The new project is now over 5,000 words long and I aim to have it at 10k by next week! It’s coming along nicely and I’m doing a bit of outlining but also a lot of writing-as-I-go. I’ve always found it interesting to see how others write novels from blank page to finished draft, so allow me to share how I’m doing it this time! Basically, the way it’s organized is that I have the main beats of the story down. Specifically, the main 5-7 points the novel should hit. The Headings 1 on the document outline those points. Basically, they cover the five big event of the story. Somewhere along the lines of the usual: exposition, rising action, climax, falling action and resolution, give or take. Then, using Headings 2, I break those down into smaller parts. Parts probably too long to be chapters later on, but we’re getting there. These I haven't completed at all. Perhaps for the first section of the novel they're somewhat prepared, but otherwise, the action isn't specified yet, and will probably be specified when I get there. (Which makes it sound like I write chronologically which, regrettably, I do not. I write all over the place depending on how I feel any particular day. It's not helpful, but it's way more fun than writing one scene in the novel after the next ha). Headings 3 is where it’s at. Those will likely be the chapters, or will be joined together to create chapters. They’re anything from a scene to a sequence, but I’m playing with it loosely since I am working on a first rough draft here. So basically everything goes. I have plenty of those but they don't necessary are at the place where they will be later: I've got a lot of sorting out to do! Using the headings functions makes it way easier to coordinate where things are in the navigator, and makes it so much more efficient when I need to move one action to another part of the story. Yes, we’re so early in our draft that scenes are stilling getting moved up and down the story depending on various factors. I’m two weeks into the project now, and am still super hyped about it, but sadly not getting as much work for it done as I would like. But, if things go well, I really do hope to get to that 10k by next week. Stick around and you’ll find out if it worked out!
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I’m back from my hiatus! Yay! As I have said before, I have been so lost in writing that I’ve neglected this blog to some degree – and I apologize profusely! DREAMING updates I have done what I set out to do in January and sent off my queries for DREAMING to a couple of more agents. The other week I got another rejection. Yay! Querying is so much fun and rejections definitely do not get to me! Either way, a handful of queries have been sent out and I am still waiting to hear back. In the meantime, I plan to do much more reading, as I am exploring new genres but also am aiming at looking for books similar to DREAMING and other projects to hopefully get to use them as comps in future queries! New project alert! As of this month, I am working on a new project to see if I can work on it as well as I have been working on my fun project these last few months. If I manage to get it done as quickly, I’d have a first draft done in March and a final draft done in April, ready to be beta’d and critiqued! If all goes according to plan it could be queried by this autumn! All of this, of course, is theoretical. But it could work. Given the time. And motivation, of course. The question now of course is how to divide the time. Whether I should focus on DREAMING and the queries, or focus on new project(s). Or work on both at the same time... If the project thrives, I'll add a pitch in the projects page of this here website. For now, I'll leave you with this: it is an enemies-to-lovers slow burn set in a fantastical world! Hopefully soon I'll have updates to share for the project! Hopefully hopefully! |