Hey... Remember Me?

I used to do this blog every day. What happened to those days? Those were good days. I want 'em back.

And the best way to do that is to start today (carpe hodie?) and begin as I mean to go on. So... here's the plan.

I want to get back into Bryony's Market. Even more--I want to finish it. I just completed a reread of everything I've done so far, followed by a reread of the blog posts I wrote concurrently. So to start my marathon NYC-based writing session today, I'm going to give my thoughts on that reread.

First, I enjoyed the story. Nearly a year's distance allowed me to examine the story with more of a reader's eye than a writer's, and I found myself laughing at some of the jokes, flipping pages to get to what happens next, and feeling tantalized by the little hints that I left behind. This tells me two things--I've spent insufficient time editing the story, and it's better than I was afraid of.

Second, the computer problems ended it at a bad spot. In my memory, I had written much further than that unanswered question in the carriage, and I was intensely saddened by the fact that, as of yet, the story went no further. I know I'm the only one who can do something about that, though, and I plan to do so. That's why I'm here.

Finally, the pace is better than I was afraid of. Several times throughout the course of the blog I was afraid that the story was getting bogged down. Reading through it, however, I discovered that on the contrary, other passages felt rushed. In the course of editing the series as a whole, I may augment several scenes, or even add entirely new ones in order to tweak the pacing.

I have developed a plan for resuming the dropped threads of the story:

• Reread all text, notes, and blog posts - COMPLETE
• Second reread, taking notes on plot threads
• Scene brainstorming
• Sort scenes into basic outline
• Start writing where I left off.

And when I say where I left off, I mean it. The first new section of story will take place at my usual 10pm update on November 26th, which is the one year anniversary of when that section should have been written. It's still Day 57, if not the one I had originally intended. That's not to say that I won't be writing at all before that, but that's when updates will begin. Anything else is a buffer, and there ain't nothing wrong with that. If at all possible, I want to build up a nice long buffer for Christmas.

And then I just start cranking out the daily 1,689 like I used to back in the day. As easy as that.

Well, I've spent the last hour talking about it. Now it's time to actually do it!