Monday, July 19, 2021

get to know me tag (writer’s edition)

I wanted to do a tag, so I went and found one. I think I need to do more casual posts on here, try lighten the mood a bit. Most of my posts this year have been MY ENTIRE LIFE IS SPIRALING OUT OF CONTROL I FORGOT MY OWN NAME HERES MY TO DO LIST, you know? I miss casual fun posts. So no, I wasn’t actually tagged, call me a pirate I like it. This originally comes from Savannah Grace Writes




Vital Stats And Appearance

Name: Miranda Carter

Nicknames: Mo (Miranda & Jo squished together) Nie Nie (I really don’t know. Given to me by my little sister. Could be affectionate. Maybe it was supposed to be an insult but here we are)

Birthday: June 26th 

Hair color and length: Mediumish brown? It’s darker but I have natural blonde highlights which make me feel like an opposite rapunzel JUST saying. Medium height. It was all the way down to my waist but I cut it off when I had my last mental breakdown :’)

Eye color: Brown but I call it cherry brown because they have so much red in them. They aren’t black-brown they look like a violin’s wood. And I give myself permission to go on about my eye color because I hated them growing up I thought they looked like muddy piles of poo. So I have to romanticize them. 

Braces/piercings/tattoos: Only earring pierces though I don’t use them often. I used to have braces. For SIX years. Now I just wear a retainer but I haven’t worn it in like half a week and so I’m scared I’m going to wake up with crooked teeth but I gag when I wear it and it’s stressful. 

Righty or Lefty: right handed. 

Ethnicity: White. American. Everything that’s wrong with the world. (Kidding. Kidding. I think.)


Firsts

First novel written: A story called Wanderlust that was heavily influenced by Alice in Wonderland and Entwined by Heather Dixon. I stuck with that story for a pretty long while and I filled a couple of notebooks with it. There were dozens of plot holes and actually now that I think of it, barely a plot at all. A girl named Tamzin scuttles away from her evil stepmother and her spawn into the woods and climbs a magic tree that has gemstones sticking out of its trunk for no reason. She then falls INTO the tree and lands violently on the lawn of a palace and I think she like snapped her leg or something gory and then this super handsome doctor who was way too old for her but we’re not going to discuss my childhood issues heals her and then she realizes everyone there thinks she’s THE princess so she has to do lessons and then her dance teacher is SPICY too so she’s like hmmmm can’t choose and she starts loosing her memory of her life before this place but yeah that’s it. Oh, and in the world these instruments play on their own and the rain is sparkly. 

First novel completed: I’ve never completed writing a novel, only completed plotting one. That was an amazing feeling. I still have the pen I used to plot the entire thing and magically, it ran out of ink EXACTLY when I wrote the last letter of the last word. ✨ MaGIc ✨ That was a sleepy hollow retelling which is still one of my works in progress. It’s dark, it’s a little gory, full of folklore, and very very autumnal 🍁 

Award for writing: Nothing, okay? NOTHING. Have I entered the national poetry competition every. Single. Year. For the past 8 years? YES. Have I ever even been on the honorable mentions list? NO. However, I’ve never entered a story competition I should really do that. Seems like fun.

First publication: Nothingggg. But I’ve never pursued publication before as I always drop projects halfway through. I’m looking for THE STORY. 

Conference: Never been. Seems like the craic though. I’d like to ACTUALLY do NANOWRIMO and go to some write-ins. That would be awesome but I can be a little socially anxious so I would probably have a blank document open and just be pretending to type some sort of story but really it’s jibberish and I start to sweat and when someone asks me what I’m writing I lie for no reason but that it makes me feel protected and it just goes downhill from there. But I’ll still give it a go. 

Query/Pitch: *crickets*


Favorites


Novel (that you wrote): Before I Go Mad. My pirate tale. I like the concept I developed for it and I think the twists and turns make it strong but I haven’t fully plotted it. I also love my sleepy hollow retelling but despite the fact that it is fully plotted I can’t figure out several characters and it’s very hard to get it to turn in the direction I want it to go but I’ll FORCE it to and then it’ll probably steal the number one spot. 

Genre: Fantasy, Historical Fantasy, and I could see myself writing a Sci-Fi or Sci-Fi Fantasy story as well. I prefer low fantasies to high and more unique worlds than just another medieval kingdom. But still, all hail the Lord of The Rings. 

Author: Heather Dixon. She writes so creatively and it’s not pretentious at all. I love reading her stories. 

Writing Music: I love setting up soundtracks for projects! I used to use Spotify but I’ve since deleted it so I’d have to reconstruct the writing tracks I had. I think I’ll do a post on this in the future. Off the top of my head I like Remember from The Lion King, Silver Leaves from Treasure Planet and Aeon from Nick Murray. 

Time To Write: I usually blog or write in the morning surprisingly. I really don’t like mornings. They’re intimidating and boring. But I also have intense creative bursts in the evening as well.

Writing Snack/Drink: Cinnamon apple tea or a cup of coffee orrrr hot chocolate. 

Movie: The Lord of The Rings trilogy. Masterpiece. I also love Pan’s Labyrinth, Inkheart, Timeline, and Barbie movies. 

Writing Memory: I mentioned finishing the plot for my sleepy hollow retelling, that was a good one. Probably writing with my older sister. We’d gather all of our supplies and go into her room, sit on the floor and think of new characters or ideas and then fall silent for hours writing. 

Childhood Book: The Chronicles of Narnia were read out loud to me by my mother as a kid. My two older siblings and I would sit in the living room at night and she’d read a few chapters out loud. I remember thinking that I was Lucy and that I was truly, really, going to go to Narnia. That was a great book experience. 


Currently


Reading: I’m a horrible reader. I’m so picky and I prefer to work on my projects than read as of late. However, I’m technically reading The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, annnnd The Giver by Lois Lowry. But I haven’t touched any of those in months so did I just lie maybe. 

Writing: I’ve taken a break from my larger projects (by break I mean I haven’t touched them in a year) and I’ve been filling out a short story book I got. It’s very fun and I love to see what stories I end up with. It gives you a premise and several words you must include in your story and then the rest is up to you. It has helped me recognize writing mistakes I make, where I’m weak, where I’m strong, and that I literally cannot fit a story on one page.

Listening to: Traveling Song from Ryn Weaver, Mise Eire from Sibeal and Patrick Cassidy, The Best Day from Taylor Swift, and Fall On Me from Andrea and Matteo Bocelli. 

Watching: Doctor Who. Besides different movies here and there, I’m not watching any other shows. I’m picky about tv shows too. They always spiral out of control into a trope-filled lucid dream of ridiculousness and then I get ANGRY and throw the remote across the room turn it off. 

Learning: Besides learning how to function as an adult (am I though?), writing-wise I’d say I’m becoming more familiar with my writing style, and am learning how to change what I don’t like or recognize what isn’t hitting the way I want it to. 


Future


Want To Be Published: Yes I do. It’s been a goal of mine since I was really young and I’d like to make that happen.

Indie or Traditional: Traditional. I find the whole system and process of publication fascinating and I believe every great author needs a great editor. Even though you have little control over cover art and the branding of your book so to speak, to see the publishing house logo on the spine of my book would make up for it. 

Wildest Goal: Wildest writing related goal? Right now to finish an actual manuscript of one of my projects seems pretty darn wild so I’ll chose that. 

This was fun I think I’ll do more tags in the future. Now to pass it on, even though it’s old it’s still good. 

I tag…
Celena  @ Maiden Knight

And that’s it. Now don’t let my fame or follower count overwhelm you. And if I didn’t tag you, do it anyways!