Last year, I wrote a post on outlining a novel with the goal of reaching between 50,000-60,000 words in 12 days (a condensed version of NaNoWriMo). This was for a cyberpunk Snow White retelling.
The goal was met, I did a bit of editing on that project, handed it off to a beta-reader, and then sat it on the proverbial back burner.
Though I was busy with other projects, I occasionally thought back to that cyberpunk fairy tale but didn’t do much with it until several months later, when (in classic fairy tale-style fashion), I had a dream that I was busy editing the cyberpunk story.
Later that same day, the beta-reader who’d read it contacted me to ask if I had a cover for it yet or if I had made progress.
I took that as the “go-time” flag to get back to work on that project.
(I’m not kidding. I really did have a dream about editing the story before getting contacted out of the blue on the same day by my beta-reader. Coincidence? Probably. But still a great story to tell about the writing process of a fairy tale retelling).
Anyway, I proceeded to make revisions, sent it out to another round of readers, polished it, did a read-aloud for errors, and then proof-read.
The book… now dubbed “Huntress” (and the first in a series), released on Sunday. 😀
*Happy-dance*
If you’d like to see how it turned out, grab a copy!
From now until Sunday, December 9th, you can grab it for 99 cents (or read it for free with Kindle Unlimited).
And, of course, you can get an idea of what the original outline looked like (and what changed) by reading the original post here).
Without further ado…
Huntress
A YA Cyberpunk / Dystopian Retelling of Snow White
Her touch is poison.
Verdi is a huntress for Koenigin Corp. She’s augmented. Perfect.
Determined to earn her dear president’s favor and finally have her voice heard, Verdi agrees to target Maria Snow, the favored candidate of the Society for Natural Progression, in an acid attack.
After all, once Maria is no longer so lovely, surely she’ll accept the nanite-based technology that can remove her scar—thus branding her as a traitor to her cause.
But when Maria Snow refuses treatment and Verdi catches her secretly meeting with an enhanced, sapient bird, she realizes Snow might be the one woman who can forge an alliance between the technology-loving corporations and the nature-oriented Progressionists.
Forced to choose between loyalty to the corporation who raised her, and falling in love with the woman who could finally unite the two factions, Verdi’s decision will change the face of the city.
Buy Huntress today!
I hope you enjoy the book! 😀
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(Note… I don’t plan to keep Huntress in Kindle Unlimited forever. The first three months are a test run, and then, depending on how it does, I plan to eventually release it wide across other retailers.)
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In the meantime, I wrote the rough draft of the sequel for this year’s NaNoWriMo. I used a similar process, creating an outline (though I diverged more from it), and writing 50,000 words in ten days instead of twelve.
Now it needs editing, but the start of the story is there. 🙂
Stephanie Flint - Author and Artist 