Writing Over 20,000 Words in a Day

I wasn't sure I would ever get here.  Honestly, when I started writing again, squeezing out six thousand words in a day burned me out.

But this weekend, I set a goal for 10,000 words during a 24-hour competition of word wars. After getting woken up by cats at 4:30 am, I started writing.  I managed 1,600 before crawling back into bed (it was 5:00 am, could you blame me?). I woke up again at 7:30 am, a more appropriate time.  I wrote.  I didn't stop writing until my dearest husband made us breakfast - then I only stopped to eat.

By 4:00 pm, I finished my novelette, a semi-comedic dystopian.  It stands at 19,380 words.

Since I hadn't broken 20,000, I switched gears and wrote a few more thousand for No Sugar Coating.  My grand total of the day was 21,968 words.

A lot of people commented on my status updates and said I was a machine (okay, maybe I said that I was a machine).  I kind of felt like it that day.  My fingers kept writing in this weird autopilot.  It was my writing and me, nothing else came into play.

It was a little bizarre to finish the entire novelette in one day, almost like I had watched a friend grow up in the span of nine hours.

I wanted to share some tips on how I made this possible.

1. If you have a significant other, get him/her to support you for the day (like making food).  You may owe them a few back rubs.  If you don't have a partner in crime, be prepared with meals you can heat, eat, then resume writing.
2. Outline, outline, outline.  I'm usually write by the seat of my pants.  A lot of writers do this, and I used to love doing it.  But I've seen the light. Outlines can really save you from making weird little plot bunnies that don't end up going anywhere.  They can also help you stay focused.  I wrote 2,000 words in my outline.  2k for a 19k piece seems excessive, but my characters stayed on track.
3. Read over your outline the night before.  In fact, you should be thinking about your story almost constantly in the days leading up to this! 
4. Give yourself a reasonable goal.  Pass it.  Then keep writing.  I started with 10k.  Once I finished that and saw how early it was, I said, "I can do this."  Set my next goal for 15k.  Finished that, still had time.  So 20k it was.
5. Don't sweat the small stuff.  You will have grammatical errors and probably a lot of typos.  This is your rough draft.  It does not have to be perfect.  Can't think of the right word?  Find a quick filler and keep going.
6. Reward yourself.  If you achieve your first goal, you should allow yourself to do something that you don't normally do or buy a little something for yourself.  In my case, I bought more books.  (ALL THE BOOKS).

It's possible.  It takes a lot of focus, some fun and friendly competition, a super supportive group of people (thank you husband and members of the G+ community!!), and tons of motivation.

Any of you have big writing goals planned?  How do you approach a full day of writing?

Oh, and be on the lookout for upcoming news of my novelette.  I plan on releasing it in July, but there will be plenty of sneak peeks and information before then!

Goals 2013

The clocked turned to 12:00 am last night, and I was still wide awake.  So I set about reading the first book of the new year.

Since today is the first day of a year, it seems appropriate to do the "this year's goals" post.  I accomplished a lot last year, in summary:  Published novelette "My Summer Vacation by Terrance Wade", wrote novella The Unanswerable, wrote 55k of WIP Good Criminal Heart, made my first ten dollars on Examiner, finished Rioss, rewrote RUHE and had an awesome beta critiquing session.  And!  Had RUHE in the hands of two agents (both rejected, but after initial interest, which is exciting).

Goals by month:

January: Finish Good Criminal Heart, get 30k of Where We Collide edited.  Submit The Unanswerable to ABNA after a quick read through (not significant editing, just a quick one!)

February:  Finish Where We Collide editing and get it to my beta readers.

March: Make edits to RUHE based on beta's comments. Attempt the same for Where We Collide.

April: Rewrite Rioss (specifically the ending and adding several scenes to make the ending make more sense).

May: Get betas for synopsis, first five pages, and queries for both RUHE and Where We Collide then start querying (this will continue for the rest of the year, goal is 15 agents RUHE and 25 agents Where We Collide)

June: Edit The Unanswerable.  Get beta readers.

July: One last read through of Rioss now with new ending, then get betas.

August:  Edit The Unanswerable again - maybe hire an editor.  Or re-read it 10 times myself.

September: Start campaigning for the self-published release of The Unanswerable.  Make some early giveaways, cover reveals, get some bloggers to help me spread the word, etc.  Get betas for synopsis, first five pages, and queries for Rioss.  Start querying (will continue until I reach 30 agents).

October: Release The Unanswerable (perfect end of the world tale for the month of Halloween!)  Prep for NaNo.

November: NaNoWriMo!  Yes, I'm going to do it again.  Either The Underground, a semi-sequel to The Unanswerable or 2041, my silly sci-fi novel.

December: Wrap up any NaNo leftovers.  Start editing Good Criminal Heart.

I'm hoping to start 2014 with three fully-edited pieces, another self-published work, a new novel, and a partially edited novel.  Who knows, if I manage on querying the right person at the right time, maybe I'll even get a partner-in-crime (aka. an agent).

What are your goals for 2013?  Good luck to everyone!  Let's make this year a great one :)

NaNo is Coming!

It's October 1, and as such, I am required to do the obligatory NaNoWriMo post.  Anyone else out there participating?  If so, do you know what you will be working on?  Are you starting something completely new?

I'm still debating between three things. I think I'm in the mentality right now to write Olive's story, but I still really want to finish Anthony. He's been sitting in a box since I was seventeen because I didn't have the drive to rehash it. Though, these two stories would be rewrites. Complete rewrites, mind you. In the last year my writing has improved so much that I really need to clean out all the old writing on these two titles (both written well over two years ago, and then some).

Then there's 2042. Which is supposed to be a Douglas Adams like sci-fi comedy. Thing is, "Terrance Wade" was finished recently (currently rewriting for end of October self-publishing). Which is great, but it has that same comedic feel.  Something tells me I'll want a change of pace.

It's really between these two stories: Olive is intense, raw, emotional, and sometimes hopeless. But her search and struggle to get back what she believes is rightfully hers is powerful and endearing. Anthony's is also intense... raw... emotional and sometimes hopeless (seeing a pattern?) but his story is about finding love for the first time and losing it. But having the strength to find himself in all the mess - to become a better person.

Both of them are very similar, and intensely different. Olive tries to be proper, nice, treat others with respect. Anthony doesn't care who he steps on, or who gets hurt in the process.

Which makes writing each of them taxing. I'm leaning towards Anthony. To finish it, to finally get his story out of my head so it can be done, done, done.

December will bring rewrites to Rioss, as I really - really - need to finish that.

How's your NaNo prep going? Do you have a weigh-in on which character I should choose?

Personal Update

I come to all of you readers from the past.  I wrote this blog post on Friday, but I didn't want to interrupt the blog tour mania. 

This month has brought quite an accomplishment - mostly me going insane.  Just a little insane.  Regardless, I will spend all Saturday finishing my Camp NaNo novel.  As of Friday, I had 10k to go.  And possibly, come Sunday, I might be done with a novella.

The Unanswerable started out as a blog short story, but someone asked me "Where's the rest of it?"  There was no rest of it, but I thought about this.  I thought about the characters, mulled over their circumstances.  And soon?  I had about ten excerpts from this story posted on my blog.

And I set out to eventually finish it.

I'm glad that July is going to be easier.  I'm planning on dedicating the month to editing Ruhe and Rioss and doing a ton of beta reading for other people.  I'm excited to finally be done with another project - but this Camp NaNo really took it out of me.  Due to my (in)sanity, I am also attempting Camp in August and NaNo in November.

Why?

Because the characters (voices) in my head won't leave me alone!  That's why!

Oh, that and if I finish my novella and another novel by October, I will have written four novels and one novella in a year.

And after never having written one?  And picking up projects only to put them down again for years?  I say it's the greatest accomplishment of my writing life. 

Camp NaNoWriMo

As if I didn't have enough on my plate, I have enlisted myself into Camp NaNoWriMo.

The Unanswerable, which a lot of you have probably seen excerpts of over time, is finally being written.  It has a 50-60k goal as a self-published novella about the "end of the world."  It will be stand alone, but I might write about other people in the same world, but different area, different circumstances.

It is now 12,892 words done (7k of that was already written prior to Camp).  It feels great to finally get some progress made in this story.

What's on my plate, besides Camp:

• Working with three other writers in a critique group - doing one-two chapter critiques a week for each person, as well as editing one-two chapters of Ruhe weekly.
• Received my edits back from Taryn.  They are spectacular, but I have a lot of work to do.  I'm still sitting on the new idea/replotting what has to be changed.  I'm not even attempting these changes until post-Camp.  So, July is Rioss rewrite month.  I plan on getting it out to my six or seven beta readers as I make changes.
• August brings about the second Camp.  I'll be completely rewriting Anthony's story A Good Criminal Heart.  My seventeen year old writing was just not as good as my twenty five year old writing.

Basically, a lot of rewriting.  As much as I want to start new projects, and I am allowing myself to work on The Unanswerable, I really need to sit my butt down and finish my other projects to query level.

But The Unanswerable and "My Summer Vacation by Terrance Wade" will both be self-published.  Which means, I have legitimate reasons for wanting to work on them.  They are great stand alone pieces and attest to my capability as a writer.  Not only that, but I think they are downright fun.  And it's a good "test" to see if I can get an audience through self-publishing.  If not, I'm saving my other three books for the real thing.  I don't care how long it takes me, I am going to become successful at my craft.

Just you guys wait and see ;)  I'm a very determined keyboard monkey.

Or maybe a Golden Tamarin. 

I love those.

April Goals

As you have probably noticed, I have a lot going on this month - making it one of the most stressful months since college finals (seriously).

But I wanted to take the time to outline my own April Goals, since I feel like I need to get it off my own shoulders and push it out there into blogger world.

• Finish editing Rioss - must submit to a contest that ends before I get back from Hawaii
• Find more beta readers for Rioss
• A to Z Challenge on this blog
• A to Z Challenge on Adorning Schemes (thankfully, I have Llora helping me out over there)
• Keep up with reading/commenting on A to Z challenge blogs
• Keep up with WIP500 (hopefully writing more of The Unanswerable or Kingdom of Obsession)
• Read and post reviews from my "to be read pile" challenge list 
• Finish my April Giveaway
• Prepare the post about Matilda (the next book in the Books that made me love reading challenge)
• Script Frenzy with Llora (100 page comic book script in a month)
• Continue digging up the horrendous back yard
• Go on my honeymoon (April 21, and I won't be back until May)
• Submit Ruhe to another agent (preferably sooner rather than later)
• Find some time to breathe

You guessed it.  My deadline isn't the end of April.  My deadline for everything is the morning I leave for my honeymoon.  April 21st - and it is - gasp - already April 8th

Want to hear my May schedule?  That one is simpler.  WIP500 - write synopsis - edit - query.

Oh, and sleep.  May = sleep month.