Tag: writing sprint

Once More With Feeling

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Formatting troubles aside, the overwhelming feeling that this is going to fail like everything else I’ve tried over the past year or so is attempting to suffocate me again.

It’s that time of year again, when I reflect on what I’ve done this past year, but we’re not going to do that because reasons. I’m also supposed to make plans for the next year and lay out all the stories and my plan for getting it all published.

We’re not quite doing that this year.

I want to do a bit of a modified 12-in-12. It turned out pretty well last time, I thought, and I got a lot of books done. The idea of doing it again caused a great deal of excitement until I sat down to plan it out and got that low down feeling again.

I never follow the plan, so why plan it out, I think was the point. Dunno, super wish it’d shut up and die already, though.

My very initial plan was to stream and vlog the experience. Might be good for someone out there to see the way I do things. Might help them sort out their own plans on publishing? But a vlog takes editing and that’s a new skill.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d be willing to learn. It’s just I wouldn’t have the time, it’s adding something else to my plate that I would need to do and let’s just roll back on the stressors a bit.

I’ve done some livestreams and have gotten wrapped up in the viewers possibly being bored. That’s a stupid way of doing it. Well, doing it for writing specifically. So, I’m debating keeping that in there and livestreaming my work, basically. The videos are only supposed to stay up for two weeks but I now see they’re twenty-five days old and still there. I have a gaming channel too and all the videos from after fourteen days have disappeared.

Now I’m more than a little confused…

That being said, I want the first book to launch in March but that’s not a book that’s going to be written during the challenge. I want Mars Red to launch in March. And I want to start writing December 1.

Which means I need to get Mars Red edited. Right.

I also want to make several box sets. “Smart people” have box sets. It’s just more work piecing it all together and then I get wrapped up in the fact that I don’t think it’s very good and it makes me grumpy. Blah, blah, blah.

But the plan was to make boxsets so I should do that. Listen to myself when I make these plans because they’re good plans. I loved the 12-in-12. It gave me purpose besides staring at a computer screen and spending way too much time thinking about how and why people never seem to like me.

So, let’s drive some danged purpose back into my days.

Part of the livestream purpose was to get me back into writing. It’s like an accountability thing. If I feel like you are expecting me to keep my promise, I will. But if I just make a promise to myself well… maybe I could play a little more of a game I’m not actually enjoying to fill my time instead of doing something I’d really like to do.

If you are a reader, call out a book, a series, a world you’d like added to. I’ve got all the universe to play in.

What I’d like to do? I’d like to write four books in the new Shadows series and publish them one after the other from April to July. I’d like to write Kaz and maybe the first in that witch series for Coffee and Blood. I’d like to write Suicide by Pluck and its sequel. Full stop, it seems that’s just a duo of books but it’s… a thing.

So. December 1st, I start writing again. Shadow of Coventry is my first month. Eight chapters are already written and there may be dice involved. But so help me, it’s going to get finished and other books will follow.

And soon.

Awakened Week Two

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I’ve written about ten thousand words in the last week and I hate the struggle. I came up with the loose plot four days ago and then forgot it all. It’s like hitting a wall.

My sleep patterns have changed because the noisy neighbour moved out. Today I realized it’s been a year since I slept properly. No wonder I’m now struggling.

This morning I sat down and wrote out a rough geustimate of the plot. I started at the end and worked my way back because there was this little gap I was struggling with and working backward was definitely the way to go.

I’m hoping I can get a move on again. It’s about nine more chapters or about another 35k words. I’ll get about 23k this weekend but I do believe Awakened will be my longest project to date. I think even Contract Claimed was shorter.

I found and joined a high word count group and they think I’m burnt out.

I mean… Full-time job and the move and the life changes and trying to meet a project, okay. I guess they’re right but that’s not a great thing. I’ve been doing so good! I’m halfway there. May is supposed to be when I struggle.

When I’m going to Mexico the first week, and flying out for a wedding the the third week. Second week? Something like that.

I will have to just take it as it comes. This isn’t like the struggle with His Wings, I want to finish Awakened and I’m enjoying writing it.

All told so far, between writing and editing the books I’ve wrtten, I’ve clocked about 80k words a month.

Or about 320k from November until the beginning of Marcg. That’s still pretty darn good.

Oh, in other news. I’m about to finish the read edit for His Wings. The final draft will be up sometime this weekend. That’s another project down to bed.

If I can finish Awakened, I’m going to edit Contract Gifted again and hopefully get that up. Maybe get it up the first week of April. That’d be fantastic.

Crop Week Three

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Crop is done! I even converted the files over but apparently forgot to check the word count. It’s probably about 66k words, but with autocorrect being labotamized I’ve found it less detrimental to the story to write it all out and then go back for the additional information. This is what I’ve been calling the description edit.

Or, alternatively, getting to the end and realizing you gave no one and nothing descriptions. Like. At all.

Ugh. It’s only been like fourteen manuscripts since I started chastising myself about the descriptions, you know. It totally takes forty before it clues in.

The plus side of such description edits is that I don’t have to stop and backtrack going, “what do these characters look like again?”

It never seems to stick. That’s what happens when you want to pump out stories to get the ideas down before you forget them.

The detail edit also lets me get really into the manuscript and paying attention to details and typos

I finished last Friday and proceeded to take almost three days off to drink wine and play video games. I got bored halfway through day one when I realized my controller didn’t have batteries and I was out and feeling lazy. So I didn’t get to play the games I wanted.

The third day, I set up the wrap for Seed and wrote two chapters of Harvest.

Yesterday, I edited four chapters of His Wings, read five chapters of Fragments, decided to rework the description of Fragments my next day at a computer, updated the Worlds on my website, started plotting Awakened, and began working on the cover for Crop.

Yes, that was all yesterday along with a full shift at the day job.

It seems I was suffering a B12 and D deficiency, both of which can lower energy levels and cause depression on top of my home situation which resulted in me being a lazy bum.

I’m back to myself again!

Except I’m not cleaning my apartment. It’s this whole thing. Landlord thinks I should live in a mouldy home and pay full rent while my ceiling is leaking in three places and I’m kind of hoping the leaks cause an electrical fire and take it all out. But not until I move my stuff out.

And cleaning it never feels clean thanks to the issues in the building. But I’m sure it’ll make good backstory for something.

Awakened is so far the contender for March. Mr. Wrightworth has walked away from Contract Delivered again. But it could be because once it and Contract Gifted are written, the world will be closed. Only because I feel like the stories have been told.

I will be writing Harvest at the same time, on commutes, after I finish a read edit of His Wings.

And I need to pack at some point. Right… much to do, sort of enough time to do it in. Basically, it’s crunch time.

On Not Meeting a Word Count

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

75,629 / 90,000 words written.

That was not my goal, so what to do now?

Well, here’s what actually happened:

I wrote a majority of my words over three days, which was about 22,000 per day. One day I wrote 600 words, another only about 3,000.

Friday night (technically Saturday as it was 2am) I finished the rough draft at about 67,000 words. A rough draft is rough because you then make changes.

It was halfway through my second day of heavy writing that I realized I hadn’t been doing descriptions. Not of the characters or rooms, or really any emotional attachment to anything. It was mainly dialogue and barebones.

So, I went back to the beginning and started adding it all in. I’ve only reached chapter nine in this endeavour, not even halfway through the book.

Reaching that 90,000 word count for this book is possible, I just have to backfill the stuff I skipped over because I knew it would slow me down. If I had done it, I would only be about 40,000 words and not know the end or the thread of plot through the book. I would have lost it.

Now that I’ve got it, I’m almost good to go. Yay.

Long nights and regular mornings can wear you out. If you want to try this yourself, you will need to figure out what writing method works best for you, and practice meeting the word count.

This was a stretch for me, I knew that. I did it to fill a staycation where I couldn’t afford to do anything or go anywhere. It was my break from reality, one that I planned so that when I woke up this morning for my day job, I didn’t feel dejected because I did nothing but play video games and drink.

Don’t get me wrong, those things still happened…

Halfway through the week, I realized that I had no plan in place to edit it. But I think I can place it in the edit spot for Seed as I’m not certain that will be done on time.

I should be working on that now, but two hours of sleep and a long day ahead of me. I need my wits, because I need my day job and there’s not much room for error today.

During my week off, yes, I was pretty well holed up with no contact with ‘real’ people. All I had, for the most part, was a writer chat that kept me company. They knew what I was planning, and called me crazy, but then cheered me on and participated in sprints when I was struggling to meet my word goal for the day.

Once I made that goal, I was pretty well set. I’d end up staying up another four to six hours and adding between six and ten thousand more words to the book.

I don’t think I could have managed it without that chat.

Anywho. Heading back to the day job today. Not enough sleep because of a combination of my sleep schedule for the past week and being a little manic of plans for marketing and such.

The one plus side of the late night is that I might have and line on the next D.o.t.A. book. Apparently Morgan is content without telling his story, so I’m not about to push him.

New Alphas, new city, with only one of the old crew making a brief appearance. It promises to be fun.