aesmael | Entries tagged with draft

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Finally, finally done. Half past seven the morning of December 1st. 3,048 words since I woke, 22,183 total in this first draft of the story. So that's well more than 10% I wrote on the last day, seems to be a habit of mine finishing that way.

I managed two of my major goals for the month. Didn't make 50,000 words. Did finish the story. Did do more than double the words I'd written of fiction all year. And now I am very tired and I want to sleep. Somehow got to get back on regular time. So here's the story. I actually liked some of the stuff I wrote in this stretch, maybe that means it is awful. We'll see next time. Goodnight.

( 4064 words )

Current Mood: tired

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Another very bad batch of words, but at least it was a pretty productive one so far as words go. This was a NaNoWriMo thing, an effort for the month because I was teetering considering and someone I'm very close to signed up for it, so why not? The goal was to try and write a novel, 50,000 words of the month. Currently we are at 18,119, all of which will have been posted publicly as draft by the time this is readable.

So that's a failure? I don't think so, depending how today and tomorrow go. I set out to tell this particular story, which I thought might have been novel-sized. It turned not to be. We are at nearly 20K words now and right on the cusp of the final sequence(s). So the word count isn't what it was officially supposed to be, but we're at the end of the story and nowhere near that, so it never was going to be. I wasn't sure from the beginning, had a vague idea of doing two successive projects this month (which didn't work out, but might have if I'd kept the WriMo pace). But I'm at the end of the month and the end of the story, however bad its drafting has been, and for me that's pretty good.

I hope I can finish the rest, and then it will be very relieving to move on to something else and maybe do some other stuff I have been neglecting.

(that second goal is the less public one I have been writing to - if the story reaches that mark I will have succeeded in doubling my year's fiction writing in a month)

( 18130 words )

Current Music: Moonlight Sonata - Beethoven

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

I don't like these words at all. They're awful, and insufficient in number, but we're still trying to get to the end of the story so that's what we have. Bit too foggy to say much here right now. Don't like that; there are things I have to say in these posts which vanish whenever it comes time to write them down.

Here's what we have this time:

( 1192 words )

Current Music: My Oh My (club mix) - Aqua

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Long, long delay since last posting here and of this story. I had an idea to put within the story a smaller adventure that could work as its own story and I wanted to finish that bit of digression before putting up any more excerpts. It went longer and slower to write than I was hoping but now the third chapter of the story is drafted enough to post.

Thoughts, thoughts, thoughts. From right after I started it has seemed like this work would come out more like a 20K novella than a 50K novel and it still looks to be that. I have a working week to finish on time, five thousand words to write if I want to meet my personal goal for the month, and probably a fair few more than that of story to go. So after this is posted, back to work and hopefully a thousand words for each of those days.

I don't like how this story has come out so far. That's normal for something I'm actively writing. It has felt more like a skeleton of a story, more hastily dashed outline than fleshed tale. I worry it has become more abbreviated as I continue. I worry I am losing or have lost what little character definition I had to start with. I hope that, in editing, this story can become something I am not ashamed to say I wrote. At worst presumably it becomes a learning experience.

( 'A Simple Run' 6259 words )

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Haven't posted updates for a couple of days because while I have been writing my output has not felt substantial enough to merit posting. Have not really got enough for that so far either, but I've been doing some thinking about what to do with this story to regain momentum and the next update, while likely not coming tomorrow, is probably going to be relatively lengthy. So here's a plate-clearing update of wretched writing:

( 1078 words )

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Surprisingly I actually managed more than the pace target last night. Probably won't happen again but it was nice to do that for once.

Was disappointed that a scene I had been building to ended up not happening. It turned out not to make sense given everything that had been written so far, so was averted instead.

The cast of this story are supposed to be of Arabic heritage, but I am fairly certain a lot of definitely wrong idioms and details have made it in so far. Am trying not to worry about that for this draft and wait until editing to fit those details to the story (including making significant changes if that proves necessary). Depending how well that works, will consider making such an approach in future too - sort the details and practicalities we don't know after writing the story's skeleton. There will be a lot of that to do, not only for culture.

Currently at 7841 words, should be at 16,667 to be on track. I compare the counts because doing so is easier than not doing it, but I don't really care by this point. I seem to need the occasional day or few off writing anyway, don't know if I will be up to writing more tonight. We shall see, but this is a late start and I'm having an early night.

( 2071 words )

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Last night I committed a NaNoWriMo sin. After a couple of hours writing some scenes for Ferideh the story would be improved if these were Algol's scenes instead and rewrote. They ended up longer than before but I wrote much less in total than I'd intended to. Trying to be a bit more disciplined about it tonight.

I've been leaving out the formatting in the story so far, but forgot to call attention to this until now. It does mean some information is missing which will be present in the final version but I doubt that is anything pertinent to this particular story. And maybe I'm mistaken.

Word meter's been acting up, but the total currently is 5770 words. So here we go:

( 712 words contained )

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Not much to say at this point. Will have to increase the writing pace significantly to make the official targets but I think that's more "It would be nice" than "I have to". I am managing a rate about half that of the NaNoWriMo goal and for me that is significant. If I can keep it up this will signify a large step in my ability to produce story drafts.

As I had been learning with my work on A Library Fox, having a clearer idea of what I am doing as a scene in advance helps to work faster, where before I had often been working more sentence by sentence and often not knowing what happened that far ahead. I'm not actually sure if this is a change, and maybe I have just improved.

One thing I am disappointed about is how much some of the cast have been non-entities so far, particularly Algol. She was originally conceived as the starring character with a supporting cast but so far mostly Ferideh and Nawar have been featured, with a touch of Altair. I suspect this is because I am enjoying them more and that I have a less clear idea of who the other characters are or ways they might choose to be active. Will be trying to fix this both as I proceed and in revision, although this excerpt and the next are I think mainly committed to Nawar and Ferideh.

So here we go:

( 1187 words )

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Only 3236 words words so far, had a stall the past couple of days. That usually happens to me, few days writing, few days of very little.

Well, it seemed for a while this project might not be novel length after all, but be much shorter. Although it also seemed what I was writing was too abbreviated to be the full story, enough that I had thoughts of finishing early and then expanding on what was written.

Last night had one of those moments of understanding, and realised I had things happening in the wrong order. Was trying to push the characters to follow what was laid out in outline, which was not working well because it went contrary to how they'd been established. Then I realised letting them go the way they were inclined to would get us to the same point, later, without having inconsistent characterisation, with a clearer sense of why their enemy is their enemy (which I'd been worried was getting lost), and getting to showcase some stuff that I was being worried was being inappropriately left out. So that's a very handy detour that'll add quite a lot of word count too.

Sadly, by the time I realised this it was 0300 and I needed to sleep. But now there is today! and... errands. But we'll get there.

As much as I say I hate the story, that it is terrible and in no way worthy of being written, I have read enough by authors to know this is a common sentiment while writing, and enough personal experience to know I feel that way about just about every story I write. So I'm not going to throw it out just because I hate it at the moment. Maybe at some other point, maybe after it is finished, if I think my assessment of its quality is a bit more enduring.

The first part of this story turned out to be more prologue than quarter of the narrative, but here's the end of it. We continue with the writing of the next part, but give 'end of story-part' priority as posting cut-off point over 'how much we wrote today'. So here's that bit, and an image:

( 819 words )

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Still hating this story. At least I have decided the main problem is it is badly written. The plot has no merit but if it were written skilfully it at least might be fun to read.

Coming out more like a sketched, rushed outline than a full story. I have that problem with most things I write lately. Maybe I'm doing it wrong. Have very nearly reached the end of the first part and it is looking more like a prologue than an equal part of the story. This whole thing is looking increasingly less than novel length, would probably need to stretch for it to be more than 20 thousand words, and I don't want to force something like that.

Tempted to quit and revise, get the story some proper outlining or work on something else, but I know whatever I work on I will hate it and be miserable anyway, so I'm going to continue and make this thing get to its end. I don't know what I will do about the later parts. There is no way I could write those quickly; they require a lot of invention of the sort I do slowly and poorly.

It could be better. I could be more patient, or write it out quickly and then go over it more carefully. I was going to outline this story, all proper-like, but then I ran out of time. Characterisation is going badly, of course. It is something I am especially bad at, at I have no idea how to show the qualities I put in their design, or even how to come up with decently peopled characterisations.

Anyway, it's all rubbish. But it's my rubbish, and I decided to produce it, and keep a log of it, so that's what is happening.

I have been trying to write in whole scenes, not leaving them incomplete at the end of the day, but the last one here is unfinished. I was tired and did not have a clear idea of how Nawar interacts with the world, or how to depict Shula in that scene.

( 1449 words )

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Yesterday, the first day of our NaNoWriMo endeavour. Experimenting with daily excerpts instead of weekly, just for this attempt. The other approach I had in mind was to post each part of this four part story and post it then, but I am more assured of having done writing than being able to complete those sections in a timely way.

The words were far less than needed for keeping pace, making only 911, but my history suggests I was never going to make the total anyway. For me, that is a good output, so I am managing to be pleased. I am trying to focus on getting the story written instead (although still in the month if I can, however quick I can). Whatever story I am writing I tend to hate at the time, sure it is worthless and badly done, so I am going to try and keep going anyway.

A lot of short scenes here. I think on rewrite maybe I should start things a little earlier in time. Lots of dialogue, and I am bad dialogue. Bad at description and visualisation of spaces too. I couldn't say I have strengths to compensate for these, but ah well. We keep along, and let's see what today's effort brings.

Ugh. Such pointless filler and sub-standard, typical rubbish. Can barely stand to look upon it.

( 911 words, no particular content )

I sit here in the small room which has become my home for however long I pursue this path, light of the star that until recently anchored me in life washing over this vessel in ever-younger waves, reaching back in time as I am drawn out in space, and notice a shift in my writing.

My journal is changing as my old world fades. Not out of contact by necessity but by choice. Captain's choice, and Coruscant has no need of chatter now the system is so far behind, and my journal grows stilled. No longer a voice speaking to those I know, it is turned inward, speaking to myself, perhaps at long intervals squirted back to the web of what was known, but truly my outward voice is being silenced. Captain will want to vet my writings anyway.

My journal is changing. Perhaps I am changing. We have not even been anywhere yet, might be months and months between, and more between things interesting, but still. Is this what it is to be suspended in this void?

I am flying and I am touching the spaces between. Ephemeral fingers brush the texture of existence.

Current Mood: indescribable
Current Location: coruscant, +months
Current Music: Delerium - Twilight