Write On Redux – This is Hardcore

So, Michelle is leading me in to trouble again this year.

Two weeks, twenty pages a day, one book at the end of it. Absolutely no excuses.

We’ll be partaking of this insanity from March 19th to April 1st, so I’ve got a bit of time to prep. And finish off the current novel in progress. Oh, and continue revising last year’s Write On Novel.

Still, I’m optimistic. I have a plan.

1 Get into training
2 Work out my timescale
3 Find the time
4 Outline
5 Write

I’ve even made a start. I’ve upped the daily word count on my current novel, Black Cat Hollow. It’s a children’s book, so shorter than the average, which helps. I figure that if I’m making 2,000 words a day on this, which I am, then it won’t be such a huge step up to twenty pages a day come March 19th. Hopefully.

The timing actually works very well for me. The two weeks chosen are completely empty in my calendar, for a change. Apart from work and family, I’m clear. And my husband has agreed to entertain himself and do the cooking for a fortnight.

I know what I need to finish before I start the challenge, and I know what I need to do daily to reach that.

20 pages a day is a lot. It’s suggested in Candace Haven's notes on the Fast Draft process that most people take around three, three and a half hours to produce that. So I figured that’s what I needed to find in my day to make this work.

It wasn’t that hard. With my current word count I’m getting back into the habit of getting up early and writing first thing, before I’m even really awake. I find it easier to get into the flow at that time, and even just a little in the morning makes it easier to get the words throughout the rest of the day.

So, that’s one hour.

With my new job, I tend to get home around an hour before my husband. If I sit right down and get to it, which I try to, that’s another sixty minutes. Knock out cooking time, and that’s another half an hour.

Two and half hours – nearly there.

After tea, I tend to have an hour to read, watch telly, or generally lounge around, before I start clearing up and getting ready for the morning. Simon will help out with all that stuff anyway, especially over that fortnight, so there’s another hour there, easy.

Three and a half hours. Add in thirty minutes at lunchtime, or extra time at the weekends, and this suddenly becomes eminently doable. At least, for a two week burst, anyway – I don’t think it’s something you can keep up all the time!

So, that’s steps 1-3 done. Now I just need to get outlining…

Wish me luck!

Words and Curry

All is very busy at the moment. We've got a conference in London next week, running for three days, and generally being difficult. Still, somehow I managed to write 2,500 words today. I know!

I do get annoyed with myself sometimes. I mean, I know how I work. I know that if I write a little every day, then it's much easier to keep momentum, to keep going, and to go over my word goals more often. Conversely, I know that if I leave a story for more than a day, I lose any speed I've built up and tend to languish in 25-words-a-day hell. I know this. Hell, if you've read this blog more than once, you know this.

And yet, time and time again, I don't put the writing first and I lose days, weeks, sometimes months worth of words.

So I've spent a lot of this month pushing back slowly against the drag of the tide, and trying to get the words, any words, down. I finally pushed through today, I think.

The book I'm working on at the moment is another kids novel, about 40k, 10 chapters, fantastic fun. I set my goals very low - 500 words a day - partly because it's nice to exceed expectations, partly because it adds up nicely to finish just before my birthday (27. God.) and partly because I've got a lot on over the next month or two, including revising my Write-On novel.

Still, I have very good feelings about this book. And now I've ploughed through Chapter Two, exciting things are happening. Or will do, if only I remember to write every single day.

In other news, we booked train tickets up to Scotland in early March to visit some friends and their daughter (our Goddaughter). That's six or seven hours each way in which I can read, write and revise. I am very, very excited.

Anyway, off out for curry with friends for tea. Suppose I'd better go make myself look presentable...

Writing On Again

I mentioned to Bonnie that I was reading through my Write-On novel from last year, with an eye to (finally) starting the revisions. She asked me if I still liked it.

It’s funny, but until I actually started the read through, it never occurred to me to wonder if I would. I assumed, if I thought about it at all, that since I would be walking through my own words, since I’d already know everything that was going to happen, that it would be more of an academic exercise than an enjoyable one. It was work, after all.

But I was surprised. There were scenes I don’t remember writing. Characters were much more themselves than I thought they would be. And after six months of not looking at it at all, I really enjoyed reading it.

It’s full of problems, of course. There’s lots of stuff still to fix, but I definitely feel that it’s worth fixing.

So I’m going right back to the beginning, reminding myself why these characters are where they are, what they want, how they’re going to get it, and who is trying to stop them and why.

It’s actually a lot of fun…