Nine years ago, I had the realization that I, despite previously believing otherwise, had the capacity to write a book. A novel, a fantasy story that would span tens of thousands of words. On April 2nd, 2011, I wrote the first lines and pages of what would become my first completed novel. (I just went and reread those first lines and it made me so happy.) That story is trunked, but I have fond memories of some of the elements from it. I hope to some day resurrect those elemen

I think I’m stuck in a rut.  The past few weeks have been particularly trying for me. Because even though school is finally back in session and I actually have down time most days, I’ve had a lot going on.  School started on the 5th. The first week is always rough, and this time around our kids had trouble staying asleep all night that first week, so along with working until 1am some nights, I also wasn’t getting sleep  between 1am and 7am.  Then on the 15th we got news th

Back in September of 2012, when I was still a newbie writer, I typed “The End” on my first ever first draft. I immediately sent it to a few friends who had volunteered to read it, and then sat back to wait and realized: I had no idea what to write next. The problem hadn’t occurred to me until that point. I knew, from being online and seeing more seasoned writers talk about it, that the next step after finishing something was to start the next thing. But I didn’t have any othe

January 2019 has been a whirlwind, guys. Between December 28th and February 2nd, we went from settled and happy and planning the coming year, to having our roots ripped up and being forced to make a huge shift. Our landlord gave us six weeks to move out of our apartment. I won’t go into his reasons, he was within his legal rights to do so. I have opinions about the situation but what matters is what happened. Friends and family contributed to support us. Our cousins—who are r

Hey y’all. It’s been a minute, hasn’t it? Happy New Year!  As some of you may know if you’ve been following me for a while, instead of resolutions the last few years, I’ve chosen a single word to be my driving force. 2015: Believe2016: Gratitude2017: Wait2018: Reach A year ago, I set my 2018 Focus Word as REACH. It was good for me. I didn’t want to do too much or push myself too hard, but I did want to get out of the rut I felt I was stuck in. Looking back, I can say with co

Hey guys! I’ve been thinking a lot about character motivation lately. This was brought on by a couple of books I was reading simultaneously, and realized that both of them had some things in common. First of all, they were books I LOVED, and the exact kind of stories I want to emulate in my work. Second, they were amazingly compelling and well paced. In trying to think about why I loved them so much, one of the things I realized was that each of the main characters had very t

HEY BLOGGER! Does anyone still read blogs anymore? Who knows. But I figure this is as good a place as any to update the world on the doings of Darci Cole. As you can probably see from the post history, it’s been A While since I posted anything. It’s been rough, and I’m just starting to work my way out of it. But now I’m back, and it feels good. Update #1: I started a youtube series? Click HERE to check out the first (very rambly) video to find out more details about what I’ve

Y’know, some people can multitask in life, and some people can’t. I see people in publishing doing so many things at once–reading slush, agenting, parenting, traveling, editing, revising, drafting, and the list goes on and on. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned about myself in the last five and a half years that I’ve been writing seriously, it’s how much of a binge-er I am. I am not a multi-tasker. I’m a binge-er. When I draft a novel, everything else in my life takes a ba