In today’s Journal
* Quote of the Day
* A Friend Is Writing in Public!
* Recount, Promo, and a Cover
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
Quote of the Day
“I continue to be mystified by Chat GPT, because bullshitting vaguely plausible sounding answers based on no understanding of the question is something humans do exceedingly well, and will do free.” Falling Diphthong (username) in a reply on Askamanager.org Thanks to Gary for the tip.
A Friend Is Writing in Public!
Hey, if you’re a fan of those who have enough belief in themselves to write in public, you’re in luck.
I STRONGLY recommend Philip Michael Smith’s new substack As My Cigar Gently Weeps and his first shot at writing in public with Sinners: A Noir Crime Thriller. I just read the first chapter. This guy knows how to write.
Take a gander, and if he pulls you into the story, hit the little heart at the bottom and take a few seconds to leave a comment with your support.
Just so you know, there’s some language, but it’s a noir story. Duh. None of the language is used gratuitously, and I don’t doubt for a second it’s what the character actually said.
Recount, Promo, and a Cover
While cycling back over the last three chapters of Looking to the Future, I added over 800 words to the last Wes Crowley manuscript. In fact, the last three chapters became the last four chapters.
So I counted yesterday as another writing day. See the Numbers below. Now I’m done. (grin)
My first reader, Russ, also got the manuscript back to me in the early afternoon. And for the first time ever, he caught nothing! I was amazed.
I’m pretty much famous among first readers for omitting the D at the end of past-tense words and adding an S to singular nouns. Or writing “when” when I meant to write “went.” Things like that. (grin)
Anyway, I published the book for pre-order to Amazon and D2D by 1:15 p.m. yesterday.
You can see the cover and the sales pitch on the book page at Looking to the Future. I think when I rebrand the series I’ll do so with a similar cover for all 22 books.
Best of all, there’s no reason I can’t start writing again by today at the latest. Well, after I publish this edition of the Journal and finish setting up a new laptop.
If you followed along with the story on the Writing in Public substack, thank you, and I hope you enjoyed the story.
And if you want to see what grabbed me about Wes Crowley in the first place, I’m still giving away the very first book in the overall saga (chronologically), Rise of a Warrior. If you’d like a copy, email me.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
Episode No. 843: The Professional Writer For me, an “author” is a person who “has written.” A writer is a person who writes. A professional writer is a person who shows up, like s/he would at any other job.
One Well-Chosen Detail: Write Juicy Descriptions Without Overwhelming Your Reader In case you want this. I write through the POV character’s physical and emotional senses. If s/he notices something, it goes in. If s/he doesn’t, it doesn’t. That’s why my readers feel they are in the scene with the character.
The Numbers
The Journal……………………………… 550
Writing of Looking to the Future (WCG10SF5)
Day 1…… 4086 words. To date…… 4086
Day 2…… 3609 words. To date…… 7695
Day 3…… 3971 words. To date…… 11666
Day 4…… 4129 words. To date…… 15795
Day 5…… 4542 words. To date…… 20337
Day 6…… 8696 words. To date…… 29033
Day 7…… 5025 words. To date…… 34058
Day 8…… 0802 words. To date…… 34860 (done)
Fiction for November…………………… 52368 (Guess I still won NaNo.)
Fiction for 2023…………………………. 371012
Fiction since August 1………………… 38710
Nonfiction for November……………… 15450
Nonfiction for the year……………… 243340
Annual consumable words………… 610845
2023 Novels to Date……………………… 8
2023 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2023 Short Stories to Date……………… 7
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………… 79
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 9
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)…… 235
Short story collections…………………… 31
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.