A parchment-style graphic with elegant floral borders and fantasy-inspired text. The title reads “Blood of the Banshee” by T.J. Hassall. Below, a progress update is shown: “First Draft Complete” with a scroll icon, and “Scribe’s Edit Underway” in red with a candle icon. At the bottom, it reads “#TuesdayTales In Progress,” with a small black ink blot beneath it. The design has an aged, magical feel, like a page from a fantasy scribe’s journal.
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Tuesday Tales: The First Draft is Complete!

ByTiffany
A parchment-style graphic with elegant floral borders and fantasy-inspired text. The title reads “Blood of the Banshee” by T.J. Hassall. Below, a progress update is shown: “First Draft Complete” with a scroll icon, and “Scribe’s Edit Underway” in red with a candle icon. At the bottom, it reads “#TuesdayTales In Progress,” with a small black ink blot beneath it. The design has an aged, magical feel, like a page from a fantasy scribe’s journal.
A parchment-style graphic with elegant floral borders and fantasy-inspired text. The title reads “Blood of the Banshee” by T.J. Hassall. Below, a progress update is shown: “First Draft Complete” with a scroll icon, and “Scribe’s Edit Underway” in red with a candle icon. At the bottom, it reads “#TuesdayTales In Progress,” with a small black ink blot beneath it. The design has an aged, magical feel, like a page from a fantasy scribe’s journal.

I finished the first draft of my novel this week. That sentence feels impossible to write, but it’s true. When I realised it was done, I burst into tears (my husband did, too), and I couldn’t stop crying.

It’s the first time in nearly nine years that I’ve completed a full draft of a book. I’ve tried (god knows, I TRIED) more times than I can count. I attempted a few short stories, thinking maybe if I kept them small, I could push through. But they were always tainted. I felt lost without my author mask and identity. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get to the end.

This time, I did.

And I did it by accident, too. I wrote the three different POVs at different times, and when I finished the last one, I went to plan for the next day and realised:
“Shit, I’m EDITING.”

The story I’ve been working on finally has a name. It’s called Blood of the Banshee, and after sitting with it, testing it, and second-guessing it, I’ve decided to trust my gut and keep it. I’ve tried variations and other words, but I keep coming back to this.

It’s a dark fantasy story with epic threads. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing more about the story itself and not just the worldbuilding.

At its heart, it’s a story of three fractured lives bound to something greater than they can understand and the choices they must make to survive the unravelling of Elisar.

The first of those lives belongs to Maggie. I’ll introduce her next week.

For now, I just wanted to mark this moment as a milestone and as proof that what I thought was lost is still there. I’ve gone right back to the beginning, and I’m now running through the second draft!

I’ll also be updating the website with a dedicated page for the book, where I’ll share more details and updates on its progress.

Thank you for reading.
Thank you for being here.
More to follow.
T.J.

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