Process Notes

I guess this is why people have day-jobs, huh?

PETERMBALL Works in Progress , ,

It’s been a long time since I thought hard about the thing I’m writing as I wrote it, rather than sprinting for the finish because I needed stuff to be done and sent out and justifying itself now now now! 600 words on the great-swashbuckly-lovecraft-ghoul-wahoo! novel draft this afternoon, which brings the total up to about 5,000 for the week. It feels so very slow, working like this, but I suspect it may actually be better for me – when I’m not trying to rush things and get wordcount for the sake of wordcount, I have time to start picking at phrasing and thinking about the pace and structure of the scenes. Oddly, writing slow and considered is also a means of curing myself of my addiction to semi-colons.

Also, 2011 is the year I teach myself to write in third person or die trying; place your bets on whether it works, but my money’s on the latter.

I’m going to reward myself with an episode of NCIS before diving into the Flotsam story and racking up some wordcount there.

Toil

PETERMBALL Works in Progress ,

‘Tis actually a horrible name for the blog post, ’cause the writing thing doesn’t actually feel much like toil this week. Not even yesterday when it took me seven hours, total, to get fifteen hundred words down across two projects. There is probably toil coming though – there’s a Flotsam deadline looming in nine and a half days – but for the moment I get to skip through the word mines surrounded by bone-white moths and singing ravens and tinkling silver bells whose chimes echo strangely in the dark and shady corners. Plus I have Leonard Cohen CDs on, which is always a source of the happy.

One day I will remember that the cure for not-writing is writing, rather than having to relearn that lesson every time I stop.

I recently chatted to a friend of mine who enjoys the discussion of toil on the blog, watching the numbers stack up and the reports of work done come in. I know other people who are utterly opposed to seeing such things, preferring blogs to be more than just the accumulating of wordcount. I honestly don’t really know where I stand – I often wish I could do more, writing one of those online blogs that are broad in scope and capable of depth – but the truth of the matter is that I was first drawn to blogs because it allowed me to track my favourite writers doing their thing. In public. With occasional commentary.

For what it’s worth, folks who don’t enjoy the discussion of toil may wish to avoid this blog until April 2nd. The inimitable Jason Fischer and I have uttered one of the forbidden words – gauntlet – and quietly started naming tasks that need be done by March 31st. By mid-February I’m largely going to be posting wordcounts and the words “fists of fucking steel” as I try to get things done.

Day Planner

PETERMBALL Works in Progress , , ,

Today I am:

a) writing
b) making plans
c) washing up
d) buggering off early to play DnD

Last night there was write-club, whereupon I wrote about fifteen hundred words on my next Flotsam story, then sat up into the wee hours forcing myself to write 250 words on the novel project for 2011 (which is currently called Tarnished Silver Swords, but once existed under the working title of the weird lovecrafty-ghoul-swashbuckley-wahoo-novel; neither of these is workable as a final title).

I thank Trent Jamieson for the reminder to do the latter, courtesy of his recent blogpost aboutgetting stuff done despite being a procrastinating slacker (which is not to say that Trent is a procrastinating slacker, just that I am and his advice came at the right point to remedy that).

There has been too much not-writing in my life this January. I have another five days to rectify that.