Hi Everyone! Reenie here.

I write this, but you probably know that.

Tomorrow we’re going to start a new(ish) chapter around here, this time retelling the time we’ve covered from Athena’s perspective. This was a really hard decision for me to make, whether to take a break altogether, or move along, or come from another angle.

I’m immensely grateful to everyone who’s come along so far on this journey. There’s been a lot of experimenting and shifts and decisions, and I know I’ve become a better writer because of it.

Here’s a secret that I’ve never told anyone, when I get writer’s block, I go back to my first fiction writing love, which is fanfiction. I still play around with fic occasionally, just for fun. I haven’t posted anything in years. Even when I did post in was in the more obscure corners of that world. (I was writing Harry Potter fic like everyone else, but I was TERRIFIED of that fandom, so I kept to my quiet little Wicked and Mighty Ducks corners.)

When I get too hamstrung here and don’t know where to go, I write what amounts to fanfiction for Cammadan. The threads of this world are bound on the great spinning wheel (where Cornan and Rana are currently held prisoner) and occasionally I will jump onto a different thread and see where it leads. What if Marie had lived to raise Annalise, exiled in Phania? What if instead of bonding as siblings, Aaron and Annalise fell in love? What if Tristan chose Marina? And on and on.

But what really helps me break through is what I call, “The Guides.” I’m not really good at new ideas. My training is in analysis and production. I’m really good at remixing, at indentifying patterns and executing someone else’s creative ideas. So, none of my characters are really new. And I’ve found assigning a “guide” to each of them from work I love and then letting them talk it out, helps me focus on what they want.

Marina’s guide is Samwise Gamgee

Annalise’s is  Steve Rogers

Aaron’s is Leo McGarry

Tristan’s is Joey Potter

Lefty’s is Dick Grayson

Eric’s is Han Solo

Athena’s is Kara Thrace

I could go on, but I won’t. So, when figuring out what to do next, Annalise and Steve had a long talk about taking that next step, about getting up when it feels like your world crumbled, about the only constant being change. Marina and Sam discussed what home actually is, what loyalty actually is, how to fight without fighting, how to be strongest when holding someone else up. Tristan got a lecture about how delaying choice causes fractures that will never fully heal between between people. And Athena. Athena was reminded, by Space Jesus herself, that she is supposed to fight, the push forward and find her destiny.

And I realized I needed to tell the story of how she gets there.

So tomorrow, we start with Athena. I love her and I hope you all will too.