In today’s Journal
* Quotes of the Day
* My Typical Day
* Back to the Original Plan
* Of Interest
Quotes of the Day
“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far [they] can go.” TS Eliot Wow. Maybe my new favorite quote.
“Heavy social media use in children aged 12 to 13 associated with increased brain activity in regions controlling reward processing (emphasis added).” Headline under Science & Technology in the 1440 newsletter (SF ideas, anyone?)
“Scientists conclude the tail cannot, in fact, wag the dog.” Another head-slapping headline from 1440, this one under the “Etcetera” section. I wonder how much money they spent on this study? You can’t make this stuff up.
Apologies for yesterday’s post being largely a repeat of the post from the day before.
Also, part of today’s post is also a comment on Terry Odell’s TKZ post today. (Yes, I’m glancing at TKZ again each morning. I’m getting a guest gig there soon, so I thought I should.)
My Typical Day
It’s been a while since I did one of these “typical day” posts, so I thought I’d do one now for anyone who’s interested.
When I get up each morning, I get a mug of coffee and commute (a 150-foot walk) from my house to the Hovel, my adobe office. I sit down at my business computer first to check and respond to emails, read my newsletters, check other websites, etc.
I also prepare my almost-daily Journal during this time. That variously includes quotes, a topic on the craft of writing, my non-process of writing, or publishing, and links to articles around the internet I think my readers might find of interest. That’s usually my first 300 to 1500 words of the day, all nonfiction.
I take a break (15 minutes or so) up at the house, then come back to the Hovel, check for any other emails, then swivel my chair to face in the opposite direction and open my writing ‘puter.
When I turn to my writing ‘puter, a cute little HP Probook 11 (I like the keyboard) attached to a 24″ monitor, the manuscript is already open, not to where I left off but where I started writing yesterday. I read over what I wrote (usually 2000 to 4000 words). I don’t read critically but simply as a reader, enjoying the story.
As I do that I allow my fingers to rest on the keyboard. My characters usually add or deepen some description, sometimes say more (dialogue) than they did originally, etc. That part feels like it usually takes around ten minutes or so, but I’m not sure.
When I get to the white space, I write the next sentence, then the next and the next and the next. This is my practice until the characters lead me through to the end of the story.
My sessions are usually an hour to an hour and a half, usually 1200 to 2000 words, which for me is both a scene and a chapter. I try to knock out three or four sessions of fiction every day. My daily word count goal is 3000 publishable words of fiction.
I never consciously plan or plot or signpost or inflict anything else external on the story. That would render it something other than the story the characters would have lived without my interference.
I prefer to tell the story the characters are actually living. Like any story in any life, it’s unfolding as it happens, as the characters live it. Because of that, it can only be reported, not planned or foreseen.
Some believe the we “own” the characters, that they are a figment of our imagination, of our creative subconscious.
I’m not so sure. When I access my creative subconscious, maybe I’m viewing a creation of my own imagination. Maybe it really is all in my head.
Or maybe when I access my creative subconscious I’m drawing back a curtain on another dimension, another place, one in which my characters are actually living their ongoing story. Maybe the stories I record for them are only slices of the life they’re living in that other place.
I personally prefer to believe the latter, but it doesn’t matter, does it? The point is, I respect my characters enough to let them live their lives as those lives unfold. I don’t invent what’s happening and the characters’ reactions and what’s being said. I only report it.
Back to the Original Plan
As you can see, I’ve decided to set aside my hoity-toity attempt to post the Journal later in the day and thereby report my fiction numbers in real time instead of posting them a day late (and a dollar short?).
The new format was putting too much pressure on the fiction writing. No need to pressurize something that’s strictly for fun in the first place. So I’ll post today’s fiction numbers tomorrow (or when I post the Journal again) and so on.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
See “What’s Your Writing Time Like?” at https://killzoneblog.com/2023/01/whats-your-writing-time-like.html. I urge you to leave a reply. It isn’t everyday you get an open invitation to let people know who you are and what you do.
See “What will the internet of the future look like?” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/what-will-the-internet-of-the-future-look-like/. See PG’s take. Excellent!
See “Predictions from 1923 on life in 2023” (via Twitter) at https://twitter.com/paulisci/status/1609597531251703809.
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………………… 860 words
Writing of Santa Fe: A New Office (novel, WCG8, Santa Fe 3)
Day 1…… 2815 words. Total words to date…… 2815
Day 2…… 2034 words. Total words to date…… 4849
Day 3…… 2650 words. Total words to date…… 7499
Day 4…… 2209 words. Total words to date…… 9708
Day 5…… 4214 words. Total words to date…… 13922
Day 6…… 2299 words. Total words to date…… 16221
Day 7…… 2136 words. Total words to date……18357
Total fiction words for January……… 8649
Total fiction words for 2023………… 8649
Total nonfiction words for January… 2840
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 2840
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 11489
Calendar Year 2023 Novels to Date…………………… 0
Calendar Year 2023 Novellas to Date……………… 0
Calendar Year 2023 Short Stories to Date… 0
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 71
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 217
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31
Disclaimer: I am a prolific professional fiction writer because of my zen-like non-process. If you want to learn it too, either hang around or download my Journal Archives, read them, and try WITD for yourself. The archives are free.