Author: Kathryn Amonett

How much my word count improves when I have an accountability buddy!

Actually, I have two.

One is geographical, we meet every morning in the same location, to do work.

The other, on the other side of the world, keeps track of my word count progress, and I hers.

Now, of course, in an ideal world, I would be able to keep myself in line, be able to complete all I set out to just through will power and intention alone. But not only am I human, I’m a human with a brain that doesn’t generally like to do the executive function things. So while it’s hard to show up for myself, it’s easier and more interesting to show up for others. 

We all need someone to shout at us sometimes.

In fact, I got a text from my accountability partner asking how I was doing. I confessed I was at Barnes and Noble, struggling to come up with blog content. She recommended the use of accountability buddies in writing, pretty much proving the point of how valuable she is.

So, shout out to Alexandra in London, for giving me the inspiration and the idea for this post, and for encouraging me every day. And thank you Susan, for meeting me at six o’clock nearly every morning in coffee shops across the city.

Between the pair of them,  I think I’ve doubled my word count?

All this to say, that the last book in the Relearning Magic series (which I’ve decided to call The Nature of Magic) is nearly done! 

Not only do I have missing scenes needed to fill in a few gaps, it still has to run the battery of edits and rewrites. But the end of this experiment is finally approaching and I can move on to other projects, my darlings like Where Power Lies, and my travel adventure series.

(Fun news, but the location for the first book in the travel series is decided, and I’ll be traveling there in October. More on that as it draws closer, I don’t want to jinx it. But I am very excited to travel again with my family, and I hope that aside from a bunch of wonderful memories, I also get a book out of it.)

It will be my first attempt at a modern Mary Stewart, to be available by the end of the the year.

Now I’ve told you, now all of you have to hold me accountable to that! Pester and demand! Or you could be nice and comment words of encouragement. They are both effective.

It has been a while. Only because nothing of import has happened (in my personal life, though the world has been happening non-stop).  I’ve written words and read books and continue to slog through the summer heat with everyone else. I’ve been nowhere. I nearly boiled myself alive in the cabin a couple weeks ago, and despite that, I still enjoyed it. Going again today, as it will be rainy and overcast and below 100 degrees F (37.7778 de C). 

Along with sweating and reading and writing, I have, of course, been doom scrolling, pulling out my hair, protesting, and spending hours at a time curling inwardly, cravenly cutting myself off from the world until I feel like I can brave it again.

For those of you who don’t know, I live in Oklahoma, the worst state to be a woman. And also, just one of the worst states to live in, generally. Terrible health outcomes, low insured rate, poor access to healthcare, poor representation, poor voting rights. Poor poor poor. Most recently, since the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, it is illegal for a woman to get an abortion, and it looks as if soon it will also be illegal to travel out of state in order to get a safe and legal one.

Dystopian future novelists have plenty of inspiration these days. I know people who are now calling our home state Gilead.

And yet.

And yet.

When you go out, just like no one wears a mask, as if the pandemic isn’t happening, people go about their days smiling, as if we are not descending into a hellscape. 

What does one do? Move out of state? Not an option for so many. 

“No! Stay and change the system! Vote them out!” 

Yes, yes, but remember those voting rights I mentioned earlier? That includes the ability to legally gerrymander, AND local states can change their voting results to whatever they want it to be instead of what the people actually voted for. They know how they failed in 2020 and they are going to make it so that in 2024…

I rile myself up, even if I’m not reading the news.

And yet.

And yet.

I still stubbornly ride my bicycle (on streets not meant for feet or bikes, but only cars) with books, a baguette, and a bouquet of flowers in my basket. Because I like to pretend that I live in a place where that’s actually a thing, and I’m not a weirdo who looks like they are posing for an instagram post.

I’m growing aggressively greener. I’m that annoying person who gives you a judging look if you don’t bring your own travel mug to a cafe but use and throw away a to-go cup. I use a debit card that plants a tree every time you swipe, I offset my carbon emissions by giving to Wren every month. I’m doing these things that don’t feel like much. I am composting, riding my bicycle when I can, trying to reduce waste as much as possible, attempting to grow my own food, (though this summer has been so scorching I lost my blueberries and strawberries. Only my lemon tree, goji-berry shrub and my neglected dragon fruit cactus survive, but none are fruiting. 

But the world is still on fire.

What are you doing to stay sane? Reading is both an escape and not. Writing is both an escape and not. Because it’s impossible not to compare the world in the book to the world in which you live.

Friends are essential, but you inevitably end up discussing the disasters of the day. 

Most mornings, I meet with my mother for coffee, we chat for a few minutes and then ignore each other and do our own work. It might be the nicest thing.

Seriously. What are you doing to bring yourself joy? I’m looking for (inexpensive/free) ideas to bring more wonder, joy, or beauty into my life.

Any ideas?

I’ve been working on finishing the tiny cabin. I’ve heard the coyotes and the owls, seen deer, mink, armadillo, followed tracks of racoon, bobcat and, worryingly, wild boar. (My greatest real world fear is having a run in with a wild hog. A bear or cougar, you could make yourself big and loud and convince them that you aren’t worth the trouble. But that would only exacerbate the situation with a wild hog. There is, in fact, nothing you can do in case of a hog encounter but try not to die. Best case scenario you scramble up a tree and live the rest of your life up there as an incompetent monkey.)

But beside that, I’ve learned a bit about myself during this project. 

First, that perhaps my calling in life is not writing after all, but being a woodland creature. Failing that, I think I could be a creditable witch of the woods, brewing my little concoctions and getting the news from my crow informants. 

The only downside to this existence would be the lack of library access.

Witches must frequent their local libraries now and again, mustn’t they?

Not that I don’t have a nice little collection of books there already. 

I’ve got bird books and plant books and wildlife books and tracking books so that I can tromp about and identify the species of the faeces and tracks I come across. 

There is something wonderful and cowardly about being out there. Because of Covid, I can’t go anywhere, but at the micro cabin, I can forget about covid and everything else. I don’t have internet so I can’t read the news. It’s just me and the junkos most of the time. (Juncos are like sparrows, but… you know, juncos.) 

I’ll spare you all the nature writing I’ve been doing lately. Turns out I go all Walden while I’m out there (though no pond for me.)  But it’s nice to take a break and write poems about crows and coyotes, juniper trees and ladybugs. 

I think this could very easily turn into a wilderness blog—just nature writing and photos of bits of poo that has me very excited because it’s a new animal for the log. But! I will try my very best not to let this be the only thing I write about, here. 

So! I will say that I enjoyed a book recently. The Maid, by Nita Prose, is a murder mystery about friendship and neurodiversity and I ate up the entire story in one day. No regrets. Let’s see, I did that with another book recently—a retelling of Beauty and the Beast, called Bryony and the Roses. A short and entertaining read. I think I’m on a B&B retelling kick? Because I also read For the Wolf this week. 

Despite having literally hundreds of books on my TBR list, sometimes when the library tells me it’s finally my turn to check out this book I reserved a spot for weeks ago, I’m no longer in the mood to read that book now that it’s mine. I want something else.

What is everyone else reading right now that they would recommend? I want…. Something. I’m not sure what. Need a wide variety of recommendations. Dark and wholesome? Is that a thing?