I'm Baaaaaaaaaaaack...

Yes, I'm back, after a few years. There may be some changes to this blog, to the format, or I may move it elsewhere, but I'm back. To all those who were fans of those blog, I hope you're still around. To anyone else, seeing this for the first time: Welcome. Check out other posts and other pages. I'll be posting here soon.

For now: 3,660 words today and two submissions. And I sent a story to some beta-readers and heard back from one already. Not too shabby.

February 2016

I haven't had too much time to write in this blog, but for a great reason: I've been writing, instead! I finished two short stories in the past few weeks, and I've worked consistently. Because of that, I haven't wanted to stop my mojo and post here.

Which brings me to a conundrum: I initially started this blog so that I would write more consistently, the whole point being that I had to write every day so that I could post the number of words written every day.

But now I'm way beyond that. I don't need this blog anymore to get my writing done. And as it hasn't been a stop for other writers to post their word count, I'm wondering if it serves a purpose at all anymore.

Maybe I'll post here once a month, or once every few weeks, instead. Or maybe I'll just delete the blog altogether. We'll see.

At any rate:

The word count for those two short stories, plus my WIP, for the last few weeks:

Approximately 20K-25K, at a guess. Not bad for me, for the past five weeks or so.

January 1, 2016

Ringing in the new year with a sinus infection, as usual. Trying to be productive, regardless.

Lately I've been notecarding.  Is that a verb? Outlining doesn't usually work for me, but for some reason notecarding my chapters and scenes have been worthwhile.  It works, so I do it.

I've notecarded more chapters of the WIP, plus a short story, and have written both yesterday and today.

Short story and WIP...about 2,000 words, total.

Happy New Year!

A New Beginning 12.30.15

Okay, so it's been a few months, but I'm back.

Back, and writing another WIP.  This one is actually more than 150-200 pages in, but it's in pieces and chapters and fragments, and there's actually enough here and in the little noggin of mine to maybe make a trilogy. We'll see.

For now, I think I've finally nailed the beginning (again).  It's been challenging finding where to begin. I keep going back, and back, and back. But this is a good problem to have, as the novel has been progressing in its regression, and the textures and voices have really shown themselves.

So in the past few months, plus the excerpts and chapters and pieces before this, there've been at least 40,000 words, but let's just start with what I think is the beginning, and go on from there, though I may find a spot where I see it's a good place to drop this chapter there, and this piece needs to go there, and this fragment works really well there...so I'll just add those as I go.

So for now, the last few days...10 pages...

2,787 words

It's Good to Be Back

It's been a long time...

Let's see.  I'm going to combine the totals of my writing of the past couple days. Consider them an accumulation of daily entries here over the past few days that I didn't press PUBLISH for.

617 words today for a blog entry I've staggered until a few days.  600 more for one written and published a day or two ago.  I forgot if I was counting blog entries or not.

1,446 for a piece I hope to finish in a couple of days and sell to a local publication.  I'm typing out the second part now, so...

Okay, 698 words.  Not bad.

So, over the past 2-3 days, about 3,361 words.

And I found all of the fragments--ranging from a page or two, to about 75 or 80 pages--of my next novel-in-progress, written in spurts over the years.  I printed all of it out, and it took an entire ream of paper, and much of a printer cartridge.  Overall, over 100,000 words.  That's the one I think I've got a trilogy-amount of.

I'm going to try to outline all of that stuff.  Outlines will definitely count here.  And Part 3 will conclude the piece I'm writing, so that'll get done tomorrow, hopefully, and I'll send that out.

It's good to be back.

WIP No Longer IP -- It's Done

It's done.

The manuscript is finally done.

At 1:57 a.m. on July 1, 2015, I finished the entire novel.

May all my edits be small.

And make a publisher tell me to make them.

Week Ending Sunday, June 29, 2015

Whoa, sorry about skipping last week.

Major things due at the job and now I'm on vacation for awhile.

And I'm just a few chapters away from giving the whole thing to my beta-readers!  Very cool!

So...about 2,500 words.

How's everyone been?

Week Ending Sunday, June 14, 2015

Whoa!  Looks like we both backed away on this!  With my building closing, the end of the job upon me, and sending out my chapters to my beta-readers (and what a formatting nightmare that has turned out to be!), plus some other added ridiculousness...Just kinda got lost in the shuffle there.

Sorry about that, especially since I'm the one who called this meeting to order.

How's the wrist?  Feeling better?

Editing and query letters this week: About 2,000 words.  Actually, not bad for me, considering all the above.

Week Ending Sunday, May 24, 2015 -- Beta-readers

Editing red pen comments over last manuscript and lining up my beta-readers and sending the work to them via email or snail-mail, so I haven't kept track of my word count.  I'm going to guess...1,500 words.  Paving over a manuscript by the red pen comments in the manuscript is as much a tedious process as it is a productive one.  I got sick again, too, with a sinus infection / virus situation that made my head quite swimming.  Exhausted, too, really early in the day.  Really hard to write, edit, and save correctly that way!

So, yeah, 1,500.  Sorry for the whining.

By the way, I have 7 beta-readers lined up, and I would love 10, and I haven't asked any of my e-friends yet.  I mean, haven't we all been buried by people asking us to read their books and manuscripts?  And I especially feel bad because I haven't had the time to read and comment on too many of anyone else's work lately. 

But if you're an e-friend of mine, and you wouldn't mind being a beta-reader, please let me know by Wednesday the 27th.  My email is on this page somewhere.

Please and thank-you!

Week Ending Sunday, May 17, 2015

Chapter 67

1,504 words.


Chapter 68

921 words.

Lots of query emails to my beta-readers.

So let's say...3,000 words.


Spent much of the week getting my beta-reader email packages together, plus calling a few people so I didn't have to send them emails.

Why?

Because the 37th novel-length edit of the book is done!!!  That's right--37!!!  This week I'll send out my beta-reader queries and work on the next book.  This weekend I'll spend one day incorporating all of the red comments in this last manuscript edit, save it all to one long document, and back it all up.

Then, out go the agent queries as I work on the next book, tidy up and send out a few stories, and take a look at the new book my zombie story is in.  And, please, wish me luck!!!

Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Chapter 65

696 words.


Chapter 66

227 words.


Total: 923 words.

Monday, May 11, 2015

Chapter 64.

2,316 words.

Almost cried while writing it.  I'm so close.

Week ending Sunday, May 10, 2015

Chapter 63.

628 words.

I'd do Chapter 64 now, but it's past 1 a.m. and I have to go to work in a few hours.


So...

Chapter 58--612 words.

Chapter 59--542 words.

Chapter 60--1,194 words.

Chapter 61 (1st half)--1,221 words.

Chapter 61 (2nd half)--793 words.

Chapter 62--2,168 words.

Chapter 63--628 words.


For the week: 7,158 words.  And during a workweek!  For me, that's not bad at all.

Saturday, May 9, 2015

Chapter 62 is done.

2,168 words.

Just a couple of chapters left.

Friday, May 8, 2015

Finished Chapter 61.

793 words.  Off to dinner out.  Have a nice night! 

Thursday, May 7, 2015

About half of Chapter 61. 

1,221 words.

A thousand words a day, every day, means a completed novel manuscript in just three months.

Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Chapter 58--612 words.

Chapter 59--542 words.

Chapter 60--1,194 words.

So, the total for today: 2,348 words today.  From about 5:15 pm to about 11:30 pm, with about an hour and a half off for dinner and a couple of other minor things.

Why more today during the workweek?

--I was more awake, though I was exhausted.  (I can't explain this.)

--I kept making small rewards for myself.  Like, I couldn't open my most recent T206s until I finished these three chapters.

--These were the last three chapters before the big explosive denouement chapter, plus the wrap-up chapters.

--I'm about four or five total chapters from typing THE END.

--The Red Sox suck right now.  Painfully.

Week Ending Sunday, May 3, 2015

Well, not quite 9,000 words this week.  But I knew that was gonna happen.  Just barely 2,000 words.

Time to face that I'm a weekend writer during the workweek.  It is what it is.

Week Ending Sunday, April 26, 2015

Chapter 53.

949 words.

More to come today, but it's 2:41 a.m., so I should probably sleep.

...Okay, did that.

Chapter 54.

2,105 words.

So over 3,000 for this day so far.

I hope to finish Chapter 55 tonight.

So exhausted I'm making silly mistakes and the words aren't coming like they do.  I even made some saving errors, which is really bad.  But...


For the week (drumroll, please):


Chapter 49 = 689 words.

Chapter 50 = 372 words.

Chapter 51 = 3,002 words.

Chapter 52 = 803 words.

Query letters = 224 words.

Chapter 53 = 949 words.

Chapter 54 = 2,105 words.

Chapter 55 = 396 words.

Chapter 56 = 509 words.

Chapter 57 = 79 words.


9,128 words!  YES!!!  I can't tell you how great this feels.  And it even felt great doing it.


And now vacation ends.  I really, really hope I can produce even half this much during a workweek.

Saturday, April 25, 2015

Chapter 52.

803 words.

A query letter for a story, which got an okay, so a query submission.  Another 224, since the first query was 112 words, and the second seemed almost exactly similar.

We'll call it an even thousand words even.

1061 + 3002 + 1000 = 5,063 words.

Not awesome, but I'll take it.  One more day left of vacation.  I won't finish before I go back to work, but I'm getting there...