Welcome, friend, to the first part of the series I’m doing this summer here on my blog: re-reading Steering the Craft by Ursula K. Le Guin and breaking it down one chapter per week!

Let’s chat for a bit about what’s important.

And by important I mean this: Why are the stakes of your story necessary, and how do you write them well?

Have you ever read On Writing by Stephen King? One chapter of the book, in particular, addresses the concept of writers having and developing a toolbox. The toolbox imagery, as King paints it, has a few layers, at least three levels—just like actual toolboxes are often multi-level.

Every writer must decide what tools they have and which ones they want to develop. This is your invitation to dive deeper into that!

In my previous blog, I took you behind the scenes for my first two completed manuscript projects—A House of Broken Chords (fiction, magic realism, YA) and Bold North (fiction, YA, light sci-fi)—and now I’ve got two others to tell you about.

Been seeing lots of people on Instagram sharing behind-the-scenes of their stories. Inspiration, writing process, character vibes. All that good stuff. I thought today might be a great time to share a bit more about my own manuscripts I’ve already completed.

Books and words and stories have been staples since the beginning. And I’m writing about it today because it’s Mother’s Day this coming Sunday, and who else do I have to thank for my love of literature other than Mother Nerd herself?

This week two things have been true: I’m meeting my daily word goals and I’m incredibly distracted. My brain has scattered to many places this week and has been full of contradictions. 

The first quarter of the year has come and gone, so I thought it’d be good to take stock of how my writing habits and productivity have been so far for 2025.

Ever thought about how cemeteries can be a great place for character inspiration? No? Well, I have. And they just happen to be my favorite place to get name ideas from.

We see, hear, smell something and our brains go, “Hey, there’s the potential for a story somewhere in that.” Writing requires an insatiable curiosity and an imagination that can fill in the gaps of what-might-have-been.

Everyone has their two cents on how to fight writer’s block, so let me chime in with mine.

So, let’s talk about where ideas come from.

And do you know what? Sometimes—dare I say often—they sneak up on you.

“Beyond Imagining” is the story of twins, Tommy and Jane, who grow up around the turn of the 20th century, an era of invention and progress. Tommy’s spirit for creation is hindered by his tendency to turn every idea into a mess, and Jane seems to have been born to keep an eye on him. As young adults, they find themselves living in a world at war. Jane can’t watch out for her brother, once he joins the war effort, and Tommy will learn that what he can create comes with a cost.

When I say routine, I’m really saying, “Hey, check out this skeleton I made that helps me get stuff done.”

On this day of love, allow me to talk about when writing and stories hit you right in the honey-nut-feelios.

To embark on a project takes some sort of ego, some voice within you stating that you can, indeed, do the thing you’re envisioning…It’s simple boldness that says, I can and I will.

It’s the plot twists you never see coming that mean the most.