Trying to stay on track/ ahead of my 1000 words/ day posting schedule. This is what keeps me on track for the year. I don’t aim for 1000 words and then stop, but I don’t stop until I hit 1000 words. Sometimes, like tonight, I go a bit over if inspiration strikes.

Inspiration didn’t take me too far over 1000 tonight. I managed to get in 1,124 before it started to drone on and get boring. I’m going to break for a bit and if I feel like moving on tonight I will. Chances are that I will edit it down to below 1000, though. Always happens. I write everything and then delete half of it!

Otherwise I’ve found a good spot to stop. I need to pace this chapter well. I have a lot I want to cover and I can’t stroll slowly through it. I also have some conversations that need to happen on this trip, because that pushes this story forward significantly. This trip is very important in the lives of my characters so I want to do it right. I just don’t want to spend 30 pages doing it.

I’m also reading, actually a few books at a time. I get bored with one and pick up another where I left off. I wish I could be so ambidextrous with my writing!

I’m in shock.

It’ll actually end up being 21 chapters on the archive because one chapter is over 10K words and the archive holds, at most, ~10K words at a time, so ch 19 will end up being split. I mean, I started this story Nov 1, 2009. It only took me almost a year to finish it. I hope it’s not lame and doesn’t seem like I just wanted to get it done… everything I wanted to accomplish with it, I did. Wrapped up my loose ends and made sure each character came full circle and solved all my conflicts and my ending is happy.

And I am happy.

Woo. I need a drank. Hopefully will be up later. I’m in a hurry to mark it complete but I at least want to read through them both to make sure I didn’t type poop instead of pool. (A real mistake I caught. Yowzers). I don’t want to correct too much because then I lose the passion. Just mechanics. That’s what I am telling myself, anyway!

YAY!

I need to back the story up.  I’ve solved my problem too early and I’ve run out of enough conflict to keep the story running. So, I need to add more ‘story’…. I always get into trouble when I get lazy and try to skip story… and bring both conflicts in the story to a more reasonable conclusion. And I need to bring my main characters back to a certain point, which will be significant to the story.

Amazing. Uhm. I have no idea when I am going to dig into it and fix it. But. Yes.

Now I am back at my own piece and asking myself questions, like why? Why would my main character stick with this person? Do I need to explain that? What does she see in him? Since this is just a snapshot, should I leave people wondering and asking themselves the same question? Does it just seem like she’s whiny and weak, or does she have any kind of resolve in her? Do I want my readers to like her or hate her?

This process is maddening. Every time I think, okay this is the best it can be and maybe I should just save it and email it to the submission site, I read it again, and see more things I could probably change. Grrrr. I need to leave it alone for a bit again.

*

Update: More editing, reading through, perfecting. And I joined Protagonize, a community of writers who sometimes collaborate on works but most importantly read and offer critique. Sometimes I need to hear from people who don’t know me and aren’t obligated to be nice. Though it’s nice to get that pat on the back from my friends, too. I’m sure I’ll open myself up to a few of those.

I’ve posted the current draft at Protagonize here.

*

I’ve been doing some editing this morning on Calm Waves and Smooth Moon which has now been retitled ‘Try to Say No’.

I’m wondering if I need to add more to it… more reactions to what’s going on, more internal thoughts. It’s in 3rd person, pretty much from one perspective, so the reader gets a view into that character’s thought process.  I don’t like to write what I call ‘diary entries’. This happened and then that happened and then happened, the end’. I like to be introspective and bring elements out. At the same time I want the author to draw conclusions and not have to be told how the character feels.

Hmmmmmmmmmmm.

I also went for it with Autocrit. Got the basic package which lets me run a series of reports on things like overused words and phrases, cliches, repeated terms, sentence length variation. It was quite helpful. I’m learning that I am repetitive by nature. While I do it on purpose, overuse loads the story down– it’s just meant to carry a central theme, not be annoying. Autocrit directed me to get rid of as high as 42 occurrences of a word! It did help me think about the point I am trying to get across and try to use other words, more complex or simpler terms.

I think I am going to seek out a few people to read it and get some thoughts. Let it sit for awhile and look at it again. I’m not in any hurry, but sometimes I can overwork a piece and it turns out worse. I want to get it complete and submitted so I can stop messing with it.

It’s break time, here at the ranch! Back to writing later,