The Importance of Balance

Psh, I can handle soccer Tuesdays and Thursdays, homework and chores, guitar lessons on Wednesdays, as well as swim meets early in the morning. And oh, I can still attend church and socialize. I won't get stressed out or anything.

Haha, 'won't get stressed out or anything?' Nice try, buddy. I've learned the hard way that it's extremely, EXTREMELY important to have balance in your life. I'm a writer, I'm a reader, I have school to attend and grades to maintain. I have chores to fulfill, a part time job, and piano lessons every Thursday, as well as a script to memorize. I get stressed out very easily, over the tiniest things.

I have to tell myself that school, chores, and my job come before writing (even though, in a way, writing is my job). My grades are super important, and if I fail - well, I can kiss all possible scholarships goodbye. And now that I'm in high school* things will be even more difficult than they were the past few years.

Even though it's only the beginning of the year, I make sure that I focus on the most important things first, but still manage to fulfill the lesser important things. It's good to have a balance of work, fun, and physical activity, as well as any other factors that are important to you.

And stress - well, don't take more than you can eat. I've also learned that the hard way, and look at me, I ended up on medication.

Photo Booth. WHOOT.

My brother and I having some fun with Photo Booth.

Covers & Camp

First of all, I should probably mention that I'll be gone all week. CAMP FTW. The only depressing part about it is that there will be no wifi. NOOOOOOO HOW WILL I SURVIVE.

Anyway, it's time to share some of my beautiful covers for my projects.

The Sent Trilogy

The Hollow Trilogy 

The Pacific Trilogy

Essence

Falling

Song of Serenity

Haze

Camp NaNoWriMo

Writing 50k in one month is like strolling through a peaceful garden.

NOT.

Writing a freaking novel in 30 days is stressful. Every year I've participated, I've failed. Epicly. And I don't think this time will be any different. Mainly because I'll be at camp for all of next week with very little time to write. It would be a miracle if I could reach 13k by Sunday, but I'm too much of a lazy ass. But hey, Camp NaNo motivates me to write. 

MAH NOVEL.

For NaNo, I am working on my newest creation, Moments Between Sleep.

In the glimmering city of Arzen, parties run 'til the dawn, limousines roam the streets, and everyone maintains to keep their valuable reputation. Sixteen year old Nessa Hexon was born into one of the richest families, and enjoys every minute of her glamourous life. That is, until the Sent invade. Everyone knows the legend - the Sent are powerful ghosts, ones you don't want to mess with. If you do happen to come into contact with one, you'll spend the rest of your life as a Sent. As Arzen erupts into chaos and panic, a mysterious figure tells Nessa that she has powers; powers that could stop the Sent. With several other powerful teens, they work together to harness their powers - and to stop the haunting invasion.

Pretty crazy, right? Moments Between Sleep by VersaEmerge (sound familiar? :P) and the music video for Throw Me A Line by IAMEVE, along with Bones, also by VersaEmerge, helped inspire this.

By the end of the month, I'm gonna have some verbal vomit in need of some dire editing.

Writing, Writing, Writing

Some people think it's easy to write a novel.
HAHAHAHAHAHA.
Easy? I wish. I've been writing for two years now, and have I completed a novel yet? Nope. I am working on it, though the highest word count I've ever reached is 25k. I currently have multiple books that I am working on, and I'm crossing my fingers that I'll be able to finish at least one by the end of this year.

Novels I Am Working On:

• Hollow: One of my favourite (favouritism. Sue me) novels. It's a paranormal, involving a soul sucking tree (appealing, I know), a bunch of family issues, a seventeen year old girl who deals with too many drastic scenarios, and a few tragic deaths here and there. 
• Essence: A fantasy/sci-fi/dystopia/paranormal with angels and demons. The main character, Rosetta; is she an angel, is she a demon? She's an Essence. What's an Essence you ask? Someone who is both angel and demon. Very powerful creatures. Not necessarily a positive thing.
• Tearing Through The Light: Book one of the Pacific Trilogy, inspired by two songs: Father Sky and Consider The Sea, both by my favourite band, VersaEmerge. This interesting novel involves a girl who can control oceans, a ghost that wants revenge, and two vultures.
• Redemption: A dystopia that takes place in New York. The year is 2093, and the government is in the process of turning the place into a utopia. Well, the main character, Carmen, has been a very bad girl (murdering is not a good thing, folks, nor is lying). In order to live, she has to redeem herself. Otherwise, she'll end up being executed, just like her family. 
• Frost: An adventure novel about a girl and a wolf. And guess what? It's not a werewolf! Hooray for regular old wolves!
• Falling: A novel in verse. My first time taking on general fiction. One of the characters, Celeste, is what you would call the perfect girl; pretty, popular, friendly, and all that jazz. Secretly she's an extremely depressed cutter, abused by her drunken father. Thoughts of suicide have crossed her mind before, but will Alex be able to save her?

Those are all of my current projects. If you're interested in reading any of them, Falling is up on Figment (username: Kristin), and Hollow and Essence are up on Wattpad (username: PaperHeart34). 

Jelsa's Junk: Dear Harper-Collins,

Jelsa's Junk: Dear Harper-Collins,: For those of you who don’t already know, I’m Jelsa Mepsey, an Inkpopper who Top Fived in October 2010 and December 2011. I was hoping to g...

YES. JUST YES.

Insurgent

May 1st, aka tomorrow. The day when Insurgent, the sequel to Divergent, is released. I've been waiting for this day for nearly a year.

I first read Divergent a week or two after it came out, and I finished it in two days. It immediately became my second favourite book, right after The Hunger Games. I was astonished at its success, seeing as Veronica Roth was a 22 year old debut author at the time. I admire her talent greatly, and she is definitely one of my favourite authors.

I'm looking forward to discovering more about the other factions as well as *swoon* Four, aka Tobias. Tris is a lucky girl.

All of my friends who have read Divergent say that they would be Dauntless, though I can't see them all willing to jump off of a train. I, on the other hand, would most likely be Amity, seeing as I can be a fairly peaceful person. Of course, I do threaten to stab people with sporks quite often, but it's not like I would literally do that. I'm not that vicious.

If you have not yet read Divergent by Veronica Roth, I suggest you go out right now and buy it. It's a fantastic book, and I enjoyed reading it, and I'm sure I'll love Insurgent just as much.