June has not only marked the half-way of the 365k Club challenge, but it also has turned out quite an interesting month writing-wise. As you already know, I’ve finished the first draft of my fantasy novel, so for the first half of the month my excitement of being so close to the end has fueled the word count.
Then I wrote the novel’s last sentence. And I felt lost.
For the past months I knew what scenes I was going to write, and what my characters would do, even if sometimes I had to flesh out the details. With the novel finished, and nothing new plotted, writing my 1000 words a day suddenly became a chore, and it didn’t help I missed the imaginary people I spent a good half a year with.
I managed to keep with my daily goal, though I definitely felt out of my comfort zone. But isn’t it what the challenges are about?
Besides, I can’t consider June all that bad, if I not only managed to write 1000 words a day, but I’ve also met with my friends, read two books, played a lot of Divinity: Original Sin and binge-watched season 2 of “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” On top of that, I did a bit of editing just to get a feel of it before Camp NaNoWriMo started.
And with a third of July already gone, you probably wonder how my double writing-editing challenge is going, but I’m not telling! Not yet! It seems that the biggest challenge for July won’t be balancing my time between the two goals (and still not neglecting life!), but plotting out a new novel to write. Short stories are just not long enough to meet the needs of 365k Club, and although they need less plotting, their condensed structure requires a lot of consideration.
How will it go? We will see next month, in yet another “A Month of Writing” report.
This post is a part of the “A Month of Writing” series – a monthly report on my progress in the 365k Club challenge.
Congruatulations! Joanna! So proud of what you’ve accomplished! 🙂
Thank you, Katharine! It wouldn’t have happened without you and 365k Club. 🙂
Congratulations! You make me look like a lazy slob.
You shouldn’t feel like this. My 1k words is nothing compared to some people who produce 10k words daily (and we have few like that in the club!).
Congratulations on completing the novel. And I COMPLETELY sympathise with your feelings of sadness after finishing your novel – as soon as I type THE END, I feel like I’ve lost an arm. All those people, that world, those situations I’ve been working with and through and on for months at a time have suddenly slipped out of my life. And while editing does bring back the world, it can never be with the same vivid intensity as when you’re actually constructing it… That’s my take on it, anyway. And even though I’ve written a bunch of novels, that sense of loss is still there.
My answer is the same as yours – to find another novel to plunge back into. So it has made me very prolific, but please don’t make the same mistake and neglect the editing and ‘getting it out there’ phase, which I’m now busy rectifying!
But it’s a huge achievement – so many people talk about writing a novel and make a start and never get any further. I’m very impressed at your professional approach – you set yourself a set of targets and went for them. It’s been a great year for you creatively – I hope you feel proud of yourself, you should!
I see we feel the same about finishing the novel. 🙂 I’ve made the same mistake (neglection) in the past, but I also had the excuse of not feeling the previous novels were good enough to work with them more (you know, the time spent on editing would be inadequate to the effects), while with this one I feel it just has to be done – both the story and English are good.
And editing does bring the taste of the world and let’s me rediscover all that “cool stuff” I wrote, so I have motivation.
And thank you for the kind words. It’s been good 20 years since I started writing, and 9 since I had my first short story in print, so I figured it’s time to start being a bit more serious about my passion–even if I still hold a full time job. I also considered myself a procrastinator, so I wanted to see “do I have it in me”. I can be stubborn and determined at times, but disciplined? Well, looks like I’m learning it now.
I wish I had had a better half of the year. I’m hoping to do better this second half. Congrats on doing so well and for finishing your book!
Thank you, Sheri! You did what you could and you keep fighting, and that’s a lot more than others accomplish. I was lucky to have a good first half, but who knows? Maybe the second half will become more turbulent? As writers we do as much as we can, but we can’t fix life from interfering.