NaNoWriMo 2010, Day 30/30

It looks like my word count for November will be around 20,000 words. In that respect, I "lost" NaNoWriMo. I could think about that.

Or I could think about how I'm 80 pages further along in my novel. That a whole big swath of story that didn't exist before this month is now on paper. That I've made new personal discoveries about the craft of writing, and begun to apply them to my work. That I've maintained a working writing routine for two months. That I've drunk a whooooole lot of coffee.

Instead, I plan to think about next month. My goal is a very simple 30,000 words. An improvement on this month, but a reasonable one around the holidays. The minute I hit that 30,000 mark, I'll be ordering Dr. No on Blu-Ray. And for a bonus, if I manage to exceed my goal by 10k, I'll throw in a P.G. Wodehouse book. (How about a book for each 10k I go over?)

The bribes will be fun, but they're not the reason I write. I've got 167k words that prove that. I write because I love it, and that's why I get up at 5am even when it sucks.

Day 100

Today, I am about to start my 100th day of writing Bryony's Market. That's 100 days of writing, not 100 days since I started. If I count the number of days since I actually began the story, we're looking at... carry the one... 789 days. (That's not a very good record, but that's not my point.)

The point is what it is possible to accomplish in a little more than three months of daily effort. And not a great deal of daily effort. Each day gets me a little bit further than I was the day before, until suddenly, I'm more than 160k down the road.

I look forward to a time that I no longer doubt that I'm making progress, when I write for the sake of writing, and I don't have to worry about pushing myself past the questioning voice that asks if I'm really accomplishing anything. And I think the best way of getting past that voice is one day at a time.

So now, back to the story.

NaNoWriMo 2010, Day 18/30

I've divided up my index card stack into multiple stacks. They're just getting too big to stand alone. Perhaps once I'm completely done with Book 1, I'll join them up and see how long it is. I like the idea of the book tumbling down the stairs and coming to rest at the bottom with a good six feet still to extend.

I'm on the cusp of finishing one chapter, and I'll be starting the next one today.

The State of the Novel, mid-November 2010

Sometimes in writing a story, you're the construction worker, laying brick on narrative brick. Other days, you're the architect, whose task it is to figure out where all the parts need to go to make a completed structure.

Today was an architecture day, and although I didn't get any actual writing done this morning, I can't help but feel like I made significant progress.

I have finished my plan for Book 1. Not just the arcs, or the main story beats I need to hit, but a serious scene-by-scene plan. There are a total of 106 scenes, of which I have currently finished 70. That's approximately 2/3 of the way done.

At my current rate of progress, that means I should have the whole thing finished in (gulp) another forty or fifty days.

Now, I should probably take a step back and define what I mean by the whole thing. As this story has grown, the scope of it has widened, and certain events that at first I considered to be "backstory" are now full-blown revelations, and major movers of plot. As a result, a lot more has to happen to get to the ending I've been planning all along.

The current volume will end once I've written another 36 scenes. The way that usually divides up, we're talking another 18-20 chapters, probably. In terms of word count, maybe 250k. As a point of reference, most epic fantasy lives in the 200k - 300k range, with the occasional giant tome around 400k+. So I'll be in good company, length-wise.

After that, I'll be taking a short break from Bryony. I have a few other projects I want to work on, or finish, and the end of a volume is a good place to pause. The next stage will be some good heavy plotting. So far, I have stick figures drawn for the next two volumes of a proposed trilogy. I need to turn those stick figures into skeletons, then turn part of that skeleton into flesh and blood. (That is to say, I need to take the sketches of events that I have and build up my scene structure, then heavily develop and write the scenes in the early part of the novel.)

And so the process goes on. I hesitate to set any dates because I've proven myself wrong so many times before. But this time feels different.

January 31st, 2011: Completion of Volume 1
February-March 2011: Other projects
April 2011: Plotting and development of Volume 2
April 2011 - July 2011: Volume 2, Part 1
August 2011 - September 2011: Other Projects
October 2011 - December 2011: Volume 2, Part 2
January 2012 - February 2012: Other Projects
March 2012 - May 2012: Volume 2, Part 3

Come back in 18 months and see how I did!

NaNoWriMo 2010, Day 16/30

Funny how things work. As soon as I decide I don't care about word count, I whip out 2,020 words in a day. Go figure.

The first thing I did this morning was detach my big stack of index cards, after a point one and a half scenes from now. There are a few more things that have to happen before I get to that point, and those scenes need to get added in. So part one, plan out the next week or two of writing.

This brings up a point that I occasionally find frustrating about my writing methodology. Early on, my index cards pretty much have a one card, one scene ratio. Later on, as I develop the story more, I realize that I need more connective tissue to hold them together, so I wind up adding in extra cards. Sometimes, it feels like I'm not making progress, just adding more and more new cards in between. It's not true, but the feeling is one I have to be aware of, so I can deal with it.

After the cards, I'm going to see if I can finish up this chapter. I've done half up to this point, and I'm happy with what I've written. Let's see if I can do a second half to match the first.

NaNoWriMo 2010, Day 12/30

Visions of the future. That's what I got for Bryony yesterday. As I've stated before, I know where the story is going, could pretty much write the final couple of scenes right now. But if I had to write a summary of the entire story, it would be very detail-heavy at the front, and more and more general toward the end.

That's a good thing, as far as I'm concerned. Part of the fun of the writing process is the creativity that comes along with the process of composition. As I write, I'm taking those general statements and turning them into full-blown narrative, discovering new aspects to the story along the way.

But sometimes, a pulse of creativity runs down the entire length of the story, and that's what happened yesterday. I can't claim that I got a lot of words down, but I did achieve a new clarity of vision that will make what I write from here on out that much better.

I also know my stopping place. Not a permanent one, but a place where I'm going to step away from Bryony for a time and work on something else. I'll need to charge up my Bryony battery (batteryony?), and I think the best way to do that is to keep writing--but to write something else. I'm thinking, though, that my stopping place is easily months away. And when I'm done, I should have a complete "chunk" of story, something with a defined beginning, middle, and end. Not the whole story, but a good part of it.

The Drama of Boredom

I was recently presented with a challenge--write a scene about a character's boredom, but make it interesting for the reader.

The construction of this scene took longer than usual, because I had to proceed very, very carefully. In a normal scene, you can use the interesting stuff that's going on, and the narrator's engagement in it, to keep the scene moving. But what happens when the narrator is bored out of her mind?

This challenge made me consider in greater detail what it takes to make an interesting scene in the first place. First and foremost, I believe that comes through character--the reader must be engaged in what the character is experiencing.

Secondly, the reader must enjoy learning about whatever new information is being presented in the scene. Let me state for the record that "enjoy" doesn't necessarily mean that they'll like it. The reader may be horrified by what they learn, but they are drawn to find out more. Whatever happens in the scene has to scratch that itch.

Finally, the scene must in some way address the character's goals. That's not the way real life works, but it's the way a story works. There are lots of things that happen in real life that never make their way into fiction because it has no relevance to the story. So how does this scene bring the character closer to, or further away, from the goal?

I will now take the discussion out of the abstract and into the concrete. In this particular scene, Bryony was waiting. She thought she was going to be trained as an attendant, but instead, she's just sitting in a room getting more and more restless. I'm going to now describe how I attempted to address the three points above.

At this point in the novel, if the character isn't engaged in Bryony and what she wants, then I doubt they're still reading. I entered into the scene after a tense emotional moment, so hopefully the reader sympathizes with her and is willing to want what she wants. Okay, good, we've got them hooked.

Next, the new information. Here, I was handicapped because Bryony was seeing for the first time a place that we, as the reader, had visited before. The information was not entirely new. I included some reminders of what the place was like, in case it had been forgotten, then gave some more detail. Although I touched on the setting, I tried to spend more time with the people. I also attempted to demonstrate how Bryony was dealing with her boredom by describing her visual tour of the room. (In other words, working in some character beats to strengthen it.)

As for the goals, I needed Bryony to come to a new realization of what it meant to train as an attendant. I did that through the introduction of Cohenrad. He is an established character, but one that has been offscreen for a while. Bryony had never met him, but I needed to forge that connection for later on. I used him to convey to Bryony, and also to the reader, the appropriate information.

However, I didn't want to turn Cohenrad into a puppet, spouting exposition. I made sure to include Bryony's reaction to Cohenrad, and his reactions to her, as these first impressions will form the basis of their relationship. I tried to make the exposition come as naturally as possible.

If I had to judge my success, I'd say I got about a 3 out of 5. When I revised, I'll want to make Bryony's desires clearer, so that the drama of her boredom is more sharply defined. It was definitely a slow scene, but there's not much I could do about that. We'll just have to see if the next few scenes can build some more momentum.

Digital Hygiene

First of all, I'd like to commemorate my 255th post. If life were Zelda, that would be as many as I could do, because 255 is the largest number.

The real point of my post today is digital hygiene. You know how the bulk of your early childhood was spent learning how to keep yourself clean, the difference between number one and number two, the joys of napkins, etc? It's all hygiene, right? It's figuring out how to use the human body in the proper way.

Of course, different people may have different ideas about what constitutes proper, but in general, hygiene is there to keep you healthy, and to make it easy for you to get along with other hygienic individuals.

But the parents never taught us digital hygiene because it didn't exist. And you know, a lot of people from my parents' generation (my actual parents being exceptions) have terrible digital hygiene.

You've seen the symptoms. A desktop full of documents, so much you can't see the default Windows wallpaper behind it. 57 Windows updates waiting to install, and a Yahoo toolbar they don't remember installing on Internet Explorer. They were never taught how to clean up after themselves, so they don't.

Now, I'm not saying I have perfect digital hygiene. There is a folder on my desktop called "Desktop Documents." Whenever I'm too lazy to save something where it's supposed to go, I'll use my desktop. And then, when it starts to get too crowded, I'll just dump everything in that folder. I have no idea what's in there, but if I can't find something, that's a good place to start.

But for the most part, I keep myself digitally hygienic. Which brings me to writing, which is the whole point of this blog anyway.

If you're a writer, it is of supreme importance to keep good digital hygiene for your typed stories or other writing. For me, that means a directory by genre. Inside the Fiction folder, which is the largest by far, I have folders for each individual story or novel. They are arranged, not by name, but by date. Down at the bottom is a sad little folder called "Abandoned," where bad little stories go to die.

Within each story folder, I may have multiple copies of each story. I name each one with the current date in yyyymmdd format (so they sort chronologically, natch) and save each day's work separately. I cannot stress enough how important this is. I mean, c'mon. Haven't you ever written something, decided it was crap and rewrote it, and then started thinking that the original version was brilliant and you should never have gotten rid of it? Maybe you're right, maybe you're wrong, but if you never save over your work, you'll never have to wonder.

For longer projects, like Bryony's Market, I have a folder called "Daily Work." Each day of writing is in its own file. I do this because it makes getting a word count for the day easier, and allows me to easily keep track of progress in a way that a single long file can't. I do copy and paste these into a "Combined" file, which I maintain for sending to interested friends, or for editing purposes. (And yes, with a different one for each day.)

I have a folder for notes, a folder for compilations, etc., etc. I do all of this because the organization makes it easier to find what I want when I want it. I'm keeping my digital house in order, and I think my writing is better for it.

The Experimental Film Scene

Every so often, I'll run across a scene that I have defined more by its effect than its content. I try not to do this, because that's when writing tends to get contrived. But sometimes, you just need something to happen. Something--but you're not sure what, just what it's supposed to accomplish.

I call this an "Experiment Film" scene, based from a line in the They Might Be Giants song of that name.

I already know the ending,
It's the part that makes your face implode.
I don't know what makes your face implode,
But that's the way the movie ends.

The scene that I was dreading two days ago was something of an Experimental Film. There's a lot of weight riding on this little scene, since it has to support motivations for a couple different characters moving forward. I knew what it had to do, but I didn't quite know how to carry it off.

And in reality, I don't think I quite managed it. All the pieces were there, but it lacks smoothness and consistency. I'm going to leave it behind and continue on with the story, secure in the knowledge that I can revise it later. Maybe when I do, it will make your face implode properly.

The Freeze

Writer's block really isn't the inability to write, in the cartoony blank-page-on-the-typewriter sense. Not for me, at least. What I get is the certain conviction that the scene I'm about to write won't be any good. Instead of writing it, I feel like I should wait until I can write it well.

Except that time never comes, and the scene just gets built up in my head as an insurmountable obstacle of suck that I'll never get over.

It's the Freeze. Last year, I got distracted from my writing on Bryony's Market because of a Devan scene I just couldn't get a handle on. I put it off by a day, two days, and suddenly it was ten months later. I wound up changing up the whole scene anyway.

I hate the Freeze, because it's what's keeping me from getting to the better parts of my story. If only I could get past this one scene, I think, everything would be all right.

The freeze can hit at the beginning of a project, too. I spent months developing the project I call Dairhenien's Library, working out elaborate world-building and character outlines and the like, without every actually starting the story. Eventually, the bulk of all that world-building weighed me under so much that I backed off of the project.

What was I thinking? I was so afraid that the finished story wouldn't live up to the really cool stuff I had developed, and as a result, I just didn't start. I've got lots of great notes out there. Someday, maybe after I finish Bryony, I'll pick them up again.

And that brings me to today. The upcoming scene is one that I don't believe I'll be able to write well. And so I've been spending the last twenty minutes writing this blog post, and started thinking about researching magazine fiction markets instead of writing today. If I were a cat, I should get squirted with a spray bottle for that kind of thinking.

I'm going to write the scene. And there is a very good chance it won't come out well. I'll shake my head and move on. A year from now, or whenever it is that I revise this story, I'll come back and do it right.

But here's the thing--I'll have accomplished so much in that year. For the last year, I stopped until I felt able to tackle the scene, and did nothing on the story in the interval. I was trying to compose the story linearly.

The reader may read the story that way, but why do I have to write it that way? It'd be like building a car front to back, or painting a picture like an ink jet printer, top to bottom.

All right, enough of this small talk. Let's write.

Index Cards and Ambiguity

Last year during my composition of Bryony, I moved to a system of using index cards to represent scenes. I went back to everything I did in 2008 and put one scene on each card. Then I created cards for everything I had been doing lately, and every scene I had conceived of for the future of the book.

The thing is, I've known from the beginning what some of the big "set piece" scenes are. I also know what some of the smaller moments should be. With the index cards, I've been able to first, put them in order, and second, figure out how to connect the dots. I've noticed that my writing tends to be the best when I can make the smaller moments do double duty as the connective tissue between big set pieces.

Let me define some terminology first. I think of a set piece as the big events that move the plot along. Bryony being set middling is a scene like this. Sure, there are some great character moments that come in along the way, but the purpose of the scene in the narrative is to accomplish that plot point.

The smaller moments are targeted character development. Usually, my index cards for these scenes involve listing the characters in the scene and how they're interacting. "Bryony meets Illiantine," for example. These two characters need to have met for later elements of the plot to work, so this small moment involves these two interacting for the first time.

On the card, I did not specify where they were, or what sort of interaction they would have. The setting arose naturally from where the characters happened to be when that scene was placed. If I moved the card to another point in the narrative, then the setting would be entirely different. As for how they interacted, that has to do with who the characters are, what they want at that moment, their mood at the time, that kind of thing.

That's how I'm trying to balance the need to keep the story along the pre-determined path, while still allowing room for creativity. It's how I can know where I'm going, yet still make discoveries along the way.

One of the things I enjoy most about writing is figuring out how something I had set up earlier in the story, without knowing exactly how or when I was going to pay it off, has surprising relevance to the present moment. Occasionally, a plot point is introduced earlier than I anticipated, because the interaction between characters is driving the story towards it without my help. If it happens too early, I have to figure out how to divert that flow without making it unnatural. If it doesn't happen when I want it to, I have to figure out if it makes sense to do the introduction there at all.

I say all of that to say this: I have just finished revising the outline for the part of the story I've been calling "Book 2," although at this point, I'd have to say it'd be more accurate to call it Part 2, or even Chunk 2. In order to write some of the upcoming scenes, I need to do the same for Chunk 3.

So... time to write some more index cards, and tape them together.

October... Again

So somehow, I've gotten into a yearly habit. That's tough to do, but I've managed it. I start writing in early October, I push all the way through the month of November, make it partway into December maybe... and then I fizzle.

I started this post intending to brainstorm how to extend that time, but you know what? I've got a good thing going. I've got a solid six weeks where tradition and habit tell me it's time to write. And that's awesome. The reason I fizzled out in December last year was because of the holidays, and that's not going to change.

See, I love writing in the fall. Something about the cooling weather, the rainy vistas, the darkness of the early morning, has gotten encoded into my DNA as Writing Time.

So what I need to do instead is to start new yearly habits starting in January, lasting another six or eight weeks. Then another, and another. I need to write in seasons, each with their own traditions and habits.

I am about to start the Fall 2010 writing season. And when it's over, I'll start planning the Winter 2011 season, and so on. I look forward to writing in the fall, and with a bit of effort and planning, I can capture a feeling for the other seasons. Not the same feeling--that's the point. A different, individualized feeling I can look forward to.

--

I'm going to continue keeping statistics about my writing, but not necessarily in the same form. A cumulative word count graph, NaNoWriMo style, will definitely be in there. I'd like to see a graph of my daily word count too, with a trend line and boundaries above and below to indicate standard deviation. Then there will have to be a target graph, with its own target line, and perhaps a few more esoteric ones, like a graph showing what percentage of my writing comes from each day of the week.

Why do all these graphs? They do kind of sound like a distraction from the business of writing, don't they? Early on, at least, I need to have things that show I'm making progress. The feeling that I'm not accomplishing anything is one of the things that kills my writing the fastest.

So here's my plan. This week, I'm going to work on a project for Writers on the Verge, where we take turns writing in the style of each member in trun. This Sunday's meeting features Abbey, and I have to do an extra special job given that she's my fiancée and all.

Once I'm finished with that, I'll start plotting out my graphs, and then worming my way back into writing for Bryony. I plan to hit the ground running on Monday, October 11th.

Day Seventy - 129,525 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

The Bryony sections always seem to be the easiest for me to write. I've spent longer in her voice than any other character's, and I believe it is one of the more distinct voices. That being said, I've often discovered that there are unexpected challenges that come from writing about events that Bryony doesn't have direct knowledge about.

As an author, I want to be able to hint to the reader what is going on, as well as to Bryony. The reader has information she doesn't have, and can draw conclusions she cannot. Sometimes those conclusions are correct, and sometimes they are not. As a reader myself, one of my favorite surprises is the feeling I get when I'm sure I'm smarter than the author, or at least the author's characters, and discover that I'm not.

But back to today's section. I've already established that the ducal city of Eldercroft is several days away from the capital, so this is not a trip that they're going to finish in one night. Let's see how I can pull this off.

*****

Oh, the old "attack the stagecoach" ploy. You have to love it. In case you're wondering, here's what the dialogue said: "Is that the girl?" followed by "Quiet! They might speak (name of language)."

(A note on grammar for linguistic types. "Menodg" is the command form of the verb "menod" meaning "to look (at)." In this form, it has the basic meaning of "behold," but when made a question becomes something more like "is that ____ that I see?" "Gar" means girl, but not in a nice way, and "hekl" is a reflexive, something like himself/herself. In this context, it means something like, "the actual one."

"Heine" is not a command form; it is a noun, meaning "silence." "An" is a clause initial particle that indicates the information following it is not factual, something along the lines of "what if". "Turtenag" is the name of the language. "Dramachelin" is composed of the elements "dramach," meaning speak, and "-elin," a suffix that agrees with "an.")

I hadn't intended to end the chapter at this point, and in fact, I believe that there is one more short scene to finish up Chapter Eleven. Even so, I believe Chapter Twelve will begin tomorrow as well!

Today's Total: 1,738 / 1,689 words (102.9%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 16,220 / 15,201 words (106.7%, 0.6 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 16,220 / 33,780 (48.0%)

Day Sixty-nine - 127,787 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

Finally a switch back to Bryony's point of view. It hasn't been long since we left her, exiting Tynofast's room with visions of magic in her head. It's time we caught up with her to see what she's been doing lately.

*****

The chapter has only just begun. There's nothing like a late-night carriage ride under mysterious circumstances to get a story moving. As to why they're leaving in such a hurry? Well, that's an answer for another time.

Today's Total: 1,789 / 1,689 words (105.9%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 14,482 / 13,512 words (107.2%, 0.6 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 14,482 / 33,780 (42.9%)

Day Sixty-eight - 125,998 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

Today I resume Gideon's investigation into the attack on Bryony. There is a certain amount of information he needs to find out before a certain other event occurs, and as that event is rapidly approaching, it's time for another Gideon scene to move us closer. In fact, this scene should reveal all that is needed for that portion of the plot, at this time.

*****

Okay, so I go a little mired in this one. As in, it has taken several days for me to get started again. But I plan on making up the lost ground over the next few days, and throughout the weekend, if I can manage it.

The problem with the original Gideon scene was that it was empty. There was nothing more to it than Gideon sitting in a chair and thinking. I couldn't get into writing it because there was simply no substance to it at all.

As I've rewritten it, there is some good character substance for Gideon, some dialogue, a bit of a twist at the beginning, and what's more, some direction for this character as I go forward. In other words, everything that had been lacking has been made up now.

I've also planned out the remainder of Book 2. I'm currently on scene 16 out of 46. Or thereabouts... there may be some juggling and rearranging, and perhaps an added scene or two, but that gives you the idea that we're about a third of the way through the book at this point.

I need to decide what to do about the previous day's section of writing that included some now-discarded material from this scene. There were 332 words in all, and I think I'm going to redo my count for that day as if I didn't write it at all.

*****

Thus concludes Chapter Ten. Chapter Eleven begins with a different POV and perhaps an interesting turn of events. We shall see!

Today's Total: 1,911 / 1,689 words (113.1%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 12,693 / 11,823 words (107.4%, 0.5 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 12,693 / 33,780 (37.6%)

Day Sixty-seven - 124,087 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

I think part of what made yesterday's writing selection so difficult was the lack of a clear way to get Devan to the testing room. I hadn't really spent a long time visualizing that section, and looking back, it was done a little jerkily. Now that he's actually there, I expect things will go a bit more smoothly.

After that I've got another POV shift, but I don't know if I'll manage to get to it today. Either way, that shift should finish out Chapter Ten.

*****

I like that I've gotten the chance to talk about the way people think about the marks when they grew up with it. It's a totally different perspective than Bryony's, and that's important.

I did manage to get to Gideon's section, although it didn't end at a good stopping place for the day. That's all right--tomorrow, I should manage to finish out Chapter Ten, and perhaps make it to Chapter Eleven.

EDIT: Gideon's section has been rewritten, and today's part of it removed. The totals below have been updated to reflect this.

Today's Total: 1,434 / 1,689 words (80.3%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 10,782 / 10,134 words (106.4%, 0.4 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 10,782 / 33,780 (31.9%)

Day Sixty-six - 122,653 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

Of all the scenes I've written since I resumed the story, today's scene that ends chapter nine is the one I've been looking forward to the most, rubbing my hands and cackling when I think about it. Now that I come to it, I'm trying to figure out the best way to carry it off. It's a cool moment, after all, and I don't want to spoil it by doing it badly. But I can always fix it later, can't I?

*****

I finally got the opportunity to use the term "the veil," which I've had for a while now, but had no way to introduce. It's about time!

I found it hard to switch gears and get back involved in the Devan story. We just had a nice long three chapter swath of Bryony time, plus a little Tynofast coda that should have been a surprise--it was a surprise to me when I thought of the idea. Now we're going back to the market and watching Devan test. We've already seen Bryony test. Well, this is more what it's supposed to be like, with the candidate well aware of what's coming.

What helped me get into the scene was the idea of seeing the testing from a different point of view. Essentially I've got Devan walking the same path that Bryony did, but noticing different things. It's not every story that lets you do that.

It's hard to believe that I've already crossed the 25% mark for the month, though of course it is a short month. Tomorrow I'll hit the 10,000 word mark for the month, and in a few days, I'll top 125k for the grand total. Things are actually moving along!

Today's Total: 1,807 / 1,689 words (107.0%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 9,348 / 8,445 words (110.7%, 0.5 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 9,348 / 33,780 (27.7%)

Day Sixty-five - 120,846 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

I'm so tired this morning. It's really, really hard to get motivated to write right now. But we can't leave Bryony hanging, can we?

I think I need to talk a little more about Bryony's emotional state through the early part of all this. She's just been through a hell of a time, after all.

*****

Oh, I'm laying the groundwork for soooooo much right now. I knew this would be an important scene, but I didn't realize it would be such a pivotal one. Now all that build-up I've written over the last few days seems much more justified.

I don't know how well I managed to carry off the emotional roller coaster that Bryony endured in this section. That's going to take some distance and feedback to see it objectively. I needed to put her in a place emotionally to justify the action of the next part of the story arc.

Bryony's part of the chapter is over, but the chapter itself is not. There is a slight coda, on which I will begin the section for tomorrow. After that, I should have room to begin Chapter Ten!

Today's Total: 1,813 / 1,689 words (107.3%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 7,541 / 6,756 words (111.6%, 0.5 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 7,541 / 33,780 (22.3%)

Day Sixty-four - 119,033 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

Today. Today it will be, I promise. I absolutely guarantee. In fact, I'm about to do it right now.

I admit, I've got a little trepidation at finally reaching this scene, which I've been building up to for so long. I think I'm a lot better at the build-up than the climax. (Out of context, that would mean something entirely different.) That means that when the time comes, I often find myself struggling to make the payoff mean as much as the buildup that led up to.

I'm going to try to treat this as just another scene, or perhaps the build-up to a bigger payoff down the line, and see what happens.

*****

Such hard going today! Every word has been a struggle, which is surprising, since I know just what's going to happen. It feels like I've got a kink in my writing hose, and it just won't come no matter how much I turn up the pressure.

*****

Well, I got the kink out, but it took most of the night to do so. I think a scene this important, with such emotional highs and lows, deserved a bit of extra time. The scene continues tomorrow, with what I hope will be a bit more in the realm of interesting revelation. He chuckled deviously.

Today's Total: 1,750 / 1,689 words (103.6%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 5,728 / 5,067 words (113.0%, 0.4 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 5,728 / 33,780 (17.0%)

Day Sixty-three - 117,283 words and counting

I'm writing a novel. All my progress can be found on my private blog. The commentary for each day's work can be found below.

This is shaping up to be a long chapter. In general, most don't go beyond two days of writing, or perhaps three. This one might just reach into four, which I believe will be a record. There's nothing wrong with a long chapter, now and then, but in general I think 3,000 - 4,000 words is a decent length for a chapter.

This one may be in the 6,000 - 7,000 range, and that might make it a candidate for cutting or splitting later. But that's in the editing process, not now. Now time is composition time.

*****

I've finally gotten Bryony and Illiantine to meet, an event that I've been intending since Illiantine was introduced way back in Chapter Eight of the last volume. Okay, so it's not a meeting with the Patroness, but it's important for the story.

So as it turns out, this did conclude chapter eight, although I did about a third more than I had to, just to make it there. So it's a long chapter, but not an immense one. And I don't see any more distractions ahead between Bryony and the Patroness.

Chapter Nine will be another Merona chapter... just kidding. I wouldn't do that.

Or would I?

Today's Total: 2.220 / 1,689 words (131.4%)
Dec. Progress to Date: 3,978 / 3,378 words (117.8%, 0.4 days ahead)
Dec. Total Progress: 3,978 / 33,780 (11.8%)