Progress is still coming and the book is still GROWING. I didn’t ask it to grow past 150K, I swear. But it swore back that I need another chapter of this, and two more chapters of that, and by the way I’d left an entire Very Important POV dangling. So. Still growing. New Stuff is Read More…
Category: the writing life
New Beginning In
NewBook’s new beginning has now been approved by two different first-readers (and many thanks to both of them!!!) so Chapter 1 is now anchoring one end of the book and the Good Ending (which has no chapter number as yet because things are still fluid in the last third and I need *uninterrupted* working sessions Read More…
Second Revision Draft
Second revision draft is now on chapter 22. This book, thanks to the years of not writing and brain foggy stuff, may take more than one run through the “Construction Phase” to get things right, but every thing so far is willing to be nudged in the right direction. My metaphors for the problems are Read More…
First Revision Draft
Done. But not dusted. The miserable tooth abscess slowed me down and tomorrow will be all dental work with two different dentists. It’s complicated. You do not want to hear about it. The book however runs like a fox across country…and surprised ME with its ending, which is logical, crisp, definite, and yet…makes it clear Read More…
Titles
Someone on Twitter this morning asked a writing group “What is the significance of your title? Could it be something else?” Hmmm. But my NewBook has no title yet, so let’s talk titles. The title of a book has different roles, as seen by the writer, the editor/publisher, and the reader. Let’s look first at Read More…
156,300+ Is Not The End
It is, however, *this* end. The last day in which what I’m doing could be called “first draft* rather than *revision*. Somewhere between three and four in the morning, I finally got my heroes out of the low passage out into the air and light–battered, filthy, stinking, exhausted beyond exhaustion, half their original companions dead, Read More…
150,000+ And Fireworks
This afternoon, a particular sentence pushed the NewBook length to the approximate, estimated length for a Paksworld book, and I went seriously giddy, made a pan of brownies, and asked R- to go get us fried chicken for supper, and ice cream to go with the brownies. Snippet here: ……………………………………………………………………………………………… “By dark, he had achieved, Read More…
The End’s In Sight: 141,000
NewBook is still accelerating, or rather trying to, since I just cannot type any faster any longer without the machine (the one that’s living on dark chocolate and junk food on top of a healthy diet just to keep the fires going) breaking down. It’s *almost* like being 30 years or more younger and able Read More…
Finish Line in Sight
This is the point at which, in the old days, would lead to two to four weeks of flat out writing all day and half the night, every day–no stopping, eating only what appeared at my side or (occasionally) on the kitchen table, as I made the final dash to the end of the first/rough Read More…
Yeah, It’s a Book. But Is It a Series?
Current-to-the-minute (but not for long) length of NewBook is 119,243 words. Still moving ahead strongly, though with some things that will be tightened and a few that will be cut, most likely. It now feels like it’s more than halfway through *this* part, but not through “the whole story.” Which means it’s definitely part of Read More…