Another week behind me. The stress and the many tasks are still there in my day job. Sometimes, there is so much that needs to be done, it gets pretty overwhelming. It doesn’t seem like I’ll ever finish it all. I feel the same way about some of my writing goals, only my goals are more flexible. Besides, with my goals, I can review my progress and make adjustments. In my day job, I don’t have that luxury most of the time.
So how do I get through all the tasks that take up space on my desk in my day job and still have time for my family and my writing?
I take it in small chunks, and I do the best I can. There are always things I can easily do now, things that will take a little more time, and things I don’t yet have a solution for. When I get overwhelmed, I take quick breaks and focus on the easy stuff. Those quick breaks help me refocus on the harder stuff that doesn’t yet have an easy solution. That is also the way I approach my stories. Some settings and events are easy, and I can write them now. I may write them before I outline the novel. Some may take more time. Other scenes and events may need to wait until after I start writing.
My writing is in the middle between outlining the entire story and writing by the seat of my pants. I usually outline the first half of the story in detail, begin writing it, and when I get stuck, I add more to my outline.
For me, Dividing everything into bite-sized pieces makes it manageable, and leaving some easy pieces for those overwhelming moments helps me stay focused. When I’m overwhelmed, this is how I get through it.
I’m still finishing my novel in progress, Dissonance, which is a sequel to Resonance. I think time travel is fun to write about, but I really like the characters I created in the first book in the series. Those characters, and a couple more are in Dissonance, which is available for Amazon Kindle pre-order until September 3, 2021. Resonance, the first book in the series has surprised me with how many Kindle purchases and page reads I’ve had. It’s performing well so far.
My most recent book, an epic fantasy titled, A Map, a Mage, and a Sacrifice, was a fun book to write, and my beta readers say it is the best one I’ve written so far. It is set in a world with limited technology, think of an empire like the Romans, but where sacrifice is a necessary element to magical power. The greater the pain and suffering, the greater the magical power generated.
If you’re interested in time travel stories, check out my science fiction book, Resonance. It’s great to see people reading pages on Kindle Unlimited.
If you’re looking for a science fiction story, try my books The Promise of Dust or Progenitor’s Legacy: Deceit.
If a young adult science fiction is more to your liking, check out my series This New Earth, that starts with Demons of a Dead World and Secrets of a Dead World.
If you are looking for a young adult fantasy, check out my book The Threads Unbound.
DANIEL R. BURKHARD 