Been a long time

Well it has been way too long since I have posted here.  The summer was great.  Spent lots of time with my family at the cottage.  My writing took a serious hit however.  As I broke the normal work routine and basically lived at the cottage for 3 months, I found myself not beeing able to make the time to write.  Fortunately the kids have gone back to school and I am slowly but surely finding time to write.  I am around the 90000 word mark and expect to finish around 130000...I hope.  I know the rewrite is going to be tough.  I already have tons of key plot twists to straighten out, not to mention two or three massive information dumps to spread out somehow.  I still feel pretty good about the project as a whole.  A few friends and family have beta read what I have so far and seem to like it.  I mean they would tell me if it sucked ...right?   Hopefully I will have a finished product by January or February.  Then the real fun/work comes, so I am told.  Happy writing.

So I started jogging last week.  It was time.  I have never successfully jogged more than a click or two in my life, until last week.  My wife taught me not to jog too fast.  No wonder I couldn't do it, I was tired out after a few minutes.  Now when I jog it is barely faster than my fastest walk but I don't stop.  I did 4 km today.

I do have to say that I find one thing troubling so far.  I have often heard that when you go for a run, you feel 'so much better' when you are done.  That is definitely not my case.  I feel worse all day long.  Ok I guess I have to give it more than a few days.  I'll let you know next week....as long as the running doesn't kill me first.

Writing routine

I've discovered that I need to have a writing routine.  We went to our cottage for three days last weekend, where I thought I would have time to write more, but low and behold, I only wrote 300 words all weekend.  I think I am a creature of habit and not being in my normal zone threw me off, even though I had less to do.  I guess I'll have to establish a cottage routine.

Working at working

I've been getting about 2300 words per day this week.  I have lots more time to write now that I cut back my 'other job' hours.  So it turns out that the old axiom 'you need to write to learn how to write', is true.  In my case at least.  Who would have thunk it?  I'm 57000 words in to my book and as I look back at my writing in early chapters compared to now, there has been a marked improvement in my writing.  That's good in the sense that I am improving, but bad in the sense that I now have to do more rewriting than I planned for.  Oh well. Its all part of the Journey.  Is there anyone else writing their first novel out there who wants to connect?  If you don't want to publicly send me an e-mail:  john.ava@eastlink.ca.

Plugging Away

When I first started my book I thought that I wanted it to be about 150000 words long. That's about 50000 words longer than what is recommended for first time writers.  I hit the 50000 word mark last week and felt a lot of satisfaction from doing so.  After spending several hours this week taking a hard look at my plot and outline I decided I could do better and re-wrote a lot of it as well as the scene descriptions.  I am much happier with the result now and think I can get it closer to 100000 words which is a bonus. 

It sure seems a long time ago that I started writing this even though it was only in January.  I have had a zillion self-doubts as I am sure every writer has when they first start out.  Here is a list of some of the things I worry about, for the heck of it:

1. My story will have poor grammar and seem too simple.
2. The prose is too simple.
3. It will be uninteresting to readers.
4. My characters are too flat and readers won't care about them.
5. My concept is just a re-telling of a story common to the genre (fantasy)
6. My attempt at not having over-the -top characters will disappoint readers.
7. I often think that it lacks that certain 'oomf' to get a 'wow' from readers

Here is how I try to overcome these doubts:

1. I walk about an hour a day with my kindle talking to me through my earphones.  Nearly always it is an e-book about writing or publishing or how I wrote my first book, type stuff.  I have never been much of one for motivational talks and the like but man does this keep me fired up.
2. The books/websites etc that I see almost daily now, repeatedly tell me its OK to have those doubts and that everyone else does as well.
3. I tell myself that knowing my weaknesses is the hardest part of solving them.  The rest is just hard work, which I am not afraid of.
4. I have researched enough to know that I will be re-writing, re-writing, re-writing lots and lots, and I have resigned myself to..., nay, I am looking forward to being at that point.
5. I have decided that I will get a content editor and copy editor come hell or high water. 
6. I have decided to self publish and know I will have to put a great team in place to do so. 

All of these things combined will help me polish the book to a standard that I will be happy with.

Anyway I'd appreciate any input from other writers out there.  I am an information sponge at this point.
Have a great day
John

NEED WRITING HELP?

     I am new at this novel-writing thing, and I can't believe I have waited this long to start.  (I'm 44)  The rewards I get from writing every day are fantastic.  Aside from my eventual dream of making a living by selling my books, which is a long shot from what I have read and heard, I get a lot from writing.  It changes your identity slightly for one thing, and opens avenues of thought that I didn't really know were there. 
     If you are new to writing and are looking for guidance, don't come to me. Ha. Seriously I am in the same boat, so I wouldn't be much help. I have, however, read lots and lots of books, blogs, websites and the like over the last four months and have found  some very encouraging and informative items that I will post on this blog as time allows.
     By far, the best resource I have found to date is Holly Lisle's website. http://hollylisle.com/ She has been a published writer since 1985 with over 30 books.  She offers tons of free advice and also has free and paid writing courses.  I am currently taking the How to Think Sideways course, which I find to be excellent. 
     I have to say, I am an independant, pig-headed guy and when I first started writing I had the illusion that I didn't want any help.  I just didn't think it was necessary.  As I progressed I ended up reading a few books about writing, more out of curiousity than anything and found out that I really didn't know everything. (I know what your thinking and trust me, I was surprised too.)  Once I started delving I found an amazing quantity of information on how to write a novel.  Topics covered everything from motivation, scheduling, outlining, character development and so on.  I soon found that my writing up to that point was pretty flat and although I had a good idea, it needed more.  Holly's website and many other sources opened my thinking enough to accept that I had to seek knowledge and dig a lot deeper to write well.  I am no where near there yet, but I keep plugging away, and I'm getting better.

If you are a writer or are thinking about writing or you have been putting off writing that book for years now, you should check out Holly's website.  I guarantee she will inspire and show you that you can indeed write.  Put away self-doubt and act.  You'll never know until you start.
Good Luck

Welcome

Hello and welcome to my blog.  I have created this blog to track the progress of writing my first novel.  I began this work in January 2012 and have found it to be an incredible journey of learning so far.  Now I am about 50000 words in to it and have become very passionate about writing every day.  My plan is to record my weekly progress and comment on new writing techniques or methods that I have learned about.  At some point I may even become brave enough to post some of it, but don't hold your breath.  It is my goal to create links to other author blogs or writing blogs in general to perhaps make this a resource for new writers like myself.  I have found that staying motivated is probably the most important thing at this point, so I will pass along anything I have read or picked up regarding that as well.  That will all have to wait until tomorrow though...5am comes early.