It was months ago

when I last posted. I sort of lost track of everything.

However I am now picking up the threads again. I've got a new story for this year's NaNoWriMo. It's all planned out and almost ready to go. I'm actually going to try the same method with an old story that I've been trying to finish for ages. I think it might help.

I seem to be very good in planning books, just not so good in actually writing them. I usually end up with a first draft of 50-60 thousand words and nothing else. Hopefully this method will help me work out how to get beyond that stage.

I tend to be a little disorganized and end up changing names, locations and killers. Then I have a problem in making the story cohesive. This new method will hopefully make that less likely to happen.

I'll see how it works over NaNoWriMo and then say more about it. There are definitely some things I will continue to use even if I don't stick completely to the method.

As I no longer have a job, I'm hoping to write a little bit more than the 50 000 words minimum. I usually skip some scenes and just write a quick precis instead. This year I want to avoid doing that. I know I don't write as fast as some people can, but I'm still hoping for 5000 to 10 000 words per day. At least during the week. Weekends won't be as easy as I have a family and other things to do.

Still I hope to write something on most days, even if it's just 500 words or something. It is a pity that Nov. 1st is a Saturday this year, so I won't have the largest word count to start of with. Hopefully things will improve on the Monday...

A new week

And a new goal. I am writing, well mostly deleting at the moment. However I am busy working on my novel. I never realized exactly how bad my spelling is when typing, but it is truly awful. There are some words that I just can't type without spelling them incorrectly. Auto-correction is a wonderful thing.

I will need to read through very carefully afterwards, make sure that it hasn't done anything too strange...

Still it feels good to be writing and editing. I've got rid of about 1500 words which I was in two minds about, but I really don't feel that the were working in this context. So they've gone to another file, just in case I change my mind again.

So now I'm back and trying to work on some new scenes and re-writing the parts that I've just cut out. The action still needs to happen, but now from a different perspective and probably off stage. The consequences are needed for the storyline.

Back to writing.

No job anymore

I haven't written for some time, but I did have a reason this time. I was finishing off everything associated with my full time job. The job ended on Friday 28th February so now I am unemployed...

Well OK, I'm now at home writing or trying to at least. It all feels a bit unreal at the moment, but to be honest I'm also more relaxed. A little nervous as well, but mostly relieved that it is all over.

I am finding it a little hard to concentrate on writing, but with perseverance I hoping that will change and it will slowly become easier and easier to write. Of course I could just be fooling myself. Time will tell.

So starting next Monday I am to write (or edit) at least 1000 words each day. I know this doesn't sound much, but I want a goal that is reasonably easy to achieve but is not so low that it is too easy. If I don't manage my goal, then it is added to the following day. So for the entire week I should have 5000 words.

I'm attempting to write as I know I have another 20-30 000 words left to add and I would like to get those written before I get too caught up in editing. However if I get really stuck, then I will do some editing instead.

This week is not quite a normal week, the kids free from school on Monday, then there are 2 birthdays with associated parties and dinners. So as it is so busy this week, I've chosen to really start next week. That doesn't stop me from writing this week, it just gives me a week to adjust.

Writing

I wrote yesterday. Admittedly not a huge amount, but I did write. I had trouble getting into the flow, but it was a new storyline and that might be the reason. I find that the more developed a story is, the easier it is to go on. I'm still playing around with this new one and I keep changing the specifics every time.

One thing I find is that names are hard to come by. Appropriate names that is. I can think of Jane and Mary and Mark etc. but trying to find the right name for the right character is sometimes very hard. But once it's right, the story seems to read better.

I'm sure that's just me though. It would probably read the same to everyone else no matter what the characters are called.

This afternoon I'm going to try some descriptive writing exercises. I find this the hardest to write. I tend to keep things simple, but too simple. I need to learn how to get sound, smell, feel and movement in text.

Now to find my reference book on descriptive writing...

Update

Well I completely forgot to write a post on Friday and I could have sworn I wrote one on Thursday. I have such a clear memory of writing one...

I didn't though. Not sure quite what happened. I did have a meeting at work on Friday and that might have caused some of problem, but still it's a bit weird. Anyway I'm currently in the middle of threes projects.

Probably that is two too many, but when I get stuck on one, I find I can work on one of the others easily and then go back when I've worked a way around the block.

My mind keeps jumping between the three and I'm not sure how good or bad this is. I think, for me, it is good. Each one is at a different stage; one I'm just planning; one I'm just starting to write some scenes; the third currently has 50 000 words and is complete, but instead of full scenes in some places there is just a quick description of the scene.

Two are murder mysteries and one is a vampire, which might possibly end up also as a murder mystery. I do tend to end up with a murder or two no matter what I start writing.

Yesterday everything went well. I wrote in the morning and I felt like a writer. I was using my dictionary and thesaurus. It was a bit weird really.

Today I don't feel so good and it's affecting my concentration. So I have been sorting through a few things as I just couldn't get into writing. I still need to go through one more folder and that will be all the hard copy sorted out.

I still need to work on the computer files, but one step at a time and I don't want to spend all my time moving and comparing files when I could be writing.

I'm hoping to do a bit of both. Some days I'll only be doing admin. stuff, but hopefully there will be more days when all I do is write.

I scared of actually finishing a book, because then other people will have to see it. People I don't know. I am really not looking forward to that.

last week

So I successfully forgot to write a blog post on both Thursday and Friday last week. I'm still not into a routine yet. I'm hoping that once I get into one, things will become easier.

One positive point is that last Friday I did write a bit. It was bad, but it was writing. I started, well I tried to start, writing the beginning of a new book. I find that trying to concentrate on one project at a time doesn't really work for me. Or I'm trying to avoid working on the last draft.

On balance the latter is probably more true. I have now sorted out my files a little. I really need to spend more time getting rid of old files. I have about ten duplicates of almost every file. I've started to delete some of these.

And I don't mean ten versions of a story, I mean ten identical files in different directories. I need to create on main directory and start merging stuff. Trouble is I'm terrified I'm going to delete the wrong file.

Of course this is more of an excuse than anything else. I can always rewrite anything I do accidentally delete, if I've emptied the trashcan and can't retrieve it. I always still have the earlier drafts.

Strangely enough this reminds me a a short story about writing involving a cat. I wonder if I can find it again. It was good in so many ways.

Enough for today, back to editing, which is what I had started before I remembered I had to blog. This is for the almost final draft, which I have the feeling is going to change quite a bit over the next couple of months.

More about last Thursday

The problems didn't stop with the monitor. In the evening, I decided I would do a little bit more, so I went into the study and switched on the light. A fizzle, a small bang and no light was the result. The bulb had blown. It was an old bulb, but still. Unfortunately I live in an old house and this has one main disadvantage, which I actually love - high ceilings. Great for the feeling of space, but not so good when you need to change a bulb...

Fortunately my husband had left one of his work spot-lights after putting in a new radiator, so I used that to start off with. Then when he had time, he brought the stepladder in and took out the old bulb. A good clean and a new led bulb meant that the room looked better than ever. The light shade is actually made of cut glass and, when clean, makes great patterns on the ceiling and walls when the light is switched on.

Yesterday was a slow day. I don't know if it was just because I was tired, but I didn't do a huge amount. I've done more this morning than during the entire day yesterday.

I've started a new story, which is a murder set in the 1930's probably in the Caribbean, but it will be on some holiday island, which is hot in the winter. A very old fashioned tale, similar to Agatha Christie and because of this I'm hesitant about the Caribbean. For those that don't know, there is a Miss Marple story set there.

I don't mind the story being similar, but I'm not out to copy her. The location is about the only thing in common for the two stories, but I don't want that association to override everything else.

Progress

I was sick on Friday, so I did very little on that day. I slept all afternoon and when I was awake I wasn't exactly with it, so to speak.

But Thursday, now that was a nightmare day. After I posted on here, my monitor stopped working. Totally. I couldn't get it to even power up. I tried for an hour before giving up and moving on to other things.

At lunch I spotted the monitor on the old desktop and thought it would be worth trying that, so at least I could tell if it was my computer or my monitor that was bad. There was, of course a problem. The monitor is an old one and only had a vga connector. My computer is very new and only has a HDMI connector...

Then I remember seeing an adapter when I first got my computer. A little detective produce said adapter and a few minutes later I could contact my computer. So it was either the monitor or the cable.

I discovered the main on/off switch for the monitor and powered it down. A little while later I turned it back on and tried the same cable that worked on the old monitor, so with the adapter. Hey Presto! It worked.

So I tried the old cable for one last try and it also worked. All of this takes just a few minutes to type up, the whole episode took almost 4 hours in total. I was not happy.

But I now know that the most likely cause is a dodgy connection in the monitor, specifically a connection to the HDMI connector on the monitor. There is still a chance that it is the cable as I can't test that separately, however on balance, it's more likely the monitor.

This means that at some point in the next few months, my husband needs to take my monitor apart and see if he can find the problem. One advantage to being married to an electronic engineer.

Still the whole thing killed most of Thursday and I was sick all of Friday. I did still manage to find all the files I needed, which means today I have no excuse. Time to start reading through and editing where needed.

Another post!

Yesterday I was at my work, hence no post here. I didn't exactly have a lot to do, but still I didn't feel I should be writing while there.

Afterwards I went, with my husband, to buy some cheap shoe racks and we took a whole lot of old carpet to the dump.

So we come to today. So far I've done nothing. This is the first bit of work I've managed, but I will say it has sort of got me more in the mood to do something. I need to use my netbook to find some files and put copies of those here. Then I need to start editing and writing.

I have one ms, which has gone through a couple of drafts and I think, with a bit of hard work, might be a good possibility. The current version is on the netbook and I need to find it. I have the first chapter on this computer, however it is an old version and I don't want to spend time rewriting something I've already rewritten.

I need to add in some more scenes. I already know that. It's a bit patchy at the moment, but that just requires me to write.

The other thing I did yesterday is to tell some more people what I'm going to be doing. Most took it really well and offered encouragement, which is more than I thought I was going to get. I only had a couple of comments that were more negative and those I will leave where they belong - in the past.

I remembered

Not really too much to say today, which is something that I was worried about. I did more reading than writing yesterday, but that was because I discovered a directory with a number of forgotten about files.

I started to read one, then it was a couple of hours later and I had to get lunch ready. Time flies when you are enjoying what you are reading. It was a piece I wrote for NaNoWriMo eight years ago and it was pretty. Definitely rough around the edges, but not bad at all.

Today I'm going to be reading a bit more and possibly even writing, but that will be after lunch. I want to sort a few things out in my head first. Reading tends to help with that.

Hello again

It has been so very long since I wrote anything here. Things have changes quite a bit. I no longer have a job. Well that's not entirely true at the moment, but from 1st March it will be.

I have decided that for the moment I will not get a new job. My husband earns enough to support us, so I don't actually need one. I had jobs that I found interesting and this last one was getting more boring by the week.

This should mean I have more time to write and this is my first step in that direction. Technically not the first step as I have installed a legal version of Word and loaded up a whole load of old files, which I am now working my way through.

I'm hoping to submit a short story by the end of the month. I have 3 versions of the same story and with a little work I think I can come up with a version to send out. I need to research exactly where to send it. I did do some research before, which I still have, but I go through it all again before sending.

I'm also working on a novel. It is almost finished. And I don't mean the first draft, I mean the one I want people to read. I'm hoping that by the end of February I'll be in a position to start contacting agents.

I need to get into a routine at home for doing all of this. Today it is more housekeeping than anything else, but I have also done a little on the short story. I've put my netbook on recharge. Most of my writing is currently on there, which is fine except that I now intend to use my desktop as well. The screen and keyboard are better.

I can swap the keyboard over, but not the screen. Plus its advantage of being so portable is also its disadvantage. I want to get into the habit of writing at my desk for most of the day.

I also want to get into the habit of writing here everyday, but I'm a bit afraid that will turn into a drudge rather than something interesting. I don't want to write on subjects at the moment, because I don't want to spend too long planning and/or writing here. I just want to get into the habit more.

I do find that it is easy to write when I get going. That doesn't mean that it's good writing, but it is writing and that's, for now, the important bit.

Ummm...

Well I did very little writing, despite by best laid plans. I did however learn how to crochet. It's something I wanted to try for years, but life always got in the way. I've now made 3 doillies. OK, so they aren't brilliant, but you can see the improvement from the first to the third. I'm also using a medium wool, which means they are a lot more chunky than normal.

So now I just have to use the same technique to write more. It's a very simple technique, which can be applied to anything. And I do mean anything. From flossing to exercise to cooking and to just about anything you can think of.

You start by forming a habit. A very simple habit. The rest grows from there. So for writing, you form a habit, which consists of writing just one word. That word leads to the next and so on.

For the crocheting, I started with just one stitch, which lead to me crocheting for 5 minutes, which lead to me getting totally distracted and crocheting a doily in one sitting. On Monday I made 2, one in the morning, and one in the afternoon. The first one took a couple of days...

So for writing, when I have some free time I need to sit down and write one word, which will hopefully lead to a second and so on.

A great place to go to learn about forming habits is http://tinyhabits.com/, which can teach how to form habits. It may seem a little weird, but it does actually work.

Very bad

I haven't written here since January, that is so bad. I have written. I started a new short story and there is another that's mutating in my head.

I start off with an idea, which when I start to write doesn't work, then it begins to mutate into something that might. At least that's the way I look at it.

For some reason I'm writing in very short paragraphs today, and I don't really know why. I normally write much more before changing the subject. Oh well.

I haven't touched any of my novel since NaNoWriMo last November and that is not a good thing. I really need to sit down with it again. The trouble is I sort of promised myself to write and finish a short story first. I think I need to break that promise and actually do something rather than make up excuses for not doing anything.

I'm very good at doing nothing. That's one of my biggest problems. I have Friday off work and I will do something writing related then...just not sure what, but I'll think of something.

I quite like writing blog posts, but they aren't essential to me or to anyone for that matter. Still that's no excuse, I guess.

Anyway time to get back to work.

Long time no post

Well first there was Christmas, then New Year, then I was sick and I never quite got round to writing a new post. I did do some writing, just not here. I wrote a bit more to a short story and I even have an ending for it now. I haven't finished writing the ending, because some of what I've written doesn't sound right at the moment, but at least I know where I'm headed.

This is a different story to the one that I was going to submit. That one I'm hoping to completely re-write. I'm going through all my old files trying to find one of the first drafts. The last version I worked on just isn't right. I have an older version, which is better, but has too many characters. I know I had another version with still more characters. I want to find that one to see if I kept the wrong characters and deleted the right ones - if that makes any sense.

Of course I could just simply rewrite it completely, which will probably happen.

As for a novel, I'm sort of stuck. I know what I want to achieve, I just can't seem to get it right and instead of going round this, I'm stuck. I need to give myself a good push, trouble is I'm so busy it's easier to leave this until later and concentrate on other things that can't wait.

NaNoWriMo

I've written about 7600 words for NaNoWriMo, which is not so good. There are still eleven days to go, so I will probably still finish in time, but I really am not feeling it this year. If that makes any sense. I just can't get into the story. I don't know if it's because I did a detailed outline or not.

But on balance I think that must be it. I think I miss the freedom or writing and discovering what the story is. I'm hitting the second draft doubts instead. Of course if I can get past them and get on with this story then that should help with other first drafts I've written.

Still I think that next year I won't outline at all. Hopefully I will have a story, but I just put down a few lines giving the general overview and do the rest in November. Currently it feels like I'm just filling in the blanks and there is nothing to discover.

I love discovering the story. I think that is what I love the most about writing. I also think that is the reason I will never be published. I'm not sure I'll ever finish anything to a high enough standard to be published, because by the time I reach that stage there is nothing new left in the story for me.

I never started this to write for other people. I started this to write for me.

2000 words and counting

I'm behind in NaNoWriMo and for some reason I'm not worried. This year it seems less important and I don't know if that is because I know I can finish it in ten days or if I've just lost the will to complete NaNoWriMo.

Last year was the first year that I wrote on almost everyday. I spread the load out more evenly. All the previous years, excluding the one where I didn't finish, I wrote 50000 words in just ten days. The last ten days to be exact.

I think it's the deadline that pushes me on. Without it I don't feel any urgency, I mean I can always catch up tomorrow, right?

I'm hoping to write today. In fact, after I've finished this post I'll be writing. But I have a busy day at work and at home, so I'm pretty sure it's not going to be the big catch-up I need. Then again, at least I'll be writing something...

NaNoWriMo

I have a total of 750 words written. I should be at 8335 words, writing at the 1667 words per day. I have an excuse...

Work has been a nightmare. I didn't get a weekend. I was in working both Saturday and Sunday. I'm taking Tuesday off in compensation and possibly Friday. I have a meeting on Wednesday which will decide if Friday is possible or not.

I should get some written today too. I'll update here if I do, but as things aren't working I do have a bit of extra time.

The other weird bit about all this is that I am not the least bit worried. I normally start about November 20th and finish in time, so I'm totally calm. At the moment that is. Give it a few more days and I'll be wondering if I'll make it this year.

Good luck to all NaNoWriMo writers.

Long weekend

I wrote something over the weekend! OK, so I didn't write every day. On two days, I was so busy there was no chance to do anything. However I got all of one ending complete and most of the second ending outlined. The second ending is a lot more complicated. Much more than I originally anticipated, so there are still a couple of scenes left to go. I hoping to finish that tonight.

But as I was so busy, I didn't get all the housework done, and that needs to be done at some point. I still have to load all the scenes onto the computer to. I wrote them long hand, which for outlining seems to work for me. I will have to spend a couple of hours typing them up, but in the worst case I'll simply refer to the paper copy instead.

So I'm almost ready for NaNoWriMo and I'm looking forward to it too :)

More scenes

I added five more scenes to my NaNoWriMo outline and with those scenes I have reached the point where I can go one of two ways. So tonight I'm going to start writing the first of the two endings. Hopefully I'll get a chance to put down the other ending too.

I have fifty scenes without any ending, which is the highest I've ever go to with this sort of outlining. So if I average 1000 words per scene, that's the 50000 words without finishing. Of course some will be much shorter, a few hundred at most, but others will be much longer, especially where I have grouped together several scenes in the outline.

The upshot is I shouldn't have any problems with writing the 50000 words for NaNoWriMo. There should be about 15 to 20 scenes left for the ending, perhaps up to 25. So I should be able to write getting close to 75000 words if I keep going and use all the scenes I've got written down.

I wonder what the reality will actually be...