Anna

For those who may have been wondering if, and when, you would be getting Lex's story back... Here's a little update on my writing plans for this year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82FmN6fyiGg&ab_channel=AnnaCorey
          
          I know it's been a while since I've offered anything up on that front, and I do apologize for that—adulthood has been more exhausting than expected, ha. I do have a lot of plans for this year and next, though, and I'm 100% serious about giving things back to you guys as soon as possible. Thanks so much for sticking around if you're still here from all those years ago, and I can't wait until I have more to share :)

Well. It's been a while over here, hasn't it? I promise I'm alive (not that anyone was really asking). I was clicking around on here the other day and realized that I'll have had this account for ten years in the spring, which is wild. If you're still active on here ten years later and are reading this: hello! how are you doing? What are your favorite stories these days?
          
          I don't want to spoil anything, but I've got some things in the works, so... stay tuned. I can pretty much guarantee that it won't be what you're thinking it is (though... more on that later too), but I'm excited for it nonetheless, and I hope some of you guys are still around and will check it out when it makes its appearance. 
          
          Peace and love, folks, and hopefully things around here will be a bit more fun soon xx

Fun how I checked this account for the first time in months only to find out that I’ve been hacked........ We’ll get back to normal at some point here.

Hi, just wondering when Pine river prep is going to come back along with your other horse books and when two strides out will be updated.

The bad news:
          
          - My plot outline for Two Strides Out isn't complete
          - My laptop (with all of my character data on it) crashed over a week ago and I haven't had a chance to get it repaired yet
          - I am just under 30,000 words behind on NaNoWriMo
          
          The good news:
          
          - My second-to-last draft of my thesis has been submitted and we're in the home stretch, so I'll just be making a few more tweaks that won't require hours and hours to complete before I turn in my final draft on Friday
          - I've completed five chapters of Two Strides out so far, and while they all need some revision and I'd like to almost entirely rewrite two of them, we're getting somewhere
          - I printed out the completed portion of my plot outline before my laptop crashed, so I have it in a binder where it's useful
          - I managed to resurrect my high school/early college laptop from the dead (not sure how I pulled that off, I thought this thing was done for) so I've actually been able to continue working on things despite tiny laptop crashing on me
          - Most of my work is done for this week so I'll be challenging myself to ten (maybe more) 20-minute word sprints tomorrow, Wednesday, and Thursday (as needed) in order to make up for that 30,000-word discrepancy because I refuse to lose NaNo
          - You guys should be getting this part of the story back starting sometime in December like I said in my last note. Isn't progress wonderful?

I have zero character profiles written which will probably require me working on them on the fly throughout NaNo, but I'm almost done with the reworked plot outline for the first part of TIAWFI (aka "Two Strides Out"). I've cut some unnecessary subplots/characters and merged some chapters (which were already merged in the original revision of the outline), and in total it's looking like there will be sixteen or seventeen chapters in this part. 
          
          To put this in perspective, it took me twenty-seven chapters to cover the same ground in the original story. I realize that seems like a big cut, but it lets each of the chapters serve a purpose and keeps the story moving forward. 
          
          This also means that I should be getting most (if not all) of the chapters written during NaNo, as (if there are seventeen chapters in total) that's just under 3000 words per chapter to hit 50,000, which seems right on target for my usual minimum word count for these things.
          
          That means that you guys should be getting this first part back in December, if I had to guess---probably not early December, as I don't know if I'll finish the whole thing or still have a few chapters to get through, and then I'll want to reread for continuity purposes and make any changes necessary (all of this after I get through finals, of course). My goal is to have it posted for you by the end of the year, though (well past when it should've been done, but so it goes).
          
          We're finally getting somewhere and it's a beautiful thing.

Good news, friends: I wasn't sure if I was going to do NaNo this year, but I am, and I'm planning to write the first part of the TIAWFI rewrite.  
          
          I'm currently in the midst of reworking the plot outline that I had originally made for this rewrite so that subplots are appropriately split across the two parts and things of that nature, but if all goes well, I should get a significant number of the chapters done by the end of NaNo. I don't want to start posting it until it's complete, but we're actually getting somewhere and I'm working with purpose, which hasn't happened in a while.
          
          You should also be happy that I decided against merging some of the characters, because I was seriously considering that for a while, but by shifting subplots around I think I can get away without that.
          
          We'll see how this goes.

I desperately wanted to take a nap before my night class but it appears that's not going to happen so here's an update on the state of things:
          
          I recently went through the entirety of my original writing folder on my computer (as opposed to my fanfic folder) and grouped together all the stories that exist under the same umbrella (i.e. in the same universe, i.e. these characters have the potential to show up in each other's stories at some point).  I then ordered them chronologically and identified the key pieces of that chronology to determine what needs to be written first in order for characters to make sense.
          
          This isn't to say that every character from every story will be showing up in other ones, or anything like that, but it's something that I wanted to do for continuity purposes and to make my life easier.
          
          The good news for you guys is that Lex's life is at the top of that list. 
          
          The not-so-good news is that I have a lot of work to do before I can really get started. I have to do for her story what I've been doing for some of the others - write detailed character profiles, write a detailed plot outline (my plot outlines used to consist of a few sentences per chapter. I'm now writing paragraphs), determine what I can cut to streamline the writing process, and get it all organized in the binder that I'm keeping all of the details in for the stories in this universe so that all of my information is in one place and easy to reference.
          
          I'm currently in my final year of university and while I'm not job-hunting at the moment (I was offered a position over the summer, which I've accepted), I am taking eighteen credits this semester, which amounts to about fifteen hours of class a week plus ~thirty hours of homework (three of those credits belong to the independent study for my thesis). As a result, my planning time is limited.
          
          I'm hoping I'll settle into a rhythm soon so that I can find time to get some work done, but we'll see.
          
          Thanks guys xx

Did you used to have a book called pine river prep?

I must say I find it much harder to get into sixteen-year-old Lex's head now than it was when I first started writing her story back in high school, which probably has something to do with the fact that I'm not the person I was back then. I tweaked a few more things in the plot outline (mostly moving character introductions around), and doing that is really letting me get moving now.
          
          I'm on spring break next week so I'm hoping to get a lot of writing done then, but we'll see how it goes. Life is busy between school and me riding three times a week, but I brought it on myself.
          
          The fun news is that I'm probably going to start half-leasing one of the horses in the barn at the end of the summer (provided she's still around then, although my trainer thinks she will be) and take her to a show or two where I can fit them in around my internship. We'll be doing the jumpers and while she can jump the moon, I might die, so we're going to keep it small (ish. Definitely the 2'6" jumpers, possibly 2'9" if I can get my head together and ride it well enough at home to feel comfortable). She's loads of fun to ride and while I wouldn't be riding any more than I am right now, half-leasing will give me a consistent mount, which should help with my progress (and my confidence). 
          
          That's all in the future, though, as is the rewrite, but I'm working on all of it, and life is pretty good.
          
          Friendly reminder that you can find me on Tumblr at acswrites (if you want to ask me writing-related questions), or at musingsofanequestrian and at triplebarsandtrakehners (if you want the horse blogs), or on Instagram at trakehners. 
          
          I'll keep you posted, and thanks for being awesome x