#-basically do a nanowrimo type month to get the first draft written

[literalnobody]

Hi can I ask about The Water Dog? When is it going out (no pressure), could you share what it's going to be about, or if it's already out and I missed it could you direct me to it. ❤️❤️❤️

Thank you

Hi there! No worries, The Water Dog is not out yet but it's a pretty major project I plan to develop during the hiatus of my webcomic, and I'm not sure when it'll be out as I'm hoping to pursue getting it published when it's finished ^_^ I can tell you the general premise though!

The story follows a young nurse named Sybil who has to suddenly upend her life to care for her estranged grandfather, who lives on an extremely remote and insulated island off the western coast of Ireland (the story is set in 1930). She arrives amidst the tensions of the islanders and the Irish soldiers who are there to enforce a mandatory evacuation of the entire (very small) population to the mainland in the wake of a series of violent and mysterious deaths. The island has no police force, no fire fighters, one doctor, no social services and a population rapidly aging out of able bodied labour. Are wild dogs to blame for the sudden deaths, or is the ferocious monster that the islanders believe in actually real? 🤔 Ultimately this is a story about community, found family, romance, horror, and most importantly, the dignity and kindness we owe to one another ^_^ I hope you'll consider checking it out when it's finished, which I hope to be in Spring of next year!

[promisewrites]

starting a new project

The liminal space between an old project and a new project.

A few days ago I finished collating the first draft of page of swords into one document by importing all the individual documents I had accumulated over the course of NaNoWriMo into one Scrivener file. It was a tiring process, to say the least. And disheartening. When I stepped back to see all of the scene cards laid out, what had once been a monolith was now bone-thin.

It shouldn’t have been a surprise. I had cut so many scenes in my race to finish the novel before the close of the month. It’s kind of silly because I didn’t finish the story by November 30, in the end, anyway. The 50,000-word goal was accomplished, but I still had the fourth act (the dénouement where the characters return to a more familiar setting, changed) to write.

Because of this, I didn’t take a break from the draft in December, ready to leap back into it with fresh eyes in the new year. Instead, I worked (less furiously) to reach those magnificent words—’the end’—which I typed out at twenty-to-midnight, December 31.

While I relished working at a more leisurely pace that allowed me to flesh the prose out and tune it the way I wanted to, it gave me no room to breathe. It’s interesting. That something can continue to inspire you, but your mental energy does not keep pace with your creativity. For example, I added two epilogue chapters in a moment of evil genius. Crushing, vivid, emotional chapters.

But now I can’t bring myself to work on it anymore. Which is good, since I am supposed to have stashed the printed manuscript in a dark drawer to collect cobwebs over a month by now.

So I come to where I am now: beginning something new. Among the cut scenes, some require writing and some I loved but they just didn’t fit. It is the latter that I have interest with. And looking at aesthetically curated images in my world setting Pinterest board. A perfect marriage.

the world—I know it’s a cop-out name, but it’s simply a placeholder like the rest—is something a bit different than I have done. Looser. Less thought-out. I already have the basic plot of the rest of this series, and onyx spills afresh, mapped out in summary form at the least. But for the world, I made it on a whim. And that’s the same for all its contents. Bits and pieces of half-formed ideas my romantic brain has latched onto that I am collecting like scraps of paper.

I’ll admit quite freely: I enjoy painting pictures with words as much as with gouache. I probably do it as egregiously as Robert Jordan. So I will probably enjoy this change of pace immensely, and I don’t think anyone can complain about purple prose if that is the whole point of the piece.

To conclude, there is a gold nugget of truth in authors’ recommendations to let your first draft marinate—especially if it was written in the firestorm of a one-month writing challenge—and I am immensely excited to embark on my next project.

It’s like getting a new journal full of crisp, blank pages, in a way, after putting your lovingly worn Moleskine to rest on the shelf.

[nanowrimo]

5 Tips for Fast Drafting from a New York Times Bestselling Author

NaNoWriMo is basically an exercise in fast drafting: getting as much of the first draft of the story as you can on the page as quickly as possible. Today, bestselling author J. Elle is here to share some pro tips for fast drafting: My first middle grade novel took me nine days to write. 

The first draft was about 40,000 words or so. And yes, it needed to be revised before it sold to a publisher. But the meat of the story was on the page in just over a week’s time. I’d never drafted anything quite that fast before. Within a single month I’d written an entire novel, revised it a couple times and readied it for sale. A few months later that novel sold at auction and will be on shelves May 2022. 

I still look back on this feat with a bit of shock and awe. To date I’ve sold five novels to major publishers, two young adult, two middle grade and one non fiction and my experience fast drafting has forever altered the way I approach writing. I should mention, fast drafting isn’t for everyone. Writing is such a personal thing and each storyteller has their own process, but in the event getting the first draft out is the biggest hurdle for you, like it is for me, I’m going to share five tips for knocking out that first draft in record time. 

1. Start with a SHORT story pitch.

Pitching a story in a few words is tough. But it’s a worthy effort and the best use of your time before you get any words on the page. Why? Because it helps you hone in on the core of your story and its hook. A good short pitch involves the character, their dilemma, and a hint of the stakes. In October of 2018 I pitched my YA debut novel in a tweet which then blew up. Not many words can fit in a tweet, but by choosing the right set of words, I was able to convey the heart of my story and it really resonated. (From that tweet, I signed with a literary agent and sold my debut novel to a Big 5 publisher in a six-figure-deal.) The biggest favor you can do for yourself is understand the story—its essence, its core—you’re trying to tell before you start drafting. And that’s hard. But the more you play around with creating a short pitch, you’ll begin to see a clear snapshot of what your book is going to be about. That’s your jumping off point. 

2. Expand your pitch into tent pole beats.

From your short pitch, spend some time deciding on what your major beats are. Now, yes this is a bit like outlining. And for you pantsers out there, I empathize with you. I was a pantser and still am in many ways. But I still do this step because this step ultimately saves me time. The beauty of fast drafting is that you know what you need to do when you sit down to type. So a lot of these steps are about doing pre-work so that when you sit down to type you’re not spinning your wheels to figure out what to type. Instead you’ll have a clear goal and you’ll be ready to execute it. Also, note that the goal isn’t to perfect each of these steps, but instead to try to do each step, to the best of your ability, and in a way that makes sense. 

I could write an entire piece on beat sheeting novels (which I love and do for all my books), but for the purposes here, I’ve organized the main things you want to know below in a series of questions. Simply answer each, make a chart if you like that sort of thing, and once you have each question filled out in a way that logically makes sense, move on to the next step. (NOTE: It’s a good idea to get feedback on this step if you have critique partners and fellow writers you trust.)  

Opening Scene - Who is the character before the world changes?

Inciting Incident - What happens that forces them to make a choice, changing their lives forever? What are they choosing between? 

“A” Plot - What is that choice they make? What are they pursuing or working toward? Finding information? Going on a quest? Uncovering the truth behind a murder?

Stakes - What are the stakes of the “A” plot? What’s at risk if they fail to accomplish whatever they’re pursuing? It should be something that personally affects them or someone / something they care about. 

“B” Plot / Character - Who or what is the theme of the story? What character in your story is going to embody that theme and play a key role in helping the main character change?

Midpoint - what happens in the middle of the book to change the character’s direction. Usually it’s some bit of new information or they realize things are not as they seem. 

Stakes Raise - How do the stakes (what’s at risk if they fail) raise after the middle of the book? 

Character Arc - what does your character believe about the world in the beginning of the book that by the book’s end they will no longer believe? (An extension of this question is: what things can happen in this character’s life to facilitate them incrementally learning this big truth? If you don’t know this question right off, that’s okay. But this is a question you want to go back to every now and again, even after you finish the first draft, to ensure your character is actively involved in a plot that is resulting in their change.)

Failure - How will your character fail big? This happens at about the 75% point of the book and it's the final moment of failure, usually, before they pick themselves up off the ground (figuratively or literally) and learn the lesson they’ve needed to learn. There forward they act on their new belief to the end of the book, demonstrating how they’re changed. 

If you’d like a more in depth look at how to beat sheet a novel, I strongly suggest reading Jessica Brody’s Save The Cat Writes A Novel. 

3. Flesh out your beats into a detailed synopsis. 

Now the fun part! This step is the most helpful thing you can do to enable yourself to fast draft. 

Write a mini version of your story, also known as a detailed synopsis. The key to writing synopses is not to worry about the voice, but instead what happens. Try to convey what happens and its impact on the character to show how the story moves from tent pole moment to tent pole moment (per the step above). This takes some trial and error and you may get annoyed with yourself because it’s not as easy as it seems. But, I’ve seen that if you can write a compelling and cohesive synopsis, the draft that you execute will be far stronger and more efficiently executed. 

Definitely get beta feedback on your synopsis from writing friends you trust. It’s worth going over this a few times to get it right. In terms of length, aim for 3-4 pages for a middle grade novel and 5-10 pages for a young adult or adult novel. These are just general guidelines. My latest YA novel required a fifteen page synopsis and I am very glad I did it because it conveys the tone, arc, and plot of the novel and the main plot threads quite well, which allowed me to draft the first 23,000 words of the story in five days. 

4. Summarize each scene. 

(Note: a chapter can have more than one scene.)

Okay, we’re getting really close to writing! Now that you have a mini version of your story, consider how you will break it up into scenes. This doesn't need to be perfect, but spend some time figuring how to stretch your synopsis into a full novel. Give each scene a short summary. Aim for a few sentences, no more than a paragraph, just so you know what needs to happen in that scene (or scenes). Do not skip this step. I repeat, do not skip this step. This step allows you to sit down and execute the scene without figuring out what to write. The “figuring out” part is where a lot of writers slow down. Do that in the summaries so when it’s time to draft you are ready to execute, not sort out details. 

5. Write with a goal in mind.

Plan your writing days. I’m not talking anything extensive here. Just grab your phone calendar or a post-it note and write down which days you want to do which scenes. Then on writing day re-read that summary and execute it. If you’ve done all the pre-work the words will fly from your fingers. Don’t worry about grammar, typos, reading back what you did. Insert fillers such as, “TITLE” or “NAME” for details you haven’t worked out yet. Just get the scene that you’ve summarized out. The goal is to finish the draft. After that is when you make sure it all works together through revisions and fill in the details. Right now the goal is finishing the draft. It literally just needs to exist! 

If you’ve done all five steps, pat yourself on the back because congrats, you’re ready to fast draft! Don’t hesitate to tag me on socials if you try this method out and it works for you. I’d love to hear how it goes!

J.Elle is the New York Times bestselling author of Wings of Ebony. Elle has a Bachelor’s of journalism and an MA in educational administration and human development.  She grew up in Texas, but has lived all over, from coast to coast which she credits as inspiration for her writing. These days the former educator can be found mentoring aspiring authors, binging reality TV, loving on her three littles, or cooking up something true to her Louisiana roots.

Website: WingsOfEbony.com

Twitter: @AuthorJ_Elle

Instagram: @AuthorJ.Elle

TikTok: @authorjelle

[noonaishere]

@luvvvx lol, thank you. I’m glad you like it, it was very difficult considering my cat was assaulting me the whole time I was trying to put it together 🤣🤣 (Sort of like right now, lol)

(Putting a read more because this ended up being longer than I expected)

See it’s actually because I learned from trying - years ago - that I can’t write serially. Like, I can’t just sit down once a week and write a chapter of a fic and upload it and then go off and live the rest of my life and expect to sit down a week later and still have the same level of interest in the project; I still have an unfinished fic on my AO3 that is testament to this. I really envy people that can do that, because unless I ride that hyperfixation wave all the way up to the shore of Actually Finishing Something, it’s never going to get done. (Like, I was one of those students who waited until the last second to do anything because that’s the only time the deadline felt like it was real at all?? If that makes sense lol) This normally manifests in me doing some variation of a Nanowrimo-style thing working on something for a straight month until it’s done and I’m mildly burned out on it and can’t even look at it for a week after.

Basically, I wrote this for every Fri-Sun during May of this year (as I had work from Mon-Thu); then divided it into “parts” for upload (roughly based around scene changes or time jumps); made all the text screenshots (which was probably the worst part, my carpal tunnel was like “SURPRISE BITCH!” from all the typing on my phone and I was like “Dear GOD, no!!”); then I made this tumblr and premade the posts as drafts so they were all in number order and I could add the pictures and/or text after; added all the pictures and text once they were all done; figured out the dates that everything would have to update and then put them into a document (so I would never have to figure them out again because oh my god, that was tedious lol) and copy/pasted the dates into the schedule part of each post and scheduled them.

... then as it started uploading, I realized I needed to have a couple more scenes to make a few points a bit clearer (and I just finished the last one and still have to make a post lol)

So like, it was a lot of work in the behind the scenes sense, but now I get to kind of chill while it updates on its own and enjoy everyone’s reactions to it without the pressure of “Shit, I have to write this week’s thing.”

As for new stories...

I thought of maybe doing kind of a “choose your own adventure” (like a Twine or something) style fic with Ateez where you get to choose which member you have important moments of the story with and which one you end the story with, but that would require writing certain scenes 8 times and that’s..... a lot, lol. So idk about that one. (That might actually be easier if I had someone else to write it with lol)

I also have been having ideas for an original story that takes place in the kpop industry, but that’s not a fanfic, soooo...

I was also thinking of finishing the unfinished fic I mentioned, since I still have most of the original notes and maybe turning it into an enemies to lovers or something? It wasn’t kpop though lol

And then I also have like... four original things that I need to so something with. Like... a something that involves me getting paid for having written it lolol. Like, I’d love to find an artist and do them as webcomics, honestly.

But if you’re interested, I have some older fics on my AO3:

An oc/Deucalion (Teen Wolf) fic. My first one. I think there’s some formatting funkiness in there somewhere, but I might have fixed it? I literally can’t remember anymore. This has smut.

An oc/Loki (MCU) one. This has smut as well. One chapter is just 10k of almost all smut.

An oc/Malachi (Riverdale). This doesn’t have smut, but it’s also the unfinished one.

An oc/real person fic (Henry Cavill), which is only like 30k (smutless), and I wrote it because I wanted to try writing something with the structure of the first season of The Witcher (re: time jumps and that narrative circle).

Soooo, yeah. I tend to jump from fandom to fandom as I find interesting things or get bored of them lol.

I’m not totally sure what I’m going to work on next 🤣

[bardic-inspo]

Fic Writer Interview

Thank you for the tag @deacons-wig!! :)

Tagging in turn: @pchberrytea, @diredigression, @gingerbreton, @tanaleth, @valkyriejack if you’d like! No pressure if you don’t! Name: Megh

Fandoms: I really only write for Fallout, but casually partake in other fandoms (like Crit Role, Mass Effect, DA). 

Where you post: AO3, which you can find right here. I don’t post full fics on Tumblr, but do include links to them on AO3. Any WIP memes like WIP Wednesday or similar deals are posted on my Tumblr. 

Most Popular One-shot: No Rest For the Wicked - a sort of pining thing about Deacon showing up to MacCready and Natasha’s place after the fall of the Institute and some sleepy encounters putting Deacon in close proximity with the pair he’s maybe sort of secretly in like with. Overtures of future polyamory and all that. Your gateway drug into my favorite OT3.

Most Popular Multichap: Bring the Gasoline - my multichapter, in-progress slow-burn MacCready x Sole Survivor fic. Here’s a summary for you:

“Six months, huh? How much fast talking did you do to get here?” “Enough to keep me alive.”

“Really? Cause you don’t act like that’s your goal half the time. Hell, you throw yourself at everything like you’re jumping off a cliff.”

Sole survivor Natasha Sokolova is burning through friends faster than she can make them. Robert Joseph MacCready needs all the caps he can get. Problem is, the smooth-talking woman with a pistol and a job offer turns out to be more trouble than he’s counting on. They’re a match made in hell, but their little partnership might be the only thing that can see them through it.

Favorite story you’ve written so far: Bring the Gasoline is my baby, but so far I think I’ve had the most fun writing No Rest for the Wicked. It was the first thing I posted, nobody really knew I was working on it, and there were zero expectations about it. It was something I wrote purely because I wanted to and no other reason. It was also a huge sigh of relief for me to even hint at what the endgame of Bring the Gasoline is like because I’d been hermit drafting for a year while keeping my trap shut about most of what happens.

Fic you were nervous to post: All of them, every single one.  I was a bit nervous about In the Name of Love because it’s sort of an awkward situation. My goal was to balance the awkwardness with tenderness and show a sort of realistic moment where the OT3 have a little hiccup getting used to each other, but they’re helping each other through it. Not everybody’s cup of tea, but I do like how it turned out.

I was also super nervous about We Never Go Anywhere Nice because I’ve never done a gift fic before, and I was kind of trying to do a lot within one oneshot. Naturally, it turned out to be far longer than I initially envisioned, but I’m happy I tried my hand at it.

How do you choose your titles: Whatever strikes me. I try to do something thematic. For my BtG chapter titles, I try to play to themes or something a character says that sort of embodies the idea of that chapter. For my one shots, I’m okay going a little cheesier. 

Do you outline: Yes, I do, but I’m sort of ass backwards about it. I have three different outlines going on within each other like some sort of 3D chess operation. I have a pre-outline, which is the outline before I draft the chapter, usually broad or tentative plans with some specifics but not a ton. Then I have my working copy, which is literally in brackets within the document I’m typing the chapter in, and then I delete it out as I progress pass those plot points. And then, when I’m doing revisions, I bullet point every single little detail into a document called “Actual Outline”. I do this specifically in between drafts as a way for me to find plot holes and fill gaps, or see where things maybe need to be changed. Sounds a little backwards, I know, but it has really, really helped my editing process. There’s color-coding for who’s POV it is, and a scene-by-scene breakdown.

Complete: I have two complete one shots, and a third completed three-chapter “one shot”. But, the series those are nested in is ongoing and has no definitive end. It’s just sort of as I feel like it right now.

In progress: Bring the Gasoline is the only major fic I have in progress. I do one shots as they sprout in my brain, but I don’t have any in progress right now. My main focus is getting edited ahead one chapter on BtG so posting comes a little easier in the future.

Coming soon/not yet started: BtG chapter five is about halfway through a new draft, though I’ll want a new draft of chapter six before posting it. I’m making steady headway there. I have a very smutty WIP in mind for the OT3 with a special focus on Nat/Deacon. The prompt is that the two of them are spending a weekend away together, but MacCready has left some specific instructions as to how he wants them to spend some of that time. Like I said, it’s smutty, but I also want it to be sort of emotionally smutty. I wanted to write the OT3s first time together before writing any other smutty one shots for them, but realistically, I need to finish BtG before that could really happen, because spoilers, so it’s this domino effect waiting game. Which...makes me want to just go ahead and write the smutty one shot anyway. So, maybe. We’ll see. 👀 I also have another idea (also smutty) that might be a one-shot or a scene in a future fic. Basically, Nat and Mac and trying to have some intimacy but Deacon is staying with them which makes things tricky. So they seize the opportunity when he’s stepped out for a sec...but, maybe he’s not gone so long as they were thinking.

Prompts?: I sometimes use prompts as a springboard of inspiration, but I’ve found I’m no good with requests. I have a hard time writing something that I’m not personally excited about.

Upcoming work you’re most excited about: I am really excited about the Gunners plotline for Bring the Gasoline. It’s my first real foray into canon divergence, and the arc I finished for NaNoWriMo last year, so it’s sort of near and dear to me. And it’s right around the corner - not so far as readers might think!  👀 

This is so, so far away, but I also have tentative plans that are starting to have some framework for a multi-chapter fic on how the OT3 get together after Bring the Gasoline. I have a secret wish that this could be my NaNo project next year, but that would involve getting a lot done with BtG, so we’ll see.

[bexical]

April ‘21

Okay, monthly updates. I can do this.

I’m doing Camp NaNoWriMo this month! I mentioned last time that I wanted to do a rewite of Soul, and I decided to try to focus on that this month. I hear that finishing projects (as opposed to 1: getting distracted by side projects and 2: forever striving for ‘perfect’ as opposed to actually 'completed’) is an important skill to practice and develop, and I figured this was a good way to do so.

Of course, a little more than a week in and I don’t think I’m doing quite what I set out to do. I did work on it for a bit and make some good progress, but then I got distracted and returned to Fireflower for a bit (I’ve got a fun fight scene I’m working on - first fight scene I’ve actually sat down and written since I started taking MMA classes. The emotions in one particular scene in Raya and the Last Dragon have been perfect inspiration also). Then I picked up a draft of a poem I’d started some time ago - and while working on a stanza for that, I conceived a whole new poem. So much for practicing focus and finishing projects :P

That’s not entirely true though. I did actually finish that second poem (or a…sixish-th draft of it?) - if I’m feeling courageous, I’ll post that soon.

What else is new…

I’ve discovered how much I love writing on pen and paper, especially outside in the sunlight. It’s tricky - my body does a shit job at staying warm when I’m not moving so I get very cold sitting there, and when I’m out I don’t have wifi to stream music beyond what I’ve downloaded onto my phone - but it really is such a nice feeling. It’s not just that I’m more free of distraction (though that certainly helps) - there’s also the way scribbling the words feels that is… different, somehow from typing. (I don’t know the word to describe the difference. For some reason, my brain has descended upon the word 'vistruously’, which is of course not a real word. the word was VISCERALLY. figured it out the next day =P)

I’ve also been playing Disco Elysium - i.e. I played it with a friend, then decided to purchase it myself and play through it again in French to practice the language. It’s actually really great for practicing a language, since you can switch the text between two languages instantly, allowing you to compare the text easily. (Unfortunately, it doesn’t have Japanese, which I’d also love to practice with Disco Elysium. Alas.) One fun aspect is how the characters aren’t the most clean-mouthed, which means I get to see how people curse in French: I’ve learned the equivalent of 'fuck’, which is 'putain’ (transliterates to 'whore’) and sadly does not seem to partake in expletive infixation to the same extent as 'fuck’, if at all. The favorite French thing I’ve learned though is probably the translation of “Have you found anyone to be sweet to?”, which is “Avez-vous trouvé chaussure à votre pied?”, which in turn transliterates to “Have you found a shoe for your foot?”

Beyond the use it provides in language learning, I of course have thoughts about the game that I’ll hopefully write up and post here soon. One thought in particular is that it’s a really interesting way to tell a story. To briefly describe the game: it’s an RPG, playing a specific character (as opposed to a fairly generic blank slate). Your skills are customizable but are still personalized to the character: the best example is probably Inland Empire, a skill that reveals the inner workings of the character’s imaginations and fears. I really like how the skills interact with each other: while they are all a part of you, they’re separate parts of you and they argue with each other fairly often. Obviously, since they disagree on occasion, they can also be wrong on occasion: a fun lesson the game reminds you of is that succeeding a skill check does not always mean success in a more conventional sense.

So, in a return to the first topic of this post: I’ve thoroughly failed at not getting distracted with new projects by deciding I’d like to write my own game with similar concepts. Tentatively titled Dreamscape Fantasia (so while the game design may be a ripoff of DiscoE, the name is clearly a ripoff of Planescape Torment, a D&D game considered to be the spiritual predecessor to DiscoE =P), the game would focus on the exploration of the main character. DiscoE does of course explore the main character (that’s the whole point of personalizing the skill system to this character, after all), but DreamscapeF would do so more explicitly: as the title suggests, it would take place in the dreams of the main character, with events being far more abstract and with little to no extrinsic storyline.

I’ll likely develop it a bit then leave it alone for a while - I want to get the basics down while the idea’s fresh with inspiration from DiscoE, but then I want to focus on existing projects (hi Fireflower, I haven’t forgotten you). There’s also the question of feasibility… I’d ideally want to hire people for the art/music to fully deliver on the concept, which is of course technically doable - it just (significantly) ups the difficulty on a number of levels.

Nevertheless, it’s a fun project I’ve got going in my head. And that’s all for now - pce out til next time!

[clevercatchphrase]

Just some numbers and figures~

So! I finished my fan fiction, You Monster, this week, and it took me exactly 3 and a half years to write/edit/publish. This post at the time of writing, however, is being written a few days before the final chapter goes up, just examining  some numbers and trends around the wordcount and posting rate of my fan fic, because i’m obsessed with numbers and such, and i’m just trying to chew up time and keep myself occupied before the last chapter goes public. There’s literally no point to this post other than to marvel at how long this story is and how long it took me to get it out there, and reflect on what happened to me in The Real World during that time. Care to join me?

In Microsoft Word, this entire story is 609 pages and 209,235 words. The word count is slightly higher on AO3 (which I consider the definitive draft), partly because AO3 counts formatting tags as words for some reason, and because if I make little adjustments to the story, I’ll do it on AO3, but not on the original word file (or corresponding tumblr post for that matter) because I can’t be bothered to. 

According to AO3, I started this fic on January 3rd, 2016, smack dab in the middle of my winter break in my last year of college. I probably started writing it a few days before, maybe in december. I’m not really sure, but I’m kinda surprised I started it so early in the year, especially since I was writing by the seat of my pants for the first 14 chapters or so.

The following pictures highlight what days/months chapters were posted, according to AO3 (I personally think there might be a discrepancy or two due to timezones)

Chapter-wise, the first third of this story (Chapters 1 through 12) was written and posted in 2 months, and TWO THIRDS of the entire story (Chapters 1 through 25 (rounding up)) were written in the first YEAR.

Wordcount-wise, HALF the story (roughly 100k words) was written in one year.

There was a dramatic drop in productivity at the middle/end of 2016 due to Real World Stress, mostly me graduating & getting a job, the presidential elections, and learning a family member was starting to have kidney failure.

God, 2017 was a bad year for me, productivity-wise. In early June I lost said family member due to their kidney failure, and was completely unmotivated to work on You Monster for the rest of the year. I remember forcing myself to write for NaNoWriMo that year, and it helped snap me out of my funk, but I didn’t like how the writing came out and kept pushing off revising and editing the drafts for several weeks. I also remember getting really sick on christmas eve/day with a terrible flu, which made me unable to post the next chapter until January.

I actually felt a lot better mentally and emotionally in 2018. I WOULD have written more in early 2018, but that was also when the Hiveswap Comic Contest started, and lasted for 3 straight months with me doing nothing more than drawing comics for 12 consecutive weeks. Then, after that was over, I started thinking/planning more seriously about writing ANOTHER story, which later became Ghost Switch, and I offically started that halfway through 2018. I originally thought about making Ghost Switch a written work, but it was basically going to be another re-telling of Undertale, which was what I was doing with You Monster anyway, and I didn’t want to write all of that out again, so I decided to make it a comic instead. It was a great decision for me art-wise, because now I’m improving my art skills through weekly comic pages, but it was also a terrible decision art-wise because now I GOTTA KEEP DRAWING POSES AND BACKGROUNDS AND DRAWING PEOPLE IS HARD. 

Back to the point- I forced myself to write this fic again for NaNoWriMo that year, and was terribly upset that I still didn’t finish. But this time, I forced myself to revise and edit my writing until it became something I could tolerate, and posted the next chapter in January (again, but this time because my writing needed far more revisions than last year’s nano draft) 

Getting back into revising and editing DID seriously help me get back in the groove of Wanting To Write, but it was a little trickier now that I was also drawing a comic, and it was hard to manage my time between the two, because when I write, I do it for great stretches at a time. I mean, like, 4 or 5 hours straight of writing. Same goes for comic making, too. sketching the pages can take me two hours, and cleaning/inking/coloring them can take me anywhere from 4 to 6 hours.

Hm. If I included the other fics I wrote during this time, I get the feeling these calendars would look a lot more active and colorful. Maybe i’ll do that for myself later, so I can see how much I posted in 3 years.

This year, I was absolutely determined to finish this story, even if it killed me. I was still struggling to manage my time between writing and art, mostly dedicating a few weeks to make a buffer of comic pages so I could have a couple of weeks dedicated to writing. It was time consuming, and I felt bad when I worked on one but not the other, but I finally got my breakthrough in May, when I had to take multiple trips to an automotive shop for several different car repairs. Instead of just leaving my car there and going home, I brought my writing spirals with me and just wrote and wrote and didn’t stop writing while I waited in their loby. I finally finished the rough drafts of my story after being stuck for 4 hours in a Pepboys, and spent two more full days typing it out. Then, I rested for a week, and spent 3 more revising and editing the remaining bits. I was hoping to get the whole thing done and posted before July ended, but that did not end up being the case. For me, when we finally get to August, we have entered “the end of the year”. Ah, well. Even though I didn’t get the story completely posted before August, I can still take pride in knowing I finished it before the year was half way over~!

NOW FOR SOME NUMBERS!

I personally divide this story into 5 arcs, Ruins, Snowdin, Waterfall, Hotland, and New Home And Beyond (Which is basically anything that can happen after you unlock the true lab in-game)

Ruins

The Ruins arc I consider everything in chapters 1 thorugh 12. It is simultainiously the longest arc (chapter-wise, with 12 chapters which as mentioned earlier, is 1/3rd of the story) and also the shortest arc, only taking up 24k words (Which is an 8th of the entire story, or roughly 12.5%).It was also the quickest writen arc, as it was primarily prologue/first act material. Pretty much all of it was written in that first January. It’s 80 pages long, or 13% of all pages

Snowdin

The snowdin arc (chapters 13 to 22) is just under 25% of the entire story, coming in at 49 thousand words (on the nose!) It is the second longest arc in both word count and in number of Chapters (10, to be exact~) It took me roughly 4.5 months to write this arc. We also spend the most physical in-story time in Snowdin. Almost 3 full days, which is half of the story’s timeline (not counting the 7-8 years in the Ruins. That was all set-up) It’s 172 pages long, or 28% of all pages.

Waterfall

The Waterfall arc (Chapters 23 to 28) is the longest arc wordcount-wise, making up another 25% of the story, coming in at 53.6 thousand words, and dead center when it comes to the number of chapters it makes up (which is 6). Looking at this now, litterally half this story takes place in Snowdin and Waterfall. Roughly one full day is spent in waterfall, from noon of the first day, to roughly late morning of the second. This arc took me 11 months to write/post, and if you read the notes for these corrisponding chapters, you can tell I was not having a good time during it. It’s 178 pages long, or 29% of all pages.

Hotland

The Hotland arc, (chapters 29 to 32) Is the shortest arc chapter-wise, with only 4 (10% of all chapters), and second shortest arc wordcount-wise, coming in at 36 thousand words, or about 18% of the story. It’s also the shortest in-story arc time-wise, seeing as you only spend about half a day here. I did not like writing the hotland arc! Mostly in part because Hotland is my least favorite region in the game. Chapter 32 is probably my least favorite out of all of what I’ve written. It was difficult figuring out what to do with Alphys and Mettaton, seeing as their interactions with you in game heavily focus on you and your human-ness. I am quite glad that each chapter was pretty neatly divided by in-game floors. It was a good way to know where a chapter could end and when I could give the characters some breathing room. It took me over a year to complete the Hotland arc, and most of that time was because I didn’t want to revise and edit what I wrote. It’s 123 pages long, or 20% of all pages.

New Home and Beyond

I don’t consider the True Lab part of Hotland because of in-game story reasons. You can’t access it until you’ve gone to New Home at least once, and once you enter it, you cant leave until you finish it, which, again, takes you to new home. Honestly, once you get to the true lab, you’ve won the game. There is no way to ruin your pacifist playthrough once you get to the lab, and while the amalgamates may kill you, you can’t “lose” once you get this far. That’s why I consider Chapter 33 the start of the New Home arc even though in my story we haven’t seen new home yet (mostly because there are no saves or resets in this story, so we kinda couldn’t have gone there first).

The New Home arc is the second shortest chapter-wise, making up the last 5 chapters (13% of all of them), and is dead-center when it comes to word count, finishing with 46.5 thousand words, or roughly the last 25%. I was actually really excited to write everything from chapter 34 to 36 after having been fantisizing about it in my head for the last two years. I gotta be honest, the end of chapter 37 gave me some trouble. I was still making edits up to a few days before it went public, but I think I got the feelings I wanted across~ It’s 161 pages long, or 26% of all pages.

Extra???

I started keeping a word file for bits of dialogue and scenes that I originally wrote in my spiral, but ultimately cut for one reason or another. Mostly these are just sentences and snippets that sounded redundant, ooc, or were just an alternate dialouge I decided not to use. I didn’t start doing this until chapter 28, according to my files, but according to the masterfile, there were 6.4 thousand words I ended up not using. 

There are, in fact, several bullet points I had originally planned and ended up not using, such as Sans ASKING Undyne to keep an eye on the kid while they were in waterfall, which sounded hypocritical after I wrote him coming to peace with them, as well as having Asgore tuoring the Underground that week, and thus Sans, Papyrus, Undyne and Alphys having to hide Frisk from him once they become friends. (the painkillers Alphys also gave frisk were actually supposed to induce drowsiness in Frisk, making them fall asleep so Alphys could keep them from going to New Home, but this was a point I dropped at the absolute last minute, and you can tell if you re-read chapter 29, because it’s hinted at, but the painkillers are never mentioned again. I figured that plot point was a little too dark for Alphys’ character)

Fun Fact: the zalgo text in Chapter 27 DOES actually have dialouge in it, if you know what to look for. Only one person has asked about it, but no one has yet to decifer it.

AT A GLANCE:

ARC LENGTHS (CHAPTER WISE) SHORTEST TO LONGEST

Hotland (4 Chapters)

New Home and Beyond (5 Chapters)

Waterfall (6 Chapters)

Snowdin (10 Chapters)

Ruins (12 Chapters)

ARC LENGTHS (WORDCOUNT WISE) SHORTEST TO LONGEST

Ruins (24k)

Hotland (36k)

New Home and Beyond (46.5k)

Snowdin (48k)

Waterfall (53.6k)

ARC LENGTHS (PAGE COUNT) SHORTEST TO LONGEST

(Same order as above)

TIME TAKEN TO WRITE/PUBLISH, SHORTEST TO LONGEST

Ruins (1 month)

Snowdin (4.5 months)

New Home and Beyond (~6 months)

Waterfall (11 months)

Hotland (>1 Year)

Other Numbers For Some Reason

Chapters 1 through 19 make up the 1st 50k words (this when Frisk falls into the underground, up to Sans attacking them in the kitchen) 19 chapters

Chapters 20 through 26 make up the 2nd 50k words (when Frisk decides to seek asgore’s help, to when Undyne cuts the bridge) 7 chapters

Chapters 27 through 31 make up the 3rd 50k words (when Frisk dislocates their shoulder to Flowey killing the messenger spider) 5 chapters

Chapters 32 through 37 make up the 4th 50k words (When Mettaton decides to change the programming, to Frisk’s final choice) 6 chapters

Only 5 chapters exceed 10k words, they are chapters 22, 27, 28, 33 and 36

Here’s a visual representation of all the chapters and their word counts in relation to one another. I was so startled by the spikes of chapter 22 and 28 that I had to go back and skim the chapters to remind myself what went down in them and why they were so long. Chapter 22 is papyrus trying to keep the human in snowdin while sans runs some errands, and then the human discovering the skelebro’s deceit. Chapter 28 is the human realizing Undyne tried to murder them, and then escaping from waterfall. I distinctly remembering saying I could have split chapter 28, but I was so tired of writing waterfall that I refused to do so because I just wanted it to end already.

I find it absolutely hilarious how consistant my word count was until chapter 20 (chapter 15 is an outliar), and then everything went off the rails.

Here’s a graph of the total word count, shown to you NaNoWriMo style~ (I spent way too long in excel making both of these charts, please validate me) 

The climb definitely looks a lot less drastic here, as it is always building on itself, but if you look closely, you can see one or two inflection points, roughly around chapter 20 and 28.

FINAL THOUGHTS

I’m so glad to finally be done with this story. It’s certainly deviated from what I originally planned, but I think all the changes are for the better. Now I can think about writing other things, like the PTA!AU shorts I’ve been meaning to do. It was fun and it was challenging, and this is literally the longest thing I’ve ever written in my life. Will I ever make a story this long again? Maybe?? If I ever encounter another game with as much character and worldbuilding as Undertale that also just hits me in the feels the same way, I might, but for now I’m going to focus on other projects (most of them still undertale related, but shut up)

Got any questions, comments, concerns for my fic? I’m so glad it’s done, now, and I’d be happy to talk about my thoughts behind it~

[siarven]

11/11/11 tag

Thanks @pheita​ for tagging me! :)

1. What is your favourite genre to write? Fantasy, because you can put almost all other genres in it but also dragons ;D

2. Who is your favourite OC and why? How can you ask me that?? How the hell should I know? :’D Probably Ava or Kiyera from As Dreams Collide? I have no idea. Maybe Onii or Timbre or Selandri from LDOO! I love all my children so much for so many different reasons?!

3. Who is your least favourite OC and why? .... uhh..... I find all my Ellariel characters really hard to write because they’re so inhuman. It’s especially hard with Mikaen because we get so close to him and his thoughtprocess... so from a hard-to-write point... maybe them. 

From a purely "I despise them” point of view, it’s 1) Rheon, who’s from Feuervogel, my first ever “proper” wip (to be continued when I’m better at writing...). He’s a minor city lord and has sympathetic motivations (saving his people from starvation, ...) but the ways he goes about solving these problems and the way he changes throughout the story are ... not good. :’D Also Kardim from the same wip (but I can’t say anything more about him because it’s all spoilers). He’s pretty horrible. And Luzire from As Dreams Collide. And...

Basically I have a few antagonists that I really don’t like as people :P

4. Do you ever find yourself self-inserting in your writing? I think every character is a tiny piece of me because how else am I supposed to bring them to life? :) Some are just a bit more “me” and others a bit less. :)

5. Are you hoping to publish your work? If so will you submit your work or self-publish? Hm, I haven’t really thought about it yet because the first step is to create a finished story that can be published XD So I’ve decided to tackle that issue when I get there. But right now I think I might go the traditional way because I don’t have enough experience with self-publishing (and don’t really think I’ll be that good at the business side of that). Maybe I’ll change my mind when I actually get there, though :) 

6. What is your favourite book and why? I have faaaar too many favourite AUTHORS, let alone BOOKS xD 

But I did manage to meet Brandon Sanderson yesterday and I’m still reeling with that so I’ll say Oathbringer, book 3 of Stormlight Archive (which is phenomenal) because I cried in public transport at 11PM surrounded by strangers who all stared at me, but I didn’t care at all because I was in SO DEEP and cared so much. He’s the reason why I fell in love with creating amazing worlds and magic systems, and I care about soo many of his characters SO MUCH and just. The plots are amazing, too?? His books are literally everything I want. AND HE’S SO AWESOME IN PERSON TOO???? Still Shooketh. 

Thank you @random-stuff-thrown-into-a-pot​ for bringing it to my attention that he was in Berlin yesterday :’))) <333 (and getting my book signed when I didn’t know if I could make it in time ;W;)

7. Do you set yourself goals in your writing? If so what is your current goal? Hm, I work really well with nanowrimo goals because the NEED to have a pretty statistic is enough to force me into aggressive productivity. That helps especially well during November, a bit less so during April and July. Apart from that I don’t really have word goals because quantity isn’t really a problem for me, more the fact that I have to be happy with what I make because otherwise I’ll just rewrite it from scratch instead of editing XD so the nanowrimo mindset is actually not all that helpful for me, apart from writing the very first draft... up to a certain point. XD

8. Do you like to handwrite your drafts or type them up? My hands will die if I handwrite them so I type actual scenes etc. Also, my hands are far too slow XD. I like plotting on paper, though. Especially when it’s larger than A3 and I have a lot of space to just let my mind wander :)

9. What do you think is the hardest thing about being a writer? Not moving on to the next project when I get a new shiny idea... also not rewriting a chapter again.. and again .... and again.... :’D

And not being discouraged when nobody else seems to care! There are people out there who love exactly what you do. You just have to hang on long enough to find them :) ... even if it’s hard. 

10. Do you plan out your projects or just start writing? First draft is usually me having a series of ideas and knowing the beginning, end, and a few things in between. (That’s also usually the beginning of NaNo). So then I write and discover things and characters along the way, until I get roughly to day 15 of NaNo, when I sit down and make a rough outline. It’s still very general, just story-beats, but then I have a better idea of where I’m going and already know the characters a bit (So I can see if things might work or not) :) So then I write draft 1, which is mostly me telling the story to myself, and tweaking the outline if I have to. Especially near the end, when characters have changed over the course of the story and the plotted ending wouldn’t fit them anymore :)

So I’m somewhere between plotting and pantsing, where I plot the general course of the story but am more of a pantser when it comes to characters :) And also always have enough room to change things around when I have better ideas along the way!

...At least in theory xD. As Dreams Collide (ADC) is the only thing that’s ever come this far (I’m still re-plotting draft 3) and it’s had MAJOR changes (and turned into a trilogy... sigh) so I can’t really say that it’s been all that structured. But most of the process above is how I’ll continue working for Like Dragons Of Old (LDOO), for which it worked really well this far :)

Slowly but surely I’m getting the hang of this, I think!

11. Do you like to stick to one project or have multiple ones at once? I have all in all 8 wips that I all want to finish one day. (with possible spin-offs that like to show up.. sigh) Out of all of these, I started LDOO lsat november, and I’ve been working on ADC on and off since november 2014. 

I only work on one thing at a time but LDOO isn’t quite as much on hold as the others, and it’s also the one I’ll go back to when I’ve gotten ADC to the point where I can let it wait a while :D (So when I’ve written draft 3, I guess)

tagging: @corishadowfang @lynnafred @asttralhell @raiswanson @paper-shield-and-wooden-sword @random-stuff-thrown-into-a-pot @fatal-blow @wilde-writing @kittensartsbooks @romenna @cirianne if you want to <3 

I think I was tagged for this multiple times last month (or before that?!) but I’m really bad at doing all of these so heyyy I did it now! XD

[ecritetmort]

questions for the author (attwdc)

Saw @loopyhoopydrabbles​ do this for their neat WIP (The Intercession of Godliness and Humanity, which sounds amazing and I’ll rb a post about it in a bit because the idea and characters are cool af)

1. Who has the darker backstory, your protagonist or your antagonist?

Antagonist (Triste) for sure. I think the only one who could get close, out of the entire cast, would be Diana, but even then, not quite.

2. What creeps out your main character?

Karyn is very much a know-all-the-details kind of person, so anything that is a mystery and left to guesswork is a source of anxiety. Also, being watched.

3. How long have you been working on your latest WIP?

ATTWDC’s first draft was written for the July Camp NaNoWriMo of 2013. I wrote the first draft then, the second draft for November 2013 (and then threw it into a dumpster fire after passing 50k because it was, bad), the third draft the following spring (2014), and then decided to take a hard break. I finally returned around October-November of 2015 to do a Gem AU (on this blog, actually), and then plotted out the fourth draft a couple months later in 2016. The fifth draft, with a few worldbuilding-affecting-plot changes, began out of an au from early 2017 that I nicknamed the “power au”, and I began writing in late June 2017.

I’m being thorough with this answer because there’s a very strong difference between each of the drafts, and ATTWDC in its current form is much younger than the WIP overall.

4. Which character is most like you and why?

Difficult to assess. In their canon forms, I think Karyn and I are the most similar (sarcastic, gay and oblivious, conflicted emotions, flirts but can’t handle being flirted with, just want to live our goddamn lives).

At the same time, I think that if they were all to be stuck in a human AU (like the college jh au), I would be the closest to Triste (band gay, Politically Pissed 24/7, book nerd, 50% edgy 50% just likes the aesthetic, disillusioned with theological upbringing, Weak for powerful women).

5. What genre is your latest WIP?

ATTWDC is YA magical realism.

6. What’s your main character’s idea of a perfect date?

The entire (applicable) cast has answered this (in character) in this ask.

7. If your main character was an animal, what would it be and why?

as a huge HDM and daemonology nerd, I can do you one better:

Karyn’s daemon is Susichiyan, unsettled but preferring songbirds or other small birds (robins, larks, swallows, etc). The why would be since Karyn is generally unassuming or seen as a threat, but when flight is no longer an option, she definitely has the ability to put up a fight.

Name: Susichiyan (pronounced -yān)

Animal: Unsettled (M) (usually some type of songbird)

Personality: Generally fluttering around Karyn’s head, Susichiyan often tries to keep Karyn more cautious and aware of her surroundings. Although he’ll occasionally take on the form of a fluffy mammal or threatening animal as necessary, usually he takes on a very mobile and small form, trying to act as an extra pair of eyes or ears. Less trusting of other people (and daemons), he rarely interacts with other daemons unless to try and distract or harm them.

also because death is a fox and younger me was big on animal imagery

8. What books/films/songs have influenced your WIP, if any?

His Dark Materials (book trilogy) was a large inspiration (especially evident if you read the first draft). Since my mother pushed a lot of her anti-theist beliefs unto me, the idea of killing God was very much in my vogue at the crisp age of 11/12 and while motives and the world of ATTWDC diverged and has continued to diverge, you can uh. see. yes. where Triste originated.

the entireties of Sara Bareilles’ Kaleidoscope Heart and Little Voice albums were basically the music to which most of Karyn’s and Oscar’s characters appeared, along with a generous helping of Marianas Trench’s Ever After album.

on that note, SB’s The Blessed Unrest and What’s Inside have sat with me through later drafts (as the albums have been released, lol), and those have been equally formative in in that they’ve helped modify and solidify changes.

I also have the Book Thief to thank for being formative in my writing as a whole.

9. What annoying writing habit do you have? (ie, too many commas, too many looong sentences etc).

I’ve been informed by a wide variety of sources that my sentences are, on the whole, too long, and I will admit to an abuse of semicolons and commas which make ever-longer my phrases in all types of writing.

10. Describe your WIP in one sentence.

Karyn thinks she’s a normal Asian-American teen, and everyone disagrees.

(or, to be less facetious:)

Karyn Lee just wants to live her normal life with her two normal parents and her best friend, but Life, Death, and a revolutionary king think otherwise.

Tagging: @goforwardgreenwriter, @plsfeedthewriter, @damawrites, @jmlascar

[scriptmedic]

How to Prep for NaNoWriMo

(Or, How I Wrote 30,000 Words in 4 Days to Finish a Novel)

Hey there Scriptaccinos! Welcome back to Aunt Scripty’s House of Mayhem, where we’re getting ready for pumpkin lattes, candy corn, and NaNoWriMo! 

People have asked me more than twice about how I manage to be so productive. I work a full-time healthcare job, and yet, in the last year, I’ve created (85+%) or curated (~15%) over 2,000 blog posts, published 3 books, and written at least 200,000 words of personal writing.

I’m not a superhuman. Actually I’m pretty average. And I’ve set myself an enormous personal challenge — write a trilogy of fiction before the end of 2017. While blogging. And helping you all with NaNo.

On the most recent note, I came into October with 18,000 words of a novel written. I wrote the last 30,000 words and finished the project in four days, while answering bucketloads of blog questions (the last 10 days worth of content was also written in that timeframe), contending with a mild fever, and Life Stuff.  Oh–and I’m about 14,000 words into Book 2 already.

I have been accused of being a machine. I assure you that beep boop boo–

….uh oh. Who found my secret pictures?!

And yet the number 1 request from my readers is the desire that I clone myself. If only I were Tatiana Maslany…

You don’t have to do all the things I’ve been doing to hit those levels of productivity. But a lot of you are doing NaNoWriMo, and I want to give you some advice for how to Get It The F*** Done, Mate.

I’m also going to give you the techniques I use and some of the books that I’ve read that are helping me along the way. I’m constantly striving to improve how much work I get done with the same measly 24 hours as anyone else.

Defend Your Time

Everything demands your attention. Work does. Your cuddlemate(s) do(es). Your TV calls to you. YouTube beckons with lures of dancing cats. Tumblr will eat your soul if you allow it to. 

…establish a writing time. Get up an hour early. Stay up an hour late. Do it on your lunch. Whatever it is, establish a time and defend it. Tell your honey “This is my writing time. This is important to me. I need it.” Sacrifice some TV time. Writing Time is sacred. If you use headphones, put a Post-It on your headphones that say “Writing. Please Do Not Disturb.” (Yes, it’s dorky, but it will work.)

If you need to be in a different physical space to write, go there.

You also have to defend your time from yourself, more than anything. Set an alarm on your phone: This Is Writing Time.  Turn off your internet. Silence your phone. And, once you’ve started writing, put it in another room — or at least out of your sight.

You’ll need about an hour and a half every day for this. Ninety minutes. If you can work for 90 minutes a day, six days a week, you can write this novel in a month. (I actually recommend seven days so you don’t lose momentum.)

If your day is jam-packed, decide what’s truly necessary, and what can be smooshed out of the way to make room for your writing time.

Techniques: The Pomodoro

By far, writing in sprints is the number one way to get your stories done. But word sprints are an art form. They need to be done in a special way.

The point of a word sprint is this: For 25 minutes, you will do nothing but write. Phone Off. Butt in chair. Hands on keys. Write.

The best way to do this is to set a timer on your phone for 25 minutes. (If your phone lets you set up multiple ones, like mine does, set another for 5 minutes; you’ll use this when you’re done with your Pomodoro to take a break.) Don’t listen to music that has words. If you can, I actually recommend putting your phone in another room so that you have to get up to make the beeping go away.

For those 25 minutes, you can do nothing  but write.

When you’re done, I want you to tally up the number of words you’ve written. (I just make a note in Notepad or StickyNotes on Windows with: Starting Wordcount, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. Track how many words you write in each Pomodoro. (It takes about 4 seconds with a Calculator app.)

NaNoWriMo means writing 50,000 words in 30 days, which is scary. But a smaller target is 1667 words in a day. Still daunting? That’s fine. Do 3 Pomodoros with a target of 650 words per 25 minutes. That’s 26 words in a minute, and it will take you an hour and a half to do three of them. (If you can, I highly recommend 4 — I find the 4th Pomodoro is where I start to hit my stride.)

For productivity stuff, I recommend [5,000 Words per Hour] by Chris Fox; you can get this book for free from [his Web site].

Make It A Game.

Humans love games. Our brains think they’re better than crack. Seriously, Mrs Scripty has been playing hours of Bejeweld Blitz lately.

So make your word count a game. How many words did you do in your last sprint? Let’s top it! What’s your strongest day in the month? Top it! Push yourself to write more and write faster. You’ll get more into the zone and sooner than you think you’ll be blinking and going “Wait… did I just win NaNoWriMo?”

Know What You’re Going to Write (Before You Write It)

This is so important. I cannot even begin to tell you how much this helps. If you want to write quickly, this is how you do it. You plan to write, and then you write the plan.

Whoah! you say. Outlining?! you say. I’m a pantser, like my aged grandmother before me! We don’t need no stinkin’ outlines! 

You might not need them. But they help. Especially in a project like NaNoWriMo, or mine (12 Weeks to a Trilogy), knowing where you’re going will help you decide what matters and what has to get written.

I recommend [Take Off Your Pants!] by Libbie Hawker, [Outlining Your Novel] (and the Workbook) by K M Weiland, and [Save the Cat!] by Blake Snyder.

If you plan nothing else about your book, I want you to plan three things:

The Inciting Incident

The Midpoint

The Climax

Do not skip the Midpoint. It will help you. I swears it. (The Midpoint is a big change that causes your character to take things seriously; it’s the big Shit Hits The Fan moment of the middle of the story. It’s a huge false victory or false defeat.) Then all you need to do is get to the next big scene: Write from the “hook” to the Inciting Incident, from the Inciting Incident to the Midpoint, the Midpoint to the Climax, and resolve all the little things after. That’s it. Four easy phases.

A Basic Scene Structure Helps. Really.

A scene is a product of six components:

A Goal — what your hero wants

Some Obstacles — what gets in the way

A Disaster — something catastrophic happens that prevents them from getting their goal (or lets them get what they thought they wanted — for an enormous price)

The character’s Reaction — how they feel about it

A Dilemma — what do we do now after that Disaster?

A Decision — a plan for how to proceed.

That’s it. And the easiest, most helpful thing you can do before writing a scene is give just one sentence to an outline of what you want. Six sentences will get you so far in knowing where you need to take your scene.

Let Yourself Write Shit

First drafts are made to be awful. All of writing is rewriting. You won’t write a good first draft in a month. But guess what? All a first draft has to do to be perfect is exist.

Small Tricks That Really Help:

Research Before or After, Not While, You Write. You don’t have to know everything in the moment. If you need to research something — a gun type, a character’s favorite car, whatever — just [put it in brackets]. You can come back and work on those later.

TK will TKO Your Interruptions. The letters TK are an editor’s mark for To Come. Like brackets, they are magical. Not sure what to name the whizbang gizmo? “Stop or I’ll destroy you with my [gizmo TK].” And move on.

Eat the Elephant Bite By Bite. You’re not writing a novel and you don’t have to write 50,000 words this month. You’re writing one scene, and you’re trying to write 800 words this Pomodoro. That’s it. Miss your 800? Hit it next time.

Take Walks. Your 5-minute breaks between 25-minute Pomodoros? Use those to physically get up and walk around. Don’t stare at the Internet. Go up and down some stairs or go stare at the sunset. Get away from screens.

Leave Tags. When you stop writing, stop in the middle of

a sentence. It makes it so much easier to pick up momentum when you sit down again.

Watch The Movie and Write It Down. It can really help to just picture your scene in your head like a movie, again, before you write. (You can watch it on Fast Forward.) When you sit down to write, just write what you see.

Defend Your Space. Make your own little world. Put in headphones or earbuds and listen to music. I try to either use something appropriate and ambient (like wooden ship sounds for a pirate story) or music set up to be productive (like this upbeat productivity mix).

BONUS!

For all your Scrivener users out there, I made an outlining Scrivener doc!

It has:

A Foolscap outline (to help you with global structure)

Integrated Save the Cat! beat sheet cards (to help you figure out where things belong) with word count targets for 60k, 80k, and 100k projects

Obligatory Scene lists for Thrillers, Redemption stories, and Love stories

Scene cards which include the six-phase scene structure up above.

It’s what I’m using to write the novel I’m currently on, and I think it will help you out. [Here’s where you can download it.]

Also, the structural cards are separate from the Manuscript for the document so that you don’t wind up with random things in your exported ebook/docx/whatever.

[Download It Here]

xoxo, Aunt Scripty

[10 BS Medical Tropes that Need to Die Today]

[Maim Your Characters: How Injuries Work in Fiction]

[Blood on the Page Volume One: A Writer’s Compendium of Injuries]

How to Prep for NaNoWriMo was originally published on ScriptMedicBlog.com

[emmalwrites]

Why I avoid National Novel Writing Month, Reason 1

National Novel Writing Month (NaN|oWriMo) is a pretty cool idea: each November, writers attempt to complete the first draft of a novel within a four-week timeframe. The apprehensive or reluctant get the kickstart they need to begin; the unproductive commit to a daily word count. Dreams of publication and success bloom anew. NaNoWriMo provides a community for isolated writers, especially now that in-person writing clubs have had to disband. I love that it gives people the motivation to start the scary, complex, frustrating business of novel writing, and I admire those who plunge into the project year after year. But I would never do NaNoWriMo myself. As described in previous posts, the journey of my current novel-in-progress (or NIP, as I prefer to call it) has taken several years. I was barely fourteen when I began, barely a person, though I'd have been deeply offended at the time if anyone had suggested this. At twenty I began draft two, but progressing at any speed was impossible because of the joint problem I'd developed. My wrists ached whenever I spent more than ten minutes typing, chopping vegetables, or many other basic task that my friends seemed to manage in seconds. For seven years every doctor I saw had a different idea about what was wrong, and no exercise or therapy worked. I got my diagnosis - De Quervain's Syndrome - in October of this year. Treatment begins soon (hurrah!) but I have no idea how long the recovery process will be. I continue to wait, and budget my "hand tasks" carefully. Sewing, knitting, art, writing - these are indulgences I can't always afford.

It's true that technology exists to help people with conditions like mine. However, only the mediocre ones are affordable, and faulty programs cause delays of their own. Take a look at this excerpt, which was written with my dictation software: "Broga is lagging behind the Tav now in terms of development. I can decide on his objective – though of course, neither can he escalation point Broga doesn't know what he wants to do. However, is the latest know what drives him.​" And this is how it was supposed to read: "Broga is lagging behind Tav now in terms of development. I can't decide on his objective – though of course, neither can he! Broga doesn't know what he wants to do. However, I still need to know what drives him.​" The NIP can only progress slowly, whether by hand or by dictation. I don't write at a profitable pace. If you're capable of launching into NaNoWriMo at 1500 words a day, great! Just remember that we don't all have that privilege.

[katranga]

Part 1: The Miracle of Revision

Same disclaimer applies: Fic is for fun, and these tips are just suggestions!

Intro: Yes, you can write words!

Hello, I am back with more writing tips! This time I’m covering Motivation: AKA Can’t The Words Just Put Themselves On The Page? (As well as a detour into scene building, because that’s always helpful).

So! Stories need to be told. They aren’t going to appear out of nowhere, they need you to be seen and enjoyed by the masses!

So, just in time for NaNoWriMo, I figured I’d share my tips for actually writing the darn thing. I’ve never participated in NaNoWriMo, but I did write a 40k novella in a month once, and that’s aaaalmost the same lol. Anyway, for that I was kicking out about 2k a day, which is a LOT, and not what my usual word count per day just fyi. But that experience did convince me that I was fully capable of writing that much in a day—as long as I knew where I was going with the story, and just. didn’t. stop.

Don’t Stop Writing

That’s my main secret. Just don’t stop writing! Obviously you don’t have to write an epic in one sitting, but set a goal, and stick to it. Whether that be 100 words a day, or a 1,000. Don’t like going by word count? Set a timer. Write without stopping for 10 minutes. Or write one page a day. Anything is better than nothing!

Honestly, there are some days where all my “writing” is just—write a sentence, scroll through tumblr for 20 minutes, remember I’m supposed to be writing and get out a few more paragraphs, head back to tumblr to reward myself, rinse and repeat the whole day. On those days I’m shocked I ever get anything done.

But that’s the thing. Anything is better than nothing! 100 words a day is going to be a finished product eventually! Writing nothing will get you nothing.

It Doesn’t Have to Be Good

Now of course there’s the question: Cool, but how is setting a timer gonna help me?

Because you have to write. Take off your critique glasses and put on those author lenses! Don’t worry if it sounds good or not! First drafts are not about being good. It’s about starting.

Better writers than me have said editing it like sculpting, so the first draft is you getting together a huge hunk of clay that you can carve away and pick at later to make something beautiful. But you can’t carve air! And readers can’t read what you haven’t written. Try to keep that in mind.

So, so far we’ve got: set a goal, don’t worry about it being good.

Have a Map

To write without stopping for ten minutes, we need to know where we’re going, right?

Have a plan. That 40k novella was the most planned-out thing I’ve ever written. And sure, it changed a lot while I was writing, but I had a beginning, middle and end set out for the characters. I had settings, I had plot points, I had characters in mind (and for fics, a lot of these things are already there for you!)

Know where you’re going. Have a vague plan. Preferably more nailed down than ‘they fell in love’ because uhhh that’s almost every fic.

Some questions to think of beforehand:

How are they going to fall in love?

When are they going to realize it?

How will they react? (To their own realization and/or the other’s confession)

What are they going to do about it?

Why are they falling in love?

That’s a good one for motivation—I know we all think our OTP should be together, but why should your specific iteration of the characters fall in love? I like being convinced!! And it makes for a stronger story.

Of course you don’t have to have it written down (unless you want to!), but if there are a lot of little details, or fun dialogue exchanges you don’t wanna forget, you can definitely jot those down, and then write towards those moments.

To help plan out a fic, I recommend Max Kirin’s How to Plan a Novel video. Now, you may not need to plan out a fic, but if you’re having trouble with inspiration (which admittedly, I rarely do anymore—I’ve just got too many damn ideas) this could help, because it starts from the ground up. Honestly, I love anything by Max, so if you’re gonna spend your time not-writing, you may as well be watching their writing videos!

And if you don’t know exactly how the whole thing is going to end, that’s fine. At LEAST have an end goal in mind for the scene/chapter you’re writing. Every scene you write should have a point. It should move the story forward (or just be cute fluff, this is fic we’re talking about).

But if the fic is about them falling in love/realizing their feelings etc, each scene should getting them closer to that moment where they confess their true feelings (or come to whatever resolution the story has been heading toward).

This usually means the characters getting to know each other better, sharing their pasts and secrets, being vulnerable with each other etc.

And each scene should build on top of the last, so that the ending of the fic could never have happened without all that middle.

Under the cut we’re digging into a scene from Voltron, to look further into scene building.

Scene Building

We’re getting into the nitty-gritty of scene-building, because having a clear picture of how scenes work will hopefully prevent you from writing yourself into a hole of “what is happening here on this day, what am I even writing” (which has happened to me plenty of times).

The beats to hit in any scene are obviously beginning, middle, end, which can also can be treated as

Intro (why this is happening)

Build up (how the characters are reacting)

Climax (peak of the scene/decisions made)

Denouement (how characters react to the resolution, which can mix in with climax for short scenes)

Let’s go over the PINNACLE OF ROMANCE that is the scene from Voltron S3 where Lance stops by Keith’s room for support. I know anybody who’s seen it has already obsessed over it, and there have been a thousand posts about it already.

But let’s talk about why it’s such a well set-up scene.

Background: Lance is coming to Keith because he feels like a seventh wheel now that Shiro can fly the black lion again.

This is building on previous scenes—Lance has been feeling insecure for a while, but now that there are six paladins and only five lions, he’s really feeling worried, and he wants some comfort. Just like he offered to Keith, when Keith was freaking out about being the leader. Lance wouldn’t have come to Keith without these previous scenes to build on.

So, Lance explains his feelings, show his insecurities to Keith and asks for help.

Now, a character in Keith’s position could do a few things:

Tease him for being vulnerable

Dismiss his concerns

Address his concerns and assure Lance he’s needed in the team

Now… Keith kind of does the second one, with a dash of the third.

(He does NOT do the first, which would’ve meant a serious downturn in their relationship development. Which isn’t always bad in a fic, there needs to be obstacles, right? Sometimes one character pisses another off, and apologies need to happen to strengthen the friendship back up.)

But that doesn’t happen here, thank god.

We get Keith Trying His Best.

This ties in to his characterization—Keith isn’t super great with words or emotions. He’s clearly surprised that Lance came to him (but pleased all the same). In dismissing Lance’s concerns, Keith is TRYING to ease them. He’s trying to help.

So the basic outline of this scene is:

Lance: Keith, I need help. (Math speech--more pilots than there are lions)

Keith: No, you don’t. (”Things will work themselves out.”)

Lance: Oh. Okay ): ): (”Okay. Thanks.”)

Keith sees that Lance is disappointed when he’s leaving, so he says the ICONIC line of “Hey Lance? Leave the math to Pidge.” Which roughly translates to:

Keith: You don’t need help :) :) :) <3

And then there’s the subtext of Keith wanting to tell Lance he’s an important part of the team, but he’s socially awkward so he doesn’t, blah blah blah, we all know that.

And a good scene usually has subtext, an underlying current of what the characters aren’t saying—especially if they’re bad with their feelings, or just holding them back (which is like every fic ever).

Now, we can debate over whether or not that convo influenced Keith into leaving to join the Blade, but in a fic, that would DEFINITELY be a cause and effect situation, because Keith would want to solve Lance’s problem.

Lance: There are too many paladins. You guys don’t need me :(

Keith: I’ll leave. Now there are five paladins again. All fixed! :)

Which is obvs not what Lance meant but HEY, stories have conflict.

So, to review:

Intro: Lance has a concern and wants Keith’s input

Build up: Math talk, Lance asks Keith for reassurance that he isn’t useless

Climax: Keith tells Lance to stop overthinking, things will work themselves out; Lance isn’t satisfied with that, which Keith notices

Denouement: leave the math to Pidge (Keith trying his BEST)

Aaaaanyway, the point of this tip is, if you know where your scene is going (AKA why you’re writing the scene and why it’s important to the fic at large) then everything will go a lot smoother for you!

Distractions--Get Rid of Them

The final tip is about distractions, and besides locking yourself in an empty room with a good playlist, I’ve got some helpful apps/sites that suck out any distraction. Obviously both free.

Fighter’s Block – Website, super cute. You decide how many words you wanna write, and you keep typing, or the dragon defeats you. A health bar goes down when you stop typing, and goes up when you keep typing, to keep those fingers on the keys. (Don’t worry, even if the health bar gets to 0, your writing will not disappear, and it’ll save it for a while, too.)

Focus Writer – Free downloadable app for your computer. Basically fills your whole screen with a blank page so you’ve got no distractions. Totally customizable, you can pick the font, upload a background pic, turn off spellcheck, set goals for the day that it’ll keep track of so you can set a streak. Saves your documents. Basically, if you don’t have MS word or any other writing program, you can totally use this for all your writing.

Both of these are really useful when you know what you want to write, but you just can’t focus. They help me, at least!

-

So, that’s all I’ve got! Again, this got way too long, but I hope it helps! If you’ve got any questions, shoot ‘em my way, and I’ll do my best to help out.

[thefakeredheadwrites]

Shop The eBooks For Your 2017 NaNoWriMo Inspiration | Writing Tips

I’m NaNo-ing, and you should too!

In case you missed it, yesterday I announced that I will be participating in the 2017 NaNoWriMo writing challenge, which starts on Wednesday, November 1. In that post, I also mentioned that I was going to post a Writing Tips NaNoWriMo Countdown, so welcome to it:

Part One: 4 Reasons Why You Should Participate In NaNoWriMo.

In this post, I will discuss some of the many reasons (because there are many, and these are just mine) why I think it’s important for writers of all skill levels to participate in NaNoWriMo.

The Accountability

In my announcement post, I mentioned how I need something that will hold me accountable and get me off my backside and back to writing, because I personally haven’t done it consistently in the last year, and I really want to get back to that. NaNoWriMo is fantastic for that.

Not only do they send email reminders throughout the month with tips and tricks and reminders to report your daily word metrics, but I’m the type of person who strives for any goal that I set, so I know that I, and others who follow me as I write, will combine to remind me of the importance of the goals I set.

The Consistency

I also mentioned in my announcement post (and a couple sentences ago, it’s that important) how I need to get back into writing on a daily basis, because I think consistency is key for writerly success. Now, I know that it’s not entirely feasible to write every.single.day. 365 days a year—sometimes you need a break, but that’s why it’s great to do something like NaNoWriMo.

In NaNoWriMo, writers haul ass for 30 days to write 50,000 words. That is absolutely insane, you guys. That’s about 1,667 words a day, and yeah, sometimes you can write that much or more in a writing session. But that doesn’t mean you HAVE to write 1,667 words a day for 365 days. That WILL burn you out. You must find your balance, and with NaNoWriMo, you can discover what your balance is. It could be more, it could be less, it could be WAY less. Whatever works for you.

Did you know that if you wrote 500 words a day for 365 days, you can write 182,500 words? That’s a lot. That’s like, three and a half NaNoWriMo’s. Three first drafts of a novel. Two drafts of a 91,000-ish word novel. That’s a lot of words to write consistently, and writing doesn’t always work like that. But you can still, as I said, find a routine that works for you. And NaNoWriMo can help.

The Community

Since NaNoWriMo is so massive, with participants competing from all around the world, so in order to narrow it down and find writers nearby—especially for those of you who do well with writing with other people—there’s a Regions option (you can find it up in the main menu page), where you can connect with writers who live in your city. Not only can you interact with Municipal Liaisons, but you can also follow your Region on Twitter or Facebook, see blog posts and helpful links, and so much more.

Not only that, but NaNoWriMo has a massive forum. And while massive may sound intimidating, the categories are broken down so well that it’s difficult to be overwhelmed. There are prep threads over in NaNo Prep, the Reference Desk for research help, and even Writing 101. Not only that, but you can find forums of people in your age group, Word Wars, Prompts, & Sprints (which includes a couple threads with some picks from my Prompt Library), you can connect with others on Social Media, and it even narrows down to lounges categorized by genre. Need help finding an editor or are looking to purchase something a fellow NaNo-er is selling, then there’s even a Marketing, Self-promotion, & Stuff For Sale thread.

Live in San Francisco or can travel there? Don’t forget to check out The Night Of Writing Dangerously Write-a-thon on November 19. It’s six hours of writing and dinner and drinks in a ballroom overlooking downtown San Francisco. How cool is that? You can attend by raising $300 dollars for the nonprofit behind NaNoWriMo, more details on it here.

The Bonuses

Participating in NaNoWriMo means getting access to a lot of cool bonuses. Not only do you have access to the stunningly massive forum that I talked about in the above section on the community, but they have recommendations from NaNoWriMo experts, blog posts from guests like published authors who either got their start in NaNoWriMo or have written some of their more recent works during a NaNoWriMo challenge.

It also has a store, where you can buy exclusive merchandise that’s based on each NaNo’s theme, and they have a MASS of awesome sponsors who offer awesome discounts and freebies to those who win NaNo and validate their word counts. One of the highlights I remember from the 2015 NaNoWriMo, where I successfully completed my first draft of the #WhoIsTalyaNightingale novel, was a company that offered a free, printed copy of your NaNoWriMo manuscript. Free. Book printing is expensive, y’all.

NaNoWriMo also offers a Young Writers Program, and Camp NaNo, which is basically NaNoWriMo in the summer, and while it’s also about writing, it’s a lot more collaborative, with participants matched into groups or ‘cabins’, with other authors of your same age, genre, or any other specification you choose.

Shop The eBooks For Your 2017 NaNoWriMo Inspiration

[zoematherswrites]

Happy Friday!

This week zipped by because of how chaotic and absolutely insane it was. Not only were there assignments and projects and readings for school I had to tackle, but as the entire world knows, the COVID-19 virus has escalated intensely in the last few days. Where I live, there are only 3 known cases at the moment, but my school is still considering shutting down for a few weeks. My fingers are crossed that this doesn’t happen because we have less than a month of classes left and I would really like to finish them. That, and get marks for all the assignments and projects I have poured HOURS into! Of course, if that is the safest option for everyone then I understand but hopefully, it does not come to that.

Anyways, amongst the chaos, I have somehow found time to write so today, I wanted to share this rambly, chit-chatty post all about my writing progress and plans for the coming month.

Currently, I am writing a short story/novella based on my Aztec mythology idea and decided earlier this week that I was going to scrap what I had already written of it (around 3,000 words) and start fresh. Usually, I would highly advise you NOT to do this, but sometimes it is the best thing you can do for your project and this was one of those rare cases. I have not written too much for the new draft, but I have clocked in around 1,300 words which is better than nothing. Another plus is that I have really enjoyed writing this story and it does not feel like a drag to work on it anymore. That was my main problem with this story before. Every time I had to force myself to work on it and I never had any clear sight of where I wanted to take it. Naturally, I am a pantser so sitting down with only a rough idea in mind is how I typically write my stories, but I had no motivation or inspiration with where this story was going to start. So, long story short, I changed my idea a bit and plan on finishing my first draft (which should be around 17,000 words) sometime next week…preferably mid-week but we shall see.

Some other projects currently on the go for me is a project for one of my classes. I decided to create a zine which is a collection of various pieces of your own work. This is for my fine arts class and for it, I am writing poems and flash fiction pieces that will tell one story throughout the entire zine. At the moment, I am trying to make it so it switches between poem and flash fiction, but overall, I will just have to see what works best for the story and flow of it. I am also including some art pieces which is kind of new for me. I used to draw a lot when I was younger and I am not being modest when saying I am not the most talented drawer…but I think it will be an interesting addition to the zine. Also, a necessary one because you need art for the front cover at the least! This is due by April 3rd so I have some time but I would rather start now than leave it to the last minute. So far, I have a flash fiction piece and a poem that I am still working on. I’ve also been practicing the types of drawings I want to include. The theme is very whimsical and mystical so it has been a lot of fun so far!

Leaping into the future just a bit, I have decided to re-think my Camp NaNoWriMo plans a little more. After starting this little zine project, I thought it might be fun to work on a short story collection rather than one novel or novella project. For years, I have been working on this Aztec story, and of course, in between, I have devoted time to other projects, but this zine idea has really inspired me to take a break from that world this coming month. For now, I am thinking of just including short stories into this totally separate project from my fine arts one, but I might include other forms of written pieces as well. Basically, I am giving myself creative freedom for April which could either be a brilliant or self-destructive idea.

  There you have it! Those are my current projects and future plans for writing and I hope you enjoyed. Let me know below what you currently have on the go, as well as if you are participating in Camp NaNo this year because I would love to know. Don’t forget to check out my last blog post, and also my social media accounts which are all linked down below!

Thanks for reading and stay healthy 🙂

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WIPs, Camp NaNoWriMo + More Happy Friday! This week zipped by because of how chaotic and absolutely insane it was. Not only were there assignments and projects and readings for school I had to tackle, but as the entire world knows, the COVID-19 virus has escalated intensely in the last few days.

[danafraedrich]

October Recap

Hi, friends. Sorry it’s been a minute since I’ve posted on here 😅. I took a stay-cation when the bestie came into town, interspersed with some shows. October basically went by in a blur. And November… well, November’s been a bit rough. So here’s a recap of last month.

Shows ~ September ended with me finishing up the Doctor Who Steampunk Convention in Clarksville. The community was super nice, and I made a bird friend! His name is Bishop and he’s an African raven, so I couldn’t resist showing off my book, Raven’s Cry, with him. He tried to eat it 😂.

I also did the Southern Festival of Books here in Nashville. Don’t tell the other shows, but it’s one is one of my favorites 😉. That one is outdoors, and I get a whole tent for it, which is good since it always tends to rain one of the days. And it got pretty chilly, which tells me I need a medium-weight steampunky type jacket. If anyone has any recommendations I’m all ears. Let me know in the comments below.

And finally there was the Atlanta Steampunk Expo. This is the second year it’s been on, and I’ve done it both years, so I guess you can call me an elder attendee? I dunno. Anyway, because I’ve been there before I saw some familiar faces. People I’d met the year before, which I really love. It’s nice to catch up and reconnect, plus I got to hang with a friend of mine from college after the show. I also got to meet some new people. First there was Mike Lackey, who I’ve known through Instagram for a long time, but haven’t ever actually met him in real life. Does that count as a new meeting? 🤔 Anyhoodles, I didn’t know he was going to be there and at one point I looked over, saw his banner, and thought, “Hey, I know the guy!” I also met Kevin J. Anderson, who is a massively prolific author. He’s got over 150 box under his belt! I even had the the honor of doing some panels with him. I always learn things at panels, even the ones I’m on, and this was no different. My biggest takeaway was dictation, which he does all the time. Part of this blog post was even written via dictation. Unfortunately, Siri doesn’t understand everything I say, so it requires a good bit of corrections, but it’s still a quick way of getting down thoughts your thoughts.

Books (bought and read) ~ As far as buying books goes… ha ha, things got a little out of control 😆. While the bestie was here, we hit a bunch of independent bookstores (support your local bookstores, people!). It’s near impossible for me to walk into a bookstore and not buy something. But look at all the pretty! 😍 I’m currently reading Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott, which has turned out to be both amazingly comforting and instructional 😊 .

As for books read, I feel pretty proud because I have once again proven that I can eat a book for breakfast if I really put my mind to it. I purchased Hallowe’en Party by Agatha Christie on October 30th and finished it on the 31st. This was also my first Agatha Christie novel. What have I been missing my whole life?! Firstly, I really appreciated the storytelling style. I know I’ve mentioned this before, so I don’t know why I keep thinking this way since it keeps being disproved. I often think older books are going to have a boring storytelling style, and that’s just not the case. People just don’t really change no matter what decade or even century you’re in. People so often assume they know things things, take them as absolute fact. Things that are broad-brush generalizations. And they take things they heard from someone else and believe it as gospel, and I love the way that muddied the waters of the mystery. As I’ve mentioned before, I love playing Whodunnit, and I could not come near to making a guess. I had a suspicion about one character, but it was about 40% suspicion, 60% uncertainty. And Hercule Poirot was a way more interesting character than I expected. I first met him while watching the film version of Murder on the Orient Express with Kenneth Branagh, and that was a really great depiction, but I don’t think I got the sense of Hercule’s character from that as well as I got it from the book.

I also barely finished listening to the audiobook of The Picture of Dorian Gray. Like, finished reading it around 9pm while giving candy to trick-or-treaters. I’m not sure what I expected from this book, having never read any Oscar Wilde before. I found the characters a little difficult to relate to but only because I got pissed off at them again and again. Lord Henry is king of the douche bags, hands down. I had more trouble with Dorian even though I understand his character. People rationalize all kinds of things to themselves, but I wanted to shake him. I’ll be honest, I didn’t know where the book was going for a lot of it. I feel like the middle kind of fast forwarded and just gave us an overview of his life, but the ending got really exciting. I had no idea what was coming and was not disappointed at all 😱.

Newsletter ~ I wrote a spooky story for my newsletter last month, set in the Broken Gears world. You can still access that if you want to by signing up for my VIP newsletter (along the right-hand sidebar if you’re on a laptop or desktop computer or down at the bottom if you’re on a mobile device - tablet or phone). The story stars Cali from Raven’s Cry, plus a few other familiar faces. No spoilers but some relationships that are established during Raven’s Cry are revealed in the short story. Once you sign up, you’ll receive a password to access the Exclusive Content page where you can find this and all my other VIP-only short stories.

What’s Next? ~ I’ve got a lot in the hopper, friends. You can check the homepage or the Events pages of my website for all my upcoming live shows. If you’re in the Tennessee area, however, Dickens of a Christmas on December 8th is the next one.

I’m also working on my NaNoWriMo project, which will be the next installment in Lenore‘s storyline from the Broken Gears universe. There are so many pieces! I’m really loving Scrivener’s folder functionality right now because, without it, I think I’d be tearing my hair out.

I’ve also been selected to contribute to an anthology coming out in February! I’m so excited because I get to write a retelling of The Snow Queen 😄. The first draft is done, and I’ll be getting first critiques on it this weekend. The anthology will debut at the Austin Bookstars event I’m attending in Austin, Texas on May 4th. All proceeds benefit the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which is a charity very near and dear to my heart since I am a survivor of childhood cancer. When the pre-order is available I will post links everywhere!

I know this was kind of a long one, so thanks so much for sticking with me 💗. If you made it this far, here’s a picture of me dressed as a faun for Halloween.

Thanks for reading!

[marktheweaver-blog]

August book update: Difficulties, progress, self reflection and analysis!

As always, things are progressing, with the book. I’ve had a trough couple weeks when it comes to word counts. I think Ive been averaging 500 words a day, with some higher or lower. It seems that that is not that terrible of a word count, but it feels disappointing when during Nanowrimo last year I did 50k words in a month when I had very little free time. I mean, last November I was able to crank out 50k words with only like 4hours of free time a day. Most days i was aiming for the 1666 words needed to finish in time. Some days i could only make 1000, but other i was able to get up to 3000 words. The fact I’m doing like 500 words a day now, when i have a lot more freetime, is saddening.

I don’t like to make excuses. However i think that part of the reason for the lowered count is that i care more about the words now. This is the second draft, and so i want to make sure the words I’m putting down are a better representation of the final product. I want them to tie into the greater story better than the first draft because it will make editing all that much easier.

Let me look at some numbers. the second draft is currently just a few hundred words short of 50k words. The very loose goal is about 100 words. I’ve been working on the second draft for about 5 months. which means that Ive averaged just over 300 words per day.

That’s not the whole story though. Let me check. In that time i also wrote and cut 6 chapters from the beginning. I have them saved in a separate document for reference, so counting them that brings the words typed up to 61k words. which translates to about 400 words per day. I could further improve this number cutting out like 15 days for weekends that I didn’t get any writing done. I’ve been terrible about writing on the weekends for a number of reasons. I won’t make the changes to the number, because i don’t think its fair. i could have written something then, but i didn’t.

That number also does count the number of words that I wrote while revising chapter 1 a million times, of the times I rewrote chapter 2-4, only to have them cut. I don’t have those specific numbers so in truth the 400 word daily average should be a little bit higher. So basically these past couple weeks Ive beaten my daily second draft average words per day. I’ve still gone slower than i wanted though.

Despite this, the book moves forward inexorably. I might be exaggerating there. But things are moving forward.

One of the things Ive started doing is watching/ providing feedback on a live twitch editor. Every Sunday/Wednesday at 7am EST he’s been going through and editing people’s submitted works(short stories and excerpts). If you’ve got something you want a pair of eyes on, maybe you’d like to check him out: https://www.twitch.tv/lyrebird_edits