The Irish Project: Something Completely Different

About a month or so ago, I started a new notebook with new ideas about a new project. I tentatively titled it The Irish Project. I wanted to dig into something current day. I wanted a protagonist who was more like people I knew, and less stuck in the time before the middle ages. I wanted to relate to people I could relate to.

Don’t get me wrong. The Avalon Project is far from dead, and I am hoping to tear it apart and re-outline it after the holidays are over. But I needed something that was at least partially ready to hammer on for NaNoWriMo, and The Irish Project was what I had ready to go.

To be fair, lately I have been reading way more current-day fantasy than high or epic fantasy. My To-Be-Read list is way longer than it has any right to be, and I’ve spent the last few months working my way through the Shadowhunter series (and all of the related series) by Cassandra Clare. While I do consider them YA (and The Irish Project is NOT), I have enjoyed the books for what they are. If forced to choose, I’d say The Infernal Devices trilogy was my favorite of the ones I’ve read.

I have found a sincere since of joy in this new project. My main character, Quinn, is very relatable to me and I have found a way to incorporate a few key experiences of my own life, as well as other people’s lives. I struggle to do that in the Avalon Project, but here, I can make it work.

The happiness this is giving me is pushing my word count for NaNo as well, and on day 4, I am already over 12.5K words. It has rough spots, and I have been taking a ton of notes as I write, of things I want to go revise or remove or add, but the goal of NaNo is to get words on a page, and I am doing that in spades.

After all, that’s what I am here for. Words on the page.

NaNoWriMo word count so far: 12,818