Writing
April was a very productive writing month. During Camp I set my word goal to 10,000 and won this morning with 10,227. Score! All of those words went towards my TMNT fanfic over on Wattpad, which needed some serious attention since I'd been falling behind with updates. Now that I'm a few chapters ahead, as soon as finals are over, I'll be back to weekly chapter releases. I'm sure my readers will be happy about that. I'm really happy with the direction the story ended up taking me. I was kind of unsure at first, but once I let the characters take over, it made so much more sense and was easier and more fun to plow through. I'm especially proud of the nightmare scene that's coming up (spoiler alert!) since it gave me a chance to practice my horror-writing skills. I actually freaked myself out a little while writing it. That has to say something about its quality, right? My current stats for "Dude, This is No Vacation" are as follows: 2,000 reads; 159 votes; and 38 comments.
As with last month, I did not work at all on "Follow the Raven." Like, I didn't even brainstorm this time. I was more concerned with getting new chapters written for my fanfic. My plan is to spend more time on that after finals (mid-May).
Reading
Not gonna lie...I cheated a little this month by reading books that were 150 pages or less. My primary reason for doing this is because I was falling behind on Goodreads, but also because I wanted to spend April focused on writing. That being said, these are the books I read this month:
- The True Meaning of Smekday by Adam Rex
- Sounder by William H. Armstrong
- The Family Under the Bridge by Natalie Savage Carlson
- Hedgehogs in the Hall (Animal Ark #5) by Ben M. Baglio
- The Secret Sisterhood of Heartbreakers by Lynn Weingarten (started April 29, in progress)
The True Meaning of Smekday was amazing. It was one of those books that I felt was destined to become a favorite of mine, and it did, very quickly. (The last book I experienced this with was Skulduggery Pleasant when I discovered it four years ago as a freshman in high school.) The story was so sweet and fun, full of friendship and adventure. Sounds cheesy, I know, but I loved it so much. The book was written for a young audience and was in the kids' section of the library, but it is over 400 pages and can be enjoyed by readers of all ages. I was not even finished with the book when I decided to buy it at Barnes and Noble. It is now sitting proudly on my shelf at home. (Also, fun fact: this book was the inspiration for Dreamworks' new movie, HOME.)
Sounder was the first book I chose because of its short length. I had never read it before (surprising, I know), but even as an adult I didn't entirely understand the point of it. There really wasn't any serious plot; they were all just kind of ho-hum about the fact that the boy's dad went to jail and the dog went missing. The five-minute happy ending didn't help, either. I didn't hate this book, but I didn't love it either. How is this a classic? Because it's "about a dog," when it really isn't? I don't know.
The Family Under the Bridge and Hedgehogs in the Hall are both books that I've had sitting on my shelf for years and just never read. The first was a cute, quick read and the second was a neat blast to the past. As a kid I read every Animal Ark book I could get my hands on, mostly because my best friend in elementary school was obsessed with the series. Going back and reading it again was like visiting old friends. I instantly remembered Mandy, James, and even some secondary characters from the series. It was informative and fun.
That's all I have to say this time! Thanks for reading! Stick around next month as I review my freshman year of college and dig into more nerdy topics, such as casting for TMNT 2 and Sonic-related debates. See you then!
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