Writing Update - Six months

I didn't post an update on November 20th (five months since the Great Reboot) mostly because around that time I had some computer issues and frustrations were getting the better of me.  Unfortunately I've had a similar problem this month to go with lots of formatting issues with older work, so this month is the first I haven't actually hit my monthly target.  In any case, here's a stats update on what I've written since June 20th this year.

	Name	Type	Word Count	Status
1	The Ship	Short Story	3793	Finished - to edit
2	Take me Back with You	Short Story	2528	WIP
3	Take me Back with You	Novel	35303	WIP
4	The Lost Train	Short Story	4352	WIP
5	The Other Set of Feet	Short Story	3749	Finished - to edit
6	The Hunter	Novella	18783	WIP
7	Once We Were Children	Short Story	2513	Finished - to edit
8	The Assignment	Short Story	8802	Finished - to edit
9	Never Give Up	Short Story	5111	Finished - to edit
10	Clones	Short Story	1323	Edited
11	Beat Down 1 - Clones	Serial Novella	19233	Published
12	Sunfall	Short Story	1271	WIP
13	The Tube Riders: Exile	Novel	90629	WIP
14	Beat Down 2 - The Heist	Serial Novella	18533	Published
15	Beat Down 3 - Badassaur	Serial Novella	19699	Finished - to edit
16	NaNoWriMo 2012	Novel	3714	WIP
17	Beat Down 4 - The Sneevla	Serial Novella	4015	WIP
18	Undelivered	Short Story	358	WIP
	Started June 21st	Word Count	243709
		Pages (300w/pg)	812
	6 month target (Dec 20th)	(183 days)	250000
		Ahead	-6291
		Total	Month
	One month tally:	33598	33598
	Two month tally:	62217	28619
	Three month tally:	119253	57036
	Four month tally:	180097	60844
	Five month tally:	217500	37403
	Six month tally:	243709	26209

It could certainly be worse.  I missed my six-month target but 243k in six months is pretty solid going.  However, in October I had been hoping to break 300k by now.

The biggest problem I have had is with flash drives.  I learned the hard way to make sure I back up my work after breaking a flash drive in November.  However that was just the start.  I actually saved that one, but since then I've had two fail on me and while I've been backing them up more regularly I still lost a bunch of words both times, most notably on my effort at NaNo, which I lost TWICE.  In hindsight, taking on an entirely new project for NaNo was a huge mistake, because I overestimated the amount of writing time I would have, plus I tried to push my boundaries by writing in a genre I wasn't familiar with.  While this in itself was not a big deal, I spent a lot more time writing it than I spent on more familiar projects.  It all started well, then I lost six thousand words.  I rewrote it, then lost it again.  That kind of bummed me out so I abandoned it, although the whole experience left me feeling a little burned out and it took time to get back the motivation I had previously had.

Then there was the formatting issues I had with the paperback for The Man Who Built the World.  I struggled with it for weeks before finally outsourcing it and paying someone else to do it for me, which I should have done in the first place.  The sum result was that I failed to get the paperback ready for Christmas, although it should be available shortly.

In other writing, I'm plot-knotted again in Tube Riders, although I'm working through it now.  My novella series, Beat Down, suffered from the flash drive failures and I had to rewrite roughly 5000 words on part three, something that was very frustrating because it is very creatively spontaneous and I think a bit of the humour was lost in the rewrite.

Overall, though, I'm pretty happy with what I've got over the last six months.  In addition, after reading a blog by a pretty successful writer which encouraged us to get as much product out there as possible because you never knew what would strike a chord with the reader, I went back and took a look at a really old novel, one called Possession, which I wrote when I was 19.  It's little more than a straightforward horror story and I have never so much as reread it, but I found it was a lot better than most of the stuff I've read by indie writers so with a couple of solid edits it might be serviceable.  So I've started to work on that as well as the edit for a book called Head of Words, which is a (very) black comedy/horror/thriller/thing.

Right, back to it.  Have a good Christmas everyone, and I'd be happy to see any comments below.  And just a reminder that Tube Riders is currently free, until the 22nd of Dec.  Click the links in the sidebar and grab a copy.

CW
21st Dec 2012

The NaNoWriMo Challenge

The NaNoWriMo Challenge!

I've decided to sign up for NaNoWriMo this year for a bit of an experiment.  This will be my first time but I've been writing so much recently that I think I can handle it.

However.

Writing, when I'm in the zone, is not something I find particularly difficult.  In the last week alone I wrote some 15,000 words on just one or two hours a day.  When I have the thread of a story its like I don't actually write it, it writes itself.  So if I'm going to make it a challenge, I want to do something different.

This is what I've decided to do, and I want anyone who's up for the challenge to join me.

For a bit of fun, let’s create something “out-there” and attempt to push our literary boundaries.  If what you write turns out to be a masterpiece then all well and good, but at the very least it will give you a chance to try something different and explore new territory.

The target, as with all NaNoWriMo novels is a story of 50,000 words within the month of November.

This year, however, I have chosen a number of criteria and I will use a dice to decide exactly which ones I will use.

My criteria are -

1. Genre.

2. Narrative voice.

3. Character

4. Character attribute

5. Setting

You should choose six options for each, then roll a dice to decide the basics of your story.

Please note – all criteria should be filled out individually.  The choices below are what I chose, but please make sure that each option is something you would feel comfortable (or be willing to try) writing about.  For example, if you don’t like writing about serial killers, don’t use “serial killer” as an option.

The most important one is the genre.  You should chose six genres that you have NEVER written in before.  We're attempting to leave our comfort zones here.

Okay, so here's what I chose for my categories, and the results of my dice rolls are in bold.

Your novel will be a –

1.    Western

2.    Historical romance

3.    Techno-thriller

4.    Mystery

5.   Crime story

6.    Literary story

written in –

1.   First person

2.    Second person

3.    Third person

4.    First person omniscient

5.    First person multiple viewpoint

6.    Stream of consciousness

And featuring a –

1.   Cowboy

2.    Talking animal

3.    Housewife

4.    Ninja

5.    Bank manager

6.    School teacher

who is –

1.    Immortal

2.   Gay

3.    Disabled

4.    Retired

5.    Pre-teen

6.    Very overweight

In a primary location of –

1.    Desert

2.    City

3.   Ocean

4.    Space

5.    Mountain

6.    European Countryside

You can add more and more categories if you wish.

Good luck!

So, my result – I will write a crime story in first person, featuring a gay cowboy and set in or around the ocean.

Hmmm.

Feel free to add my to your friends list on NaNoWriMo.  I'm going under my real name, ChrisWard.

Good luck!

CW

3 Oct 2012