In today’s Journal
* Quote of the Day
* Merry Christmas
* Welcome
* Bradbury Challenge Writers Reporting
* Fan Fiction Writer?
* The Writing
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
Quote of the Day
“Stephen King writes on Christmas because why not? If we eat and sleep and brush our teeth how is this different?” George Kordonis
Merry Christmas
Good morning, everyone. I’m up a little early this morning so I can write fiction before the day’s festivities begin.
Wishing you all a very merry Christmas day.
Welcome
Welcome to WS, Edward and any other new readers or subscribers of the Journal. I hope you will find it useful.
Get the Archives and other free downloads at the Journal website. Just click the links and a PDF will download in a new page.
If you download the Journal Archives, I suggest downloading and reading the most recent one first. Then, if you’re bored enough to want to see how I personally progressed as a fiction writer, you can go back and download the others. It has been an interesting journey.
When I compile the archive for 2023 in early January, I will add it to the Archives page. I will also announce it and make it available in a post in the Journal.
I also recommend reading the posts “I Believe in You” and “Fear”. Can’t hurt, and it might help.
Oh, and check out this half-hour video where bestselling author Vin Zandri and I are chatting about writing on The Writer’s Life. Merry Christmas, Vin.
The Bradbury Challenge Writers Reporting
Reporting your numbers to other writers can help encourage them and yourself to keep writing. It’s why I post my new numbers each day in the last section of the Journal.
Anyone can jump in (or jump back in) and join or rejoin the challenge at any time. There’s no cost.
This is a great way to jumpstart your writing and get more practice pushing down the critical voice.
Notice, there’s no pressure re submitting or publishing. That’s up to you.
The point of this challenge — the point of all writing challenges — is to have fun and grow as a writer. Learning to keep track of your writing is a bonus.
During the past week, in addition to whatever other fiction they’re writing, the following writers reported their progress:
Short Fiction
- George Kordonis “Christmas in Space” 2789 Science Fiction
- Adam Kozak “The Wooing of Winifred” 2639 Romance, Humor
- Christopher Ridge “Yums Yums” 2300 Horror
- K.C. Riggs “The End of the Universe” 1681 Humor
Longer Fiction
- Balázs Jámbor *Kylen’s Story* (tentative title) 2000 Fantasy (21800 to date)
Fan Fiction Writer?
Check out Archive of Our Own at https://archiveofourown.org. Thanks to Matt G P for the info.
The Writing
To see my goals for 2024 and two new mentorships I’m considering offering, read this post.
I did write yesterday (and this morning.) But yesterday also my son’s visit ended so I spent much of the morning with him and my wife and his girlfriend.
After they left I wrote a little, but decided to spend the rest of Christmas Eve with my bride. We’re both a little sad when one of our offspring has to leave after a visit.
So I didn’t take the day off, but neither did I come close to my goal. But again, it reset this morning. It’s magical that way. (grin)
In the numbers below, I remembered that I count only writing days in the blog. So the Day 11 you will see below is Writing Day 11 although it’s calendar day 12.
The novel might wrap tomorrow or it might run for another day or so. Not a big deal.
Of Interest
A Christmas Celebration (Celtic Women video)
The Numbers
The Journal……………………………… 610
Writing of Tarea-Garcia 1
Day 1…… 4968 words. To date…… 4968
Day 2…… 3677 words. To date…… 8645
Day 3…… 3307 words. To date…… 11952
Day 4…… 4467 words. To date…… 16419
Day 5…… 4193 words. To date…… 20612
Day 6…… 2061 words. To date…… 22673
Day 7…… 3250 words. To date…… 25923
Day 8…… 2036 words. To date…… 27959
Day 9…… 3789 words. To date…… 31748
Day 10…. 4093 words. To date…… 35841
Day 11…. 3771 words. To date…… 39612
Writing of “The Love of Soleada”
Day 1…… 1079 words. To date…… 1079
Day 2…… 1444 words. To date…… 2523
Day 3…… 0225 words. To date…… 2748
Day 4…… 0747 words. To date…… 3495
Fiction for December…………………… 93419
Fiction for 2023…………………………. 494253
Fiction since August 1………………… 379029
Nonfiction for December……………… 19480
Nonfiction for the year……………… 275060
Annual consumable words………… 765806
2023 Novels to Date……………………… 10
2023 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2023 Short Stories to Date……………… 8
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………… 81
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 9
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)…… 236
Short story collections…………………… 31
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Disclaimer: I am a prolific professional fiction writer. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Unreasoning fear and the myths of writing will slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.
Merry Christmas Harvey. I hope you and your family had a great day.
Thanks, Matt.