flaxen-finch

Congrats to everyone named on the ONC shortlist! While Idyllic Ruin wasn’t chosen, marking the end of my ONC journey this year, I’m happy to have taken part in the contest for a second time. Maybe I’ll see you again next year!

Pleased to share that Idyllic Ruin has made it the ONC’s Longlist! Congrats to everyone who’s made it this far alongside me, and best of luck heading forward.

Officially submitted Idyllic Ruin to the third and final round of the Open Novella Contest, with a final word count of 30,794. As always, I have that nagging feeling of "I could do better," but the deadline dictates I submit the story tonight. And I guess 30k words is pretty damn good either way.
          
          Whether this story gets any further in the contest or not, thank you all for your support on this journey. Best of luck to those still in the running!

Working on editing some continuity things in Idyllic Ruin, apologies if you're getting spammed by update notifications! Also editing a few scenes throughout to help with characterization and relationships between characters, which will probably be an ongoing process until I submit the piece.

The 16th and final chapter of Idyllic Ruin was just published! Thank you for joining me on this journey. 
          
          If you notice any grammatical errors, plot holes, or other continuity problems with the current draft, leave a comment! I’m hoping to revise and edit as much as needed before the final submission deadline.

Hi all! As we enter the final stretch of ONC 2025, I've started to publish the final set of Idyllic Ruin chapters. So far, a chapter is scheduled to release every other day. I've planned for the novella to be 16 chapters, so just over half are published so far! I'm hoping to get the rest out far enough in advance that I can go through and address feedback and edit as needed before the final submission date. Thanks for your support so far! Best of luck to everyone else participating in the challenge this year.
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/story/389300729-idyllic-ruin-onc-2025

Decided to try something new this year for ONC! Sci-fi isn’t my usual genre, but I figured now was as good a time as any to experiment with it. Check out the first chapter of Idyllic Ruin :)
          
          https://www.wattpad.com/story/389300729-idyllic-ruin-onc-2025

Good news! Good news! I'm excited to share that I successfully completed NaNoWriMo 2024, with a total of 51k words written this month. 
          
          I haven't attempted NaNo since 2021, when I wrote Clash of Captains, but I set a smaller goal then — just 35k words, which I succeeded in writing.
          
          However, this is the first year I've successfully completed the full goal of 50k and I'm very pleased with my progress. 
          
          There were a few days I didn't reach a thousand words. There were a few days where it felt like a chore to write. But I still found the time, no matter how short, to write each and every day of this month. That's 30 days in a row working on the same project!
          
          And to that I say... Yippee, I did it!
          
          P.S. I'm not sure as of now if I'll share this story here on Wattpad. But I do know I'll be doing a lot of editing before it's ready to be published, here or elsewhere ;)

As of this afternoon, I've written 75% of my 50k NaNoWriMo goal! It's been hard work, but we're nearing the home stretch. I promised myself I'd see it through this year—and I'm feeling hopeful about my progress thus far. Best of luck to everyone else finishing up their projects!

Just surpassed 25k words on this year's NaNoWriMo project! How are you all doing on yours?