A Thinker in Space

Back in May, I published an article on this blog about my second ever completed novel. At the end of February, a friend of mine shared with me Brandon Sanderson’s writing lectures, and I decided that it was time to give writing an honest try. You don’t become an author without actually doing the work, so I was encouraged to sit down and actually give it a go. As I said in the previous article, this was a life-changing lecture series for me, because I then sat down in March and wrote a 120k word novel in a single month. Which was wild to me.

Now, the question, of course, is whether those 120k words were good. And since I put together what I will be referring to as Novel 2 for now, and revised it to a place where I felt it was beta-ready, I have gotten a wide variety of beta feedback, and am excited to revisit the world I created for Novel 2 and rework it a bit. But in the back of my mind, I have been struggling with one big question since I put out that article: was this just a fluke? Or is this a capability I have? The act of writing a novel is so different for each person. For some, they have that one book they have always wanted to write, and they spend years crafting that novel. For others, the goal is fast production in order to publish as fast as possible. My goal is to write many, many novels over the years to come. But I was sitting on that goal with one book that took me over 15 years to finish, and one book that I binge-wrote in a month. That isn’t a great sample set to decipher my actual capability.

After I gave Novel 2 to my beta readers, I set to work on Novel 3. My thinking was that if I was able to take an idea and turn it into another book, I could confirm for myself that this is something I can do.

Well, Novel 3 is done! 108k words written as my summer project, and since the summer was so busy, it took me 3 months to write.

That, more than anything else, confirmed for me that this is something I can do repeatedly.

And if I can do that repeatedly, and can refine those products, I hopefully will be able to begin this journey of going from a writer to an author in the years to come.

I am not coming to you as an expert here. In 10 years, I might look back on both of these articles and shake my head. I have a long journey ahead of me before I am truly qualified to talk about fiction writing as a craft. But as a teacher by trade, I always feel like there might be something from my experience that others could benefit from. So I will once again share a few things that were valuable for me this time, and that other writers might be able to benefit from.

And something that I have heard over and over again that continues to ring true – the best advice is whatever gets your words on the page. So some of this advice might be terrible for you, and some might be helpful. Don’t try and make advice that is incompatible with your personality fit into your writing toolbox, because taking unhelpful advice could be actively harmful to you as a writer!

Why don’t you say any specific details about your story?

If I become a bit more established, I’ll likely break this rule, but for now, my novels are between me and my alphas/betas/gammas. It is simply a personal philosophy thing, and I will be sticking to it as I am writing about these novels in articles on this blog.

Create Personal Deadlines, But Choose Other Hills to Die On

Okay this is an over-indulgently wordy heading, but I think this is super valuable. Personal deadlines are incredibly helpful to me as a writer. I started this novel in June, and my goal was to be done by the end of July. Obviously that did not happen – I was drafting Novel 3 from June 13^th to August 23^rd (72 days total). After Novel 2, I was hoping to duplicate that one-month success. It took me just under three times longer to write this novel. But I was also incredibly busy this summer, and couldn’t dedicate as much time to writing as I could in March (though I was also working a full-time job in March with a one-year-old so how I managed that has become more and more of a mystery to me as time has moved forward).

It helps me to set that goalpost for myself, so that I can see where I want to be, and when I want to get there. But moving the goalpost is also totally fine and natural. Don’t stress yourself out about deadlines you created. If you are ever blessed enough to have deadlines for someone else, there will be plenty of time for that later. For now, your deadlines are for you. So they should be a tool that helps you but not a tool that causes anxiety or stress. Your book might not come together as fast as you wanted it to. But in the end, speed isn’t what matters. What matters is finishing, no matter how long it takes.

It’s Okay to Say “Whoops, I’ll Have to Fix That Later”

This is another piece of advice that for a small group of writers might be incredibly problematic. But I truly believe that for a large portion of writers, this is true.

You can fix a broken novel, but you can’t fix a novel that doesn’t exist.

I lived by this motto for this novel. There were a lot of things were I was like “I don’t know if this is working they way I want it to”. But I decided not to go back and try to hunt down the problem, and instead bring the book to the end.

As a discovery writer (I talk more on that in my previous article) this was crucial. Because it is easy to get lost in the weeds of the minutia – that’s why it took me so many years to write my first novel. I didn’t know where Novel 3 was going to end up – I had not yet workshopped my climax. I have described my writing like playing the video game Civilization (great series by the way, at least V and VI which are the ones I’ve played the most). Every time I write a chapter, I can see the next part more clearly, which means I don’t really know what’s going to happen until I get to the end, just like in Civ, when you move a unit, it uncovers more territory you haven’t seen clearly before.

Obviously this can create significant issues in a first draft, where things need significant revision and foreshadowing. So revising chapters over and over again gets me nowhere because I don’t even know my ending yet.

Even if you don’t write like this, finish your book! Once your book exists, you now have something to work through and polish. You can make a bad book better. But if the bad book doesn’t exist, you have… no book. Or an idea. Or a forever incomplete project. Make mistakes, move on from them, and get to that ending. That is the philosophy I lived by, and it’s the reason that I have three complete novels so far (and counting!).

Explore Your Writing Goals

This I think is one of the most important things that I have had to do as a newly reenergized writer. Some writers have that book they want to write, they write that book, they revise it, and that book is their writing legacy, published or not. Some writers have a limited story they want to get onto the page, and once they have done that they feel like their writing journey is complete. Some writers want to be prolific, and to write novel after novel after novel.

These are all fully legitimate paths to take as a writer, and a writer who finishes their one novel is no less a writer than the prolific one. But these two writers have two wholly different writing goals, and it is helpful to know what you want to do when you have taken steps into your writing career. This can radically change through your adventure on the page, and for some writers this might not be helpful – you’d rather just write and see what happens. There is nothing wrong with that.

When I sat down to write Book 2, and took all of the tools in my theoretical toolbox (because I had no idea whether I would be able to use them), my writing goal was “let’s see if I can do this.” I had only written that one novel, and again, it was over a decade’s worth of work. Writing Book 3 was proof to myself that I could do this consistently. It took me 3 months, and only 34 of those were writing days. Now, I have my plan. I am going to write as many books as I can, revise them, and begin the querying process for each novel as they are ready, hopefully positioning myself for traditional publishing.

Your goal may be different! It will likely be different, because we writers are often unique in our goals and expectations for ourselves. But one of the most important decisions for me was this: even if I never get published, I want to make these books as good as I can possibly make them for my family and friends.

Progress – An iOS App

I’m going to end with a non-sponsored plug for the iOS app ‘Progress’ (not sure if this is available on Android). Progress is what I used throughout Book 3 and the revision process of Book 2 to help keep myself encouraged (and I am now using it for Book 4). It allows you to make progress bars that you can add to. I did this for my word count – I set the word count goal for Book 3 as 100,000 words. Every time I wrote, I could increase my ticker closer and closer to 100k, and watching those numbers go up pushed me forward and excited me. The visual was excellent – I have it on my phone as a prominently displayed widget, letting me know where I was and reminding me of my active product.

When revising, I use this chapter by chapter for each revision pass, and then had a “full revision” for the number of chapters I need to revise multiplied by each pass. Knowing where I am in the process was super valuable, and something that I really needed.

My Journey

This is a bit of extra here for those of you who are invested in my personal journey hopefully from writer to published author (someday!!). Book 3 was completed, as I said, in 34 days. I’ll put the stats here if you are interested in seeing my day-by-day breakdown!

For now, here is my current plan.

• Write Book 4
  • This is already on its way! I am enjoying my new characters/storyline
• Integrate Beta Feedback for Book 2
  • Book 2 is hopefully going to be my first query, so I’d like to do my big revision of this novel in the fall.
• Book 2 Gamma Read
  • Get the revised copy of Book 2 to Gamma Readers, and integrate any last feedback
• Meanwhile, Start Book 3 Revision
  • The book I just finished will need a significant revision process to get it beta ready. I hope to start this process in the fall/winter!
• Book 2 Query Package
  • I’ll then start putting together my query package for Book 2, and begin to query my first novel!
• Then, in no particular order:
  • Book 3 Beta Read
  • Book 4 Revision
  • Book 5

I am hoping to have multiple books in the query stage by the end of next year! I am super excited about this journey, and am looking forward to eventually going back and tackling Book 1 again, incorporating all that I’ve learned into that novel.

Word Count Breakdown

One of the cool things about Progress is it lets me see, well, my progress. Specifically, how many words I wrote per day! Here is the breakdown of my process of writing Book 3.

Day 1: 4,638 total (4,638 added)
Day 2: 12,413 total (7,775 added)
Day 3: 23,024 total (10,611 added)
Day 4: 23,487 total (463 added)
Day 5: 30,100 total (6,613 added)
Day 6: 32,000 total (1,900 added)
Day 7: 32,876 total (876 added)
Day 8: 33,582 total (706 added)
Day 9: 35,292 total (1,710 added)
Day 10: 38,098 total (2,806 added)
Day 11: 40,616 total (2,518 added)
Day 12: 45,117 total (4,501 added)
Day 13: 47,551 total (2,434 added)
Day 14: 51,841 total (4,290 added)
Day 15: 52,360 total (519 added)
Day 16: 53,433 total (1,073 added)
Day 17: 56,003 total (2,570 added)
Day 18: 62,361 total (6,358 added)
Day 19: 64,799 total (2,438 added)
Day 20: 65,409 total (610 added)
Day 21: 66,312 total (903 added)
Day 22: 67,490 total (1,178 added)
Day 23: 70,143 total (2,653 added)
Day 24: 72,900 total (2,757 added)
Day 25: 75,491 total (2,591 added)
Day 26: 76,734 total (1,243 added)
Day 27: 80,588 total (3,854 added)
Day 28: 84,105 total (3,517 added)
Day 29: 87,304 total (3,199 added)
Day 30: 91,630 total (4,326 added)
Day 31: 95,204 total (3,574 added)
Day 32: 96,708 total (1,504 added)
Day 33: 103,723 total (7,015 added)
Day 34: 108,366 total (4,643 added)

Will I return for a piece on Book 4? Not sure yet! But beginning to write again has enriched my life significantly, and I have high hopes for the future. For now, thank you for reading! And I think it’s about time I stopped procrastinating my current project by writing this article, and got back to work.

See you next time!