Any Writers out There?

I’ve been writing about myself for a few months now, and it’s lovely that a handful of the millions of people with internet access have taken interest. Even so, I’m starting to feel like I’m talking in an echo chamber. Blah, blah… writer… blah… schedule… blah, blah, blah.

So tell me about you. Do I still have readers who want to be writers themselves? How’s that going? If you’re writing, what are you working on now? What would you like to write in the future? Anyone a big fan of homemade mac’n'cheese? I love that stuff. If you’re not writing, but would like to, tell me what you have in mind. It’s probably doable, and I might be able to direct you towards some resources that will help you along. Is there anything you’re curious about that I haven’t mentioned?

If you’ve just come across this post and it’s been three weeks or whatever, that’s okay. I still want to hear from you.

Fun with Shelfari

I’ve had an account with Shelfari, a bookshelf sharing website, for about a year. I’ve also heard good things about Goodreads, but haven’t tried them yet. I was poking around Shelfari a couple weeks ago and found a writer’s group. That’s the one I’ve been talking to about whether my expectations are sane. If you’re a reader and interested in viewing my bookshelf, my user ID over there is LMN. There are two of us; I’m the one with the lemon pic. My views on scheduling and careful planning are somewhat in the minority. An author with a more organic process left me a note about it on my profile. He’s a nice guy, and I’m excited to find that he and many others are so openhanded with their advice.

Word Count 6

9140 words since last Friday, with a high of 2119.

This could mean that it takes six weeks to establish a habit, or that I can do it in one, but only if I know it’s the last one. I’m not going to push it; there are four more Fridays between now and the end of May. What I do next I will schedule into that time frame.

I managed to meet my goal this week by allowing myself a free write every day. No set topic, no real purpose to the writing except to get coherent thoughts from my brain to the screen. I wandered into a couple of good ideas that way, and I may continue the practice. Towards the end I also tried to write some fiction every day, and was not as successful. I wasn’t always “in the mood.” While I know one published author who only writes “when the mood is there,” I don’t think I can trust myself to produce anything if I operate that way.

It’s time to write a novel.

There are five novels, in various stages of outline and completion, on my hard drive. The next big step is to finish one of them. NaNo notwithstanding, I don’t think I can do it in one month. By all accounts, taking a novel from Once-upon-a-time to submission should take at least 6 months, with 12 or 24 being more likely.

I’m going to start with something easy: the oldest unfinished novel in my files. Long, long ago, I wrote about the characters and what each one’s approach to the story’s main problem would be. I’ve been revisiting them in the past week, and I’ve realized that I don’t like them much anymore. During May, I will rewrite these characters so that I can enjoy being with them for the many months to follow. I will also check on the plot and subplots, and make sure they all make sense, first, and then see if there’s anything I can do to make them more engaging.

My goal for May is to put 1,000 words towards this new project per day, focusing (but not exclusively) on preparatory work such as character biographies. 1,000 more can go anywhere: blog, free write, another story, etc.

I’m not trying to work myself to death. I just know that lack of variety will bore me, and I want to make noticeable progress on the novel. If last month is any indication, I am going to struggle or hit a snag somewhere. Even if I can achieve this one consistently from the start, it may take more than one month to finish the prep. I’ll keep you up to date.

I have a correction to my post on April 22. I misunderstood my fiance when he said it took him only 6 days to level up to 60 in Warcraft. “It took me about 10 weeks to get a character to 60, not 1 week. 6 days played means 144 hours at the computer.” And we still had about two dates per week during that time. My computer nerd has mad romance skillz.