I spent my day working on stuff that didn’t involve new words of fiction. While that is my favorite thing to do, these other tasks have to get done too.
I started with two critiques I received on Serang. This was a super long section, and about the time I finished them, the final one showed up in my email. It was perfect. This took me until about noon.
Serang is now ready to move forward with new words.
I spent a big part of this afternoon researching my next post over at Story Empire, then writing, assembling, and posting it. This is from my living documents, and involves story structure. I’m tackling the writing monomyth, also known as the hero’s journey. It’s going to have to be a series, and that’s fine by me. If it performs well, I may do others of this ilk, like the villain’s journey, fairy tale story structure, etc. Show up over there on Wednesday to let me know how I did.
It made for a full day, but I accomplished a lot. My slate is now clear for new fiction. My parents just announced they’re unavailable tomorrow, so I gained Sunday to go along with Monday.
With any luck I’ll be making the pixels fly tomorrow.
Reblogged this on Where Genres Collide.
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Thanks, Traci.
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You’re welcome, Craig!
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I consider rewrites from critiques writing, so it’s still a plus. Can’t wait to see what you have to say on Wednesday!
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Could be productive, but I don’t expect anything quite like the last round.
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You are correct. It’s all progress. I’ve spent most of my day writing fiction. Yesterday, I jotted down lots of notes/ideas for finishing the story. I had a bit of editing to do before I started and ended up rewriting a few scenes before moving forward. Looking forward to your SE post!
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Sounds like you had a good day too. You’re one of the few who can snoop ahead on SE. I can’t believe how many of you schedule far ahead. There is a whole page of scheduled posts before I got to the one mine is on.
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I’m fortunate to have gotten a little bit ahead (at least through April). Sometimes I write a post and inspiration comes to me for others. Harmony is killing it! I think she’s up to August. I ended up with just of 1800 new words yesterday, all in my WIP. Hope to knock out some more today.
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That’s a good day. Most of mine are in that neighborhood. Hope today is as good or better.
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Bonus Sunday. Day off Monday. It doesn’t get any better than that. Good luck.
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I’ll take all the luck I can get. Thanks, John.
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🙂
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I fully agree with that title.
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I started revising Journey to the Mountaintop, and I just split several scenes into short chapters and added a bit more description so that I get the five senses into the important scenes. I’m counting hours during this Camp NaNoWriMo session and I’m up to nine and a half. Like you said, progress is progress.
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Sounds like progress to me.
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You had a productive day, Craig. It must be a luxury to have Bonus Sunday and Monday off.
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It is. I enjoy chatting with my parents, but they aren’t available. I’m checking all my sites, having that first cup, then diving into some writing.
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It sounds good, Craig! I have a choir rehearsal this afternoon, may not do many other things.
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Sounds like a nice creative outlet.
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Yes, singing is a best way of outlet for me!
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Reblogged this on anita dawes and jaye marie.
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Thank you.
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New fiction! Sounds good.
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Looking forward to your SE series. Sorry you won’t get to talk to your parents, but wishing you a productive Sunday in lieu of that.
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It’s going kind of slow as I explore the Temple of Wind. It’s almost like a whole new middle. I’m trying to come up with new mental challenges and obstacles. I also want to foreshadow things that will happen later on.
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It’s a cool-looking place. Can’t wait to read about it.
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I like your perspective. If we limit the definition of “writing” to only the actual writing, and discount the blogging, research, critiquing, networking, marketing, etc. etc… That’s how we drive ourselves crazy with guilt that we haven’t done enough.
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Exactly. All of that is part of being a writer.
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Great progress! Hope the rest of your writing this weekend goes just as well
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Some new words. Discovered a new conundrum that I’m thinking over right now. I’ll probably ask my crit group about it.
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Those issues always wake me up early to fix:)
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I’ve about got it figured out, but tomorrow morning will bring a fresh perspective.
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Yesterday I did the editing doe-see-doe, and probably ended up with half a page of good stuff, so your post title was a timely reminder not to be too hard on myself. 🙂
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That stuff needs doing, so it counts. We like word metrics because our mind understands those, but the rest doesn’t provide a measurable point. It still counts.
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I feel like I’m slogging through things at this point. I tightened up Chapter 1 of my WIP for the umpteenth time and then started on chapter 2. I managed two scenes but the going was excruciatingly slow.
I’m looking forward to seeing what you have planned on SE, and I’m sending a fist pump/high five that you’re ready for new words on Serang. The Temple of the Wind will surely be fascinating!
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I like the Temple, but it brings its own problems. There is a thread on Slack about it. Keep slogging, those words add up eventually.
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Every little bit is progress! Yesterday was kind of like that for me – other things to do that were book related, but not actually with my WIP.
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Exactly. It would be nice if all we had to do was park in the seat and write, but it doesn’t work that way.
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I’m looking forward to your stuff on hero’s journey! I love studying story structure. I think I mentioned to you before the book “The Writer’s Journey” by Christopher Volger? Pretty sure it was one of your posts, haha. Anyway, that was one of the first hero’s journey books that clicked with me.
I’m curious about your writing process. How much do you write before you send it to your critique groups? Do you work through their suggestions before starting something new? Rather than drafting the whole novella or novel and then tackling it in one big chunk? I’m wondering if that would be a better way for me to tackle my novel, instead of getting bogged down in the first draft…
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Yes, this will be a riff on Volger. I’ve done everything. I really like deep beta readers, but it’s a burden upon them. These are the same people, and they get anywhere from 6000 words to a bit more. My last submission was 16000 and I felt bad about it. I just finished marking one up for one of them before checking comments. I always work through my crits before starting the next section.
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Thanks! I think I’ll give that a go. It would be helpful to have someone to talk to who knew the story when I’m trying to trouble shoot a section. And having people looking foreword to the next instalment would be motivating, too!
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My first one was a live group who met once per month and exchanged markups. This one is all online and involves some serious authors. We just send stuff out when we have something to send.
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Do you use a particular platform so that everyone can discuss together? I’m not on Facebook anymore, but sometimes I feel like that would be the easiest way to organize.
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Just email, but we occasionally get on Slack. Nothing all together, just exchange comments. Might be worth knowing that we’ve all been acquainted for years.
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Thanks 🙂 I’ve just been using email, too. I’ve looked into online critique platforms like Scribophile, but I find them too cluttered to be useful. I’m not desperate enough to go back to Facebook yet. I’ll stick with my system and try breaking up my longer stuff into chunks.
It takes years to assemble a good group of critiquers! I’ve only been actively been seeking out “my people” for the last three years and I have found a whopping 6 people I work well with, lol. And two of them aren’t even writers, but are just really great readers! They aren’t acquainted with each other, though. I’ve got a group of people I work with individually. That’s why I was curious about platforms, since it would be easier to make it a real group if we had a space for everyone to get acquainted in. Oh well. I’ll keep puzzling over that. I’m sure somewhere in the internet there exists exactly what I’m imagining in my head…
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Depends on what you want. Some prefer that group dynamic. I only have three, but they’re very good.
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Ya, I’m not sure what I want yet 😂 I’m still exploring that. All part of the journey, I guess. Thanks for letting me pick your brain!
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Any time.
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Good progress, indeed!
I always think it’s so nice you talk to your parents at a set time. Last time my mother and I spoke, I asked her if we could do that and she said, “Not there yet, kiddo!” so yay! my mother is still too busy to do that, but boo, my mother is still too busy to do that 😉
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We’ve done this ever since I moved to Idaho, right after the turn of the century. It’s nice.
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I’m late reading this, but hope the pixels flew!!
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They did, thanks. No more writing days for a couple of weeks now, so I had to make it count.
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