Indie Author Weekly

169: How a new dance class is affecting my book writing plans

• Sagan Morrow • Episode 170

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I began a new solo development dance class last month in preparation for my first-ever solo burlesque show... and that's given me a few ideas for incorporating burlesque choreography and culture into my upcoming romcom novel (Book 8 in the Polyamorous Passions series)!

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welcome to the indie author weekly podcast where I take you on the behind the scenes journey of my adventures as an indie author. I'm your host Sagan Morrow, and I'm an eighth time polyamorous romance author. Plus, I've also written several business books for solopreneurs. Let's dive into this episode. Today I want to share about a new solo development, the last class that I have been taking and how it is affecting my writing as an author. So this solo development class is something that I started just last month at the beginning of September and the whole concept around this class is that we, the students are learning how to develop our first solo act as a burlesque performer. I have been doing burlesque for a number of years now. It was three years in Winnipeg with pureed diva dance before the pandemic started. And then when I moved here to Kamloops, I did heels dancing with femme fatale Kamloops, which has since turned into hillside heels. And I started that in January 2022. And I'm still with them. They're you know, they're great. Just like the Winnipeg group is great. And this past January, I started with Kamloops burlesque. And so this solo development class that I'm taking is with Kamloops burlesque. It is honestly everything that I've ever wanted in, in a class. It's exactly the type of thing that I have been looking for. Since I first started dancing and performing on stage. The entire concept of this class is really about all aspects of building out a dance performance. So we're learning everything from choreography to music mapping to stage directions, and how to communicate effectively with the sound and light technicians, all of those types of things. We do peer review and we learn how to be better at peer review. So how to give people good feedback. We are learning just all kinds of things around you know costuming and putting, putting together the character that we want to create. Absolutely everything that you can think of that goes into a dance performance is what we are learning. And it is so good. I am learning so many things. And it's been really eye opening in a lot of ways because it is helping me to understand what goes into all of all of the work that my teachers are doing when they are instructing me in dance. And it's also really interesting to be taking this class because I'm also starting to to understand why I resonate with some teachers more than others in terms of their teaching style. Because I can now know based on what I'm learning I can now see Oh, I understand that this teacher is using music mapping versus this teacher isn't. And that's actually helping me with my brain and how I'm comprehending the things that I'm learning. So that's been really cool as well. So the reason why I wanted to take this class is you know, when I first started dancing with burlesque fusion in the pre diva group, and I first did my, you know, I did my very first stage performance, I loved it, and I knew that eventually I would want to do my own solo. And I had plans to do my first solo in conjunction with the launch of book seven in the polyamorous passion series, because it is about Scarlett, who was a burlesque dancer, and I was going to do my first solo act as the dance that she performs in that book. And then the pandemic hit. So I did not get a chance to perform it, but I still really wanted to be able to do this. And so I am going to be performing my first solo act in December. I'm not going to share any details about it because I am keeping it very close to my chest, but it's going to be super fun and super awesome. I am actually documenting my whole experience of taking this class and the other classes that I'm taking. I'm also taking a ballet class right now. I'm documenting all of it on Instagram, with a new Instagram account specifically for dance. And so that account is under my burlesque stage name, which is baby Maverick at the Maverick and I will share that link in the show notes as well. And it's, you know, very funny to me that of course, of course I've created a new Instagram account to document this experiment to share this experience because I can't help but document everything that I do. I mean that is the entire purpose really of this podcast is documenting my journey as an author, right? I mean, I can't, I can't really seem to help myself. I love being able to analyze what I'm doing and to document it and to be able to see the progress that I'm making along the way and to you know, share that journey as well with other people as a kid I used to always like to write diaries and that kind of thing. But I love being able to share these types of things with other people because if you are on a similar journey, then you can you know, get lessons and takeaways from it. Or if you just like seeing what other people are doing then this is also a good opportunity. Or if you are on these different types of journeys, then you can also share with me what is what is working well for you because I would love to hear about your journey as well. So I think that it's a really there's a lot of value in sharing about these types of journeys. publicly and documenting these types of things. So again, if you want to find out what's happening with my burlesque solo development journey, absolutely check out my Instagram account, babe Maverick. Now, the interesting thing about how this really connects back to my current book writing is that it's making me pause and really think about how I am talking about dance in my novels. So in the polyamorous passion series is going to be nine books in total currently seven books are published. And these last three books book seven to nine, follow Scarlett story, and she dances for a living. Specifically, her profession is a burlesque fusion dancer. So she uses a lot of different types of dance in the dances that she does, but it's primarily burlesque fusion. And I would also say that this is basically going to be my style of dance as well. The solo that I have set up for myself in December is based in burlesque, but I'm incorporating some of the belly moves that I'm learning and I'm using some heels dancing techniques, even though I won't be wearing heels in this in this particular show. I'm using some of those techniques in it as well. So I kind of am mirroring the type of dance style that Scarlett has in my novels I kind of based her her style off of what I wanted my own style to be so that's kind of fun. And so Book Seven is already published and in that novel, you can already you know, check it out it's it's such a it's such a fun story. I would strongly recommend it enemies to lovers fake relationship, dance, competition, romance, all the things and in that novel, The main plot of it is that she is preparing for this dance competition. And so we get to see her, we get to see Scarlett doing some choreography and that type of thing. And that that was great right now book eight, which I'm currently writing book eight in the polyamorous passion series is the sequel to that. And it continues the plot of her dance career as it is starting to really take off. And so because of this, you know, I've written pretty much the entire first draft of the novel. But now that I'm taking this solo development class and I'm learning so much and so much more about what goes into designing choreography, which I was not aware of before. Now I'm kind of thinking it could be fun to incorporate a little bit of that into the novel and just kind of tweak things a little bit about the way that I am talking about her as a burlesque artist. I kind of want to incorporate a bit about that. Another thing that's happening right now is that I am learning a lot more about the the history and the culture of Burlesque which I was not previously aware of and I know you know, basically essentially nothing right at this point about the culture and the history of it, but I want to be learning a lot more. I feel like I've barely dipped my toes in it. And I feel like it would be the respectful thing to do to incorporate a little bit about that into these novels, because Scarlett is technically a burlesque dancer. And it really feels like the the best thing that I can do is to give the appropriate nods to that culture and that history. So at this point with the book, I'm still moving forward with the direction I had planned and with what I have currently, but I think I might be adding in a few scenes or weaving in a little bit more about the sort of the logistics of dance choreography and music mapping, and a little bit about sort of like dropping little nuggets into the novel about burlesque history and culture. So that's kind of my my thoughts right now. And basically just reworking a few things based on what I'm learning from the dancing that I'm doing.
So that's been kind of fun. This is kind of a fun idea to me of doing this type of thing. I'm not sure exactly what what the schedule is going to look like for that novel. I will share more about that in another episode. of indie author weekly. But that is where my thoughts are right now. And that's been kind of the fun thing that I've been doing right now. The fun creative outlet for me has really been about creating my solo for dance and really thinking about how this is going to be so useful in really writing Scarlett story and making making the most of this. So that's where I'm at. Okay, that my friend is a wrap for today's episode of indie author weekly. You can access the show notes for this episode, including links to additional resources at Sagan morrow.com/podcast. And please do as always share your thoughts on this episode on Twitter or Instagram. My handle is at Sagan lives. And if you have any additional questions about this topic or any topic that you'd like me to address here on the other weekly podcast, I would love to hear it. You can submit your topic ideas or your questions. Let's keep the conversation going at Sagan morrow.com/question. Please take two minutes to rate and review indie author weekly on Apple podcasts. Thank you so much for tuning in. And I will see you next week for another episode of indie author weekly

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Sagan Morrow

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