Fleeting Distress,
my first experience with novel creation:
In late grade school, I often fantasized about a made up world full of characters I imagined. I drafted pages of information about the characters and told my dad about them. He encouraged me to write my stories down so I could always remember them.
2010 began my drafting journey. Soon, a simple story grew into 5 books. I was always interested in sharing my writing, but I was also very interested in the entire design process of creating a novel from start to finish. So, I decided to self-publish my series.
Looking back, I've come a long way since writing this series. Back then, I didn't know much about building a consistent plot, or keeping consistent themes. I've learned tons since then, but I can't fault my earliest work because it got me to where I am today. If I hadn't put in the work to write the millions of words I did then, I never would have learned everything I know today. Practice makes perfect, as they say.
It's possible these novels are still available somewhere on the internet today if you're really interested in exploring them. Otherwise, explore some of my more recent work for better quality writing, and spend some time enjoying my commentary on these novels.
HISTORY
I started writing this series in 2010 and finished it in 2016 (so from when I was 12 until I was 17). I went through many changes during this time in my life. My education improved, my passion for writing, and writing well, improved. I also discovered some things about myself, such as my own queer identity. When I first started planning the story at age 12, the main female character was supposed to end up with a man... when I finished it at age 17, she ended up with a woman.
Self publishing the beginning books before I had finished writing the series lead to some weird plotting and desperate attempts to fix plot holes. By the end, I had also changed the tone of how I wanted the series to feel. As a complete set, the series is a total train wreck, that much I can admit (especially the first book, which I almost entirely wrote in middle school before I even knew what a plot was). By the end though, I felt pretty good about the final fifth book. The tone is entirely different, though it felt better to me, and in my opinion is the only book of the series worth saving.
PLOT
What's the plot, then? What was this series about? After writing the first book, my summary of the series was a lot different than the summary I currently have after finishing the series. I blame bad planning for this, and a bit of laziness. It's fine, and rather normal, to have your story evolve as you write it. My problem was I finished it years later and was too lazy to go back and fix the first books in the series, and I also couldn't, as I had already self-published the earlier books.
The series follows a weirdly complex mystery that stems 3 generations of women in the Collins family:
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Marcellina
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Samantha (Sam)
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Aliya
To the average person, or the reader, the mystery is directly about Sam--after being accused of murder, she's found innocent, but then takes her own life. Why? But as the story unfolds, it's clear Sam's life was molded by the decisions of her mother, Marcellina, and that there are lasting effects stemming into the life of Aliya, Sam's daughter.
This story is mainly fantasy, though a bit of a psychological thriller (especially the fifth and final book). It's filled with shapeshifters and deities that influence the characters like puppet masters, as well as a fantasy creature I created called a bearhieur--similar to a spirit animal, they are creatures connected to their human, taking the form of an animal representing the human's personality. They got their name because they bear the emotions of their human. There's also world travel, the theory of parallel universes, worlds similar to our own and worlds vastly different.
There's lots of fighting and war, as well as journeys of self discovery as we follow Sam through her entire life. There's metaphysical contemplation, debates about fate vs. free-will, and just teenagers getting up to dumb shit. And death... there's a lot of death. This was written before I experienced the death of loved ones I was really close to, back when I glamorized death as some ultimate end-all be-all, but now I think it's just sad and I don't like writing about it. But um, main character death? Yeah, there's lots of that.
SELF-PUBLICATION
I mentioned briefly why I chose to self-publish. I wanted to experience every aspect of designing a novel myself. I really enjoy design and marketing (as you might be able to see from my self-created website) and I also wanted complete control over the process. Ultimately, back then, writing was just a casual hobby for me that I wanted to share with people over the internet, like posting art to a forum page, but on a larger scale. I didn't think I wanted to be an author, so I didn't 'waste' time working to get it published.
Self-publishing not 1, but ultimately 6 novels as a teenager taught me a lot of valuable skills. I got to investigate and learn how book covers are set up and organized. I learned how books are marketed, in the plot synopsis and more. I also got to spend time drawing covers for the books (the pictures you see on this page), showing exactly how I visualized my characters.
Today, I'm still very grateful for all that I learned along the way and I am proud of myself for what I accomplished at such a young age. Though I'm in school studying science, I've grown more passionate about my writing and would love to someday become a published, best-selling, author. We'll see what the future holds!
CONCLUSION
So, will I ever rewrite this series? Yes and no. I will never directly rewrite this series, mainly because it's such a clusterfuck of forgotten plot points and bad ideas. However, the base concepts of characterization I do still like. I like the dynamics between a lot of the characters.
I've drafted up a story very loosely based on this series. They share some elements of the overall plot and stronger themes, and some characters have rather direct parallels, but they hardly share a resemblance. Currently I have two books drafted with loose plans for a trilogy, but until the story is more solidified, I won't be pursuing publication.
THE FUTURE?
What will become of this series? I've toyed with the idea of releasing the series online for free, but frankly, it's terrible! I've also toyed with the idea of making videos of me reading it and adding my commentary. I might still do that someday. A year ago I tried re-reading the first book in the series and could barely get through it because it was so bad. I think it's a good learning experience though--it would be a good example for new authors on what not to do! And it's also very entertaining because of how bad it is.
In the future, if I do ever do anything more with it, you'll be able to find all of that on this website. So keep an eye out if you're interested.