I spent my day off this week at a funeral. A better man than me might have managed to write a story anyway. I am not that man.
On the positive side, I am not counting this against my challenge. Round five is postponed.
On the other positive side, I still managed to squeeze this (truncated) blog post out of the experience, thus keeping my daily blog posting challenge going without a miss.
May you all be as blessed as I have been, to not only have had such a wonderful loved one, but to get a full measure of time to say goodbye.
Welcome to the Journey is Silver Bowen's blog on writing, self-epubbing, growth, and gadgets. All as experienced by a growing writer. Learn with me.
Showing posts with label Day Off Challenge. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Day Off Challenge. Show all posts
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Quality Isn't Related To Conditions
To explain the title - The quality of your writing is in no way related to how you feel as you write. This includes mental states like stress, physical states like illness, even emotional states like heartbreak. Note that this doesn't mean your state won't affect the tone of your writing, as it often does, merely the quality.
I first read this theory in Dean Wesley Smith's series "Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing." If you haven't read that series, do so, including the comments. It will take a bit of time, but be well worth it in regards to furthering your writerly education.
Back to the matter at hand. I have not felt well lately. I've had a cold that has dragged on for nearly a week, as well as family matters dogging me emotionally. Yet I managed to complete a fairly light-hearted and enjoyable short story for last weeks day of challenge, and another one this week. I've done some writing over the last two weeks besides these stories, but not a whole lot.
If I were to believe that my sickness and general sense of lethargy would preclude my being able to write engaging prose, neither of the two recent stories would have been written. The fact that both turned out well, and are at least as good as anything else I've written, proves the matter. Quality of writing is independent of the circumstances of that writing.
So next time you feel to tired, sick, or emotional to write, do it anyway. Force the words out, one letter at a time if you have to. You may be pleasantly surprised by the quality of your output.
I first read this theory in Dean Wesley Smith's series "Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing." If you haven't read that series, do so, including the comments. It will take a bit of time, but be well worth it in regards to furthering your writerly education.
Back to the matter at hand. I have not felt well lately. I've had a cold that has dragged on for nearly a week, as well as family matters dogging me emotionally. Yet I managed to complete a fairly light-hearted and enjoyable short story for last weeks day of challenge, and another one this week. I've done some writing over the last two weeks besides these stories, but not a whole lot.
If I were to believe that my sickness and general sense of lethargy would preclude my being able to write engaging prose, neither of the two recent stories would have been written. The fact that both turned out well, and are at least as good as anything else I've written, proves the matter. Quality of writing is independent of the circumstances of that writing.
So next time you feel to tired, sick, or emotional to write, do it anyway. Force the words out, one letter at a time if you have to. You may be pleasantly surprised by the quality of your output.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Day Off Story Challenge - Round Four
I just completed my day off challenge story number four, as of three PM. I started writing this morning around ten, so this one took about five hours. It clocks in at 2,800 words. The title is "Minor Mutilators".
It took me longer to write this than the last few stories. I usually come closer to 700-800 words an hour. At my normal rate, this would have taken an hour or so less. However, I am sick today, and this story included more characters and complexity than usual, so I don't fell like I was really all that slow writing it.
I vacillated this morning between this story and a simpler one that only had two characters. This idea was one I added to my idea bank only a few days ago. But, I thought this idea was slightly more interesting, and I wanted to try to stretch out a little.
In the interest of demonstrating the process, for those curious, The original idea and the refinement are listed below. These are all the development I had, going into the challenge.
Idea - A micro race of aliens mutilates small animals.
Refinement - A collection of house pets team up to stop the menace of tiny alien animal mutilators.
The fun of this story is seeing how the animals, who are heavily personified, manage to defeat the aliens. I had a lot of fun coming up with the viewpoints of the house pets, and their names for themselves, as well.
As the last few stories, I would like to put the full story up, but my readership is so small that I feel it is best to keep it unpublished, and try to sell it. If I get more people reading, or publish it myself, I will likely put the story up here as well.
It took me longer to write this than the last few stories. I usually come closer to 700-800 words an hour. At my normal rate, this would have taken an hour or so less. However, I am sick today, and this story included more characters and complexity than usual, so I don't fell like I was really all that slow writing it.
I vacillated this morning between this story and a simpler one that only had two characters. This idea was one I added to my idea bank only a few days ago. But, I thought this idea was slightly more interesting, and I wanted to try to stretch out a little.
In the interest of demonstrating the process, for those curious, The original idea and the refinement are listed below. These are all the development I had, going into the challenge.
Idea - A micro race of aliens mutilates small animals.
Refinement - A collection of house pets team up to stop the menace of tiny alien animal mutilators.
The fun of this story is seeing how the animals, who are heavily personified, manage to defeat the aliens. I had a lot of fun coming up with the viewpoints of the house pets, and their names for themselves, as well.
As the last few stories, I would like to put the full story up, but my readership is so small that I feel it is best to keep it unpublished, and try to sell it. If I get more people reading, or publish it myself, I will likely put the story up here as well.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Day Off Story Challenge - Round Three
I really thought this one was going to be hard. I haven't written much in the last few days, for one thing, so I had no momentum. I did have a story idea, which I came up with the night before.
Unfortunately, I didn't write it down. All I could remember going into today's writing were the character names and general details. I went with it anyway, rather than falling back on previous idea. My hope was that I would remember the rest as I got into the story.
This didn't happen. I managed to prevail anyway, and finished the session with a fairly goofy comedic story. I think it's funny, anyway.
Total time spent was about three and a half hours, word count is about 1,900 words. The story is the shortest of the three, and took me the longest, comparatively. I spent more than the normal amount of time wondering where the hell I was going with the plot :)
All said, I'm quite satisfied with the day's challenge output, especially given my apprehension going in. Yay, me! I'll be putting another tick in my challenge count box.
Oh, the title of the story is "Super Stud". That alone should give you a good idea of how goofy this one was.
Unfortunately, I didn't write it down. All I could remember going into today's writing were the character names and general details. I went with it anyway, rather than falling back on previous idea. My hope was that I would remember the rest as I got into the story.
This didn't happen. I managed to prevail anyway, and finished the session with a fairly goofy comedic story. I think it's funny, anyway.
Total time spent was about three and a half hours, word count is about 1,900 words. The story is the shortest of the three, and took me the longest, comparatively. I spent more than the normal amount of time wondering where the hell I was going with the plot :)
All said, I'm quite satisfied with the day's challenge output, especially given my apprehension going in. Yay, me! I'll be putting another tick in my challenge count box.
Oh, the title of the story is "Super Stud". That alone should give you a good idea of how goofy this one was.
Saturday, July 16, 2011
Day Off Story Challenge - Round Two
The challenge - write one complete short story on my day of, once per week, start to finish. Using pre-thought ideas is okay, but not stories that already have more than a cursory word count.
The short of today's post - I was victorious, for the second time in a row. I was off on Wednesday, July 13, and I wrote for approximately six hours. I completed a 3,400 word SF story, entitled "The Day the AI Died". Go me!
The intention of this challenge was to write shorter, easier stories. I seem to have gotten away from this today, even more so than last week, when I banged out a 2,300 word story. My original goal for this challenge was between 1,000 and 2,000 words.
Both stories have been fairly straight-forward, as expected. My
alpha reader felt that the the last story was good, but the ending was too predictable. I have a sneaking feeling this one will have the same reception. Really original fiction may require more processing time than I am giving these.
On the other hand, the first few stories I ever wrote took far longer than these, and are much less interesting too me. So perhaps letting that startling plot twist happen, without spending days or weeks thinking of it, is a learned skill as well.
This story had a slight bit more background than the last one, a text file totalling about 200 words or so. It was also an idea I recorded on a voice recorder while working. It also bore little resemblance to the original concept.
This is not surprising, as I write mostly by discovery, and none of my stories ever end up where I think they will. I rarely even start with an idea for the ending.
One really exciting fact is that this story is equivalent to about three days worth of daily writing goal word count, and will require very little editing. In practical terms, this is a week's output for me, done in a day. That creative momentum is a really powerful thing.
The short of today's post - I was victorious, for the second time in a row. I was off on Wednesday, July 13, and I wrote for approximately six hours. I completed a 3,400 word SF story, entitled "The Day the AI Died". Go me!
The intention of this challenge was to write shorter, easier stories. I seem to have gotten away from this today, even more so than last week, when I banged out a 2,300 word story. My original goal for this challenge was between 1,000 and 2,000 words.
Both stories have been fairly straight-forward, as expected. My
alpha reader felt that the the last story was good, but the ending was too predictable. I have a sneaking feeling this one will have the same reception. Really original fiction may require more processing time than I am giving these.
On the other hand, the first few stories I ever wrote took far longer than these, and are much less interesting too me. So perhaps letting that startling plot twist happen, without spending days or weeks thinking of it, is a learned skill as well.
This story had a slight bit more background than the last one, a text file totalling about 200 words or so. It was also an idea I recorded on a voice recorder while working. It also bore little resemblance to the original concept.
This is not surprising, as I write mostly by discovery, and none of my stories ever end up where I think they will. I rarely even start with an idea for the ending.
One really exciting fact is that this story is equivalent to about three days worth of daily writing goal word count, and will require very little editing. In practical terms, this is a week's output for me, done in a day. That creative momentum is a really powerful thing.
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