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Regarding How to Read and Consume E-books: Like I Have A Clue
Tag: Personal
Writing Journal/Random Notes, 6.3.2018: New Milestone and Increased Activity
With me now on full vacation and some ideas shaking loose from old projects, I think that it was reflected in my activity this week.
+1,354 words written.
Days writing: 3 out of 7.
Days revising: 4 out of 7 for 300 total minutes.
Daily Writing Goals Met (500+ words or 30 minutes of revisions): 5 out of 7 days.
Not a lot of original writing, of course, but I am keeping active. I’m going to keep the journal update brief this week, both due to the level of new info I have to share (not much) and the desire not to repeat myself (which is strong).
- I have reached a milestone on my work for The American Nine after about 1 1/2 revisions to the book. Over the next month or so, I’m hoping to have beta readers from my writing group and possibly others have a chance to take a look at what I’ve produced and give me some comments. (I might revisit the topic of beta readers in a later post).
- As far as other projects, I want to keep busy. There are two possibilities – We Can Be You…, which I’ve already discussed, and an old project that I’ve rechristened Excitable Boy to see if the name fits and if there’s enough story there to support something. Right now the latter project is at 50,000 words – shorter than most of my recent stuff – and I suspect there’s some things to cut and some things I might need to add.
- My intent with the second point is to not get caught up in not producing or revising something and keeping busy with the work. I was very happy this year that I didn’t have any major declines or dead times of not writing or revising. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to keep that up when the next school year comes up and my new job. I think that I should be able to manage that.
Just a few Random Notes:
- Looking into what format I might want to start reading e-books in. Considering how I might be publishing in the e-book format soon and many of the writers I’m running into online are doing that, I might want to consider it. (That also might be worth its own blog post later).
- Getting in a lot of soccer watching on the weekends – will watch the World Cup even though the US won’t be in it, and Major League Soccer is still deep into its season here in the US.
- I’ve recently noticed that when I get bored or start feeling down about things, getting more sleep is a good remedy to reset your mind. Probably helps healthwise, as well.
I’ll write some more when I have some more to write.
Writing Journal/Random Notes 5.20.2018: Officially blocked?
Well, here’s what happened last week in the official extension of my “vacation” :
+1,572 words written.
Days writing: 2 out of 7.
Days revising: 0 out of 7 for 0 total minutes.
Daily Writing Goals Met (500+ words or 30 minutes of revisions): 2 out of 7 days.
[Pictured: What I’m not doing.]
These, I believe, are the factors behind the pause:
- I honestly had to take a break from The American Nine for a bit while I let the project sit for a bit. I think I am feeling more confident in taking another look at it and seeing what I can remove from it as being not needed. (One thing I realized two days ago, however, is that I believe I need to add a scene – or add to an existing scene – a confrontation between my MC and his father regarding his sexuality. I don’t want to make it a cliched standoff between straight dad and LGBT son, but I think I can take it into a better examination of how many of the personal choices my MC has made were a result of trying not to make the same mistakes as his father did, and his father trying to understand how it applies to his situation. It’s a characterization moment I can’t miss out on.
- I made the decision to try and move forward with We Can Be You… but I realized I’m more excited about the idea of the prospective third book in that series than the second or first. I think one of the reasons the rough drafting of The American Nine went so quickly and well was that I concentrated on writing just the parts that excited me, which told me what was worth keeping and what was not worth keeping. However, that is a bit more of a challenge over a series of books. I have to think about that one.
So, that’s what I have faced, but I think that this week I will start to turn that around.
Quick Random Notes:
- I have now solidified my job situation. I will be leaving my district due to budget cuts and start work at a new district, contract in hand. Having all of that resolved is a big load off my mind, and with this being my last week of school, I will be getting into the writing mix soon.
- This big conference sponsored by the Midwest Writing Center in the Quad Cities is coming up. Will have to check bank account and other financials to see if there is interest. I’ve been there twice and I have found the experience beneficial.
- The Holy Fool will be published this year. Once I sign a full contract and the book would be available for purchase, I will announce it here first. My hope right now is that I could get something out in the fall, perhaps. You’ll have the details right after I get them.
That’s it for now; more later.
Writing Journal/Random Notes, 4.22.2018: Consistent but a little quiet
So, I was checking my writing totals, and… they’re not too much different from last week – a little lower, but pretty consistent. Those totals:
+899 words written (blogging).
Days writing: 2 out of 7.
Days revising: 4 out of 7 for 150 total minutes.
Daily Writing Goals Met (500+ words or 30 minutes of revisions): 5 out of 7 days.
And there we go. Not much to say about them, but some context with the numbers:
- All the written words are in blogs, which I started counting recently. It’s probably going to be a while until I get out of the revising mode and into brand new draft writing.
- My revising has been on both my projects and a beta read for a member of my local writing group, Writers On The Avenue. I’m hoping to do more of this for people.
- This summer, I’m hoping some members of my group will be willing to beta read The American Nine. However, when I send it to the group, I will have to emphasize the fact that this material could be considered TV-MA, NC-17-type material (to be fair, romance novels are getting pretty explicit nowadays). Writers who prefer to write about religious or Christian themes are likely not going to get into the material, which I totally understand. Maybe I need to put this on the manuscripts when I email them out?
OK, then! Random Notes time:
- For those interested in my actual writing, including fiction, poetry, and nonfiction work not written specifically for this site, I’ve added a new category to the blog, My Writing. Just click on the handy folder link on the right side of the blog (or this link right here) and it will take you right to those pieces, if you are curious about them.
- Real life often seems up in the air right now. I tend not to discuss a lot of personal life stuff here, but right now it appears that there is much waiting around for things to happen. Two big events are the fact that the last of my two kids will be graduating from high school in two years, and the fact that my wife is currently running for office. (Most of you probably wouldn’t be affected because it’s just our local legislative district, but here’s her site if you’re curious.) As a result of these and a few other things, I’m in the situation of having no idea what my life will look like two years from now. It’s an intriguing situation.
- I’ve got a couple of blog post ideas coming up – another one on my series of posts about revising, and getting into what that revived book project I was reconsidering looks like. You’ll probably see those within this week.
That’s it for now; more later.
Writing Journal 3.4.2018: Oh, hahaha (Life and silliness interferes with writing)
OK, here’s the totals – I’ll explain below:
+687 words written.
Days writing: 3 out of 7.
Days revising: 1 out of 7 for 60 total minutes.
Daily writing goals met (500+ words or 30 minutes of revisions): 1 out of 7 days.
OK, so it’s better than last week. Not the highest of hurdles to clear, but it is cleared, for what it’s worth. However, two main things interfered with my writing this week.
First, as I mentioned previously, my realization that I have to use a different, fictional club rather than a real Premier League club. (Spoiler alert – I was considering Arsenal FC.) After consultations on the Internet in a few different writing group pages on Facebook, I came to that conclusion pretty quickly.
To be frank, I’ve spent much of my time thinking of what this club will look like, be located, named, and its history. I am betting that 95 percent of what I came up with will not be used in the main draft, but I sincerely believe that being able to have that background, that world-building, is important enough to devote time to. I think my next mid-week post might be about that.
The second reason was more pedestrian – I’ve been dealing with some sort of cold/infection for the past three days. Yesterday, I was barely able to do anything except sit in front of the television and watch Premier League most of the day. Now, I think I can at least think, but this totally stuffed nose can disappear at any time. It is far tougher to get any sleep when you have your nose stuffed up than anything else.
So, with a relatively short work week, better mental and physical stamina, I should be able to pick up production. However, I think that it’s hard at this stage of the writing process. Like a sculptor, I’m no longer taking huge swings with the mallet and big chisel, but chipping away with the smaller tools to get everything looking just right. My plan is to have a sub-99,999-word finished manuscript in my hand by my birthday, March 30. With spring break coming up, more time away from work, and maybe one or two lucky breaks, I’m pretty sure that is achievable.
So, you’ll have another blog post Wednesday and I’ll be setting up some more content for the FB and Twitter pages to see out the week. Hope everyone has a great week, and welcome to all of the new visitors.
Writing Journal/Random Notes 12.17.2017: At least I can analyze my writing failures better
Well, this week’s writing session turned into what, for me, was a bomb. And I was at the end of the week, just staring at the screen, watching the time go by, like (inserting The Last Jedi-appropriate reaction picture here):
The stats:
+1,801 words written.
Days writing: 5 out of 7.
Daily writing goals met (500+ words): 1 out of 7 days.
Well, I always say it could be worse – I could have gone three years without writing like I did back home years ago.
Some background: I am currently working on a book with the working title The American 9. My intention is for this book, a sort-of coming of age/rise of a sports idol story that finally harvests my obsession with soccer into something of use. I’ve talked about it before.
Based on past research, I should be shooting for a book somewhere in the 80,000-100,000 word range. This is where I stand on the first draft today (I’ve not posted these numbers before):
Current length of first draft: 77,657 (as of the beginning of today).
Current goal for first draft length by Dec. 31, 2017: 85,000-90,000.
[At this rate, that goal might be ambitious. But if I have two good last writing weeks of the year, 85K is doable.]
Planned length of first draft: 95,000-99,999.
[Not so much this week, but it’s a good title for a regular feature so I don’t want to junk it] Random Notes:
- As the title implies, I do have what I consider to be a good idea for why I boinked out so harshly on the writing output. Since I rededicated myself to a writing lifestyle, those valleys of not writing have been fewer and far between.
In putting together this novel, I’m trying something I have not previously done. Instead of writing the book how it will be read – that is, from beginning to end – I am assembling the book like a mechanic. I am installing all of the vital, most interesting scenes first, and then considering whether I need to add in the other scenes later.
This week, I came across a scene that I considered to be vital – the last soccer game D., my main character, has with his old Sunday League team, after he has gone off the college and the other main members of the team have drifted off into other interests. I believed it was a vital scene, because it helps him begin to reexamine whether he made the right choice to play college football near his hometown rather than go to England and try to succeed as a soccer player there.
The only problem is that writing the scene became a slog. It just didn’t feel like the action was flowing, although I did not include the entire scene, but rather only the times when D. scored goals for his team.
What I needed to remember is that if I feel like I’m writing garbage, especially in the first draft, I just need to type the garbage and move on. Everything gets fixed in the revisions. I forgot to do that this week, and the above is the result. - In case anyone’s interested, my leg that I talked about hurting last week is slowly improving. I can now walk normally, but climbing stairs is still problematic. Thankfully, it’s a non-issue where writing is concerned.
- My winter break starts Thursday evening. I honestly could care less about any presents, but I am looking forward to ending 2017 on a good writing tear. More and more I am finding myself in front of a computer writing than anything else.
- This will be the only post here today, but I am working on another blog post that might come out midweek if I get ambitious [ha-ha].
That’s it. Going to schedule some posts for the upcoming week and getting a better writing day in so I can get out of that scene…
Joining The Men In Red
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