It wasn't always that way especially at the beginning.
My first 20 K word count was fan fic that took a couple of
weeks. An original manuscript of 102 K followed. I had the
first draft in three months, and the sequel of about 30 thousand in a month. I
started and finished my second ms, Wilder Mage, in four months.
The Adamant was completed in six months.
Mage Revealed, sequel to Wilder, in eight months.
See the trend here?
My buckle-down-and-get-it-done flitted off into the aether,
lost among the shiny objects and squirrels. The road I'm on leads to the junction of Used To Be and What If. I know I’d have lots of company—writers who gave up and quit—but dang,
I really don’t want to end up there.
And so, I am taking the advice of Stephen King and CharityBradford and putting on a new shield of Gumption.
Number ten on Stephen King’s list of twenty writing tips:
“You have three months. The first draft of a book—even a long one—should take no more than three months, the length of a season.”
That’s about a thousand words a day and not out of the range of a professional writer. It is do-able.
Charity has a excellent writerly goad called Birth of a
Novel.
Every Friday you post a quick update on how you're doing on your writing projects. It can be combined with Camp Nano or whatever personal goals you've set.
All you need is a line or two added to the beginning or end of whatever post you already had planned for the day.Then visit the others in the list to encourage them to keep moving forward.
I have several projects orphaned due to neglect.
Chimera Mage-27,099
The Adamant-First Edits
Of Oak and Dragons-102,000, re-write
Diamond Black-8834
Time waits on no one. Ambition doesn’t grow on trees. And I am running out of both.
Welcome back! Somehow we will keep plugging on. Good luck!
ReplyDelete"Onward," she stated, with great hope.
DeleteNow you'll be motivated!
ReplyDeleteAre you running out of ambition or trees?
Oh snap.
Delete*G*
We all have that point where the writing takes a backseat. The trick is to get back to it when you're ready and not let it sit forever. Congrats on getting back to it.
ReplyDeleteAnother thing I heard that helps is to make a schedule, have a certain time each day - or every other day, whatever - that you only write, even if you sit there for an hour staring at the blank screen. I write every morning for a half hour before work no matter what, and then again later if I can. My biggest problem is not having enough time. Glad you're getting back on that horse :)
ReplyDeleteI have several orphaned projects too, as I try to figure out what genre I should write in. Taking this challenge might just make me feel more guilty when I can't write that much every day. Good incentive though.
ReplyDelete