Wednesday's Writing Update: Last Day for the Flash Fiction Blogfest

 

Happy Wednesday!

 

Today's the last day to enter the Flash Fiction Blogfest. I'm going to start reading the entries today and will finish them tomorrow. I'll post the six finalists on the blog on Friday and open it up to voting.

As for writing, I'm working on the last two short stories for Women of Foxwick. My goal is to have them written by the end of this weekend, so my CPs can have a crack at them. Then, I'll do a round of editing and send it to my second batch of CPs. After that, there will be another edit, proofreading, and formatting. If all goes well, I hope to have Women of Foxwick published in mid-June or so.

So what are you working on?

Wednesday's Writing Update: NaNoWriMo Survivor: Year Three

Happy Wednesday!

My review of Russell Brooks' Chill Run is up on Surrounded by Books Reviews.

Today is the last day of November and the last day of NaNoWriMo. Phew! What a month is has been!

NaNoWriMo Stats:
Day 22: 68505 (I beat my highest word count total in a month.)
Day 23: 68505
Day 24: 68505
Day 25: 68505
Day 26: 68505
Day 27: 70221
Day 28: 73259
Day 29: 75806 (51099 in Starred and 24707 in The Last Prophetess)

So 75,806 words is my grand total, not counting what I get written today (hope to be at 80,000 soon).

I didn't quite finish The Last Prophetess either, but I did get half-way through the 50K (minus 300 words). I should have the first draft completed in early December, hopefully this weekend. *crosses fingers*

This is my third year participating in NaNoWriMo, and I used it to write novels four and five. I believe I've learned quite a bit about myself as a writer while participating in NaNo.

1. I'm a plotter. I plot out my days, my weeks, months, heck, even my years. I have my entire writing schedule mapped out for 2012 already (always subject to change, of course). So with a novel, I need to have the same preparation. I need to know my scenes, characters, world, and timeline so I can sit down and write.

2. I'm a fast drafter. If I have things plotted, then I can sit down and knock out 1,000 words in 30 minutes. I wrote Starred in twelve days and spent three more adding to the scenes and editing. That's amazing to me, and it's my best written draft I have. Then again, I probably have always been a fast drafter. My first novel may have taken nine months from beginning to end, but if you count my actual writing days where I sat and wrote the novel, it's more like six weeks. The rest was doing number one: plotting.

3. I can write every day. Yes, I need to repeat this. I can write every day. True, I took a few days off, but I could've written those days. I should've written. There are no excuses. I should be able to sit down for at least 30 minutes to an hour and get 1,000-2,000 words done. Of course, this is easier, if I have number one completed. :)

4. Most important of all, I love writing. This is what I want to do with my life, and it's made me realize I need to put it at the top of my list of things I get done each day.

5. I don't think I'll try two novels in a month again, but I did learn I am successful at writing scenes out of order.

January 15, 2012 will start my fourth year writing with publication in mind. It's time to get out there and do something with my novels. It's time to self-publish some shorter works (short story collections, novellas). It's time to keep submitting shorter works. Most of all, it's time to get those novels edited and in the hands of agents and possibly publishers.

That's what NaNoWriMo has taught me.

What have you learned about yourself through it? Or if you didn't participate in NaNoWriMo, what did you learn this month?