Monday – 12/5 – Grumpy. Got started on this week’s story, YA/SF. This month’s theme is to write a story inspired by a song, so this one’s inspired by World Gone Crazy by Sleepthief–not that the story itself has anything to do with the lyrics… It just sounded happy, so I wanted to go with it and write a happy/sweet Peter Pan meets The Little Prince PLUS ROBOTS story, and that’s what I’ve started. Working title “The Seedling Prince”. That said, I hate what I’ve done on it so far. *haaaaaaaaate* It’s dumpy and slow and has no sense of place, and I think I’m trying too hard and thinking too much about what makes a work “YA” and really I think I probably just need to loosen up and have fun. I had fun planning it last night–I guess that doesn’t always carry over to the draft. BUT NO BIG DEAL. It’s a rough draft, and if there’s anything salvagable by the end of the week, I can always rewrite the whole thing some other time.
Tuesday – 12/6 – Restarted from scratch, with a little more focus on making Blanca more like me, and her situation more like mine. It’s less YA and more adult, but that’s okay for now. It’s been retitled “The Weight of the Mind’s Indulgence” and so far I’m a lot more pleased with it. 1.3k today. Probably has too much jibber-jabber about the space station, but I want the locale to be clear.
Wednesday – 12/7 – Crap, is it Wednesday? Why am I feeling like it’s Tuesday? Added another 1.2k to TWotMI, though I think at this point I’m falling into the ever dangerous “characters sitting around and talking” method of divulging background information, which I’m not too happy about. But it’s moving forward, at least, which is good. I need to really plug along and get this wrapped up, since I wasted Monday on a false start.
Thursday – 12/8 – Made excellent progress on TWotMI, though I still feel there’s a lot I’m leaving out, the prose seems to just flow for some weird reason. It’s kind of freaking me out, to be honest. This is the second story in two weeks that has just unfolded itself. It still needs work (I need to add in some earlier stuff about Blanca’s robot-making) and I still think the characters may just chat a bit too much, but I’m really liking the sense of place (which I’m sure could still be stronger). All in all, though, I made a miraculous 2.3k addition in only 1.5 hours, which kind of blows my mind. I didn’t feel like I was writing that fast.
Friday – 12/9 – Woosh! And done, at a ridiculous 9867 words. Ugh. Of that ~9.9k, I wrote 4k of that just today. YOWZAH. And Slater fails to write a responsibly short story, yet again. But hey, at least it’s done, and even if it’s crap (it is) I can always rework it later if I so choose. It’s certainly got some plot-hole (like giant, rough-edged, filled with water so you don’t realize how DEEP they are plot-holes) that would need addressing, and I have a feeling that with proper time and consideration, this one’s going to want to be a novelette at least, if not a short novella. That said, it’s been renamed to the more appropriate and less presumptuous “Fun with Robots”, which is really what this story is all about. :) Also, glad I didn’t check my email BEFORE finishing the last scene, because I got a nice two-date form rejection for a story I really love. *le sigh* Onward and upward, evermore.
One big woohoo and a very happy new year to you and Andy. We’re eating oliebollen right now, which translates perfectly well as oil balls: deep fried lumpy doughy things with raisins. A Dutch tradition which really helps the new years resolution of ‘lose weight’. Other resolution: write write write.
Cheers!!
Hi Marloes! So good to hear from you! And I’m right there with you on the resolutions. Andy and I are trying to eat healthier things (more fruits & veggies) and my own goals are pretty much the same, too. ^_^ I’ll probably post about it sometime here in the next few days but I think my short list is about what it was in August. ^_^ hehe! How’s little Mats?!