The Words: 1835 words today in a single, half-hour sprint this evening with my daughter. I’m not more than a single day’s word count ahead, which is good, because I have a Thanksgiving event coming up in a few days, and though I definitely plan to make sure I get some writing that day, I don’t know how much I’ll have time for.

The Story: The stranger that brought Garend to Newland has now revealed the nation’s closest-held secrets to Garend. Even I felt weird typing these things out, since it’s such a major revelation, close-held secrets of my own. But it will all come to light someday, sooner or later.

Total word count: 36,774

The Words: 1802 words today in two sprints, one with my daughter and one alone.

The Story: After yesterday’s brainstorming and really struggling to know where to go next, I just kind of jumped into a scene today that wasn’t even in my plans. But it got me going, and then I went from there to another, more connected scene, and finally got back to what would actually happen next with Garend from where I left off. But I skipped a day or two that was going to just be a lot of chatting, most likely. Of course, today’s writing also ended up just being a lot of talking. Conversations between characters seems to be my go-to when I don’t know what else to do. Oh well, I left off today right on the edge of a life-changing revelation for Garend, so tomorrow at least should be easier to get into.

Total word count: 34,939

The Words: 1701 words today shortly before bedtime. It’s a good thing I realized yesterday that I don’t have a large enough lead to take more short days unless absolutely necessary, or I probably would have cut today short. I can’t really afford that, though, with holiday events coming up.

The Story: Because of trying to get the words out quickly tonight, today’s writing mostly consisted of a conversation between Garend and the person who brought him to Newland. She’s telling him a lot of things about his ancestry that he never knew (and that I didn’t know either).

Total word count: 31,271

The Words: 1726 words today in two 15-minute sprints with my 15-year-old daughter. It occurred to me today that I’m not even a full day’s word count ahead, which is both uncommon for me anymore and a little scary. I have to be careful about my short days from now on.

The Story: Garend and the person who brought him to Newland talked a bit about the future today, and Garend finally got a chance to rest and reflect. I think it’s time to start brainstorming some actual events to happen once Garend makes it over the metaphorical threshold into Newland, which I may just jump forward to in the next day or two. Even I’m getting bored by what I’m writing.

Total word count: 29,570

The Words: 1824 words today. Sundays are pretty full for us lately with church in the morning, Christmas choir practice in the afternoon, and grocery shopping with my husband while our daughter is at youth group in the evening. I did a 10-minute sprint in the short window of time I had in the afternoon and got around 800 words. Then this evening, I used the Sprinter site and just wrote until I’d gotten another 1000 words.

The Story: Garend’s evaluation is over, but things aren’t quite looking up yet. He’s finally made it within the boundaries of Newland, but he’s still not allowed to see or know anything until the results come back on his evaluation. I have no actual book plans for any of what I’m writing yet, but if I ever decided to use any of this in a future book, I’d really have to pare it down. It’s interesting for me to be exploring this process, but overall pretty boring stuff.

Total word count: 27,844

The Words: 800 words total for the day in a 15-minute sprint with my daughter shortly before I needed to head to bed to be up early. I really thought I’d have more time to write today, but it just didn’t work out. (I’m posting this for the 15th a week later because apparently, when I tried to post it on the 15th, I instead just edited the post for the 14th instead of copying it to make a new post. So I have restored the post from the 14th and have made this its own post.)

The Story: Garend has been released from his evaluation and sent to Newland, but only to a lodging building pending his evaluation being cleared by the powers that be. He won’t be alone, but he also still may not get the answers he’s looking for just yet.

Total word count: 26,020

The Words: 1959 words total for the day in 2 15-minute sprints using the Sprinter site. I wasn’t sure I’d have time to hit par today due to having a busy evening, so I did one sprint earlier in the day and thought I might have to be happy with the 1020 words it got me. But fortunately I had more time in the evening than I expected and managed another sprint. And I hit the halfway point a day early!

The Story: Today brought an interesting discussion about what Garend’s future might look like in Newland. And the realization that he is still torn about leaving Pithea and his friends there behind. But the allure of this new place is just too great to ignore.

Total word count: 25,220