SWC: Day 12 (Challenge Complete!)

Done at 42023! I'm so happy to be writing this, proud of myself for sticking with it and hoping that my effort will worth something! I love this story, and with all the changes over the past two weeks, I'm happy with where the first draft has ended up.

I have a feeling this challenge has now become a way of writing life for me. Pushing that story out the way I did was rewarding at times and other times just plain frustrating but finishing a story and moving on to the next (yes I've already thought of another one!) is so worth the challenge!

This one will be going through an edit over the next month or so. Then hopefully the second draft will skip chapter by chapter crits and go directly to Beta. I predict quite a few revisions but I'm looking forward to it!

I'll keep you posted on it's polishing!

COMPLETE!!!!

40000 / 40000
(100%)

SWC: Day 11 (Oh, so close!)

Worst. Writing Day. Ever.

Okay, so maybe I'm being a bit dramatic, but it was full of distractions and I am only posting at 1:43 AM. I did struggle to keep my eyes open during both scheduled writing times today. *Sigh*

Well at least I got something done. I've stopped counting words now...lol And it's not what you think. It's just that there's so much cutting and adding going on now that I can't keep track of how much I write, only what the ending word count for the day is.

Here's todays! :) I think it's safe to say tomorrow, the goal of 40, 000 will be reached. But I predict the first draft coming in around 45, 000.

39065 / 40000
(97.66%)

SWC: Day 10 (Salivating :P)

I can taste the end and I'm so excited my fingers a tingling. I added a few more impromptu plot changes today. And upped the word count just a little bit despite some scene cutting.

This one is really coming together and I'm relieved. From the first day of plotting, it has changed so much, but for the better. I've really come to love these characters.

And Middle Grade? I'm hooked!

37352 / 40000
(93.38%)

SWC: Day 8 (< 10,000 to go!)

So I'm quickly nearing the end! My mojo is back and my MC is finally blessing me with his voice again! I love this kid and writing for him is a lot of fun.

A goal of finishing by Saturday looks promising!

33007 / 40000
(82.52%)

SWC: Day 7 (One Week Down)

So it's been exactly a week and I am 3/4 of the way to my word count goal. I haven't reached my daily word count goal in the past two days. Mainly because of a major case of "the block" yesterday and burst of inspiration (which made me rewrite the entire ending plot) today.

So with all the word cutting and word adding I'm at 30000 words. That's 10000 to go to meet my goal. Now if I stick to the 5000 per day goal I'll be done by Thursday, but after the way I felt yesterday and this morning (like my head was going to explode) I've decided to take it easy and only do one chapter a day. That's 3000 per day. That' I know I can handle.

My prediction is first draft WIP complete by August 27th and ready for the big bad edit.

Progress:

30002 / 40000
(75.01%)

SWC Day 6: Burning Out! Oh, no!

Yes, it's true. Today was a horrific, painful writing day. It all started with an impromptu agent search. I guess I got a little too excited about the story and started searching for agents who may be interested (for when I get to that stage). Well, the search turned into hours of reading about a perfect agent with a heavy hand for rejections.

I was, needlesly, bummed. I get like that sometimes. That I-stink-at-this-why-am-I-doing-this attitude takes over and completely derails me.

I had a thought about querying today and I'm starting to think it's all about luck. It's a formula that can't be duplicated. In short, getting an agent is as lucky as winning the lottery. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm starting to believe that it all comes down to timing and mood. Sure, there's a little bit of talent thrown in there, that's a given, but how much of it is just plain luck?

If you query the perfect agent on a bad day, how does that affect your chances? If he's seen sixty query letters about werewolves and they've all sucked, the next time he sees Urban Fantasy or Werewolf or 120, 000 words isn't he going to be like, 'hell, no I'm not putting myself through that again'.

On the other hand if he's been looking for a story about a twelve year old spy and not one has crossed his desk, even if the one that finally does comes in the form of a crappily put together query, might he take a look anyway?

These are all just random thoughts on my journey to the inevitable. Eventually, I'll have to put fingers to the keyboard and start the dreaded query and even worse hit send!

Sorry for the rant, today's just one of those days when I'm wondering if I'll ever take this writing thing past the challenge of finishing a book!

Anyway...here's the SWC Day 6 update. I quit early, due to all the jumbled thoughts, but I'm still making progress!

28368 / 40000
(70.92%)

SWC: Day 2 (1K+ words short)

Didn't reach my daily goal today, but I'm trying not to beat myself up about it.

Today I blogged on one of my other blogs and did some editing on my YA WIP to post for my critique group this week.

Then I found out about an awesome contest and considered entering one of my previous works. I looked at it all day and started editing and polishing, until I finally said No! I'm sticking to my challenge.

So about two hours ago I started writing again. I'm burnt out now and taking a break.

1084 words short, but I'll have to make up for it tomorrow! At least I'll try!

Progress update:

8916 / 40000
(22.29%)

SWC Day 1.5

Since I officially started yesterday, I'll add half a day and admit to cheating a bit.
So far I've met my daily goal.

Tomorrow (as in later today, since it's already after midnight), will be a challenge in itself, to see if I can actually stick to my goal of 5000 words a day.

5035 / 40000
(12.59%)

(End of) Summer Writing Challenge

In the past few days, I had an idea for a new novel. The one I mentioned in my last post that is going to be set in Toronto. After some brainstorming and advice seeking I've decided to abandon YA (not completely, never!) and pursue Middle Grade a little more seriously. With the help of my ten year old, I'm writing this new WIP and pitting myself against a deadline.

It's back to school for me in a few weeks. I'll be pursuing a one year grad certificate by correspondance. So, although I'll be able to do some creative writing during the time I would normally be travelling on the TTC, I still don't want to overwhelm myself.

My goal is to finish this new WIP by the end of the summer. That's fifteen days. Eighteen, if you count the holiday weekend. We plotted the entire thing last night (so much fun by the way!) and came out around fourteen chapters. Based on experience, I'm assuming it'll round out somewhere beween 16 and 18 chapters. So that works out to about a chapter a day.

I'm going to be really ambitious and set a goal to write 5000 words per day. That's about two chapters, or a little less, based on a goal of 3000 words per chapter.

This is my summer challenge. Crazily, taken on at the END of the summer.

Here's my progress so far:

2750 / 40000
(6.88%)