Quiet Heroes + extra bits by jemima.moon

[jemima.moon]

OKAY, I've done nano before a couple of times with original fiction, but this year I want to do a mixture of OF and fanfiction and spread out what I'm doing a bit. So my camp nano will consist of a few different projects and hopefullyyy I'll get them all done because June has noooooot been a very productive writing month for me.

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Quiet Heroes

This one's been brewing in my head for a little while now and I've started mapping out a plot and some early chapters, so I'm hoping nano will help me to kickstart it.

Concept: Deathly Hallows era at Hogwarts, told through the perspectives of Michael Corner, Lavender Brown and Hannah Abbott. Some heroes are quiet but no less heroic. A chapter for each character for each month of the school year, ending with the Battle of Hogwarts. 

Goals: I'm going to go for 15,000 words drafted and at least one chapter uploaded during nano. I'm feeling good about this one and thinking about it a lot so I think the beginning will come quite quickly.

 

A Waltz in Three Parts

My entry for the happy and gay challenge (hopefully, if I can get it done...).

Concept: Three times Seamus Finnigan danced with Dean Thomas. 

Goals: 3,000 words (ish) will get this one complete I think. Aiming to upload them by the end of the month (which I need to do to hit the challenge deadline anyway).

 

Make Me Feel Alive

My Marlene McKinnon story is what brought me back to fanfiction but I feel like I've been neglecting it recently for newer ideas. 

Concept: Marauders Era seventh year with Marlene as main character and a Marlene/Sirius romance alongside lots of angst.

Goals: The next chapter's half written so I'd like to finish that and write one more. Let's call it 5,000 words uploaded by the end of the month.

 

Original Fiction

I've got a manuscript for a children's historical fantasy novel I finished a few years ago and have been redrafting and tidying up since then. I've already set myself the goal of a complete final edit by September, so I'm going to use July to prepare for that.

Goals: 

Complete final draft of first 12K Words

Reread rest of manuscript and make notes for August editing

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PHEW - reading back through that makes it look like a lot of work, but I think having it across a range of different projects is going to help. 35K word goal overall and 12K of that is redrafting rather than writing so doesn't feel quite so intimidating. Anywayyyyy wish me luck!

 

[ineffable_season]

JEM. I LOOOVE the concept behind Quiet Heroes! Like soo many  for that idea! I am sooo excited for it! So naturally I have some questions about it!

1. What made you choose Michael, Hannah, and Lavender as the quiet heroes of this story?
 

2. If you had to describe each of these characters in three words, what three words would you use?

3. Do you see this being novel length or a novella or just three chapters?

I'm also really digging your ideas for A Waltz in Three Parts. Where did you get the idea for that story?

I also see there's another chapter of your Marlene McKinnon story to check out, so I an definitely excited about that!

For your children's manuscript, do you plan on doing traditional querying or do you think you'll independent publish it? It's got to be exciting to have a nearly finished project after working on it for years!

Anyway, happy writing/editing this month!

 Courtney

[jemima.moon]

Quote

1. What made you choose Michael, Hannah, and Lavender as the quiet heroes of this story?

2. If you had to describe each of these characters in three words, what three words would you use?

3. Do you see this being novel length or a novella or just three chapters?

Oo good questions @prideofprewett you've made me think!

1. I've always been interested in Michael as a character. I feel like him and Harry might have some things in common because they end up dating two of the same people, and we also know he gets tortured for rescuing a first year during Deathly Hallows, which shows us some of his strength as a character. Plus I love Ravenclaws. I started thinking about his story during DH, but then felt like I wanted some other perspectives from different houses so brought in Hannah and Lavender. I'm still contemplating a Slytherin perspective as well.
2. I'm going to say:
   Michael: rational, principled, impatient
   Lavender: beautiful, underestimated, fierce
   Hannah: loyal, gentle, loving
3. It'll be novel length - 3 chapters for each month of the year until May so I think it'll be 27 chapters in total, potentially a bit more if I include a few chapters after the battle. 

And then A Waltz in Three Parts is an idea I've been thinking about for a while. I wanted to start with the Yule Ball because we know Seamus goes with Lavender but I refuse to believe he isn't already a little bit in love with Dean, and then I started thinking about other key moments of their story. So it'll be a chapter for the Yule Ball, a chapter for a dance before Dean goes into hiding, and then one at their wedding 

I'm hoping to do some querying for my manuscript later this year, but it's a bit scary! Need to give it all another big edit first and then try to be brave!

Thanks for the questions Courtney 

 

[quill2parchment]

I'm beyond excited about Quiet Heroes because I think you do such a great job writing about teenagers during war times! Here are my questions:

1) For Quiet Heroes, what does your writing process looking like? Do you have an outlined plot? Or do you just write and see where it takes you? 

2.) Have you always been interested in Dean and Seamus or is this something new to you? What's your favorite thing about them, either as a couple or individual characters? (I'm really excited for this one too, by the way! I love the concept!) 

3.) You know I adore Make Me Feel Alive! If they hadn't been Gryffindors, where else might've you placed Marlene, Lily, and the four Marauders?

[jemima.moon]

5 hours ago, quill2parchment said:

I'm beyond excited about Quiet Heroes because I think you do such a great job writing about teenagers during war times! Here are my questions:

1) For Quiet Heroes, what does your writing process looking like? Do you have an outlined plot? Or do you just write and see where it takes you? 

2.) Have you always been interested in Dean and Seamus or is this something new to you? What's your favorite thing about them, either as a couple or individual characters? (I'm really excited for this one too, by the way! I love the concept!) 

3.) You know I adore Make Me Feel Alive! If they hadn't been Gryffindors, where else might've you placed Marlene, Lily, and the four Marauders?

I'm so excited too! It's one of those ideas that's really latched onto my brain and has made me very unproductive the last few weeks because it's all I can think about oops...

These are great questions thank you for sending them!

1. I usually map out my plots in great detail before I start, but I've approached this one a bit differently. I've got a google doc for each character with a general arc mapped out, and then I've got another one with a space for each of them each month. So it's like 1. Michael, September, 2, Lavender, September etc etc, and I know what all of their stories look like for the first few chapters but then there are some gaps later on, and I've got months where I know there's a big Lavender story but am not yet sure what Hannah will be doing etc. But it's a nice kind of plotting because timeline-wise it has to fit in with Deathly Hallows, so that helps a lot with structure. I'm excited though!
2. Oo I properly love Dean and Seamus. I like the idea that while Harry's off doing all his adventures they're having their own experience of Hogwarts together. I've always been interested in writing something about them. I think my favourite thing about them is that they have their own identities that don't overlap very much with Harry's story. We know a bit about Seamus' family and we know about Dean's artwork, and we know there was a bit of competition between them when they both wanted to join the Quidditch team. I love writing about characters that we know a little bit about but still have lots of freedom with.
3. I didn't really consider another house for Make Me Feel Alive, because I always write to fit with canon, but I could see Marlene in Slytherin in a different world. My Marlene loves her friends but is fundamentally all about self-preservation, and I think Slytherin could have worked for her. 

[grumpy cat]

hey jem!

i was wondering about quiet heroes - will it be like the three characters doing their own things or will it be like a *them* story? like, how much will they interact and cooperate (i suppose through dumbledore's army?)? how much of the story will be character driven and how much of it is plot? are there scenes you're especially excited to write about? some that you think are going to be difficult but ultimately important for the story? it all sounds really great btw - i'm also intrigued by your original fiction, it sounds wonderful and congrats on actually legit having something OF finished and just there for editing and stuff, major kudos on that front

[jemima.moon]

On 6/30/2022 at 9:47 PM, grumpy cat said:

hey jem!

i was wondering about quiet heroes - will it be like the three characters doing their own things or will it be like a *them* story? like, how much will they interact and cooperate (i suppose through dumbledore's army?)? how much of the story will be character driven and how much of it is plot? are there scenes you're especially excited to write about? some that you think are going to be difficult but ultimately important for the story? it all sounds really great btw - i'm also intrigued by your original fiction, it sounds wonderful and congrats on actually legit having something OF finished and just there for editing and stuff, major kudos on that front

So they're all part of the same story and overlap and interact a lot, but each has their own arc until the Battle of Hogwarts. So far I'm really enjoying working out how they all relate to each other, and how they relate to different side characters. There are definitely scenes from canon that I'm excited about - I know from Deathly Hallows that Michael Corner's story needs to build up to him rescuing a first year who's been chained up, for example - but there are also elements from canon that I'm a bit nervous about. I know Hannah Abbott ultimately ends up with Neville, for example, and I've never had much interest in writing about Neville so need to think more about how to make sure he's in character.

 

I'm excited though! Thanks for the questions! xx 

[starlitcastles]

Hi Jem!

I know that we don't personally know each other or anything but I saw that you're doing Camp Nano/Jul Nano and also since I know that we haven't spoken as I haven't been too active here then hi hello I'm Diana or Di for short, it's nice to meet you, and do hope that we can interact more as well if you ever want to talk about writing, Harry Potter, or anything else but for now: I wanted to comment your nest and leave a few questions so let's get to it, shall we!?!

First of all, let me just say that you have some pretty great ideas especially Quiet Heroes as that one just spoke to me seeing as you'll have Hannah Abbott in that and I really like her character alot and have pondered about her time during the Deathly Hallows apart from the information that we know from the books and whatnot yet I also want to see what you do with Lavender's and Michael's narrative in this story. I'm also kind of intrigued by the children's historical fantasy novel although I'm not too sure about the latter but from what little I know that it still sounds interesting despite that as well! It's also cool that Make Me Feel Alive also brought you back to fanfiction writing yet I understand about wanting to writing new ideas and whatnot since that's me and my story ideas when I try and write hahaha but hope you can work on this idea and continue with it!  Also I don't read much Marauder's fiction but anything with Sirius is bound to be one exciting since he and Remus are my favorites and I love seeing people's interpretations or versions of Marlene too! A Waltz In Three Parts also sounds pretty good especially since its a Dean and Seamus fanfiction and don't know too many people who ship that but it's always great when people write fics about lesser known ships in the HP fandom as well as any other fandom and would like to see what you do with them!  

I wish you also the best of luck in not only reaching the 35k word count total (with all your stories) and the 12k word count goal but also doing all four projects and that it not only goes smoothly but wonderfully!  If you do ever get stuck or don't know where to go next then I can send you some motivation in a few words and that is: don't let whatever doubts, fear, or negativity get the best of you and your writing because you're so more than what they will tell you and believe me, they'll tell you alot but you also can get through it! You definitely got this!  

Okay so a few questions I have for you are:

1.  Out of all your works, which would you say feels the most longest to work on like not just word count but you know that it takes forever or to get at least get to the end and which one is the shortest in terms of reaching to the end? Why? 

2.  If say, let's use the imagination for this question shall we, as I love imagination but anyway, imagine somebody wanted you to write a story and they said that you need to write for them and that one story is the one they're taking it to, I don't know, to read somebody back in their world who are probably struggling and or need a story to be told so in that scenario, they'll heal or just feel better from hearing that story and they needed a book or any written version, which one would you be willing to share and why?  I hope that question makes sense and it's not too uncomfortable. Please let me know if it this though. I am just thinking of this as more like:  "which story would you love to tell the most" but just by another means of it, if that makes sense?  

3.  What color or color(s) would you describe the three characters in Quiet Heroes: Hannah, Michael, and Lavender and why? 

4.  How many years have you been writing your children's historical fantasy novel and what does it feel to get to where you are now? (If that makes sense?) 

5.  Do you have any playlists for any of your projects this month? If so, which story? If not, which songs would be on there theoretically? 

Anyway,  I hope these questions do help you not only motivate and encourage you to keep writing but hope that this Jul Nano goes wonderfully for you!  Again, best of luck to you and your writing journey!  

P.s.   Love the Spongebob and Kermit gifs in this especially the former!

 

[jemima.moon]

@starlitcastles Lovely to meet you Di! Thank you for stopping by here and for the thoughtful questions! 

 

Quote

1.  Out of all your works, which would you say feels the most longest to work on like not just word count but you know that it takes forever or to get at least get to the end and which one is the shortest in terms of reaching to the end? Why? 

2.  If say, let's use the imagination for this question shall we, as I love imagination but anyway, imagine somebody wanted you to write a story and they said that you need to write for them and that one story is the one they're taking it to, I don't know, to read somebody back in their world who are probably struggling and or need a story to be told so in that scenario, they'll heal or just feel better from hearing that story and they needed a book or any written version, which one would you be willing to share and why?  I hope that question makes sense and it's not too uncomfortable. Please let me know if it this though. I am just thinking of this as more like:  "which story would you love to tell the most" but just by another means of it, if that makes sense?  

3.  What color or color(s) would you describe the three characters in Quiet Heroes: Hannah, Michael, and Lavender and why? 

4.  How many years have you been writing your children's historical fantasy novel and what does it feel to get to where you are now? (If that makes sense?) 

5.  Do you have any playlists for any of your projects this month? If so, which story? If not, which songs would be on there theoretically? 

1. Hmm at the moment I'm finding it easy to work on Quiet Heroes. I think because it's a fairly new idea and I'm thinking about it a lot, the words come easily and I'm making progress quite quickly. I've learnt not to trust that feeling too much though! Because it's exactly how I felt about Make Me Feel Alive, my Marauders story, and I'm having a little bit of a block with that one right now. 
    
2. I think I'd want to tell Quiet Heroes the most. It's got some angst in it, but it's ultimately a story about people stepping up to do the right thing, which I feel makes it a more important story to tell than some of my others.
    
3. Oh this is difficult because it's easy to get influenced by their house colours! Hannah's definitely yellow, and not just because she's a Hufflepuff. She's gentle and sunny and sweet and I think a nice buttery yellow fits with her. Lavender might be more of a deep purple, which I'm aware is maybe because of her name, but she's beautiful and passionate and has hidden depths. And then if I try not to think about Hogwarts house connotations, I think Michael might be a velvety green - he's straightforward and thoughtful and clever.
    
4. I started writing my children's book 3 years ago. I wrote a first draft pretty quickly and then have come back to it a few times since then to edit. It's now in a place where I feel like I've taken it pretty much as far as I can, which is a bit scary because it means the next step is trying to get an agent or somebody else to like it too! 
    
5. I actually haven't made any playlists yet for these stories, but I quite often listen to the Harry Potter soundtracks while writing as I feel like they ground me in this world. 

 

Thank you for the questions! And looking forward to getting to know you more! xx 

[jemima.moon]

6th July Update

As of the end of the day yesterday, I've got 6395 words written which means so far I'm on track for my 35K goal. I'm going away this weekend with some friends so will try to fit in some time to work on my original fiction while I'm there to keep up my word count, although not sure how much time I'll have. I'm going to try to get a big chunk of Quiet Heroes written today and hopefully will write the first scene of A Waltz in Three Parts as well. I want to give myself a bit of a buffer in case I don't get much done at the weekend.

For now, though, I've made some Quiet Heroes character picspams to get into the right headspace. I'm pretty rubbish at graphics so don't know if I'm doing them right but hopefully I'll find them inspiring to look back at!

Hannah

Lavender

Michael

Wishing everyone happy writing today! Week 1 nearly over - we've got this! 

[jemima.moon]

14th July Update

 

I've crossed 20,000 words which I didn't expect! I think working on quite a few different projects has really helped me out because when I lose motivation with one thing I can go straight to something else. 

 

Quiet Heroes

This is definitely inspiring me more than anything I've written for a while. I've written four and a half chapters so far and am loving it. Planning to get a bit more finished but I'm excited about this one - also seem to be falling in love with Seamus Finnigan which is unexpected because he's not one of my main characters? But it's all good.

A Waltz in Three Parts

So writing Lavender's chapters for Quiet Heroes sent me into love with Seamus, which has been very helpful for this one. I've written 2 chapters of my Dean/Seamus entry for the happy and gay challenge and just have one more to go to finish it off. It's definitely had some angst creep in but they'll have a happy ending I promise!

Make Me Feel Alive

Hmmmm I don't really know what to say about this one. I'm just not feeling it at the moment? I still care about the characters and I know where their story is headed, but I'm not feeling as much motivation to work on it as some of the others. I'm trying to get myself to write a few hundred words every now and then after working on other things so I keep it going. Hopefully I'll get back into it soon.

Original Fiction

Slowly ticking along. Not getting as much inspiration as I am for fanfiction at the moment, but I feel like any writing is a good thing. 

 

Hope everyone's managing to get some writing done and enjoying the process! Nearly halfway through the month now! Jem xx 

 

 

[quill2parchment]

It sounds like you're doing amazing! I love/envy your ability to work on multiple projects at once. 

I'm really excited for Quiet Heroes! Can you share which of the three MC you've been enjoying writing the most? Is there one that you've found more challenging?

 

 

[jemima.moon]

19 hours ago, quill2parchment said:

It sounds like you're doing amazing! I love/envy your ability to work on multiple projects at once. 

I'm really excited for Quiet Heroes! Can you share which of the three MC you've been enjoying writing the most? Is there one that you've found more challenging?

 

 

I don't usually enjoy working on lots of things at once but it seems to be working well for me this time! It's definitely helping me feel in the right zone for writing, and it means I can procrastinate from one project by working on another which is kind of great?

I'm excited for Quiet Heroes too! I was most excited about writing Michael, because I've always had a bit of a soft spot for him as a character, and I'm loving exploring how he deals with things like being thrown into situations with Ginny, his ex, who is now in love with the chosen one. But actually so far I'm enjoying Lavender the most. I added her story last to my plan, but I'm absolutely loving her. I'm definitely finding Hannah the hardest. I've got her as quite a gentle character and that means she's not as active as the other two, so although I like her story, I'm finding it a bit hard to keep up the pace.

[Oregonian]

Hi, Jemima!  I have just now started to read your novel nest and am impressed by two things: the number of projects you are working on at once, and the number of words you have been able to write.  It sounds as if you're on a roll.

It is interesting how many NaNo participants are writing about the 1997-1998 school year at Hogwarts, the year about we know rather little from canon, just little snippets here and there.  You, and Noelle/inmyownlittlecorner, and me (and maybe others).  I like your slant on it, focusing on the lesser-known students, and with your group of three, all from different Houses, well, there are lots of possibilities there.

(I wrote a one-shot story a few years back, Carried In My Heart, which focused on Hannah and Ernie during the 1997-1998 school year, as she tries to protect the younger Hufflepuffs.  My Hannah may be a little different from your Hannah, so don't read it now. )

I identify with what you say about being able to move from one project to another if ideas are temporarily sparse for the first project but springing up for the second project.  Do you also skip forward in the story to write chapters that are flourishing in your head and demanding to be written NOW, even though you haven't arrived at that point in the story line yet?  I can totally see that happening in a story like Quiet Heroes!

Looking forward to seeing these stories when you post them!

Vicki

[jemima.moon]

On 7/17/2022 at 5:03 AM, Oregonian said:

Hi, Jemima!  I have just now started to read your novel nest and am impressed by two things: the number of projects you are working on at once, and the number of words you have been able to write.  It sounds as if you're on a roll.

It is interesting how many NaNo participants are writing about the 1997-1998 school year at Hogwarts, the year about we know rather little from canon, just little snippets here and there.  You, and Noelle/inmyownlittlecorner, and me (and maybe others).  I like your slant on it, focusing on the lesser-known students, and with your group of three, all from different Houses, well, there are lots of possibilities there.

(I wrote a one-shot story a few years back, Carried In My Heart, which focused on Hannah and Ernie during the 1997-1998 school year, as she tries to protect the younger Hufflepuffs.  My Hannah may be a little different from your Hannah, so don't read it now. )

I identify with what you say about being able to move from one project to another if ideas are temporarily sparse for the first project but springing up for the second project.  Do you also skip forward in the story to write chapters that are flourishing in your head and demanding to be written NOW, even though you haven't arrived at that point in the story line yet?  I can totally see that happening in a story like Quiet Heroes!

Looking forward to seeing these stories when you post them!

Vicki

Hi Vicki! 

I didn't realise you were writing about the same school year - I haven't managed to get to the Crofter and the Snake yet - but just had a look and it sounds like such a great story! I think the 1997-1998 year is so much fun to play around in, because we know a bit about what was going on, but Harry (love him but he's pretty self-involved...) never finds out enough for it to be restrictive for us to write about. There's lots of freedom there.

I'm definitely keen to read your Hannah one-shot but, like you suggested, might wait until I've got a bit further with her in case your Hannah is different to mine! This sounds like such a good story though.

To answer your question, I'm mostly writing this one chronologically, because I'm sort of figuring out aspects of the storyline as I go, but there are a couple of scenes from later on I haven't been able to resist writing. The other day, I baked a cheesecake and then when I was writing later on, decided Hannah would probably bake the same cake when she was particularly stressed in January of the school year, so wrote that scene straight away. I try to avoid writing the chapters I'm thinking about a lot straight away, because I find it a good motivation to keep writing when I can't wait to get there, but it definitely happens sometimes.

Thanks for stopping by! Looking forward to getting to know you and your stories! 

Jem x

 

[Oregonian]

I love what you say:  "I try to avoid writing the chapters I'm thinking about a lot straight away because I find it a good motivation to keep writing when I can't wait to get there..."  That's a great way to approach it!  I will try to tell myself that whenever I think of really great stuff to include in future chapters.  Thank you so much for this flash of insight!