5 done.
6-8 done
9 started

Get to the end

So far...
1-4: done
5: started

I need to get 24 done

*** Update 1:27pm:

This time it's much harder to get settled down even though the rules are the same.
I'm locked out of everything.

Following the rules, I can stare into space, stare at my hands, do nothing or I can write.
Very simple.
2 hrs to start.

And to think - there's money on the other side of this... Come on. I can do it!

***

A little blip

I turned away from my sales for 3 months and magical things happened. This is good.
(I am not a high roller; they are small potatoes for that group, but they are amazing for me.)
I have got my freedom session going so that I won't keep refreshing my stats (it won't help).
I wish I could tell family but that would do the exact opposite of help.

So, I tell you- Cheer for me, would you?

Yay!!! chocolate for everyone.


***

Now, onto the depressing task at hand. I have to write so fast my fingers won't be able to keep up. I need to shove quality right out the door because I don't have time. I need to get this stupid story told, get to the other side, and then use the editing passes to add layers and make it sing.

I am out of time.


All right, I have 24 scenes to get a good start on. Let's see how far I get today.

1: Rough/good
2: 1/2 way done

*** Update 5pm:
2: done
3: done
4: To do...

*** Update 7pm:
4: Done
5: started

Words and happy words

1100 words today. Just need about 9K more tonight.
Not going to happen obviously.

This is going to be a nightmare week if I keep up with this slow typing.

But time for bed so i can wake up happy and chipper for EDJ and more words tomorrow.

REMINDER: good to go... let it be boring so long as it's finished.

I have a deep sadness today. I carry it with me everywhere, coming down on my like painful water. when you turn to hold it and throw it away from you, it slips through your fingers.

I have no other words.

To speak of happiness and to have the world go on, as though nothing has changed.

Follow the bone

Things are not so good. My brain is stifled in misery. Whatever I used to have is gone.
I really thought this writing thing would be easy. It seems like it used to be easy, one day long ago.

If only I'd never gone this path. I loved the old stuff. Can I go back to that somehow? Just risk everything with my one chance to go fulltime and write/try to sell what I love, rather than the boring stuff I'm trying to write now.

I'd really love to have a series though. Just follow one character through her crazy new life. That would be interesting.

stilts

wow, so the book has u-turned to some very bad, bad place. It's painful to re-read.
Not, as in, I'm being too hard on myself but actually, actually painful to read.

Perhaps it has to do with a reviewer saying my characters are stilted. And, holy moley, is this guy stilted.

Yikes. I'm having a nightmare.

How to fix? How to engage back with the characters?

Part of it is that it's dang boring right now. Like dead boring. I don't care if they live or die boring.

Good enough

I need to talk about good enough. Enough already: It's good enough.
Just get the rough draft out there, in all its gory goodness. Revision will take me the rest of the way.

No more looking at the internet either... being distracted by sales or reviews or comments. All of that stuff no longer matters unless I can't write anyway.

If I can write, I need to be writing.  I need to get words, and more words, and more words after that.

I need to get this thing published FAST and yesterday.

Re-center on the positive

It's not been a good day. I got another bad review. Makes me just want to throw up my hands and give up. Sales have not been that great either.  My dreams of what might happen by releasing more of them have not gone to plan.

Also, all that effort... for nothing!! [sad face]

I guess, if I just look at these as 'practice' stories, it will be okay.  I do have this feeling that they will never touch another story because they will say, 'oh, it's by that person.'

Ah well.  Right now, honestly, I'm only making hobby money. Not good... but what can I do about it?

Anyway, I need to get my brain into the right place for writing.
This is just a fun story and I'm slowly building an audience of readers that LOVE this type of story.

Let me write this story just for them. Perhaps the sales will build back up.

Rush, rush, rush

Again I have put myself in a difficult position: The story needs to be finished by the end of the month.
That's 4K words/day.

Luckily, I have a bunch that just needs revision.

Once I get everything fixed up, I'll update with my new word count requirements each day.


***

I suppose, if I buckle down, there's no reason I can't get 4k/day even if it does come to that.
Time to build back up the writing muscle.

Sometimes I forget...

Sometimes I forget you.

You are my own little private place where no one's listening, but yet, I feel less alone because it isn't truly private.

To close things out, I did get it published.
I'm now working on the next thing.  It's not going well.

I need to truly let myself fall into that place. For some reason, I am resisting.

Forever

Please, please say I am almost done with this edit.

It's the longest thing ever!

but almost. Please almost.

Productive lunch

I need somewhere to type today, to set the session in a good way.
I have 90 minutes today to make things happen.

...Roll on...

frustrations

Frustrated today.

Feeling like people ask for help and then I get a lecture on what the answer should have been.
...Okay, don't ask then. I'm not the one looking for advice on the matter.
As with all things, all that matters is that I put this out of my head for the writing session.


I'm at the line edit. I must complete that very soon!! And then there will be rainbows and leprechauns for everyone!

Slow progress but finally some...

Very excited to finally see the end of that scene. It's the most poorly written thing ever but at least it's over!!

And I was thinking, most people will read it faster than it was written so they'll forgive the scene especially after I line edit it to almost pretty.

Anyway on to the final scenes. Please let the thing flow finally.

Editing hell

It's been a hard week. The editing phase has gone extremely slow. It should never have taken so long. I drag my way through each scene.

I'm at 9 scenes left to go.

Let me see how far I can get with that.

Hope touched

I'm filled with hope that something will come of this. Please let the story go well. Please let it sell.
I feel like I really have something special here.

Please. If wishes work. If wishes and dreams work.

humming

It looks like.

I need to rewrite my MC. Make her interesting, funny, endearing.
Hmmm.

that is tall order and I'm all frozen.

I come here to pout and to set my mind straight.

It's okay if it's not quite right; I just need to make a dent with it.

Also, what is it with people sometimes? They can be so harsh or snobby, uptight... what is the word for it?

Just everyone take a chill pill please. There's no need to be a snot about it.

next steps

So here's the question: can I actually make the next part of the book the same length as what's already written?

Hmmm... I suppose if the next section took 10k. Perhaps the last section could be another 10k

Is that dragging things out?

I think I'll need to take some more time in this section so I'm not trying to take so long later.

Fixing old stuff

Ok I took some time to work on the old project but now I'm back.
I have about 90 mins to get in some solid words and move the story forward.

Unfortunately, I think I have to fix the old stuff first.
I must face it and just get it over with.

Ok- can't do it. Must push forward.
I suppose that's progress. Just get to the end and deal with the fallout later.

almost 19K.

Looking like this suckers going to be short though. [sad face]

just keep writing

good news - apparently it wasn't that bad so I can keep going.

But finally i've gotten feedback on the other one so i'm busy bee trying to edit and then I need to get a blurb written for amazon and figure out the compiling stuff.
But hopefully I'm getting closer.

I'm just so relieved that the new one is salvageable.

Now, just to get this thing loaded to the zon so i can move on and hopefully so it will sell, sell sell

Hard times

Oh my gosh. I am so miserable. Yes, the story is that bad. It's really that bad. Beyond horrible no good very bad bad. very bad bad.

Just keep writing, just keep writing, just keep writing.

It's okay if it sucks. It's actually probably fine.

Again today, I'd like to get 5K in. I'd like to buff up this middle section and take myself to the last section of the book. Again, it's going to be too short.

Good start for today

I feel a need for a fresh start. Again, the story might need integral changes, but the skeleton is correct so I will proceed onward.
none of it makes sense but perhaps things will smooth out.

2188 words already today. I am over 18K.
I have updated my due date to July 19th.

I will re-adjusted if things don't continue going smoother but I'd love to get this story completed more quickly than the original plan.

Honestly I can't believe my word count is so high already. And the story isn't that bad, right??

Let's see how it goes

Today, I need to have similar results. I feel really uncertain about yesterday's writing so I'm very unsure I should be building on it.

Perhaps that's the task at hand: re-read and see how bad it is.

Update: pretty damn bad.

Okay, moving on. I think it will be fixable in revision. Must get to the end of this story.

Back to the original requirements: It's okay if this story is complete crap. Just write, fast, like the wind. Get to the end. I can add detail and personality later.

It's all good. Write fast. Many words.

***

Hmm, things are not going well. I am stuck in that terrible place: it's all horrible. I am the worst writer ever. How can I be so bad at this.

It's because all these books are crap. I need to be writing something I actually like. I hate these types of stories. But if it sells, how can I resist it. Must write more, that's what.

And they sell. These types of stories sell. So why am I being stupid about this?
Really, stop taking any of this seriously. Right now.

***

Edit: so really, it's just that I am such a perfectionist. No book is perfect, so as long as you are delivering what the readers want, they have learned to see past the imperfections to get what they need.
The less not-perfect you have, the easier it is on them. But the reader can deal with more imperfections than we might think.

So no reason to get so worried.

Crazy is as crazy does

I have this crazy dream to get about 14K words today (actually that's counting about 800 I got yesterday).

Let's see how that goes.

That would bring me to about 25K on the story. Currently, I'm at 10433.
Bare minimum is about 1500 today.

Okay, type fast.

I DO NOT CARE HOW THE WORDS ARE. JUST GET THE SCENE OUT OF MY HEAD AND WRITTEN DOWN SO I CAN FIX THEM ALREADY AND GET IT PUBLISHED!

Update: 6:27pm: 15370 words. That's 4937 words. What's another 10K between friends?
6:57pm: 15838 words. Yup, starting to drag. I am seriously burned out.

So for now at 7:03 pm: 15,838. That means:  5405 words today!

Today is all about getting caught up! DONE

I missed my lunch session, but I have time tonight!

In my first session tonight, I brought my word count to 9041. I am up to date.

This second session tonight is all about getting the words due today.
And if I happen to get ahead (!!), all the better.

So here goes. Again, it can suck hard. That's not what this is about.
This is just about getting the place-holder scene onto the screen.

Okay on to Session Two...


***


I have broken 10K on the project. The story has barely started. This is completely wonderful news. Hopefully it's not because I need to cut most of it.

I am 312 words into my word count due for tomorrow.
I think I will call it good now. I'm so pleased with what I've written so far.
I know where I'm headed still for the rest of the book. And I'm comfortable with the contents of the scenes that I will write tomorrow.

Please let this good news continue... Please let these sell and get me a way out of my misery.



[2269 words today]

And again... more words please

I have about 60 - 90 mins available this evening. This is big.
I need consistent 2-3 sessions a day of words.
That's professional level at that point, even with the EDJ.

Here goes...

Current word count: 6653.  Let me see how much I can add to that.

EDIT:
Okay, as usual I seem to want to stress about how stupid the story is going to be/already is, so why bother?
The thing is: stupid stories actually make money. There is no reason to worry at all.
Stupid stories sell like hot cakes.

So here's to stupid. I'm with stupid.

I have no expectations that this will be a good story, just that it will be a complete story, that I will write it fast and get to the end. Edit and polish. And sell.

I need about 2400 words to get back on track.
This will not happen.
But perhaps I can get 1500 more stupid words and get close to on track. :)

Let it be stupid. Let it be the dumbest thing ever.
Just move the story forward and that will be enough.


Word count: 8164 (+1511) .

not too shabby for the second writing session of the day!

that's 2711 today. :D

More words, please... it's worth the headache and the heartache

No words yesterday! (In my defense, it was not a good day) no excuse.
I must continue forward, push on to the end of this thing. Then take a step back and see what I have.
In order to make that happen, I must show up each day, launch my Freedom session and write.

This afternoon, I have just under two hours.   ... Gonna make this happen.
It happened.

About 1200 crappy words.

Must get more tonight!!

Getting words

I'm making exciting progress today. 1500 words so far today.
I'm now in the midst of getting yesterday's goal word count.

Today is the 4th of July though. I very much doubt I will get to today's word count.
But I've very hopeful that I can begin to make that up this week.

I think though that I'll keep my goal word count right around 1300-1500. Anything more and I'm more likely to not bother.

I'm still in the very beginning of the story. It's not going well. My characters aren't thinking, feeling or acting as individuals. But scene progress is made.

I want to focus on that for a change. Just get the rough draft out. Learn the character voice better as I go, rewrite the early scenes to match once I'm done.

'Here, Here' to writing fast and perfecting later...


Oops, but lest I forget. Starting over at this moment.
I don't care how bad it goes, just keep putting words and moving the plot forward.

Let me see how long I can make this story.

...

about 2900 words today!

Quiet on the set

It's hard to settle today, so many nerves. I will take this one step at a time though and I can make it through.
I'm a couple days behind but if I keep this up I should be able to get back on schedule.
I'm not going to worry about being a faster writer, instead I'll focus on being an every day writer.

This scene is not coming to me but that's crazy. I know what happens.
The issue is that I'm not putting all the crap out of my head.

Today and today and today. Just focus on the one scene.

Moving forward

So here's the question- can I survive? Can I put it out of my head??
Can I move on and be a pro about this?

The only way to get past the nightmare is to put in the time.
This means even writing when it's been a very bad, no good, horrible day. This means even if it's lunch time and the no good, very bad day is in process. Write. Just write.

Well, I've messed that up a couple of times. It's not over though.

Today is the day I put it all behind me... I'm a professional writer today with my two hours to get in my 2K words/day. :)

And on that note, time to take the story forward. I already know what happens. Let's make it so...

On to words...

Okay starting today over.

Just because this evening is distracting doesn't mean I should be getting ZERO words.
I have time to get several paragraphs, especially since I know the scene and what should happen.

On to words. And to believing that this moment is worth my attention.
It's these moments that add up to a novel if I use them well.



893 words. Not good but lots better than zero.

Locked in quiet

The important thing is to be locked in quiet for the next hour. Focus.
Put everything else aside, because it doesn't matter.

I made good progress. I have my way in to the character. Time to make that happen.
Perhaps 'kill' something while I'm at it. :D

***

ZERO words. Everything distracted me.

Not a good start.

Pro author

Listening to podcasts- pro authors spending 2-3 hours a day writing. Get about 3k words per day
I can do that with a full time job.

Ok- word count- can i get 3k/day from here on out? that's my ticket out of this mess.

So no excuses. I'm going pro now. (From here on out I have two jobs).

Rechecking I have 18 scenes.

I've decided to change a few locations and bump up the problems.
See how it goes.

Same goal- get to 30 scenes.

Also I need to finalize my heroine- who she is, what she wants, so I can find her voice and make it unique from the others.

UPDATE: I now have about 25 scenes and an added plotline.
If I can embrace this new plotline, I should get to 30 scenes.

Stuck at 25.

...more to come...

***
I think I have the plotline for this story. I am good to go.

I am starting a new path and it's going to be hard.

I will focus all of my energy here. There is no other.
I will write until 10pm, at which point I will go to bed.
I will write during lunch for my 2 hours and then I will go back to work.
I might even get up in the morning... okay, maybe not. But that will be okay too.
Maybe if I get up in the morning, I can go somewhere fun to write. :)

No more internet and TV.
It's just me and this page and my story.

Now... on to brainstorming for words. Eventually I'll get bored enough to cooperate.

***

737 words of brainstorming and I know their voices. Not sure I've got their conflict with each other. But then I missed that totally with 2 as well and yet somehow it still feels like a fun story.

So F*** the rules. We'll see how these puppies sell, breaking all the rules but keeping things fun.

Starting on the next one

This is fun.

Technically I have the story out for edits.
Rather than freezing up (or endlessly diddling with it) and waiting to get it back, today I am working my way through the outline for the next story.

I feel like a professional author all of a sudden.

Just on the last one- I feel torn. Either it's horrible or it's going to do awesome.
Truly it's probably just meh but my mind is stuck in that place where everyone is going to tear it apart in reviews.  But there's this hopeful feeling of these beautiful reviews from people and how much they love the story.

But on to being a professional author.

Need at least 30 scenes.  Take my time with the story!
Go... go... go...

18 so far. But time for bed.

I need a couple more plot lines. Something else needs to be up and it can't be good but it can't violate my agreements with others.

Saturday Times

Unexpectedly I have the afternoon to work on the story. Actually I should have tomorrow available too.

This is perfect...

Let me get those last scenes updated.

I am accepting that the story is as it is, as complicated as that makes it.
I need to beef everything up and just go for it. Accept that this will be more work but I can keep the lovelies I already wrote.

Here goes nothing


...unfortunately, turned out I had some housekeeping things to take care of first.  Oops... water...
Ok, needs met.  Time to put the hours in.

It's 1:15. Scene 30
2:43. Now at scene 33!
3:59: Now starting scene 36. :)
5:47: all kinds of new scenes rearranged and sorted and expanded. 40K. Yeah, baby.



DONE

Time to Focus, Time to Finish

All right, I will try to put that bit of crazy out of my head.

I have 2 hours to write. They are all mine.
This is amazing. If only I can keep it up. :D

Anyway, let me think about these two hours and what I need to accomplish:
I need to get those last seven scenes corrected so they match the earlier scenes. Need to get into the story and excited.
Even though it's been a slog for me, it should zip right along for the reader.
My experience writing it does not at all correlate with how it will feel reading it.

EDIT: Monday- going to continue along with this post until it's done. I have about 90 minutes which is wonderful!

EDIT: Weds. What a day. But time to get some more read. Hopefully I haven't lost momentum...

EDIT: Thurs. Time to make some more progress. Might get in 4 hours today! (1.5 so far)

EDI: Fri. Yesterday did not go as planned but 1.5 hrs is still pretty good.
I can't believe I'm still only up to scene 25. I must figure out how to re-handle this section. I'm torn about which to do.
Okay- DECISION MADE. I must go back to the original plan.
I must rip out all the scenes I loved and move them to a different place. IT NO LONGER FITS.
I am wasting too much time on stuff that isn't right.
Time to move forward. Bring it way down to dive shop fun. Let's go!

Got to scene 30. Decision UNmade. Too attached. I think I'll finish up as is and let beta reader decide how it seems

To Do:
Re-read from beginning, making sure the character stays true. ...LEFT OFF 30.
Get re-caught by the love of the story and act on that to have fun with the ending.
Take a real lunch to work on this, and, again, enjoy. Take the time to work on story again. :D

Just terrible

Difficult Times...

This is such a strange place to be in- like a yell it from the mountaintop but you can't because it might start an avalanche of shit fall down on top of you.

I don't care if I stare at the cursor for 2 hours. I'm not going anywhere.

Oh I been slapped in the face. Time to be sad.

And wake up.

Hello World

I am having trouble getting my head straight, so I come here to chat.

This scene is doing the opposite of coming together for me.

Well… that happened

On my latest release, I've had some success. Instead of doing hopscotch and dancing around, I'm staring at my stats all day. It stays at one book sold all day. By 5:15 I'm at 2.
I only just release it so it's too early to tell what my average will get to.

But the only thing that matters is putting out book 2.
Staring and refreshing my stats does zero for me.

Book 2 plot problems are fixed. I just have to figure out how much of the original I can keep.
And I have to shut off stupid stuff that makes me want to keep that stupid page open rather than making actual product that I can sell.

this was supposed to be the dream. Why am I so stressed?

Just as a reminder- this is very low importance. It doesn't need to be any good.
It just needs to be finished.

If I get this scene in and these words, I'll break 20K on this thing.

I have 15 scenes so far.

Need at least 50 more.

According to Write Track I need to get 1786 words a day to meet my 50K goal this month.

Today, I need to create a solid outline so that I can set my writing on cruise control.

IMPT FIRST STEP: Write the scenes in any order. This is an outline. I WANT to be able to move things around later. Just get some things percolating.

Don't mind me- I'm just having a really hard day. Can't quite figure it out. Nothing should be wrong. I felt I was building some writing momentum with the 1st story. but I can't buckle down to do story 2. 

If it's just going to flop- what is the point? 

I run into this same certainty with all my stories. There's no point jumping ship.

Which leaves me feeling stuck in this story. Because I have nowhere else to go.

I am plagued by self doubt. 

So the issue is- the story is fine. Not perfect but probably serviceable.

I'll get a good cover.

I'll request help with my blurb and my title. (although I'll probably just keep that simple).

On to book 2.

For book 2 I would like to complete my outline today. Time to move on. I've dragged this out for too long feeling helpless and depressed. Time to get the series closed out.

Therefore I need to get moving, full steam ahead. Don't look back, only forward. Get excited!