Well, shucks. It’s been almost half a year since my last writing update. I’m under no illusions that very many people read these updates, but I feel a bit ashamed nonetheless. Underpinning my self-deprecation is a gnawing, nihilistic tendency that nothing we do matters, least of all some random blog I rarely upkeep. Are we not all piling small collections of words atop the colossal heap of sludge that is the internet? Will anything we say withstand the test of time? And even if something I say gains traction, self-propelled by its impact, is quoted, remembered, or carved in stone, in the grand scheme of eons, of the lifetimes of stars, to believe that words are still meaningful could very well be pure, egotistical delusion. Who are we to assume that our babbling holds any cosmic significance? We might as well be murders of crows on a telephone wire, a chorus of cawing.
Ugh. It might be time to revisit the reasons why I write at all. The existentialists tell us that once you’re done wallowing in nihilism you need to ultimately realize that this life is your one chance to create your own meaning for the only person to whom it matters: yourself. It’s worth reminding myself that I do this for myself, not for anyone else, and in that I can find meaning. It’s hard not to often come back, however, to that realization that meaning is constructed, not innate. And then I’m shot into orbit around a void of nihilism once more.
Okay, Tyler. Come back down to earth. Stop sighing so much and make some choices. Get out there and create your own meaning. Go write. Do it for yourself. Do it because it makes you happy; that’s all the reason you need.
Enough preamble. Sorry it got dark there for minute. Here’s what I’ve been up to:
Project #1
My first novel, a dual PoV steampunk fantasy is completed. I’ve written several drafts of it, and I’m calling it done for now. Querying agents with this novel has yielded no success. I began querying back in January. I’m up to 20 queries and 8 rejections (more if I’m to take radio silence as its own passive-aggressive form of rejection [if you’re one of these people, I hope you simmer in shame]), and I’m growing very tired of the process. I query 2-3 agents per week, and I am beginning to flirt with the idea of sending my manuscript out to smaller publishers. Between leaving this novel to collect dust in a trunk and having published in a less impactful, non-traditional way, I might prefer the latter.
Project #2 (ish)
I mentioned in my last update that project #2 was a sci-fi thriller novel. While it is true that I began outlining such a thing, I never actually started putting pen to paper, so to speak, on the manuscript itself. Instead, somewhere in the last few months, I had the idea for another fantasy novel and decided to give this new idea my full attention.
So, unsure whether to call it project #2, project #3, or project #2 and a half, here’s the high concept in a nutshell: a cleric, upon witnessing unsettling truths about the theocracy, undergoes a deconstruction of his faith.
The protagonist of this story is a cleric-warrior—a familiar archetype in the D&D space. What makes him stand out is his disillusion with the stories he’d been led to believe his entire life. I’m drawing heavily on my own experiences for this novel. I was raised in a strict, high-demand religion. There’s a lot of comfort in the amount of absolute certainty that these kinds of religions offer. I know just how terrifying, earth-shattering, heart-breaking, and infuriating it can be to deconstruct from a belief system such as this. As such, to tell this story, I intend to blend the genres of fantasy and horror. I feel like this story would not be done justice without elements of both genres.
The outline came together for this novel remarkably fast, and I’m already 20% of the way through my first draft. My sci-fi thriller novel will wait. Maybe I’ll get back to it after the current project.
Until next time!
Tyler C. Clark