Currently trying to segue between a scene where my protagonist successfully captures some art-thief demons at a fancy museum grand opening gala and later that night, where she and the two demons she "caught" are naked in bed & rolling in the money she got for the job, celebrating a scam well played.
Where are you? (in your novel)
- Thread starter maxmordon
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I'm attempting a grand project, so I need a lot of front-loading of work. Currently, I am working my spells and potions list. Translating those I wrote in English, to Latin, is a pain in the backside and very time consuming. For my first era, I have to generate about 50 more spells and potions (not that difficult), but I have loads more to find Latin words for them.
I can see why it took Rowling so long to get her first book out (6.5 years or something to that effect, with finding a publisher).
Back to the salt mine.
I can see why it took Rowling so long to get her first book out (6.5 years or something to that effect, with finding a publisher).
Back to the salt mine.
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Still on my second draft. Right now I'm almost done editing this chapter. Next up is rewriting a chapter from a different point of view. 
But I guess that's what you get for starting out with four POV's and cutting it down to two. But the end of this draft is still in sight. Hooray!
But I guess that's what you get for starting out with four POV's and cutting it down to two. But the end of this draft is still in sight. Hooray!
I JUST FINISHED THE FIRST DRAFT OF MY PIRATE FANTASY!! 
Just don't ask me the word count right now.
Just don't ask me the word count right now.
Finished the first draft of my fantasy yesterday after eleven months and nine days. 368 types pages. Word count unknown but I’ve scanned it into a PDF and will know soon. Of all the books I’ve written thus far, this is the one that I really hope makes it.
At the scariest time for me. I've done my research, defined my characters, and the rough outline for 30 chapters are done. I even drew the common floor plan for use in my five cylindrical ship, the layout of the shuttle craft, and defined the technology - for example space suits with colored arm bands that go with whatever their job is (military, government, maintenance, etc).
Prep-work can be a trap I think... I could keep defining and refining for who knows how long - but I've reached the point of diminishing returns; there's no sense defining details of things that are not important to the plot.
So here I am, (figurative) pen down. Deep breath...
Oh - Now I'll go wash my motorcycle while I get my head firmly in the MC mind and see how he's bored right now, but in just a few moments people are going to start shooting at him.
Tomorrow morning I'll write -
Chapter 1: Arrival
...
Prep-work can be a trap I think... I could keep defining and refining for who knows how long - but I've reached the point of diminishing returns; there's no sense defining details of things that are not important to the plot.
So here I am, (figurative) pen down. Deep breath...
Oh - Now I'll go wash my motorcycle while I get my head firmly in the MC mind and see how he's bored right now, but in just a few moments people are going to start shooting at him.
Tomorrow morning I'll write -
Chapter 1: Arrival
...
greendragon
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Last novel done, edited and querying. New novel started! At 17K words. Brother and sister (aged 17 and 14) have escaped the Evil Step-Father and are running through the 6th century Irish woods in the middle of an icy winter storm. Perhaps not the best timing, all told.
SO - did ya? Did ya write some words? Or are you still working on your motorcycle? I wanna know.
*stares at word count*
*whimpers*
a wee bit high...
But you are right. Revisions will (in theory) help. Darn world-building / series entangled plots, grumble grumble grumble ...
Ah, yes.... Series-entangled plots. I worked on my spells last night (2 AM). I opted to create a spell from a four-letter word in Latin. I woke this morning and this dump of series-entangled plot + character arc + other elements dumped out of me in about 5 minutes of thinking about it.
Sometimes these are good things though.
Indian, it's so weirdly reassuring to know that vets still get daunted by the first blank page lol.
I'm fiddling around with the start of ms3 thinking... Surely I can't do this AGAIN... From nothing... From scratch... Yikes. Deep breath.
I'm fiddling around with the start of ms3 thinking... Surely I can't do this AGAIN... From nothing... From scratch... Yikes. Deep breath.
SO - did ya? Did ya write some words? Or are you still working on your motorcycle? I wanna know.
Yes I started in, but got derailed after about an hour. My wife had me moving furniture all afternoon.
So, I only laid down about 400 words, and I'm sorta, kinda, maybe happy with it. The first few scenes have to draw the reader in... introduce the world and environment, and in this case show some of the thoughts and tendencies of the MC - then introduce an immediate problem he has to solve to survive. I think I've introduced the bare bones of the character (that he's superstitious and in the army), also that he and a bunch of others are are fleeing a global catastrophe and bad people are after them. I only touched on the leading edge of all those things, which is enough to make the next scene work (where people are shooting at him).
With me there also comes near crippling self doubt that goes along with starting a large project like this.
> You're not a good enough writer to tell this story.
-- It's MY story, if I'm not going to tell it, who will?
> You're unworthy and it will turn out horrible. You'll make a fool of yourself.
-- Sigh... Well, I'm going to write it anyway - so there.
The furniture is where it should be so tomorrow will be a better day... although I have to teach a self-defense class in the morning, after that I'll have the rest of the afternoon.
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Nice! I always like those moments. Loads better than the times where you are staring at the screen with characters gone silent.
I'm finding it really encouraging reading about everyone's progress.
I've just come out of a two week funk of self loathing and have cranked up the pace on the plot, written 5,000 words in the last two days and starting to see the wood for the trees. It feels good.
On the flip side, I've hit 57,000 words and am nowhere NEAR finished with this first draft. However, the stuff I've come up with the last couple of days overshadows a lot of the waffly infodump nonsense I've written around the mid-end of first act point. Do I revise/remove/tighten up these sections now or just keep ploughing onward? (I'm writing completely out of order in case that makes a difference!)
EDITED to add: tiddlywinks, please share your word count or give us a hint
- is it very high? I'm feeling like I'm going to end with about 150,000 words and have to cut so much out, I need reassurance that this is in fact normal. Or at least that it can be dealt with!
I've just come out of a two week funk of self loathing and have cranked up the pace on the plot, written 5,000 words in the last two days and starting to see the wood for the trees. It feels good.
On the flip side, I've hit 57,000 words and am nowhere NEAR finished with this first draft. However, the stuff I've come up with the last couple of days overshadows a lot of the waffly infodump nonsense I've written around the mid-end of first act point. Do I revise/remove/tighten up these sections now or just keep ploughing onward? (I'm writing completely out of order in case that makes a difference!)
EDITED to add: tiddlywinks, please share your word count or give us a hint
- is it very high? I'm feeling like I'm going to end with about 150,000 words and have to cut so much out, I need reassurance that this is in fact normal. Or at least that it can be dealt with!
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Promo articles written for A Study in Honor coming out in (eep!) two weeks. Complete ms. for the sequel, The Hound of Justice, sent to my editor. Two more books for a new series sold to a different publisher, so until I hear back from editor #1 about HOUND and from editor #2 about the pirate fantasy novel, I'm working through plot notes for sequel #2.
EDITED to add: tiddlywinks, please share your word count or give us a hint
Ok, fine, you suckered me in with the thought of easing a fellow writer's anxiety!
The first draft for this book ended at just shy of 145,000 words. I'm a little peeved since I was aiming for 100-120k, but a) fantasy and b) intended first in a series (though I did make it stand alone in case).
I'm not too worried. I've ended at worse on first drafts! My very first attempt at an epic fantasy draft ended up 280k. :/ I've since figured out a way to split it in two, but have also trunked it for now as it needs A LOT of work. After that, I had an urban fantasy draft that initially clocked in at 149k, but through my learnings here, I got that down to 108k. Still on the high side, but that's the size of that story. My paranormal romance draft was about 92k and revised to 87k. That was much tighter to begin with, having learned from the UF.
I knew this was going to be a bigger one because so much world-building and layered series sub-plots. And I'm pretty sure there's a lot of rambling, which is my initial tendency. I would much rather cut than add. I've been having to add to my novella because I wrote the bones of a good tale, but needed to push it a lot darker and I was having trouble getting a handle on some of the characters. That's like pulling teeth to revise for me personally! Cuts, heck yes.
So, TL;DR don't fret. Just get the story down first. Then polish to a fine gem later! Whatever works to get the story out. And your story will be the length it needs to be.
Good luck, ktdude. You got this!
Thanks tiddlywinks that's reassuring, especially hearing how your experiences have changed on different projects. I hope I'll improve over time but rambling verbosity is definitely my main flaw, I'm studying the heck out of flash and short fiction to try and learn the ways. I do NOT feel worthy. But my story is in full flow, so there's no going back now!
Jen, a reporter with a major music magazine, was covering Carnevale in Venice. A skirmish in the crowd watching the Opening parade resulted in her falling against the balustrade on the Realto Bridge and being knocked unconscious. While she was out, she had what she assumed was a dream. A dream about a murder. Returning to New York City, she is haunted by the dream, and begins to question her sanity until she learns that the dream, the murder she witnessed during the dream, actually happened ten years earler.
