Hunting Demons: Finding Momentum not 10K

It is funny how we come to things. Trying to write ten thousand (10k) words in a day was a consequence of needing to kick myself out of a ponderous editing compulsion. A single day word count goal that would prove beyond me, as it happens. But I had guessed that from the outset, having calculated it would take me over eight hours of non-stop typing at twenty words per minute, with no pondering, or breaks or anything to achieve it.

But I wanted to see what I could achieve in a day of flat out writing. Especially as I needed to get my arse in gear with a deadline looming.

Before starting on the day I planned the medium term goals of the characters and the story. And then I began. I wrote in three sessions of three hours. Managing on average 1.2k words per session. Totalling just under 4k for the whole day. I stopped just before 9PM having written myself to a standstill. An expected fail you might think, but a funny thing happened during the day.

A novel is a strange beast. It is nothing like any other writing medium. It is focused on the moment to moment and at the same time it is a dauntingly huge canvas of interlinked threads, most of which are layered deep into the moment and only realised as we move between these moments. A lot of the links won't even be neatly tied off when the first draft is finished.

And in the four years since finishing the first draft of Chasing Innocence, I'd forgotten about those interlinking threads. As I built momentum through the 10k day they started to form, wildly branching out the more I wrote. It was incredibly thrilling realising the shift from ponderous editing to full on novel writing. This is what I got most from the day, that once my characters feel real and I know where I'm going, it is momentum that will fill the canvas and build the core elements of the book I'm trying to write.

Here are a few other observations I made during the day:

I thought in trying to write a lot in one day I might overwrite - the actual output if anything was lean. It will be built on, with additional colour edited into the core story. It will change by percentages, getting swapped about, added to, moved or dropped. I do think those percentages are considerably less than I might have expected.

Dialogue was fully realised within the needs of the story as it currently stands. There were some nuances, emotion and character inflections built around the dialogue but only those that helped the characters speak as I progressed. Once more additional colour and drama will be layered, again in lesser percentages than I expected.

By writing with momentum I was far more creative in how I told the story than I would be in ponderous mode. I think this is important for me at least in my thriller mission statement.

If I realised I needed to change previous content as I wrote, I only went back if it helped build the story. If it was just an edit I made a note and continued.

I have to see the physical environment in my mind to tell the story, so if I can't I have to stop and mentally build it. This I had to do twice during the day. Better planning would have overcome this. I knew I was going to be in these environments but realised while writing I needed more geographic detail.

Huge fun.

Shout out to Melissa Foster for providing the inspiration to attempt a 10k day.

Hunting Demons: Writing 10k in a Day

Taking the imagery that exists in my mind and producing prose that plays that imagery in other peoples minds, is a complex multi-layered process. The first layer is the hardest for me, which is the actual process of writing the first draft. Anyone who thinks an author sits hunched over a keyboard, massaging the keys with conductor like flourishes while producing sparkling jewels of literary treasure, has quite clearly never tried writing fiction.

The production of my first novel took three years, largely because I made so many mistakes and learned a lot of lessons.

For book two I'm on a tighter schedule. I need to have finished the first draft before the end of September (2013), preferably earlier. With a publish date scheduled for February 2014.

I'm currently behind schedule. This is in part due to my usual slow start while finding characters and voice, but it's also a product of my propensity towards over editing. While writing I will habitually comb back through the last few paragraphs and smooth them out. There is nothing about writing I enjoy more than editing, but with a whole book to write, these edits are a luxury I don't have. Especially when so much will change once the first draft is completed and 20% of those excessively edited paragraphs will be discarded, as I tend to over write in draft one too.

I have a number of writer friends who have studied the art of productive writing. One in particular will manage to produce ten thousand (10k) words, usually on about one writing day a week, 2-3k on normal days. 10k is often the total output of a good week for me.

My 10k specialist friend says preparation is key for the 10k day, with bullet points to hand for where the story will head, the themes and character goals. Then go for it.

Which is what I will be doing Saturday 8 June, my first 10k in a day attempt. I will Tweet occasional updates #amwriting10ktoday on my progress and blogging my considered thoughts after.

If anyone else has any productivity tips, I'm all ears.

Hunting Demons: A long takeoff

About three months into writing Chasing Innocence, way back in 2008, I stopped and did a calculation based on total word count and time so far invested. I worked out it would take me seven years to finish the book.

It turns out the hardest part of writing that book was the beginning, for all sorts of reasons, mostly as I got to know the characters and importantly, getting their voices sounding natural in my head. Once I hit the 20k mark the wheels left the ground and we were off. Five months of writing later the first draft was finished.

So a lot of writing, lessons learned and many adventures later, we find ourselves in 2013. Chasing Innocence has been published for over a year, I've written a lot of words during this time, with one novella: Mahrie now also published. I'm currently writing the sequel to Chasing Innocence, titled: Hunting Demons. With two books published, some award short listings under my belt and a lot of great Amazon reviews, I feel I'm on the right track. The sequel would be a breeze!

The thing is, progress has been slow. The slowness is not because I don't know what's going to happen through the core of the story, or because I don't know these characters. I recently did a calculation and guess what? The average daily word count meant it would take seven years to finish the first draft. And now I think about it, didn't I really struggle at the beginning of Mahrie too?

So the lessons I take from this as I approach 20k of words, is that I'm just a slow starter when it comes to getting a story underway. Daily word counts are not helpful in my planning, but sitting at the desk and steadily chipping away at the story is. Despite knowing the characters very well, it has been about finding their voices, hearing their thoughts in the moment to moment. It's getting there. The wheels feel like they might soon leave the ground.

The Indie Writer's Illusion

In just about every guide on the subject of indie publishing, or indie writing, you will find at the very beginning the same piece of sage advice, which is: you must start by writing a good book. Which I personally consider to be rather unhelpful. As readers we know a good book, but how do we make one? What does a good book consist of? And more importantly, when we've written that book, how do we massage the overwritten stack of words sitting on our hard drive into the brilliant story in our minds. Which may lead you to ask on what authority I am talking of such matters. To which I would immediately refer you to that scene in Jaws where they're comparing scars. Because that's what I'm doing here, showing you my scars. In understanding what makes a good book I've made every kind of bad book error you can imagine. If there was living proof a writer isn't born, that they're made with sweat and tears, I'm it. Likewise, if you're a writer and do read this list of lessons learned, I'd expect you to trot off immediately after, safe in the knowledge you already know better. That is the indie writer's illusion. I suspect it's a commercial writer's illusion too, except they have someone to smack them back into line. Over confidence has been my downfall too. It's not that I'm a bit of a loud mouth, or a show off. The opposite in-fact. My over confidence comes from a belief in my own potential. The trouble is, the belief is often rather premature. While I'm capable of great things, sitting down and believing I have created something quite brilliant, is often followed quite quickly by the realisation I haven't, not quite.

A very big hole.

To give you a toe curling example. I finished the first draft of Chasing Innocence exactly three years ago, almost to the day as I write this. I knew I had a great story, but I didn't see all the problems: the over writing, bad dialogue, pages of over description, excessive dialogue, dull story points, exposition and pointless literary prose. Not to mention the flawed grammatical narrative and plot holes that rivalled the Barringer crater in scope. On finishing the first draft of Chasing Innocence I really thought I'd written a masterpiece. Something that would make Lee Child green with envy. I really believed that because the story I saw on the screen was the one in my mind, not what I'd actually written. I carefully wrote a 1,500 word synopsis, a contrived letter and cycled across London to hand deliver my manuscript submission to Camilla Bolton at Darley Anderson. To which I got a very polite and honest rejection four weeks later. I was devastated. I had been convinced Camilla would call me, breathless with excitement the very next day. I had even changed phone contract to make sure I had the best signal so I wouldn't miss the call.

Fortunately my capacity for over-confidence is counter-balanced by my tendency towards introspection. Three factors have conspired to evolve this writing mind. The first was the years of lessons learned while writing blogs and cutting my teeth on writing websites. The second was to realise I am obsessively a perfectionist. Third, was to build on the first and move towards the second.

My pursuit towards understanding the mechanics of a good book resulted in a lot of hard lessons learned and many scars burned to my writing psyche. I'm sure there will be many additions as I finish books two and three. Listed below are the hardest won scars and the foundations, I believe, for writing a good book.

• The telling of a great story involves drama with deep lows to contrast against the highs. Without the lows and highs you have a flatline.
• The narrative will have a consistent perspective. If the perspective changes, the changes will be consistent.
• Great characters create an emotional reaction in the reader's mind. Anger, frustration, empathy and desire are good goals to start with.
• Every sentence and paragraph should be invested in progressing the mental image of your story in the reader's mind. If you watch a movie and it starts playing one jittery frame at a time and keeps doing it, you'll probably give up and watch a different movie.
• The end of each chapter must make the reader want to turn to the next.
• Remember you didn't like being told what to think as kid? You probably don't now, right? Well nor do your audience. Give the reader enough information to reach their own conclusions, don't tell them what to think.
• If your dialogue sounds like two lecturers talking at each other, or spends too much time explaining to the reader what's going on, it isn't dialogue, it's exposition. Which means your story is probably about as much fun as a lecture.
• There's no need to detail every colour or crease in fabric or a face, or every painting on the wall, or tree in the forest, or every brilliant dew covered bright green leaf on each tree. A lot of detail is great if your looking at a painting but not if you're reading commercial fiction.
• Trust your reader and their imagination. If they want the lead man to have dark hair, they'll imagine him with dark hair no matter how often you tell them he's mousey blond. If you push the point too often they'll get bored and maybe even drop you for someone more trusting of their imagination.
• The time taken to detail an environment should correspond to the amount of time it features in the story. If your characters briefly run through a house, describe it in the briefest terms. If your characters originally spent a lot of time in the house but now only run through it briefly, edit so the house is described in the briefest terms. Even if you absolutely adore the description of the house.
• Your clever play on words will almost certainly trip up the reader, which isn't clever.
• The human world is full of conflict, despair, love and hope. The promise of this fills every moment of our human lives, at many levels. If you have none of this in your story it won't seem real.
• Whenever you can, try to do the unexpected. Turn the moment inside out and then upside down. Some people call this a twist, it's called good story telling.
• You're not going to get away with anything. Don't think you will. If there's a nagging voice in you head telling you something isn't working, it probably doesn't. As a life-long consumer of books your mind is very skilled at knowing what makes a good story, even if the inner writer is busy ignoring it.
• If you absolutely love a sentence, paragraph or chapter, ask yourself what part it plays in the overall story. The chances are you love it too much. Ask yourself what the reader will think when they read it.
• There is nothing wrong with writing the book you want, but if you want anyone else to read it, you have to consider who you're writing it for. Don't think about individuals, think broad but don't spread yourself too thin. A top and bottom age range and gender is a good place to start. Imagine your audience reading your book in the kind of place you would read your kind of book. Write with that image in your mind.
• Edit, edit and edit. Listen to the voices.
• There is nothing like whittling your story down to a 600 word synopsis for exposing the flaws in the story. If you can't make the synopsis sound good your book's entertainment value isn't looking good either.
• Edit, edit, edit. Always listen to the voices
• For most of the human population giving criticism is hard. Friends especially find this difficult. Find proof readers you trust over those you like.
• Taking critical feedback is tough. Learn to think of each instance as an opportunity to make your story better. Do not for one minute consider any constructive feedback 'Just doesn't get it!' Or is 'Missing the point'. If you do, stand in front of a mirror and say it out loud.
• You do not need to adjust to all feedback. Weigh each in context to your story, characters and audience. Do not forget though, that you won't get away with anything. Each time you think you are, you're a step closer to losing the reader. Listen to the voices.
• No matter how grammatically anal you are. No matter how long you have been brilliant at spelling, your manuscript will have errors. You are human.
• Do not for one minute think it's OK to have errors because you're an indie author and your book will be sold for a dollar. Each error will further remove your audience from the carefully created world of your imagination.
• Check your plot is consistent. Draw charts of what happens chapter by chapter if necessary. If you dangle a carrot, make sure all of it got eaten. All red herrings must be properly cooked and consumed, bones an'all.
• Beg, borrow or pay for a copy and proof edit. They are the difference between a good story and a great book.
• Somehow, make the cover of your book the kind of picture you'd want to plaster your walls with. If you don't love the cover of your book, how can you expect anyone to stop and pick your book from the crowded virtual shelf.
• Indie publishing is to some degree technical. If you want to be an indie author, you need to geek up. Even if only a little. There's a lot of indie author's out there and a lot of them are doing some incredible things, often with little technical background. Don't get left behind. Failing that find a good looking IT geek and befriend them.

Read the list again and be honest with yourself. Don't fall for the illusion. Good luck. If you've got scars of your own to share, I'd love to hear about them.