9.28.18 My Hiatus, Please Read

Hey Everyone!

What's this? We're not on the site you likely thought you were going to be. My answer to that is---
I'm really lazy.
Ok, that's being a little mean to me; to be fair, it's the same content across all four of my stories, and a lot of my readers read multiple stories of mine, so I'm saving us both time!

In short: I am going on a hiatus from my stories.

What? You? Take a hiatus? You never, EVER do that...





EVER. 
Good lord that means if you're warning us you must be vanishing for three years or something.

Yes well I know I have a bad track record with unplanned hiatuses, and the first half of this year really wasn't too swell for me emotionally. I had to take care of my mental health and never really realized I was IN a hiatus. I was constantly trying to work on my stories and update them, but... it was just harder than it looked and I was very distracted with school and losing my job among several other anxiety-inducing things.

A lot of this followed me into my summer break and I struggled to find my "moxie." For a long time I've been admiring my best friend Blamsart and her story Light the Way to Heaven (which if you're not reading you 100% should be, it's fantastic and I get so much inspiration from it), which she has set to release every 2 weeks like clockwork.

I wanted that.

Regular story posting? Yes, please!

But I always told myself that I couldn't manage that with 4 stories - no way in hell. Blamsart and I are both students and we both entered into a fairly hectic schedule, yet Blams used her summer break to get a leg up and start scheduling her chapters in advance.

Mind. Fucking. Blown.

I started toying with this for this past month during my SimNaNoWriMo on Boolprop (you may need an account to view this page)!


I scheduled a few chapters and messed around with settings and I... loved it.
It was so satisfying and it took a lot of the stress away from getting out a chapter then rushing immediately to start filling out all the appropriate forums and updating each of the appropriate pages.
To put it into perspective, here's where I update each and every chapter I ever post: 
  • There are 3 locations on each individual website that gets it (the chapter that precedes it, usually the disclaimer - Willow is the oddball that's on the homepage, and chapter list). These are obvious.
  • I keep working links on my Home Page (aka this website). 
  • I also keep a similar layout on a Wordpress site.
  • I have a story Tumblr
  • I have threads on Boolprop: Reapers, Nightingale, Factions, Willow.
  • I have threads on The Sims Forums: Nightingale, Factions, Willow, (Reapers will be put there after I release chapter 3).
  • I have a handy-dandy list of people who receive PMs from me on Carl's Sims 3 Forum.
That's pretty much my rounds! It may not seem like a lot, but when I'm dealing with the aftermath of just finishing a chapter I can feel pretty scrambled, so scheduling is going to help combat that!

So this brings us to my non-hiatus-hiatus, because I'm not actually taking a hiatus from my stories. Quite the opposite, I'm going to be buckling down and working really, really hard on them to get a buffer zone and start scheduling chapters in advance so everyone can get regular updates. 

Yes, I hear the gasps from the peanut gallery, I, too, am shocked.

My hiatus will last until January 4th, 2019.

In a perfect world, I'd release a weekly chapter for each story. I, however, have four stories so... I just can't. What I can do, however, while keeping my sanity, is a chapter per week. Not one chapter per STORY per week, but one chapter per week, which totals to one story update a month.

Yeah, I'm kinda bummed by how that sounds when you think about it from a monthly standpoint - as one chapter a month really doesn't sound like a lot, but considering it's actually four chapters a month, I'm trying to cut myself some slack here.

I'll be releasing these chapters on Fridays, and will go by each Friday, like so: 
Right so: There's one to two months a year that have a fifth Friday and I'm not really sure what I should do with them, if anything. Maybe I'll do a fancy author's note then or maybe I'll find it in me to schedule another chapter for it or a behind the scenes or something. I'd appreciate any feedback or thoughts on this.

While I'd love to release a bonus chapter or something on each 5th Friday (if there is one), I can easily see that becoming a confusing mess for any readers of "which chapter's coming out this Friday?" "I thought that comes out x" Plus it'll put some extra stress on me to release faster, which I want to avoid, but would anyone really like to read behind the scenes or author's notes for those? Would that be something you'd want posted in all the ^ above ^ locations (forums, tumblr, PMs, etc) to alert you that it's happening?

So... I think I've said everything I've needed to, so now comes the audience polling! I really love feedback, and I don't mean comments in this case (well I mean, that can be included - I LOVE those); what I mean though is I like knowing if what I'm doing works for you or if something might work better. That's what this next bit is about! I would like to know: 
  • What time of release on each Friday might work best for you all?
  • (and) What should I do for my fifth Fridays I'll encounter? 
I'll try to make this easy, so if you could vote below, I'd SUPER appreciate it. On the same note, I'll also take any "votes" of explanation through: my Tumblrs (personal | stories) as an ask (including anon - you don't need an account); emails to livvielove@pancakesandmadmen.com; and PMs on Boolprop, Carls, or The Sims Forums; in the comments section for this authors note; or any other methods you can somehow think to contact me! 

Anyways, if you wouldn't mind giving me a little feedback here, it'd mean the world to me. To those who need it, HERE is a link to a timezone converter for the first survey!




If you have any thoughts or suggestions (or good vibes), here's a link to a form where you can express it if you so choose through Google Forms (or you can do any other method I previously mentioned). I like being accessible to anyone! My door is always open!

So anyways, I thank you so much for reading through this chunk.
Wish me luck - my stories and I will see you all back with a vigor in the new year!

Lots of love,
Livvielove

*For updates on how I'm doing/the stories are coming, teasers, etc - please feel free to check my Story Tumblr! I put a lot of good stuff here, and I wanted to let you all know it's there! Having a tumblr yourself is not required. I put anything from teasers to edits to even some pose-packs that people can download (though those are rare). Go check it out if you'd like!* 

2 comments:

  1. I'm glad your hiatus isn't for anything bad! Four stories is a lot to juggle. Take as much time as you feel like! After all, you should be having fun writing, not feeling stressed. I think the times that an extra Friday pops up would be fun to have some type of extra, so you don't feel pressure to put out an extra chapter.

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    Replies
    1. Yes nothing bad at all! More just that I want to get my little ducks in a row! <3
      Thank you so much! Everyone has been more than kind to me about this and it's made it so I've got one and a half chapters already done and stacked up! It gives me a lot of great motivation so I'm making more out of my time during the day!

      Yes I agree, I think it could be something fun for everyone! I'm getting a lot of neat ideas too, so hopefully those fifth Fridays won't be too disappointing!

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