84,000 words… the urge to resist rushing the last few chapters

Half of me wants just wants to write “The End” and knock it on the head. But I am currently at a stage where the story simply won’t let me. Sometimes a plot will not allow you to end a book whenever you feel like it. When I began this journey nearly eight months ago I had a very definitive beginning middle and end. Because I intend for this to be a trilogy there are key elements of both character development and plot that have to be told in order to set up the next two books. What I can say with certainty is this. The next book will not take so long to write. There is no better teacher than experience and learning how to write a novel, good or bad, has taught me more in eight months than I could ever have learned on pure theory. I am both excited and saddened by approaching the end of my book. My greatest fear is looking back at the mess that will be the first five to ten thousand words. (Clean up on aisle three). I know that it’s all over the place but I am confident that I can clean it up when the first draft is locked into scrivener. A note on Scrivener by the way. It’s awesome. Simple as that. If you don’t have it. Invest in it. You need it. See you at the finish line !. Colin

77,000 words.. the home stretch

Ok we’re at 77,000 words and counting. At this stage of the novel writing process I am conscious of heating it up. We all love the run in. The last 100 or so pages need to be furious page turners. I love the last 100. Where you can’t sleep or eat or talk until you know what happens. The scene is set, the orchestra rented.. Now it’s time to see if you can dance !.. If you will excuse me I have to get back to work. 😉

Twenty days to completion of the first draft.

My sister Fiona Maria’s new single “Never Pray”

My sister is a song writer musician and this is her new singe… called Never Pray.

2,000 words a day.. lets kick it up a gear

The final third of this book is going to be an intense writing experience. I have set a target of 2,000 words a day which mean that in theory the first draft of the novel will be completed in the next 20 days. Realistically that will probably pan out to 30 days but the end of November was a key target for me to complete it. Blogging is going to have to take a back seat while I tackle this puppy because every word has to count. Finish your novel strong and with determination. I have looked back over the first quarter of it and have to admit.. My spelling is sinful ..

Write on

Colin

64,000 words.. hated characters

One of my characters has turned out to be a real pain in the ass. His arc has gone nowhere and while I could simply kill him off I keep thinking that is just a cop out. I can’t just hide him in a closet for the rest of the book because he had a primary role in the story. Maybe that’s a normal thing when writing a novel. I have no idea as this is my first one. He is currently exploring the surface of a planet with a few other characters. He’s like a third wheel on a date. Maybe I’ll get lucky and the ship will leave him behind… Aha!.. now there’s a thought!… Ah no I won’t do that.. it’s the job of a writer to stick by his characters no matter what personalities emerge from within the pages..

It’s national novel writing month !!

On your marks… get set… write… !!! It’s national novel writing month.. 50,000 words.. one month.. get to it.. No excuses..

http://nanowrimo.org/

62,000 words and a concept cover

Still on track for a Nov 30th first draft wrap which is great. Starting to get a little fatigued with the idea this week but pushed through some tough writing days. I had a concept book cover sent to me yesterday which I really like but it was pointed out that there is a typo which will obviously need to be attended to before it is sent to agents or publishers.. See if you can spot it!!??… I like the idea of keeping covers simple yet enticing. This will probably be changed quite a bit but seeing a concept cover is a great booster for completing a project..

A few steps back.. more forward

So I got a little side tracked over the last few days after spotting some horrible writing somewhere in the first 10,000 words or so. The word count got sliced up somewhat in the reshuffle, which is disheartening, but life goes on. It’s definitely easier to take out than to put in. When I began this journey the opening few pages were far too wordy. I think every writer who tackles their first novel wants to come off sounding like Shakespeare but in the end most end up going in circles and getting lost in the fray of fabulous vernacular.  Cut to the chase as it were. Nearly at the three quarter mark. Nearly !!

 

 

 

58,000 words and counting

The last few days have been spent blueprinting certain character arcs and introducing some new ones. At 1,000 words a day I am still on track to be finished the first draft by November 30th. It’s absolutely horrible in Ireland at the moment with Yellow alerts being issued due to constant rain. October is a great month to write because you can’t go outside in this country. Not to get ahead of my myself but I started looking at book cover designs late last night. It’s probably a detail that my publisher will look after when I sell it 😉 but just in case it gets politely rejected i am looking for ideas for the self publishing arena. Sci-Fi book covers all seem to have space ships on them.. so it can be tricky to differentiate between them. I am probably going to look for a different angle to the whole look of the cover. Any ideas are warmly welcome !!

Goodbye Prologue … 56,000 words

So I took a major executive decision. A large literary axe was drawn and brought firmly down on my prologue. It’s been a flab of wordy flesh dangling off the novel for months and although the backstory is important it turns out it can be incorporated later on in the story without much difficulty and besides, agents hate them, readers skip them and every single article I read about them over the past year has been desponding about them. So it’s gone. On the cutting room floor. It was a nice scene to be honest and I always liked how it started but the first chapter is so important when submitting to agents and publishers that I couldn’t risk it. Get to the point in the first few pages. Grab em and keep em…!!!

I love this blog on Writing by Ellen Brock check out her advice on opening chapters

https://thewriteditor.wordpress.com/first-chapter-mistakes-and-cliches/