. Moving beyond it felt strange, like shedding a skin. Leaving it was heartbreaking.

Was it worth it? Should I have stayed? I don’t know what the right answer is. It was such a good thing until it wasn’t, but I still miss it. I think in some way it was alive with me, in that phase of the struggle, and once I matured past that phase and began understanding life didn’t have to be so hard I didn’t need the same outlet anymore. By writing my pain, and seeing the actions mirrored on the page I learned that family can’t treat you with emotional abuse. It reinforced in my mind that I’m not a failure, but I’m also not stuck in that sea anymore, and so the story needed to change. That was hard.

Does the success still matter even though the site and novel doesn’t exist anymore?

I wish I had a physical copy of it, instead of memories, but yes it does matter because it was a stepping stone on the journey to who I am today and where my passions lie. If you have a past success that maybe didn’t pan out the way you planned, celebrate it! It still matters even if you don’t have the social media highlight reel to show for it. It made you who you are and that is something to be proud of.

Create a website or blog at WordPress.com

Up ↑