Saturday, February 20, 2010

Checkpoint!

You should be halfway through your goals today. Are you?

It's a simple yes or no question. Post your answer in the comments.

No heat today. Your only task for today is to find your second wind and apply it to your goals. Push, baby! Work it! If you get over today's hump in good shape, then you can start thinking about the finish line!

23 comments:

Edittorrent said...

I'll start. My goal is to line edit 2 novellas (roughly 300 pages) and send out three revision letters.

I've edited about 220 pages, almost 230. No revision letters yet.

Theresa

Holly Rutchik said...

Yes! I can't believe I am saying, YES! Yippies!

Kathleen MacIver said...

I am extremely pleased at how I'm progressing! For my pre-writing, I'm following Larry Brooks Story Structure series which is based on the structure that screenplay writers have to follow. Out of all the plotting methods I've seen, this one makes the most sense to me! And the funny thing is, the one short story that I sold, and that I'm still pleased with...I can now see how I "happened" upon this same story structure. LOL!

Anyway, last night I finished placing all of the mixed-up plot elements I had floating around my mind in their proper places in the story. Some of them needed to be changed in major ways, but they no longer feel mixed-up and confusing. They fit. And now I know exactly what big questions I need to figure out and decide upon to finish my plotting.

So that's my goal for this week: Nail down exactly what my antagonist is hoping to accomplish and how during the second half, and decide how my hero and heroine going to defeat that.

(Once I'm done with that, I'll have to figure out whether I should expand my plot into more detail or start pants-drafting. Or drafting in pants. Or whatever.)

Jordan said...

Oh the agony. My goal is to be one chapter shy of the halfway point by tonight (I think the back half will be easier to edit), but I'll have to do 4 chapters (at least two of which will need a lot of work, and three new scenes, but I'll try the speed drafting for those).

I don't know what's with my church scheduling four functions this weekend (or me for feeling obligated to, like, leave the house and talk to people ;). Don't they know I have plans?!

Merc said...

No. >.>

I'm about, er, 5k behind. *sigh*

Jordan said...

@Kathleen—hooray! You know I love Story Structure. Two of the scene I have to write are for pinch point 1 :D . I'm excited to "fix" this story (I wrote it before he started blogging). Let's hope it's enough.

I've been wondering if his structure would work for a short story, too. Good to know!

(Let's see if I can't knock out one chapter now!)

Steena Holmes said...

Sure am! I queried and am just waiting on responses.

I also took out a novel I wrote in 04 and am working on that.

Sylvia said...

Ergh. No.

I'll get right on that.

Stacy McKitrick said...

Sadly, no. Not even close. But I am progressing, so that's what really matters. Right? I AM NOT GIVING UP!

Taylor Mathews said...

Kind of. My querying is a big fat no. But I did manage to secure a pitch session with a publisher. It is kind of like a figure skater showing up on the ice for a hockey game -- but I'll take what I can get. :-)

Dave Shaw said...

I'm on par, just a little out of sequence. I've actually done more than I planned, but there's a reason for that. (foot shuffle) You see, I wrote 5 scenes toward the ending I originally had planned, and then decided the tone and effect didn't fit, and threw them out. So now I've written 3 1/2 more scenes with a much better tone and direction (it's dark urban fantasy, so the end shouldn't be too upbeat, right?) and I'm a scene and a half from finishing the draft, which will now have a shorter, tighter, darker ending. I also planned to edit the first 12 chapters, and while I was figuring out the ending, I plowed through 3 of them, so only 9 to go there, which is doable. I mean, I won't be ripping these apart nearly as bad as I did Chapter 1. Which reminds me, there was something I needed to look at again in that chapter...

Jami G., is there a Perfectionists Anonymous? I may need to join. I figured if anyone would know, you would. >;-)

Katherine Hajer said...

No.

But I am close enough that I could still pull off one of those sudden-burst wins people love during the Olympics.

Jami Gold said...

Dave,

Perfectionists Anonymous? LOL! I'll get to work on that...

Actually, I'm in kind of a similar position as you. In some ways, I've gotten more done, in other ways, less.

I've been successfully working on my query (at least I *think* successfully). I did send out a query this past week that was rejected, but I've also gotten a bunch more ideas for how to improve it. I also wrote about 1K words on the Drafting thing that I'd planned on. And then I wrote another 2.5K on a completely new story that wasn't in the plan. All good, right?

But then I didn't get to any editing of my chapters this past week. :( You win some and you lose some...

Jami G.

Jami Gold said...

Okay, Dave,

I spent hours researching Perfectionists Anonymous groups and I found a couple. But none of them were quite good enough for me.

Ba dum dum... *desperately trying to keep a straight face, but then gives up* LOL!

Jami G.

feywriter said...

No. Ahead on the querying, but about 10 pages behind on the drafting. I can still do it!

Amy said...

NO but I made good progress yesterday and am determined to catch up

Denny S. Bryce said...

Well, I'm late to the game, but I've been writing all day, and I'm also rearranging and polishing and pushing forward. I'd made two major story changes - one was adding my hero's POV to the manuscript and the other deleting chapters with my villains POV (which I just decided today:). But it gives me more scenes for my hero and heroine - which I need.

So today, I wrote about 1000 new words, and deleted about a 1000:)...

But now that I've found the race - I'm in for the win.

(Please note: I was a cheerleader in high school. Sometimes I get carried away:)

Denny

Anonymous said...

I wish :(

I'm 2 chapters down, 6 chapters to go. Given my other commitments this week, both day and night, I'm surprised I managed 2 chapters. This week is as commitment free as it gets, so my fingers will be flying :)

Anonymous said...

Make that 3 chapters down, 5 to go :)

And I'm pushing on. I find it a struggle not to look back and tidy up, but I keep focusing on the light at the end of the tunnel. It's there. Just around the corner. I know it.

BTW - I've fallen hook, line and sinker for Write or Die, lol!

Dave Shaw said...

Okay, wrote 3,000 words last night. Drafting finished. Woohoo!

Now to work through the rest of that editing...

Dave Shaw said...

Oh, and Jami? Thanks for doing that, but could you put a little more effort into it next time, please? Remember, OCD is a writer's friend!

>;-)

Edittorrent said...

I needed to finish editing a short story and writing a critique, and I did that. But what's fun is... I also added some paragraphs to my WIP, and finally rearranged it so that the hero tells the bad news AFTER he gets lucky and not before. I had to fix the intro and exit from that, but it wasn't as hard as I imagined.
Alicia

Riley Murphy said...

Yes, better than halfway. Letter and synopsis done. Now, all I have to do is write the book...kidding! :D Still have to do edits (on the synopsis) but so far - I'm liking it! *insert me wiping my brow here*

Murphy