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Monthly Status Report
Not a lot has gotten done in October. September was a productive month, writing-wise, and I’m looking ahead to the frenzy in November known as NaNoWriMo.
I participate every year, and have a great deal of fun, so I’m not planning on missing out anytime soon. Of course, that knowledge made me desperately want to play more Skyrim, make more soup, and in general take care of my house, not to mention actually spend time with people.
So, that’s pretty much it for October. Not a bad month, but not much writing.
For November, I am not doing a traditional NaNo. Instead, I will be finally typing up and finishing writing the second draft of Cipher. I’ve been writing it by hand since 07/2018 and I got stalled recently because of the slowness with handwriting, which made my critic louder, and I just wasn’t getting the words. Since it will need to be typed anyway, I decided to just type the whole thing for NaNo, and when I get to the part where I stalled (near the end), just keep going and finish the thing.
I will be doing a third draft anyway, so might as well use the motivation of NaNo to help me get this one done.
November’s Question
And now on to the optional monthly question:
November 6 question – What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever googled in researching a story?
This isn’t actually something I googled, and it’s probably not the strangest thing, but it’s what came to mind when I saw the question.
I love cozy mysteries, and I’ve written a few over the years. I have one in a bed-and-breakfast, and a YA one set in a Catholic private school. And of course, being so slow at revising, all are very messy rough drafts. Still, it remains an interest, and a few years ago, one of my writing friends introduced me to the Ask a Mortician videos by Caitlin Doughty, which led me in turn to her nonprofit organization The Order of the Good Death.
Immediately, I knew I wanted my paranormal mystery series to be about a funeral home worker who knows about and applies natural burial techniques in addition to more typical mortician services. Her work would give her access to the corpses of the murders, and I could also explore these other options in my work. As a pagan, I have long wished that upon death, I could just be buried naturally in the earth and have the earth consume my body the way it would happen naturally. To learn that this is actually something that can be done was eye-opening to me, and I want to share that with others.
I can do that through my main character, while still presenting an interesting mystery.
And of course, I use the resources at The Order of the Good Death liberally to make sure that the details are accurate.
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And here are the awesome co-hosts for the November 6 posting of the IWSG!
Sadira Stone
Patricia Josephine
Lisa Buie-Collard
Erika Beebe
C. Lee McKenzie
What an interesting idea. I hadn’t thought of this burial before. I wish you luck as you continue to write your mystery 🙂
Thank you!
One never thinks about a burial being natural or unnatural and what the difference would be.
I want to be cremated. No need to waste money on a plot of land for my body when I’m elsewhere.
That’s a good point, too. I just want to be buried in the ground, possibly a wooden casket, but only one that’s just wood and would decompose, and even that isn’t really necessary — just my body in the dirt. No extreme measures taken to “preserve” my body or keep away the decomposing agents. I want to nourish the earth the way it would just natually happen. But it’s true that that would require land of some sort, so cremation is better in that respect.