Leaps and bounds

You know how sometimes you're slogging along through something and you're sure you're never going to make any real progress and you're starting to feel hopeless? And then something small happens, and suddenly you leap forward and start racing along, cruising smoothly through things that just yesterday seemed like great, impassable barriers?

Yep, that's me right now. In pulling out Ordinary Girl and starting to work on it again, I decided to take a look forward in the Think Sideways course to see how my working style matched up to things talked about in the course. And it meshed! And it all made sense! And I'm so excited now about the course and my book! And I realized that I was having such a hard time moving through the early parts of planning in the course because I'm actually good at those early stages, my system works very well and does the same thing (some of it is even identical). So, I am working through the plotting section of the course, using what I already have for Ordinary Girl and adding to it.

So right now I'm not writing new words, but I am working on the book, I'm excited by it, I'm getting some good insights (although I found a sticky point early on that I need a better plan for--more on the later). I'm finishing this book. I believe I will have a full first draft finished by the end of September, although I may revise that as I get a better feel for this system I'm putting in place.

Now, about that sticky point...Early in my story, my main character comes across a group of faeries in a derelict section of the city. The faeries see her, too, and the main faerie takes offense and decides to make MC's life miserable. Now granted, the MF is malicious and spiteful and generally a bitch. But would just having a human see her accidentally set her off enough to start being a stalker? I changed it so that my MC saw her doing something ungraceful, maybe stumbling over debris in the alley or something mildly embarrassing like that. But I don't know if even a malicious faerie would bother stalking a human over that. So what is it that MC sees that causes MF to be out to get her? That's what I'm working on tonight. I'm going to get back to it now, do some freewriting and see what I can come up with.

Day Two

447 words today. I fell a bit short of my 500 word goal for the day, but it's been crazy and hectic and full of interruptions over here, so I'm just going to be glad I got some writing done at all.

I also started putting my Think Sideways course printouts into a big three ring binder so I can have everything organized and in one place for my planned read through of the course. Did I mention that here? I am going to read it all and then go back and do the actual steps. This plan works much better with the way my brain works. So, I am glad to be started on the organizing part so I can do the reading part.

And now, since I can tell that last sentence was barely coherent, I am going to put myself to bed. I've been exhausted all day. I think I'll just give in to it.

Day One

I am trying something new for my writing. I'm working on Ordinary Girl, a novel I started during NaNoWriMo 2006. I am using some of the things I've learned so far from the Think Sideways course, but I'm also using some ideas I've pulled from other places. I'm using the Think Sideways ideas for coming up with conflicts, etc.

Right now, I'm going through the 60K or so words I've already written to get character and place names and descriptions. That's just listing stuff, though, so I'm not counting it toward my word count. I am also writing character essays, and since some of this will get inserted in the actual novel, I am counting these words. The major bit I'm working on write now is writing a summary outline--basically writing out everything that's going to happen (as much of it as I know) without the details. So "first she did this, then this happened, then this happened, then this happened." And so on. And I am counting these words because this is going to be the bare bones of the novel, and once I reach the end of this bit, I will go back and start adding details and description and dialogue to turn it into an actual story.

Today's word count: 680 (the even number was completely unintentional!)

Write a book with Holly Lisle

I have been stuck in planning mode for so long. I'm doing Holly Lisle's Think Sideways course, but I'm plodding and dragging and just feeling stuck. The course is great. I'm just having a hard time doing *anything*, not just that.

Enter a new venture by Holly. She calls it "Write a Book With Me." And it's pretty darned brilliant. Simple rules, simple goals, an easy place to post your progress. No pressure. Lots of fun. Lots of words. And I just realized that, even doing the bare minimum 250 words a day five days a week I will have a draft finished in four months (80 working days which works out to 16 weeks). And with a load that light, I can easily keep up with my course work.

I am not going to start on the course novel just yet. I think I'm going to pull out one of my back burner ideas and work on that. I'll tell more about that on Monday once I have some plans in place.

So, about that novel

I thought I'd put this into a separate post. While it is part of my productive obsession, the novel update deserves a post of its own.

I am slowly but surely making my way through the planning portions of the Think Sideways course. I have character profiles for my protagonist and antagonist. The love interest is nearly finished. And then I get to start working on conflicts! I'm pretty excited about the conflicts. That's where all the good stuff happens.

Yesterday, I "cheated" and jumped ahead in the modules for the lesson I'm on and read the part about math. Specifically about figuring out how long it will take to write and revise your novel. I'm planning nine months from when I actually get started on the writing. Which I think I will get to start on after I finish this lesson. So, sometime next week I think. Holly Lisle says she aims for 1500 words (7 pages) a day. I can do that! Stephen King aims for ten pages. I can do that! I can, but I think if I try to maintain that pace right now, I will crash and burn. I'm going to be sensible and aim for 1000 words a day. And weekends off at least some of the time (probably most of the time). So, nine months. That would mean that at the end of February, I will be sending out queries. Eek! I can do that!

Remembering my new mantra: Forge ahead, merrily onward!

So much to say, so little time

Running short on time today after a lengthy but productive doctor visit. So here's what's up in my writing world right now:

*Writers' group tonight (because tomorrow is my birthday, so we moved it up a day)
*Getting ready for NaNoWriMo, planning a Greenvale story
*Reading a couple of writing books by James Scott Bell
*Participating in Book-in-a-week this week, my goal is 20 pages

And a biggie that gets a line of its own: I signed up for Holly Lisle's How to Think Sideways course. Got the first lesson last night, and I'm already loving it.

And one last thing, writing related because it deals with Dracula: Stoker's blood relative to bring Dracula back from the undead