When Writing and Life Collide

I took this photo at 7:45pm last night, as I lay in a lawn chair, talking on the phone to a good friend. We'd been trying for a simultaneous voice chat (as opposed to non-simultaneous texting) for two full days. We had writing developments to discuss and we were both just crazy busy. I kind of tacked this on to the end of my day - which she did, too, an hour ahead of me in time zone - and it ended up being... just lovely. I relaxed in the chair, drinking wine and watching the sky change.

The topic in the bordello this week is "The world out there: when writing and life collide and conflict."

Boy, is it topical for me.

I've been running a packed schedule since the RT Convention, largely because I have a book due July 1 and, of course, it's coming out longer than I thought. I'm drafting at a grueling (for me) 2,500 words/day. It's difficult for me to do more and have brain capacity for the day job. (I work as an environmental consultant, so I am literally paid to think, which can be daunting.) I'm at 85,000 words on this book - the 4th in my Twelve Kingdoms series - with anywhere from 24,000 to 36,000 to go. Which means I'm headed into the final 25% of the book, which is the part that works me over the most. Not necessarily difficult, but the part that feels like it carves out a big piece of my soul, as if the book requires a chunk of my life energy to come alive.

Somewhere a portrait of me is aging five years, every time I finish a book.

To put a cherry topper on my Sundae of Superhuman effort, I fly today to Oklahoma City to spend a week there for the day job. I have no idea how well I'll do keeping up with writing, but I'm determined to try.

I saw a group of authors discussing this phase, how when writing a book they get totally absorbed in it, forget other things, leave food to burn, make mistakes at the day job. Some said they lock themselves in their offices for weeks at time, let their families cook for themselves, pay someone to come in and clean, check into a hotel for three nights to crank out 30,000 words. I don't go to these extremes for two reasons. 1) I write pretty steadily. I'm *always* working on a book at something like 1,500-2,000 words/day, so I never do the big crunch like that and 2) I can't afford to.

Literally. I have to have the day job as I'm the primary wage earner in our household and it still brings in more money than writing does. I don't want to devote any of that money to paying someone to clean. We divide the chores and I feel strongly about holding up my end of them.

Also...

Balance is important and keeps me sane. So, after Oklahoma City, we're visiting family in Denver. We'll spend the weekend with my folks, see our daughter and son-in-law, celebrate our grandson's birthday. It will be a few days of the equivalent of a breath in a lawn chair watching a sunset and connecting with a good friend.

The book will get done. It always does. 

How 2014 Changed Me

Today is the Winter Solstice in the northern hemisphere - a day that feels sacred to me, deep in my bones. In many ways, this day feels like the end of the year to me, far more so than December 31 ever has. From here the year turns around. The photo above wasn't from today, but I did take it on the winter solstice a few years ago. The brilliant light in it encapsulates exactly how I feel about the implicit promise of solstice.

This week, appropriate to winding up the old year and looking ahead to the new, we're evaluating three ways our writing has changed or evolved over the last year.

Regular visitors to the Bordello know that I keep pretty detailed metrics on my writing. That helps me get an objective measure on evaluations like this. (Can't shake that scientific training!) So, a few of those measures from the last year, as of this Solstice Day.

Words written in 2014: 558,396
Highest wordcount month: August, with 68,050
Lowest wordcount month: September with 22,402
Monthly average overall: 46,533
Highest week: 2nd week of August with 20,922
Lowest week: 4th week of July with 1,105
Weekly average: 9,144
Daily average:  1,573
Works published: 5 (10 release dates, counting the six episodes of Master of the Opera)
Longest work written to date: The Talon of the Hawk, 132,377 words

So, three ways that my writing changed?

I wrote more, faster

I took to heart my own advice to treat increasing wordcount the same way I approach physical training - by gradually increasing the volume and intensity of what I did. At times I worked with a 3,000 words/day goal. Part of this was knowing I'd need recovery time and factoring that in. It's no coincidence that my lowest wordcount month followed the highest. Overall, I increased my average daily wordcount by 200 words/day from 2013. That might not sound like a lot, but cumulatively it is. And is a gradual increase that shows an overall improvement in my writing endurance and condition.

I wrote longer

When I first began writing novels, switching over from the short essays I had been writing to creating longer works was a huge challenge for me. It took a lot for me to learn how to contain a longer story in my head and work on it incrementally. I am naturally a concise writer. My editors always ask me to add, never to cut. Edits always involve embellishing, explaining, delving. This year saw me write my two longest works ever. The other was Rogue's Paradise at just over 102,000 -  it's probably significant that both it and The Talon of the Hawk wound up trilogies. They're good-longer, too, judging by reader reactions. Not fatty, but strong stories that needed to be that long.

I got better

Maybe all writers feel this way, but I live in fear that the next book will suck. With each book, I'm getting better attention - better critical acclaim, amazing awards and singular notice - all of which is wonderful but also makes me fear that I won't be able to sustain it. Especially as I write more, faster and longer (see above). I'm knocking on wood as I write this, but so far, I'm continuing to improve as a writer. The two books I have coming out in 2015 so far - Under His Touch on January 19 and The Talon of the Hawk on May 26 - are, according to my editors and early feedback/reviews, the best I've written so far. I think I'm, like that Olympic athlete, hitting my stride.

I can't wait to see what 2015 holds!

Solstice blessings on you all - may the next year be full of wonder, beauty and joys, both great and small.

Increasing Word Count and Training for #NaNoWriMo

This seemed like an appropriate photo for the topic of the new week - Managing Your Time: If You've a Deadline, You've a Schedule. How Do You Get Back On Track When Your Schedule Goes To Crap?

I'm in this place right now, getting back on track on a number of levels. My schedule didn't really go to crap. But I did take a huge step back in September and now, it's turned out, a good portion of October. It's been deliberate in some ways and very likely much needed. Also weird.

See, in August I wrote 68,050. The most I've ever done in one month. It was a lot for me. More, that followed a straight run since the previous August when I wrote at least 41,000 words every month. In 2013 I wrote just over 497,000 words and so far for 2014, I've written 455,000. To do the math for you, that means I'll likely have somewhere around 550,000 by December 31.

Once I get back on track, that is.

Because, in September, I only wrote 22,402. So far, for October I have 16,831. These are my two lowest word count months since May of 2013. I haven't been doing nothing, precisely. I edited the novel that comes out in January, Under His Touch - developmental edits up through proofreading - and developmental edits on The Talon of the Hawk, which took a lot of focus, though a minimal additional word count. I worked up a proposal for three more Twelve Kingdoms books and started the first in the concept for another contemporary romance series. There's been a lot of promo with the release of Rogue's Paradise in September and preparing for The Tears of the Rose in November.

But I haven't been doing much drafting. Which takes a whole other muscle.

Speaking of muscles, I was also sick in September. Some kind of low-level respiratory crud that nevertheless laid me low for several weeks. I got behind in exercising, too. Though managed to use the treadmill desk some every day, if only to keep my lymph flowing, I couldn't run or lift weights. The treadmill served as a cat bed more than it moved. All of this was by way of necessary recovery. I truly believe that. I don't have another book deadline until March 1. I haven't gotten sick in a long time. It worked out okay for this to be my down time.

However, it's now time to ramp up again and the question, the focus of our topic this week, is how do I do that?

I take my own advice. The sort I had the opportunity to hand out a couple of weeks ago when Chris Baty, the founder of NaNoWriMo, visited our local chapter meeting, something I mentioned in last week's post, too. One gal asked if Chris had advice on how to get going on writing those 1,667 words/day to make the 50K words/month that's the NaNoWriMo goal. He said he didn't so I offered mine. I told her that the temptation is to do the math exactly that way - to divide 50K by the 30 days of November and focus on achieving 1,667 words for each of those days. The problem with that approach is that writing that many words on the first day is akin to learning to run a marathon by going out and running ten miles right off the bat.

Yeah, you can probably do it, but you'll feel the pain later.

In fact, you might be able to do it for a couple/three/four days - and then the crash occurs. Like my recovery time recently, it's a natural sequel to going flat out.

Better, I told her, to treat it like that marathon training. Build up a little more every day. Stop before you're tired, because that energy will translate to the next day. Consider setting up a schedule for NaNoWriMo like this:

1	100
2	200
3	300
4	400
5	500
6	750
7	1000
8	1250
9	1500
10	1750
11	2000
12	2000
13	2000
14	2000
15	2000
16	2100
17	2100
18	2100
19	2100
20	2100
21	2100
22	2200
23	2200
24	2200
25	2200
26	2200
27	2200
28	2200
29	2200
30	2200

By the end of November 30, you'd have 50,150 words. Best of all, by the time you've got yourself doing 2,200 words a day, it will feel very easy and natural. Because you'd be in shape for it.

This is what I need to do, to get myself back in shape. I've gotten back into running and weight-lifting, working my way back up to my previous levels. I'm tracking my treadmill desk miles, making sure I do a little more each week. I need to get back into drafting, but not to 2,200 words/day. Not right off, tempting as that is. I'm going to ramp up like this. Get the words flowing.

Back on track.

Counting

by Allison Pang

Many jobs ago, I used to work for Ocean Spray. (The cranberry folks, yes.) I was an intern collecting data - which meant a lot of time spent out in the fields collecting samples- berries, plants, grubs...you name it.

Depending on the particular study, things were weighed or measured...and counted. How many mites on a particular set of leaves. What part of the life cycle were they in. How many microscopic nematodes could I find in a beheaded grub? (Biology is awesome, yo.)

Lots and and lots of counting in research.  Which is usually what I told people I did when they asked. "You work(ed) for Ocean Spray? What did you do there?"

"I counted things."

*ahem*

So when it comes to word counts and writing there are times when I can be a tad ambivalent. But it also depends on what part of the writing cycle I'm in. I'm editing/revising right now, and while I'm certainly adding content, at this stage of the game I'm more concerned with the quality of the words as opposed to the number.

If I'm writing something from scratch (dirty drafting, as I call it) - then I tend to be focused more on word count, mostly because if I don't keep track on a regular basis, then I can have a tendency to let "real life" take over as excuses. "Can't write tonight, gotta do X."  When I was first starting out, that was a major issue - there was always a reason why I couldn't get any writing done that day or only a small amount of words to show for it. Once I made up my mind to do a minimum of 1000k a day, all of a sudden I actually HAD a book a few months later. (I don't do NaNo too often, either, but if you're so inclined to keep people informed of your word count, some of the web widgets can be fun. Otherwise, I don't have any tools. I just highlight the words I've written or watch the word count on the Word doc and figure it out from there.)

Would I like to do more than 1000k a day on a regular basis? Yes. Of course. (And being on a deadline usually stirs me to move a little faster than that.) But sometimes that is just not possible, so as long as I've got the "minimum" done, I don't feel too guilty. Guilt does not make for a good muse - and sometimes the best laid plans get hosed and I've mostly decided to just go with the flow these days. Miss my word count on a given day because a kid is barfing just means I have to try to make it up on a different day. And then I move on. (And like fellow Word Whore, KAK - sometimes there is just a mental limit for me. I reach it and then everything becomes mush.)

That being said, this year hasn't been too good for me productivity-wise. Surgeries and chronic pain tend to slow the body down, no matter how willing the spirit is, so to be honest? I gave myself a pass over the summer. (I still managed to add 100 pages to the current "finished rough draft" anyway - but it was a terrible slog, usually involving me stoned out of my mind on painkillers, typing out 200 words, feeling guilty as hell and then passing out. It was a pretty shitty cycle, to be honest.)

So now, I'm recovering and off the drugs and my mind is waking back up, as is the writing bug. (That itch to write/finish a project is on my mind more - whereas before other distractions would override, I actually don't *want* to play video games right now. I want to get back to the story.) It's a relief - but just like the muscles in my back which are currently being retrained to work properly after 5 years of malfunctioning, the writing muscles are also being retrained.

That means revising this new book...but it also means working on additional writing projects - short stories, comics, sketching outlines for future books down the road. And it means more discipline - turning off the internet (or at least Tumblr, because holy hell, that site is a time suck.) and just getting the words done.

Because in the end, the only thing that's actually going to increase your word count is writing the words.

Word Counts: Time Available vs Ability to Produce

J.W. Waterhouse "Miranda - The Tempest"

Just because one has the time does not mean one has the ability.

That's what I tell people who boast if they could write full-time, then they'd produce ten novels a year.

(Well, those are the words passing my lips. The angry monkey in my brain is doing something entirely different.)




Whilst drafting, my word-count daily goal is 3,000 words gross.  My word-count daily average is 2,000 net.  That takes me all day. As I have mentioned before, I am by no means a fast writer.  I am an overly analytical one. With or without a day job, my brain gives me a set amount of creative wherewithal and that's it. No more. The one time I achieved 6,000 words in a day felt like an embalmer was extracting my brain with hooked rods through my nose, ears, and eyes. And the next day? I wrote ... wait for it ... nothing.  There was no creative spark just gelatinous ooze. The aftereffects of pushing myself weren't worth it.


When it's time to edit, word-counts mean less than chapters completed. Goals vary per book. Averages ... there just aren't. For some edits, the fixes are a line here, a transition there, or policing dialogue tags. Other edits are more like full-on revisions and those fall back to the drafting goals and averages.

My Twitter feed is constantly filled with calls for #1k1hr and #AmWriting sprints. When folks answer with "2567 words, #1k1hr" or "5834 words #AmWriting sprint done. off to make dinner!" I ... ignore them. Admittedly, there was a time that shit freaked me out, like I was back in school and we're taking timed tests. I'd worry more about the time than the story. The end results were always useless crap.

As a writer, the most important thing is to be aware of our personal averages and timelines so we have reasonable expectations of ourselves. If and when the times come to sign contracts and promise deliverables, we can commit in good faith...and not develop an ulcer along the way.

Writing a novel isn't a competition.  It is art. Quantity produced does not equate to success; no matter what the e-book revolution tempts you to believe. Quality and value will always be subjective. One man's Pollock is another man's Waterhouse. And as always...

Tell the best story you can.

Finish the damn book.

Tools to Track Your Word Count Goals and Averages

Yes, word-count lovers, it's that time of year!

Because we're into the second half of NaNoWriMo (or National Novel-Writing Month, for the uninitiated), the Word Whores are gathering around the table and throwing down on the topic of Word Counts: Goals and Averages.

Our table is draped with a red-velvet tablecloth and has a very large jug of wine in the center. James looks disconcertingly like Walter White as he gives us his "I'm a word-producing machine" stare-down. KAK, resplendent in her pimping purple, spills a bit of wine from her goblet as she gestures while talking. Linda is strumming her guitar and listening, nodding along, while Allison shuffles her ever-expanding novel that just might be reproducing as we sit there. Marcella, with her laptop open, is still searching for that article on improving performance, while her tea steeps and Veronica mutters something about faffing and refills KAK's glass.

This is the group I'm calling to order.

*Ahem*

~starts Power Point presentation~

 

This is my Excel Workbook that I call "Progress Count." I review and add to it every single day. I have tabs to track my priorities, my overall word count (which includes blogging and writing for other promo) and a sheet for each book that is not yet in the can - meaning totally through copy edits and finalized.

 I've been summarizing my weekly word count totals since October 2012, so a little over a year now. I tracked them before, but didn't save the totals. I thought I might see a pattern in my productivity and I have. This is heavily impacted by periods of revision and developmental edits (as in April, May and late September), but I haven't figured out a way to separate that out. I would likely have to track drafting apart from revising and I'm not sure I care that much.

I reset my "clock" every week so, this being Sunday morning, my slate is clean. My Word Whores blog post is always my first set of words for the week. No matter what else I'm doing, I go for a minimum word count of 1,000 new words each day.When I meet those interim goals the yellow boxes that say "Not Yet" turn to a happy green "Yes!"

 I've also been tracking my monthly totals since October 2012. November is, of course, in progress. Again, some months are hit more heavily by revision time. Still I do have a fairly regular pattern of higher word count pulses followed by lower word count months.

 Here's my progress so far for November 2013. I measure my percentage reached of 50,000 words, since that's the NaNoWriMo barometer. Right now we're 57% through November and I'm at 65% of 50K, so my progress box is a happy green.

 I track all of my contracted books with the Priorities spreadsheet. Working back from multiple deadlines, I figure how much time I have for drafting, cooling time, revision, CP review, incorporating comments and polishing. After that, editing timelines depend entirely on my publishers, so I don't even try to track those.

 I work with the three-act structure and, figuring out from my projected finished word count, I estimate where the major climaxes will occur in the word count. Then as I draft, which I do from beginning to end, I can get a better feel for how the in-progress structure compares to the predicted one and I can revise my timelines if the book seems to be coming out longer or shorter than I thought it might.

 Nothing yet today, but this section will track my word count for the day and the rest of the week.

 I like incremental goals, so this shows me how I'm progressing. Right now I'm working at 2,450 words/day to meet a drafting goal of done by 12/14. I'm doing decently in that I only have to get 1,972 words done today to be on schedule, but I'll go for the full goal. That gives me padding for bad days. And Thanksgiving.

That's tighter than I like, leaving me only 11 days to revise and meet my 12/25 deadline, but it's doable.

Finally, I can always refer back to my annual goal for daily word count. I've written 417,990 words so far this year, which already has me at over 1,000 words per day for the year, even if I stopped now. We're on day 321 of the year, so that's even better, giving me an average of 1,302 words per day. Let me meet my Christmas deadline and I shall be very happy!

I think the Word Whores have all fallen asleep, except for James who's been surreptitiously writing all this time. But if you want a copy of the presentation - or a blank template of my Progress Count workbook! - let me know in the comments. Also, I'm happy to answer questions - I know this was a fast presentation.

I'm off to turn some of those boxes a happy green.

Jeffe's Five Tricks for Juggling Multiple Projects and Deadlines

This time of year, all of my flowering vines blossom, like an end of summer special treat. They'll be the first to go when we get a frost, so they are all the more fleeting for that. Transient and precious.

Speaking of which, Dear Author is giving away three copies of Ruby.As of this writing, the giveaway ends in 36 hours, so hie on over if you're interested.

A lot of people seem to be out enjoying the long weekend - the three-day Labor Day Weekend, here in the U.S. and the traditional end of summer. All the kids are either back in school or headed that way. The academic types are kicking into the new semester. For many, this weekend is the last hurrah - camping, boating, barbequing.

For me?

I'm planning to write 8,000 words, review four sets of copy edits, critique two emergency contest entries and finish reading a critique partner's (CP) book.

Would I rather be out playing? Sure, on some level. Part of me wishes I could park myself on a lounge chair under an umbrella, drink adult beverages and read for pleasure. Except I also know I can't afford that time right now and, in the end, I'll be happier to get my work done. Having an extra day off the day job is like a gift of time.

And this, my friends, is how I do it. This week's topic is: Juggling Multiple Projects & Deadlines: How to Do It Well.

I was about to type that I'm not sure how well I do this, but then I checked myself. In a rush of self-congratulation, I have to say that I think I do juggle multiple projects and deadlines with a fair level of skill. But wow - it's been an acquired skill. So many things interest me that I want to do them ALL. Along the way, I've learned tricks to keep all those balls in the air.

#1 - Organize, organize, organize

Okay, you laugh, because you know I'm the Spreadsheet Queen, but I'm a huge believer in keeping organized as the key to getting it all done. I remember a time back in grad school - lo, these many moons ago, when computers were kept in a special room and we didn't have them on our desks, much less our laps - when I drew an enormous calendar on the blackboard over my desk in the lab. I plotted out my exams, both the ones I was taking and those I was giving, research, and various other projects. One of the professors walked by, shook his head and said "looks like displacement activity to me." But he was wrong. Making those calendars enabled me to plan my effort and keep on track.

Now I use Excel. I've written before about how I track wordcount. That's part of an overall effort to keep myself not just producing, but producing on schedule. In my Progress Count workbook, I have a tab called Priority List. I have all of my active projects listed there, from those proposed to in copy edits (the final stage of editing) - right now there are 13, though two are back-burnered - with columns for tracking. I note current status, next step, next step deadline, which is up to bat, what's on deck, estimated time required for the next step and the dates for delivery. Right now I have deadline dates ranging from 9/4 (those copy edits) to June 2015.

When a publisher asks me when I can deliver a proposed manuscript? This is the spreadsheet I go to.

#2 - Slow and Steady Wins the Race

I never used to be this way. Ask my mother. When I was in high school, I drove her CRAZY because I was always completing projects the night before they were due. I was absolutely one of those people who needed deadline pressure to get my off my duff and seriously working.

And I hated being that way.

The thing is - that deadline pressure that gets you moving? It's stress. The adrenaline response to that atavistic fear of HOLY SHIT, THAT TIGER WILL EAT ME IF I DON'T RUN LIKE THE WIND is what gets you moving. However, nature intended this to last long enough to get us the fuck away from the tiger. Not to last for our entire adult lives. Being under constant stress was bad for my health. More, it sucked in a big way.

These days, my incremental wordcount plans and spreadsheets are all designed to keep me balanced. If I do everything right, then I can get my work done - steadily moving forward every day - without stressing about it.

#3 - I Am Always Under Deadline

I don't quite get it when writers say things like "Oh, I can't do that because I'm under deadline." This makes no sense to me, because, ever since my third book, I've had deadlines. Now, as I noted in #1, I have eleven deadlines. Even before that, I used self-imposed deadlines to keep myself on track. See #2. Aren't all professional writers always under deadline?

Sometimes I think that, when people say this, they mean that they're feeling the deadline pressure. That they've glimpsed the tiger or feel its breath hot on their necks. To me, this is more saying "I'm under the gun." And sure, that happens. With these copy edits, they came in late last week and I hadn't known when they'd come in. Some publishers - it seems the bigger they are, the worse this is - don't tell you when edits will arrive. And when they do, the turn-around they expect can be unreasonably short. Often this is because the tiger is hunting them and they're tearing through the woods hoping to escape with their lives. I mean, jobs.

#4 - The Half-Again Rule

Okay, so, for my day job I work for an environmental consulting firm. We're forever tasked to estimate Level of Effort (LOE) to complete a job. This means both hours and dollars. It's not easy. Worse, if you underestimate, your project runs over and the company ends up eating the loss. Which makes the bosses UnHappy. (And they turn the tigers loose.) Quite some time ago I learned the Half-Again Rule and it has saved my tender hiney from the tiger more times than I can count.

The rule is very simple: Estimate how long you think a task will take and add half of that to it. So, if I think I can write my novella in 30 days, I plan for 45. Easy peasy. This allows for all the Unexpected Things. Like sick days, or goof-off days (hey - they happen!) or family celebrations or tragedies that demand your time. Or if your New York editor says "can I have these revisions back in 24 hours?" Don't laugh - that's happened to more than one friend.

Pad that schedule with the Half-Again Rule. You will never regret it.

#5 -  Deadlines Are Tools, Not Weapons

By all of this, I'm saying - juggling projects and deadlines is about planning, not panicking. I believe strongly that "I'm under deadline" should not be synonymous with "I'm under the gun." A deadline is a date on the calendar. It lets you count the dates between then and now (Excel even has a function of =TODAY() that you can plug into formulas for this very purpose) and figure out how much work you have to do each day to reach that goal. Number of words divided by number of days (plus half-again!) will tell you what you need to do.

Work the tool and no one will hold a gun to your head.

Word Count? You Must Gather Your Party Before Venturing Forth

by Allison Pang

*cough*

Even despite last week's post about writing and the chaos that occurs with trying to balance writing time with kids, there are obviously times throughout the year when my creativity tends to plummet.

Oddly enough it's not always during holidays. (Which often become a greater source of time for me, simply because additional family members are around. Before you know it, I'm hiding out in a nook somewhere and blissfully undisturbed.)

So, no. I don't have a specific time of year that kills my word count.

It's game release day.

Now, I've had to temper that over the years. Time being a premium anyway, I have to pick and choose my distractions very carefully.

For example? Sim games - like Civilization? I have them, but I *rarely* play them. Apparently I really like to micro-manage my towns...but I completely lose all track of time and everything else. I simply cannot limit playing these games to 20 minutes chunks. It's always "just let me build one more city, one more granary, one more..."  I only play them when I literally have NOTHING else to do. And that almost never happens, so...

MMORPGs? I used to be more heavily involved in them. I still have my World of Warcraft account, but it's actually been close to over a year since I've loaded it up to play. At one point it was hard for me to break away from games like that - again, it's a game that never ends, so there's always that "just one more quest" mindset that can be hard to break. Once I stopped trying to keep up with some of my online friends, it became easier. I don't have time for raids, ever - but I can certainly set a timer, pop in to kill a few things and grind for ingredients, and pop back out again.

RPGs - this is my weakness, particularly if it's a game or game series I'm really fond of. (Bioware's Dragon Age or Mass Effect, for example  - though that certainly includes games like Baldur's Gate or NeverWinter Nights as well.) Last week after my surgery I gave myself a pass on writing and played Dishonored for days. (There's actually been a study done that shows that playing video games reduce pain. I'm not sure it completely reduced mine, but it was a very welcome distraction.) But the thing with RPG games is that it's not just hack and slash - it becomes a full on immersive experience, with a story arcs and subplots, npc characters who become friends, enemies, lovers, etc.

When one of these games comes out? Writing generally doesn't get done. At all.

However, rather than beat myself up over it - assuming I'm not on deadline - I will budget in a few weeks of play time to get a first run-through of one of these games. I've tried doing the "write x pages and play as a reward thing" but I've found that it's actually better for me to just go ahead and play and get it out of my system. Once I've beaten the game, I may very well go back and play it again several times - often the game outcome can change depending on how you play and what you choose to do - but the initial rush and desire is gone, so I can go back to budgeting 20 minutes here or there without that obsessive element batting at the back of my head.

The good news is that such game releases aren't nearly as frequent as I would like, so the instances where this becomes an issue are fairly few and far between. (DA 3 comes out in Fall of 2014, though - so all bets are off then.)

Otherwise, my rule of thumb is everything in moderation. No playing unless the word count is done and limit it to manageable chunks when I *do* play.

At least until the extra DLCs come out.

Getting Sidetracked - Knowing What Knocks You Off Course

This is the Supermoon rising over Santa Fe last night. It always looks so much bigger in real life. I wonder if that's just a misperception?

I'm a happy camper this morning - and not just because I'm sitting in my riotously blooming garden while hummingbirds zing about - because I get to break out my GRAPHS. See, spreadsheets lead to graphs, like consistent word count leads to novels.

It's a beautiful thing.

Continuing our theme of encroachment on writing time, this week's topic poses the question: "Seasonal Writing Cycles: Which times of year sidetrack wordcount the most?"

Now you know where the spreadsheets come in.

Those who follow my personal blog know that last October I started keeping records of my weekly and monthly wordcounts. I've always tracked daily and weekly progress, but I hadn't saved the numbers. Now that I'm seriously considering the transition of quitting the Day Job and being a full time writer, I want better numbers of how I perform over the longer term. I see the lack of steady, predictable income to be one of the greatest pitfalls of being a full-time writer. Many who pull it off have dutiful spouses with salaries and benefits. With my man on early retirement and developing his new practice as a Doctor of Oriental Medicine, his income fluctuates also. I'm willing to take the risk, but I want a better sense of what I can expect from myself.

(And by saying I'm seriously considering this transition, that does not mean it's happening soon. The money is coming up, but it's nowhere near what I make at the Day Job, alas. I'm just planning ahead.)

I imagine that James, our Masculine Monday Whore and Hulk SMASH! of wordcount, will say that seasons don't matter to him and he just powers through, regardless. Enviable. For me, the graph I've composed so far confirms what I've suspected.

Yeah, December is my bad month.

This spring looks lower than the others because I was intensively editing several different things. Lots of work, but not a lot of word count accumulation. June, of course, isn't over yet, but I expect it will be around 30K for the month.

December is bad for me for two reasons: Day Job and Christmas.

Because of the way our contracts are set up, most of the projects I work on for the Day Job have 12/31 end dates. Sure we roll a lot of those projects over into the new year, but because we're a private company dealing with government contracts, it often takes weeks to renew the paperwork. January tends to be quiet. December can be hell.

Yes, yes - I know I'm the great champion of Defend Your Writing Time! Still, those lovely people who pay me and count on me to deliver have to come first at times.

And then there's Christmas. Sue me, but I love it. I love the decorating, the baking, the shopping and the general festivizing. Being the one who cares most, I do the lion's share of the prep work in our household. I know a lot of people who want to reel back on the celebration, make it less work, but I'm not one of them. Instead, I try to plan my life so I have time to do all the Christmas stuff I love.

It will be interesting to see how I do this year, because I have a novel due 11/1 and one due 12/31. I'm trying to plan ahead (writing the 11/1 novel now, in fact), so that I can finish the 12/31 novel early enough for me to handle both Day Job crises AND not feel rushed with holiday stuff.

Wish me luck!

As a final addendum, I find it interesting that my weekly cycles tend to be fairly rhythmic.

I haven't decided what all to make of this, but it's good to ponder. (My weekly count goes Sunday-Saturday and I haven't done today's words yet, which is why there's nothing yet for June wk 5.) If you'd asked me before I kept these charts, I would have said I work at a pretty constant pace. This is clearly not the case.

Just another one of those misperceptions!

Full Steam Ahea...But WAIT!

Here's the secret to productivity. Have help. Just be aware that some help is less ergonomically correct than others.

 

Honestly? I may not be the best person to talk about amazing productivity. I'm a slow writer. I'm working on that - but man. It's a tough one. Add into it that I am The Queen of Second Guessing (This is NOT a self-awarded title. Entirely.) and you find my word counts over time kind of suck.

 

Still. Here's what I'm doing to change it.

 

1. Get the hell out of Dodge.

    I leave home. If I don't, the dirty dishes, the crunching floors, this chore, that chore - just one more thing THEN I can concentrate - oh look. Time for bed. Yeah. Must leave. Distractions R I. Admit this, cope with it. I handle it by taking care of two things at once - exercise and removing myself from the home front. Specifically - I bike a couple of miles to a tea shop. They bring me treats and let me work without any guilt about all of chores being left undone a few miles behind me. (Cat guilt? That's ever present.) A $4 pot of tea is the cheapest office rent ever.

 

2. Plan ahead

    Just like I wouldn't go out sailing in water I don't know without studying the charts for the area, I don't want to wander into my WIP without some notion of where the reefs and shoals are. So each morning, I spend five minutes (about the time it takes the tea shop to bring me my pot of tea) jotting notes about what needs to be accomplished that day. If there are specific questions that need addressing, I put them down. If I had thoughts or ideas from the day before, I've put them in my notebook as well and can incorporate those if I want. I also declare my intention in writing: GOAL: 2k on xyz scene. (The draw back to that has been that every single scene I have in my current WIP is exactly 2k...clearly this part of the system needs some refining.)

 

3. Zone out

    Headphones and an MP3 player. Most of my books have a playlist. Different books require different playlists. What worked for one book does not work for the next. I have very specific musical preferences that Pandora and other services cannot seem to fathom. So cueing up tunes that match my oddly wired brain is on me. Writers are sponges, right? Hear emotion in a couple of voices at the table next to you and your attention is sucked right in - not that you mean to eavesdrop - it's just that how these people sound in conflict, their posture, their expressions - it's all such great character study! It's also nil wordcount. Thus, pipe the sounds of your choice directly into your brain so you're harder to derail when other people's soap operas play out beside you.

 

4. Be accountable

    Keep track of your word counts. Set your goals so that you can achieve them - not just one day, but every day. Success builds success. You wire your brain to shoot for that success, to become addicted to getting it. But that only works if you keep track of it so you can see it accummulating. My CPs put a spreadsheet up wherein we each record our daily wordcounts. We have weekly check in meetings where we can brainstorm, problem solve or otherwise assist one another in meeting our goals. This is also useful from a public humiliation standpoint, if that sort of thing motivates you.

 

5. Get back on the horse

    When things go sideways, and they will cause life is like that, make sure you remember that productivity serves you, not the other way around. It's okay to let it go. Just don't fail to get back at it as soon as you can without winding up in a hospital, prison, or mental institution. They won't bring you treats. Not ones you'd want, anyway.

 

What have I missed? Also, any suggestions for giving up my Queen of Second Guessing title - totally welcome. How do you get past the notion that you're doing it all wrong?

Wordy McWorderson: From 0 to 1k a Day or Bust

by Allison Pang

I have a love-hate thing going on with word counts.

On one hand, yes - they are excellent measures of daily progress. But sometimes I have to pull that back and decide if it's quantity or quality that I want.

And of course, that all depends on timing. Am I on deadline? Am I just dirty drafting?  That's pretty basic stuff - and quite frankly, what it comes down to for me is if I'm accountable to anyone. I write more when I'm on deadline. I write more when I've got someone with me. (Even if it's virtual.)

So far this week, we've seen some excellent posts on the best ways to improve word count - which is great if you're already writing regularly and are maybe looking to boost your level of productivity.

But what if you're not really writing at all? How do you go from procrastination station to a completed work? This sort of ties into what James said on Tuesday - we've all run into those people who say something about how they'd love to write a book, but only if they could find the time. (This post isn't really directed to those people - if you want to write, you'll find the time, because writing is something you *must* do. Lip service doesn't get you anywhere.)

But what if you've set aside the time? You've got your clean work space, you  have your software and your books on craft and an uncluttered mind.

And yet nothing happens. Or maybe you manage a few hundred words, but suddenly cleaning the toilet becomes a much more important task. You know - since you will write that much better if you've got a clean place to pee later.

The ugly worm of procrastination has reared its head to stare you in the eye.

And sometimes procrastination is okay. I tend to procrastinate quite a bit - but I also tend to pad my time accordingly.

If you really want to write, but you always keep coming up with excuses not to - then it's time to sit down and try to figure out why you're not getting the words down. Outside stressors are always going to be there - jobs, money, family - sometimes it can take a while to figure out the balance that works best. As Linda noted yesterday, sometimes real life really does have to come first. For me personally, I find it much less stressful if I just accept that and do what needs to be done and *then* worry about the writing. Otherwise, I'm miserable and full of guilt. And that's a crappy way to create anything.

I suspect for a lot of people - myself included - it's about doubt. Fear can quash dreams pretty quickly. It's easy to sit there and fret that you suck, that you'll never be able to get this story out the way you envision it.

And if you do get it down  - will it be rejected by agents or editors or readers?

What if no one reads it at all?

And these are all very valid fears, but it's also a bit like putting the cart before the horse. You have no control over other people's reactions, but you definitely have control over what you produce.

If you're producing nothing, then the rest of it is moot.

So, how do you motivate yourself into writing?

1) Figure out your writing style - this only comes with practice, but the more you do it, the more apparent it becomes. If you find yourself staring into space more often then not because you don't know where you're going, you may need an outline. Some writers work best if they have a roadmap. They've already figured out the plot points and know where they're going. Writing the story is just filling in the gaps.

On the other hand, if you outline your story and immediately lose interest, you may be more of a panster. Some writers require something a bit more organic. They've got a vague idea of what's going to happen and they just make it up as they go.

Some people are a bit of both. Sometimes it varies from project to project.

2) It's not a competition. Word counts can be intimidating and if you haven't done much writing, 500 words can seem like a mountain, let alone 5000. It may feel as though everyone is cranking out words left and right, but that's not always the case. Don't worry about what other people are doing - everyone writes at their own pace. If 500 words feels scary, start with 250 at a time...and break them into sessions. Not everyone can just sit down and push all the words out at once. 250 words is about 1 page, give or take. Break that up into 5 mini sessions and you've got 1000 words. Build up from there. Or don't. Whatever works for you.

3) Make room for mistakes. First drafts often suck. They're supposed to. Sometimes second and third drafts suck too. That's where edits come in. Some people edit as they go. Some people wait until they're all done. If you're finding yourself freezing up because it has to be perfect before you can write new stuff, it might be better to leave the editing until later. There are plenty of would-be authors who can't get past those first few chapters, simply because they go back and edit and edit and edit. While that can be tempting to do, don't use it as an excuse not to finish writing the story. As avoidance techniques go, it's fairly insidious because you have all the trappings of an author...but nothing to show for it. Make your words count.

4) Multi-tasking.  When you're starting out or struggling to make a daily word count, be careful of spreading yourself too thin. It can be very tempting to be writing multiple books at once - and there are plenty of people who can do it. If you're getting stuck on one story, it can be nice to switch gears into something different for a bit and then switch back. But if you find yourself starting a new book every time the writing starts getting hard? You're going to be the proud owner of a lot of beginnings...and no ends.

5) Understand that writing is hard. Any creative process is, really. Sure there are fun parts, when a scene just falls into place, but often it can feel like you're herding plot bunnies up a river made of molasses. There are days I hate every word I've written...but I still sit down and keep going, because I can't fix what I don't have. Some people are in love with the idea of being a writer more than they are in love with writing. That's okay. Not everyone is cut out to *be* a writer and sometimes it can take a while to discover that. Figure out what you love and handle accordingly.

Like all things, the above advice is subjective. Take what you want and leave the rest. In the end though, there's only one thing that's going to improve your word count.

Writing.