Summer Camp 2024 Pledge - Complete

Hello! It's been ages since I've done any worldbuilding (focused on a 2nd draft and then edits for a different book). Summer Camp is going to be a great way to start thinking about the sequel.   Also fair warning my comma key is broken so while I might cave and copypaste a few I will likely rely on the lovely semicolon or just change up my sentence structure altogether. So if it reads weird this is a pledge document and I am not as concerned with punctuating it properly as I could be.  

Week 1: Change

  What better to write for than a sequel? Everything's changed for my protagonist Ruby Gray . Her best friend/sister betrayed her so she needs new companions or she's never going to undergo her proper character arc. She's going to be looking into ways to change up her life and this can help me brainstorm. There's also a bunch of history for Vielene/Valgrozna that I can develop as well as for the Chaos Coalition . I know what's happening in the world overall; I just don't know as much about their history. I'll probably be focusing on neutral changes; things that aren't really good/evil or positive/negative.   Without knowing what the prompts are, I don't know exactly what will jump out, but most of my thinking goes to historical shifts and updates to the world state for the sequel.   My pledge! I'm going for diamond because I'm a fast writer and I don't think I'll be going for any awards. The idea is to start getting a sense for the sequel and get the details for the things I'll need and not so much to win any quality contests.     Bonus of having not done much with my world here is that I'm still pretty happy with the organization and think I can find what I'm doing. For Summer Camp I plan on using the tag "camp 2024" but we'll see because I'm terrible about remembering to use tags.   Updated the world meta a bit! It's a pretty standard superhero story; Earth+ so to speak.  

Week 2: Refuge

  How does my supervillain not have a lair?! Well, she does, actually. She has several, but at the start of the book she's forced to step away and take a break to reduce the unwanted attention so I didn't have to explore them. Now that she's slipping back into her old role more, it's time to unlock at least one sanctum. Definitely going to be describing a lot of different secret bases and lairs for the Refuge prompts.   I set up to send my articles links to someone I trust so they'll pester me about getting it done. Also, my wonderful husband is a writer and he'll help keep me on track. I'm hoping to convince him to do Summer Camp too!   As for styling, I'm not much good at it so I settled for changing the theme up, changing the cover image, and that's about it. I'm going to make use of headers and such to keep the information readable, and that's as far as I go.   No CSS for me. That's a skill I have yet to learn, let alone want to include in a month-long challenge. Kudos to those who do!  

Week 3: Belief

  Calling it now, this is probably going to be my most difficult set of prompts. This particular world is just a version of Earth with superheroes so there's not going to be a whole lot of different religious beliefs or structures in place. I also haven't thought a lot about the mythology in this world, so I'm going to have to focus on the people that others aspire to. Probably good stuff to think about, but not necessarily so useful to my secondary goal of filling out the details for book 2.   Finding inspiration was the easiest part of this whole exercise. I already have Pinterest boards, YouTube playlists, and quotes galore. I'm set for success. Maybe I should watch some superhero media to get my mind in the right gear? That counts as writing, right? If I'm doing it as prep work?   I probably should make a map of my primary city setting, but I'm not good at maps so I'm not going to. I will keep track of things that come up as I write, but I'm not planning to make a map at this time.   It's not really that old of a world, so reviewing old inspiration isn't where I'm at yet.  

Week 4: Decay

  The book I'm planning on outlining heavily features the Chaos Coalition , one of the more coherent supervillain organizations. They know they're doing bad things, but they all have a goal that they're focused on that they don't see society dealing with. The decay I'll look at will probably be dealing with is some of the background behind those reasons, and thus moral decay. Also possibly decaying buildings and older organizations, since I want my superheroes to have some history to them.   For me, optimizing my environment is mainly about making the right lists. I have a comfy spot I like to write in, and my tea stocks are set for the next two years or so (only slightly kidding), and I generally have a good environment to write. The trick for me is setting up my lists for success. Adding in the right number of points on my list so I feel like I'm making regular progress without it being a single overwhelming item. It's also a matter of adding in little reward points and ensuring that I don't overdo it on the video games while also taking necessary breaks. Putting that system in place is my best tool for ensure that my writing space is going to do its job.   Fine, I will update my homepage a bit. And my author page.   Well, that's me, all updated and ready to go in a week.