Word Counting

Metrics!

PETERMBALL Works in Progress ,

For the first time in a long while, I’ve managed to write two thousand words in the space of a day. While this is certainly good news around these parts, it comes with the somewhat sickening realisation that Giving Up Coffee is Working.

Interestingly, kicking the draft version of Claw into gear has involved sketching the bare bones of a scene – basically, getting the conflict and the final line down – then trusting that I’ll be able to come back and flesh things out once I’ve got the structure in place. This is a new and different territory so far as my process goes, and may well come back to bite me in a few thousand words time.
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Current Writing Metrics
Consecutive Days Writing (500+ words): 2
New Short Stories Sent Into the Wild: 10/30
Rejections in 2010: 21/100
Claw Word Count (Finish Date: 15th November)

Once more into the breach, dear friends…

PETERMBALL Works in Progress , ,

We’re fighting the doldrums here in the word-mines this week, trying to bully my work ethic into something resembling its normal state after house-guests, cons and the furious rush of getting a new book into existence. Such lapses are not unexpected, but they are unacceptable, and so I’ve deployed the Spokesbear into his advisory position and sat down with my giant to-do list of doom to work out what needs to be done for the rest of September.

And so, September gets declared a win if I achieve the following:

– Write the first 25,000 words of Claw, the third Miriam Aster Novella (This is the only non-negotiable thing on my list at the moment, since it has a deadline of November 15th and I want plenty of time to whip it into shape)
– Revise the first 25,000 words of Black Candy (I tried to get this finished this book before worldcon, but redrafting led me to realise I’d skipped the first act of the story so I wrote that from scratch instead).
– Finish and Submit three new stories (at this point, it’s likely to be: Pickets, Memories and Tethers; the Untitled Egyptian Mummy Story; and The Gallows Magus and the Queen of the Winter Seas)
– Write the first chapter of the untitled project I’m working on with Ben Francisco.
– Finish the crit of a friends novel chapters I’ve been meaning to do for two months now.
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Current Writing Metrics
Consecutive Days Writing (500+ words): 1
New Short Stories Sent Into the Wild: 9/30
Rejections in 2010: 19/100
Claw Word Count (Finish Date: 15th November)

A Not Terribly Exciting Update

PETERMBALL Works in Progress

And lo, I am back.

Going to buy groceries, then get some writing done (Note the new project du-jour in the Metrics below).
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Current Writing Metrics
Consecutive Days Writing (500+ words): 0
New Short Stories Sent Into the Wild: 9/30
Rejections in 2010: 19/100
Claw Word Count (Finish Date: 15th November)