You’re all a little over halfway through the challenge and don’t you feel great about it? Give yourselves a hand! Bring out the chocolate and champagne. And let’s have some sexy guys do the serving, shall we?But the real party will be at the end of the month.
By now, you should have a good handle on your characters, their personalities, what your story is about and maybe even the ending, because, hard to believe, but some writers have no idea how their book will end. I know there’s been more than a few times that my characters take me in a direction I didn’t expect. And they’re always right in doing that.
What halfway through can mean is you can push on and get those words down on the computer screen, or if you’re far enough along, feel free to go back to page one and do some editing.
When I reach about halfway through I’ll go back and edit. That way I can insure everything’s in sync. It’s very easy to veer off, have a wrong eye color or hair color description. This way, you can make sure it’s corrected and move on. And you’ll add words along the way!
So take a little time, pat yourself on the back for work well done, words written and be proud of your accomplishments. You didn’t do it just because of the challenge here. Sure, we’re all here with our authorly pom poms. But you were the one to do the work!
So tell me. Are you happy with what you’ve done so far? Not happy? Walking that middle of the road?
Give.
Linda
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The worst part is when I’m muttering away while driving. Although I’m sure people just think I’m talking on the phone. At least I hope they are. :sassy
Linda
Aargh. My story actually got shorter today. But you see it has to be submitted at the end of the month so I need to edit as I go. I will admit it will not be novella in a month, it will be short story on a month. A smaller goal but still a project right from first word to press ’send’ before the 1st of June.
Novella, short story, you were writing, Emily!!! :bow That’s what counts.
Linda
Years ago I’d attended a large mystery writers conference and I sat in on a panel with five big name writers. They were all excited if they wrote two to three pages a day. I sat there in shock because back then I usually aimed for 10-15 and more. Then I decided they were writing summer blockbusters and with my writing category, I was writing movie of the week. I’ve shifted from writing three and four books, sometimes, five, a year to two a year but those two are much longer. I don’t see myself as writing the summer blockbusters, but I’m working on it.
Linda
Lisa, those are great quotes! I like the one about Steve the pirate, AAAAAAAAAAAR!
Going to get my proposal in the mail to my agent today, a milestone! Then on to my novella due August 15. Early yes, but with kids home all summer (sob) I like to get as much done during the school year as possible.
Isabel
I’m liking the editing as you go so far – quite a bit. It slows the writing process – in my old, more pansterish, write straight through style I could pull off writing 2-4 chapters a week. Doing it the new way – I’m down to 1-2 chapters a week.
BUT…those chapters are better. I’m sure I’ll need to go over and edit/add once more after it’s all done as things do change and that’s okay.
Another advantage is by going over the fresh scenes again and again, I can get really deep into them. Then, when I’m adding detail in a chapter and fleshing it out, it helps jog my muse into creating more scenes, sequels and character growth based off those details. Knowing these ahead of time lets me put them into the book and account for them without major edits and rewrites. The new brainstorms thread in easier – if that makes sense.
It makes sense to me. That’s my usual process.
Raven, yes, exactly. You’ve described it perfectly. It does get old reading the same chapters over and over, but by the time you get to the end, the early ones are fresh again.
Isabel
Everyone has their own way of writing and I always feel what works best for you.
Linda
Gail and Raven, have you done Margie Lawson’s Deep Editing class?
It sounds like what you gals do instinctively (but boy, does she go into detail. It’s fabulous!)
Thanks Marcy,
it is a tad hard with littlies…I asked my 4 yo if he could look after me because I was sick. He beamed and said yes, before losing the smile quickly and saying ‘but Mum, I can’t cook or make you soup or give you a bath or wash the clothes or make the lunch or any of that stuff.’
Cute, huh?
Not quite up to dancing yet, Linda, but getting there…
Those word counts are climbing…keep typing :write