I DID IT!

I entered my first ever contest. You can read and vote for Crybaby here. Names have been changed to protect the guilty, I mean innocent.

AHH! I forgot to put back in the returns.

Of course there is my first paid item of writing here. I wrote a review of the campsite at Wasdale Head.

Well, I have to go and plot out the next portion of my story so I can actually get my 4-6 pages done today.

Certifiably Insane

Oh, no, what have I gotten myself into. http://www.alisonkent.com/blog/?p=2089#comment-28645 I've just committed myself to over 100 people that I'm going to write 1000 words a day. Unfortunately, I haven't come up with a title for my work in progress and used the folder title. Originally she was supposed to be a witch but I changed it to a sorceress. I've been horrible about finding time for my writing lately and so here it is. I know I need to keep going through to the end, but there's so much I want to change about the beginning. From every source I know, everyone says push through to the ending of the first draft and then go through the rewrite. I think I can, I think I can.

Just cause it's cool

31,444 / 90,000 (34.0%)

I saw this in some signature lines on eharlequin.com's writers' forum. What an interesting way to keep yourself on target and show yourself the percentage your novel is complete. Of course when your novel is 80% through the plot and you've only written 34%, well, it makes me cringe.

31,444 / 75,000 (41.0%)

Of course, if you set your goals a little lower than it makes you feel better.

Sporatic

That's exactly what my writing's been. I wrote 2 days last week. My goal is to increase my writing this week which I've already finished 1,184 words today and I still have time left. I have been spending time looking at other author's blogs and agent blogs. So I haven't been doing nothing related to writing, I just haven't been writing. Saturday and Sunday were too busy and last week with Phil out of town was just too tiring. But I'm going to get back into the swing of things. Total novel length so far.... 31,335 words over 153 pages. Not horrible.

Progress

Well, I haven't made great progress since I was sick this week. I hadn't quite gotten back into the grove of things since we got back from camping. The prior week I wrote 3885 words on the story and this past week I wrote 3229. Total word count on the book is 22,728. I've been working on the plot and the word count doesn't include the time spent on characters or plot which I do in a notebook. So this week I'll go for 1000 words per day and hopefully reach 30,000 words in the next two weeks.

Temporarily Derailed

I was going very strong the first part of this week. We went out of town Thursday through Saturday and no writing was created today either. However, not counting the last two days, I had an average of 1596 words per day. My lowest day was 1017 and my highest was 3056. I have a total of 15614 words written on the story. Realizing that my plot was reaching the half way point, I began to panic. I'm hoping that my first draft at least gets to 50,000 words. I'd rather it be more, but I know I have to work more description and character into the first draft. I did think about what I need to develop my villain more. She's needs a little more flesh on her bones.

So the goal for this week is the same to maintain an average of 1500 words a day and to get above 20,000 words. I have a big scene worked out that will be the next thing I write. I also need to work on my villain.

Resisting the Urge

I'm plugging away at my first draft and am resisting the urge to go back to the beginning and adding more. I know that I need to flesh out the start of the book more, but I also know that revisions are best left for after the first draft is finished. It is one of the hardest things for me. I'm doing nicely and staying on goal for this week. We are well into the muddle of the book. Muddle is correct. It's the way to get from point A to point B through Points X,Y and Z. I'm working on character development and the next section will add a bit more of an action element. If the characters will oblige.