Okay, so Silver and I did this thing in July that we called JuLoWriMo, wherein the plan was to do something writerly every day. The idea was to use the month to get back into the saddle after our extended periods of not-writing - hers due to medical issues and mine due to working outside the home for a couple years (which, frankly, sucked the creativity right out of me).
All in all, I think it worked for both of us. She's back to working on her stuff daily and I'm back to putting words on paper. I didn't do every day. I wrote 27 out of 31 days, though, and managed to add approximately 24000 words to my WIP.
For this, I chose to work on the next Duke Noble. I'm calling it Thicker Than Water right now. I'm not sure if I'll use that as the title at the end. I liked it better when I first started the book than I do now. :shrug: Anyway, I started writing on this story on May 30th when I laid down 198 starter words. I was creeping up on the end of my day-job and the ideas were starting to pop, so I jotted one down. I did some more words in the month of June - like revving the engine before the big race. This gave me 4564 at the start of July.
The hardest part, at the beginning there, was getting my hands used to cranking out words again. I did not have to remind my hands how to type, thank goodness. I did do a lot of that at work, just not for any extended length of time. And writing requires extended typing. So, my fingers were fairly flying over the keys, but after 30-40 minutes, my hands would start to cramp and my wrists would complain. The next morning, my digits would be pork sausages. Gotta work those bad devils until they get over it, doncha know. Eventually, the ouchie got less and less and I could produce more words without paying for the deed the next day. I'm not up to previous numbers, but I did manage to whip out 1304 in one sitting.
The other hard part was learning to focus on writing again. Sit here in this chair with my hands on the keyboard and let words flow out of my fingertips without distraction. Hubs was awesome and wrangled the cats on several occasions, so I could work in quiet. But life doesn't work that way most of the time, so I needed to get used to working with things going on around me. I think I accomplished that, too. I was in the middle of my writing session Wednesday night when Hubs got stung by that wasp, and after I took care of him, I sat back down and got about 500 more words out.
What I need to do from here on out is continue to write every day (or most days) and for longer stretches of time. And if I can't do longer stretches of time, then I need to start having more than one writing session a day. In the old days, I could crank out a
Anyway, I think JuLoWriMo was a success. If you've never done something like this, I highly recommend it. Even if you're not a writer. They say it takes 30 days to form a good habit... I think. This is one way to do that. Write every day. Or exercise. Or paint. Whatever it is you want to do, pick a month and go for it. You might be surprised at the results.
Congrats! I think JuLoWriMo was a success for you. And me! I did something every day but one, as you know. Sometimes I lost words, sometimes I added words and all in all, I feel much better about this project. I added several chapters and about 10K words. I did a hard edit on the first 20 chapters, wrangled scenes into 14 more chapters, of which 10 of those have had a decently hard edit. Current word count is approximately 113K with 34 completed chapters.
ReplyDeleteI still have a bunch of loose scenes to wrangle and yes, it is rather like herding cats, but I'm shooting for a Labor Day release. 🤞🏼 crossed.
Upward and onward! Keep writing!
Yay for more words! It sounds like this novel is nearly half finished!
ReplyDeleteI miss the old hand sets, too. They were soooo much more comfortable than a cell of any type.
Hello to your new fawns!
It is way too hot here. I've given up walking until mornings cool down a little, probably in October.