I’m pretty sure that ‘A Difficult Dinner’ is going to come in right around 120,000 words. Last night I took the original story and folded it in with the new middle/ending that I’ve been working on. To do that I had to cut out two full chapters plus part of a third, more than 8,000 words. Now, I may be able to use some of that in the new ending and I might be able to get some in after Thane comes back from Atlanta, but I think most of it is gone. This puts me a bit behind. If the story is as long as I think it’s going to be, I’m going to have to write 3,700 words a day to get it done by the deadline I’ve set for myself. This is completely my fault. I’ve given myself two months to do this and I’ve not written more days than I’ve written. So now if I’m going to really get this done I’m going to have to buckle down and put my fingers to the keyboard.
Monthly Archives: December 2004
Winter Arrives
Yesterday was the first real snow fall. Most of the lawn was still snow covered when I locked the door and headed for bed last night. This morning has been windy and full of flurries. I think I can safely say that winter is finally here.
Mom and Dad should be back for the Christmas holiday in two days. Not sure what’s going on as far as the celebration. The only thing I know is that the boys will be coming over on Christmas day and probably stay through the New Year’s eve.
I had a less productive weekend than I had hoped to have, but yesterday was good. Friday I wrote just under 1000 words. Saturday I skipped the writing because Rachel and Denis came over and stay’d a good part of the day. Sunday I managed to crank out 4100 words in two seperate writing sessions. I litterally whipped the shit out of Thane and I plan on finishing the chapter with his escape tonight.
Possible Story Ideas
I thought I’d give a little summary of what some of the titles I listed in the previous post are about. So here are a few ideas I’ve had for novels.
A Difficult Dinner
A man who lost his wife and two children to vampires finds himself defending a woman and her son from two different groups of vampires.
Crazy, Deadly, Cool
Ex-cop/PI story about a guy with woman trouble. A crazy ex-wife. A partner who is deadly with a gun. And one cool bit of trouble in the form of a runaway girl on the lam.
Sitting Duct
What happens when you find a load of cash in the ductwork of an old furnace? Well, somebody tries to kill you to get it back of course.
Blackmoon
What if Star Wars wasn’t in space? What if it had vampires and chainmail? A homage to this film wherein a pair of sisters, one good, one evil, battle to determain the fate of a fantasy realm.
Outside Adamantine Gates
After a failed assassination attempt on him results in the murder of his wife and child a man seeks vengence. Styx with the help of two street tough adventurers, Dancer and Rogue, decides that it is his purpose to destroy the booster gangs that ravage the city and do the dirty work of their secretive corporate sponsors. His two companions watch as he spirals down into a deeper, darker pit of futility.
One Shot Too Many
Roderick Thane is back, but something has changed. Perhaps it is the renewed ferver with which he is approaching his job of killing vampires that has caused the change. Or the instability he is causing on the recently reestablished vampire council in Detroit. Whatever the cause, his blanket of immunity has been removed and now the bloodsuckers are out to get him.
Word Count
I was just looking over HollyLisle.com and it got me thinking about word count. In particular, how much writing I should be able to get done in a year. I should be writing everyday, but with work, family, and friends that is a real struggle. Between the pull of family responsibilities, the drain of the typical work day, and the siren song of online gaming with my friends I have to cut myself a little slack. So let’s say I write 5 days a week doing 2000 words a day, I can do that without too much trouble, that should give me 520,000 words a year. Now, I don’t really think that’s going to happen, Holly is a pro and she claims about 300,000 words a year, or two books a year. If I buckle down and really start putting some heart and soul into this there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to get enough material written for 2 novels a year. Going by the numbers, I should be able to write three 150,000 word novels and still have 70,000 words started on a fourth. I don’t realistically think that I”m that motivated, nor is that taking into account any time for rewrites, revisions, or editing.
So here’s the plan. Complete the 1st draft of A Difficult Dinner by December 31st, expected to be about 120,000 words. Then with the start of the new year hit a new story hard, most likely Sitting Duct. I’ll set a goal here of having that done by the end of April. I’ll start editing A Difficult Dinner in the middle of February to give myself some distance from that story and a chance to get going on Sitting Duct.
May should find me starting a new project. Either Blackmoon or Crazy, Deadly, Cool not sure which will be more appealing to me come May. I should be done with that in August and have started editing Sitting Duct in the middle of June.
So with the coming of September I should be writing novel number three for the year, maybe a second story about Thane, and if everything goes smoothly I should be able to finish it before the year ends and start editing the previous story around the middle of October. That would make the most productive year of writing in my life. This is a goal I’d like to accomplish, but it’s going to take a lot of discipline on my part and a lot of support from the wife. This’ll either drive her crazy or make her proud. I’m guessing a little of both.
National Novel Writing Month is Over, the Writing is Not
National Novel Writing Month is over and while I failed to get to the 50,000 word goal, I did manage to get almost 30,000 words added to the ‘A Difficult Dinner’ manuscript. As with the last two years I’ve decieded that November is perhaps one of the worst months to try and do this feat. A combination of Thanksgiving, gout, sickness, and overly busy schedule kept me from getting my word count. Well, all of those plus a good deal of procrastination.
But not to worry. I’ve gotten a good start on the end of the novel and I plan on having its first draft finished by the first of the year. I’m expecting that it’ll be closer to 120,000 words when it’s all said and done.