Words/Time: 2137 words, revising “Outcast.” So far there haven’t been a lot of changes that I’ve had to make, mostly wording differences. Still, I’m going over it with a fine-toothed comb, to make sure I don’t miss anything. I’ve already revised this story several times, so the change in story world is the biggest thing I’m doing. Later on, that change will require a lot more work than here at the beginning.
500 Words Challenge
Daily Challenge Check-in: July 2, 2015
Words/Time: 1194 words revising “Pithea” with two of my sisters over Skype. Also known as the 45th meeting of the Tri-County Sisterhood of the Traveling Book. We got through just over 5 pages of double-spaced text. We had a much shorter than normal meeting today, going only for an hour than the normal 2-2 1/2 hours. But we moved it later in the week too, and I was glad we were still able to get a meeting in this week.
With Camp NaNo going on, I had planned to work on both “Pithea” and “Outcast” every day. Since I knew I’d get plenty of time in for the day’s goal during the Skype meeting, I decided not to push myself to work on “Outcast” today too. Maybe tomorrow I’ll do only “Outcast” to make up for it.
Daily Challenge Check-in: July 1, 2015
Words/Time: 1 hour & 22 minutes, revising “Pithea” for half and “Outcast” for the other half. “Outcast” is one I have been wanting to work on for a while, but it’s taken a backseat ever since I started work on “Pithea” in 2013. “Pithea” is technically the first book that would need to come out, but “Outcast” is one I wrote 7 years ago as fanfiction, but will need much less rewriting to adapt it to my new story world than anything else I’d written. I don’t have any kind of introduction for it worked up yet, but let me just say that it’s my favorite of anything I’ve ever written. My biggest issue with the adapting so far is how to bring the narrator’s voice into it. I’m not sure if I can do that without forcing it too much.
Camp NaNoWriMo started today, and my goal is to work for around an hour per day, average, throughout the month of July. Because I’ve been anxious to start redoing “Outcast,” I do plan to split that time between that story and “Pithea.” However, I’ll put “Outcast” on the back burner if I need to; we’ll see how it goes.
Daily Challenge Check-in: June 29, 2015
Words/Time: 595 words, revising “Pithea.” Selunya joined the party this time, and now Mr. Bower, the apothecary, has showed up. Fortunately, I think I’m at the end of the area that I needed to heavily rewrite, and it should be smoother, quicker revision for a while. Maybe some big cuts later, but no more major rewriting for a while. Yay!
Daily Challenge Check-in: June 28, 2015
Words/Time: 907 words, revising “Pithea” (man, it felt like it should have been a lot more words than that). Missy is now contacting Aeldrim instead of Selunya, in an exchange from the original version that I decided was worth finding a spot for. I enjoy Aeldrim. He’s the fun-loving, happy-go-lucky goof ball that I will never be.
Daily Challenge Check-in: June 26, 2015
Words/Time: 40 minutes revising. I spent that time making notes on a chapter of a Sims story/fanfiction my sister wrote and asked me to beta-read before she was ready to post it. I finished what she’d sent me, though, so tomorrow (or possibly Sunday, as tomorrow looks to be a full day) it’ll be back to my own story.
Daily Challenge Check-in: June 25, 2015
Words/Time: 40 minutes, revising “Pithea.” Hopefully Jonathan’s introduction into the story isn’t as weird as it had been (though to be fair, I didn’t find it weird so much as inaccurate in parts–it was the other members of TCSTB who had an issue with something he was doing being weird). I wrote out a new scene, incorporating what still worked fine from before.
Daily Challenge Check-in: June 23, 2015
Words/Time: 1168 words revising “Pithea” with two of my sisters over Skype. Also known as the 44th meeting of the Tri-County Sisterhood of the Traveling Book. We got through just under 4 pages of double-spaced text. First we had to discuss a possible solution I’d come up with to fix the big issue at the end of last week’s meeting. Now that the idea has been discussed, I’ll write the new scene out for next week. Then we ended the meeting on a questionable section that we can’t fully decide on until we get further in the story to see it attempt to come to fruition, so that part’s hanging now too. There are parts like that here and there, and they make me sad.
Daily Challenge Check-in: June 22, 2015
Words/Time: 2 hours revising. I have had a growing headache all evening, but I decided to make sure to at least get 20 minutes in. I spent that time getting more major edits from my hard copy into the computer, and then into the shared file we use for the TCSTB. Then I went on to revising a chapter of a Sims story/fanfiction my sister wrote and asked me to beta-read before she was ready to post it. And I just kept going, not realizing how long it had been. It’s soooo much easier to edit someone else’s work than my own.
Daily Challenge Check-in: June 21, 2015
Words/Time: An hour and a half doing all sorts of various tasks. Part of it was going through a chapter of a Sims story/fanfiction my sister wrote and asked me to beta-read before she was ready to post it. I wasn’t sure if I should count it, but working on revision for someone else’s writing is still writing work, right? It’s nice to get a break from my own story(ies) for a while, and could even give me insight into my own writing. In fact, it already has some, because the rest of the time was spent researching character voice, writer voice, filter words, and other things that have come up as I’ve tried to help her with what she feels are problem areas in her own writing.
For anyone who’s paying attention to my daily check-in posts, I’ve been slacking off a lot lately. Originally, that was due to a planned short hiatus as my church had its annual week-long VBS program, which I was a helper for. I knew I’d be exhausted all week, and I was. Though I did actually get some work done early in the week. Then as I was trying to work back into normal days again, my 5-year-old came down sick. We still don’t know what she has, but she had high fevers for days (even up to 106° a couple of times). All day and even a lot of the night, all she wanted to do was be near me, which led to another week of not only having no time, but no energy to work on writing. Even now, her fever’s mostly gone, but she’s starting to have coughing fits that leave her distraught. I say all of this not because I think anyone is going to require a “absence note,” but because in the past, I have taken days, weeks, even months off of what I try to make daily work. This time, though, it’s not just me being lazy, it was life legitimately getting in the way. Today, as I think ahead to my next “Write Every Day” post, and as I help my sister as she tries to be a better writer, it’s fortunately bringing me back to my own writing work. That’s good, because after a few weeks off, it would be far too easy to just keep going and let it go for longer. (Though Camp NaNoWriMo is coming up in less than two weeks, which could keep me from ignoring my work for too long, but it’s not a miracle worker.)
A Journey of Words 