Archive for the ‘writing update’ Category

Another Idea

Posted: July 4, 2009 in Tears of the Mountain, writing update
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The rough draft for Tears of the Mountain has suddenly hit 9K words, the draft barreling along at a fair clip of knots, and yet not much has happened. No indication yet as to how long this will turn out to be.

Strangely, while doing this, another idea came to mind. No, I’m not stopping work on the draft, but it does sort of tie in.

What I’m thinking of is to do a longer short story, some 15-20K in length, that is something of a prequel to Tears of the Mountain. The main though behind doing this was to introduce a few of the characters and also to give an overall indication to the feel of the world which is a little different than for most fantasy worlds. Plan would be to have it to share and show around when talking about the novel and the world, so people can see what it is all about.

Sought of like a pilot for a TV program, the purpose thereof to generate some interest.

At least that is the idea.

A Good Start Made

Posted: July 3, 2009 in Tears of the Mountain, writing update
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The rough draft of Tears of the Mountain is coming along at a fair pace – already passed 6000 words and I haven’t quite finished the couple of pages of rough synopsis that it has come from.

It has been bubbling along quite nicely and I was surprised at how much has been done already when I did a word count.

The part written was meant to only be an introduction, get a feel for the setting and story, but it has expanded more than I expected – and it will only do so more when I get around to doing the rewrite.

In its current form it is fairly basic – descriptions, conversations, plot. On past performance, when I do do the rewrite and fleshing out those 6K will be out to 10K or more.

Time to get back to writing now though – have more of the rough draft that needs writing.

Week In Review: Week Twenty Five & Twenty Six 2009

Posted: July 2, 2009 in Pure Escapism, Tears of the Mountain, writing update
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It would appear that I did not do one for last week, so here are two for the price of one.

Twenty six weeks down, twenty six to go. Had hoped to show more progress thus far, but slow and steady as the old saying goes.

Over the last two weeks I have finished off the second volume of Pure Escapism, started the third and also Tears of the Mountain, the working title of the novel I’ve started. I’m already 4200 words in to the rough draft of it after only a few days and I haven’t even really started. Pure Escapism Volume Three totals over 10K words also so far and I have yet to complete the main story, or start editing and fleshing out.

By next week those totals will hopefully be significantly increased.

The New Project

Posted: July 1, 2009 in Tears of the Mountain, writing update
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After a long period of threatening, I have finally started work on writing the novel. Yep, it is now the WIP and will remain so until it is done, with Pure Escapism relegated behind it.

I started writing it two days ago and have already passed 3000 words on the rough draft, which was a bit more than I expected. I’d written up shortly before that a couple of pages in a notebook detailing just the first small part of the story. I haven’t even finished expanding on that in the rough draft and those 3000 words came from just 150 words in the synopsis. And that will only get longer once it goes from draft to expanded form.

I’m am currently giving it the working title Tears of the Mountain, but that is probably going to change later on.

As for the story itself, it takes place about 20 years prior to the events in Tomb of the Tagosa Kings from the first volume of Pure Escapism, and features a younger Halir. It has action, adventure, lost cities, ancient ruins, hidden treasures, intrigue, politics and much more.

July/Midyear Plans

Posted: July 1, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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We are now exactly half of the way through the year and it is time to take stock, recharge and plan ahead.

For July there are a couple of aims.

One is to finish off the third volume of Pure Escapism. That, however, is a secondary goal.

The primary goal for the month is to get working on the rough draft of the novel.

There are a few other minor things I’d like to see done – such as fix up the website – but they are only if time allows.

For the rest of the year, number one goal is of course finishing off the novel, hopefully finding a home for it. In addition I hope to put out at least two more volumes of Pure Escapism in that time.

June Challenge Report

Posted: July 1, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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June has come and gone and with it the challenge I had set myself.

It was to aim for doing 2K a day in word count, but to do at least 1K minimum. End result came to 40,000 words for the month.

Not as much as I would have hoped for, but if you look at it over a year keeping that pace up, it comes to almost half a million words. Which is a lot.

During that period I did finish off the second volume of Pure Escapism, and make a good start on the third. More importantly I did finally make a start on the novel in the last couple of days.

Of course, now I know what I’m doing, next month will be better. Naturally.

I Knew I Shouldn’t Have Done It

Posted: June 28, 2009 in writing update
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I went to the movies yesterday. I had been tossing up whether to go or not – it had been a while since I last went and I should have really been writing. But in the end I went.

I ended up seeing Transformers 2. The first one had been decent, but not great, and I was hoping the second would be as well. Parts were – the parts with giant robots thrashing it out. The rest, well, it was filled with far too much juvenile humour, stupid plot and useless characters. But enough about that.

As I was watching I got thinking about writing. Yeah, even when I was taking time off the old brain never stops. In this time a completely new idea was sparked, in part inspired by fragments of the movie and in part from another story I’d recently come across.

What was odd is it is really a genre I’d never considered before. Or genres. The concept covers a few genres – part sci-fi, part action-thriller, part military-adventure and even part horror. The plot has been unfolding itself before me fairly rapidly.

Whether I use it or not is another question. I should probably write down the ideas that are spawning in my fevered imagination just in case…

Another One Down

Posted: June 28, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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Just finished off the third short story rough draft for Pure Escapism Volume Three. Only one more to go and I can start the major task of editing.

The fourth one is going to be the longest, but I hope to have its draft completed by the end of the month, just a couple of days away. So far it has panned out that in each volume there is one major story that takes up about half the book and three others that fill in the rest. Not sure how that happened, but I think I’ll stick with it.

Pushing Forward

Posted: June 27, 2009 in Pure Escapism, writing update
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After finishing the second volume of Pure Escapism, I know I said I was going to move back to the novel, but somehow that hasn’t happened yet. Instead I’ve been working on the third volume and to date have two rough drafts done for stories, and two more in progress. One of those is plotted out and I hope to have done by the end of the day.

At this rate I’ll have all the drafts done soon and I can edit it all together. Hopefully I can also improve the Pure Escapism part of the site at the same time, and expand on the podcast for it.

Speaking of, when I get back to working on the novel, I might have a go serialising it via podcast as well. We will see how that goes.

Today Is A Good Day To Write

Posted: June 26, 2009 in writing update
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I’m an early riser. If the sun is up, I have to be up. I’ve always been that way.

However, I really don’t take advantage of that. I get up and the first thing I do is wade through mail and blogs and twitter and forums and webcomics and news and the like. Then comes shower and breakfast. By the time that is all done up to a couple of hours may have passed and no writing has been done. And by the time I do start it may be three or more hours since getting up.

I tried something a little different this morning. I started with mail and the like as per usual, but more browsed through it quickly rather than reading fully. Then I did some writing, even before breakfast. Only around 400 words, but it was something, and better than the output of some whole days.

I think, after that success, I should change my morning habits. Having a good start like that in the morning can set the course of the whole day. The idea is that each morning, before anything else, even mails and the like, to set a goal, even if only a couple of hundred words, then do everything else. That way I have had a start made and am in the right frame of mind.

Hrm, you know, if you turned the title into a decent looking logo and stuck it on mugs and shirts and caps and the like, it may even sell…

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