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Awesome @overcomer! I hope you succeed in your goals. (I’m really interested now in what one can write about a park foundation.)
HC
That’s a tall goal, @bluejay ! Have fun with that. 🙂
Fantasy is lovely to write, @winter-rose . I use it as my excuse to daydream more. 🙂
Wow, @anna-brie ! I completely forgot that not everybody on here is enjoying the first-fruits of Summer. Well, I like your not-so-Summery goals! Congratulations on finishing your first draft, and good luck on your second. Balancing sounds like fun, in a crazy sort of way. 😉
We all seem to have basically the same goals, @zoe-wingfeather , @gretald . Writing a book so far is a confusing but fun process. The hardest part for me perhaps is to not overthink everything. I want it all to be perfect, but a perfect first draft is unrealistic, and not a very writer healthy hope …
Thanks, @hannah-c ! Good luck to you too.
So far, I’ve written 1,544 words. Writing has been kinda slow since I still need to finish organizing my notes and read over my prewriting before I can really go forward with it, but I should have that finished within the next couple of days.
How are things going with the rest of you and your projects?
@daeus , @hannah-c , @hope , @aella , @anna-brie , @kate-flournoy , @bluejay , @faithdk , @gretald , @rolena-hatfield , @writefury , @spradlin , @sarah-h , @zoe-wingfeather , @winter-rose(Please let me know if I’m tagging you and you don’t want to participate in this topic. I think most of you already are, but there are so many people to tag it’s not easy to keep track of everybody! 🙂 )
@overcomer I have nearly finished my first story. It has turned out to be a novellette rather than a short story, but I’m making it still count. Yes, I realized after I had decided to to it, that it is a tall goal, but even if I don’t succeed, I will have at least tried my best. 🙂
Good work with your project though. 🙂
@overcomer thanks!
Ohhh you’re one of those smart people who actually plan before they start writing. I keep telling myself I’m going to do that as well but keep putting it off because I hate outlining with a passion. I just started a new book for 100-4-100 and I think it’s going pretty well so far. I’ve got something like 2,000 words already with an average of 300 or so every day. I’ve also adopted a new motto “Write Without Fear” and that’s working out good too.
HC
I’ve not done much yet; still in the planning stages. And I have a pinterest board for my story. Does that count as something? 🙂 But I’m hoping to do some major planning this weekend. Or next week.
INTJ - Inhumane. No-feelings. Terrible. Judgment and doom on everyone.
I got some books for research for my next novel. It’s historical revisionist, but I still need a lot of the historical stuff in there. I’ve also got my outline just about done. I basically just have to work on some details of the climax.
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@overcomer I’m wrapping up the planning stage for my novel, and then I’m moving into writing the first draft!
Writing a book so far is a confusing but fun process. The hardest part for me perhaps is to not overthink everything. I want it all to be perfect, but a perfect first draft is unrealistic, and not a very writer healthy hope …
Goodness, you said it! I struggle with the same thing. I want to make everything perfect in the first draft, and I worry about whether I’m showing or telling. I repeatedly have to remind myself to just write and that there’s this wonderful thing called editing. 😉
@hannah-c , if planning consists of writing lots of disconnected tidbits about my characters (to get to know them better) and the story before actually beginning the first draft, and then writing lists of main story events in order that I end up scrapping or reworking, then yeah, I do it. 🙂
Honestly, though, there is nothing fancy or methodical about my outlining. If there was I wouldn’t be able to stand it myself! I started planning more with my story ideas after my first failed novel attempt at about age 12, where I got partway through the beginning of the story before I realized that I had no middle. There was a hole in my bucket.
Since then I’ve tried writing by the seat of my pants, (I call it white rabbit chasing) and outlining a bit, and I’ve found that while the former works well for me with shorter stories, the latter seems more effective (thus far) for longer stories that have more than one major event and that require connection.
I just like to figure things out a bit so that I know whether or not my story will hold water after the first two chapters. I also usually know how my story is going to end before I begin.
… and I have a problem where I don’t write things in order. I’m not sure how that’s all going to pan out, but if I can finish a complete first draft, anyone can!
That’s cool that you enjoy “white rabbit chasing.” It sounds like it really works well for you! 🙂
@Overcomer I think my story could use some of those disconnected tidbits if you have any laying around. With my first book I had a hard time connecting to my MC. She was really one dimensional and probably still is to an extent but I think she got better as the story progressed. Now that I’m editing I can go back and give her some more character since A) I now have an idea of what I’m doing and B) I have ideas to fill in the book and make it less dull.
That seems to make sense. With shorter stories you don’t need as much prompting since the approach is more direct. I heard of people planning out each day for their characters before and I was wondering if you had ever tried that? Oh, and White Rabbit Chasing. Is that an Alice In Wonderland reference?
Same here. Middles are tough though. If I have a really good snippet in my head that I know will be a part in my story then I’ll usually just go and write it down and save it in its own little folder for later. I’ve also heard of people writing from the middle of their story first but that seems like it could get confusing.
Oh, and thanks. I’ll have that “Hole in a Bucket” song stuck on my head for the rest of the day now. ??
HC
I know what you mean about connecting to MCs, @hannah-c . I think it would actually be easier if I wrote in third instead of first for me, because then if the character is a girl, I won’t be trying so hard to make her NOT like me. It will be easier to imagine her as a separate entity from my imagination, if you know what I mean, although first can be useful from time to time.
I don’t think I’ve ever taken planning to quite that extent before, but it’s not a bad idea.
Yes, it is. 🙂 In Alice in Wonderland, Alice chases a white rabbit, and the rabbit leads her into strange and unexpected adventures, kind of like the way a pantser chases their story to see where it goes.
Middles ARE tough but so important! The beginning and ending have to reconcile their differences (or similarities) through the middle, unless, perhaps, if the story is extremely random. (like Alice in Wonderland, for instance)
I write from all different parts of the story. Sometimes I begin at the beginning, sometimes the middle, and sometimes the end. My story ideas either begin or are followed by a (usually lengthy) prewrite which generally winds up (in some form or other) somewhere in the story, or as the foundation for the entire thing. It depends … I never realized before how completely random my writing process is! Writing is so much fun, isn’t it? 😀
I like to write in scenes. One scene or two at a time. How do you write? Do like to do it in chapters, or fragments? Do you write from beginning to end?
There’s a SONG?!!! 😮
My MC is in third. I started out writing in third because that was the style I was used to from reading books and I was scared to try writing in first. But once I tried it I found that first is a lot easier for me to write. And I think that my MC ended up with some of me in her even still.
Ah, what a wonderful analogy. I will be happy to call myself a White Rabbit Chaser then.
Wow that is really random and diverse! And I think that’s just great. I have a really bad habit of being too rigid in my writing (except for the fact that I don’t outline.) I have a hard time trying not to make my writing perfect the first time around and I find it hard to step out of my writing comfort zone to try new things. And yes, writing is a lot of fun!
So far I’ve only ever written from beginning to end. But as I said if I have a good idea for a snippet I will write it down. Editing though is a lot tougher than I thought. Especially going back through areas in my book where my writing wasn’t developed real well. I kinda feel really bogged down and like the editing is endless. But I think I’m like half way done now so hopefully I’ll get it finished this summer. How do you edit?
Yes there’s a song! Its a kids song and after a few verses it can get really annoying. Even still it’s cute so you should look it up on YouTube (but beware, it’s one of those songs that’s not easy to get out of your head. Once it’s heard it can never be unheard. ?)
HC
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@overcomer
whew!!!!! summers are busyyyy!!!! i haven’t had much time to write my book so far. but i had this amazing idea to base a story off of a poem and i’ll be writing that on the side. we’ll see. 🙂@overcomer – This summer the only thing I’m planning to write is poetry, so I probably won’t be participating much. Thanks for tagging me, though! 🙂
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