The Journal: Blackwell Ops 8

In today’s Journal

* Quotes of the Day
* Blackwell Ops 8
* Of Interest

Quotes of the Day

“There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.” Ernest Hemingway

“Storytelling is a natural, instinctive act. If we weren’t taught so stringently that plotting and criticism and rewriting were necessary, we would never bother with them. As a result, our stories would be far easier to write. They would also be better, by which I mean original and unique to the writer’s own (creative subconscious) voice.” Me in reply to a comment on yesterday’s post

“Characters don’t worry about depth, or structure, or words, or scenes, or setting, or the five senses, or any other part of the writing craft. Characters are pure. They just want to live their story.” Me from “I Teach So I May Learn”

Blackwell Ops 8: Philip Dunstan and Macy Marie Corman

Yesterday, in about an hour, with 1126 new words, I finished Blackwell Ops 8: Philip Dunstan and Macy Marie Corman. I’ve never been happier to have one off my desk.

The longest it took me to write a novel was 32 writing days, but that was in 35 calendar days and the novel was just under 96,000 words. This is also the longest in calendar days. I started it on April 26, then wrote off and on until yesterday, so officially 117 days.

I did write one other novel that took about that long, but that was because I paused writing the first novel and wrote two others in two other genres before returning to finish it.

Also, as I suspected, I did write past the end, but not where I originally thought. And I wrote over 19,400 words of scenes trying to get back into the book and get it moving again. Those aren’t “wasted” words, of course, because every word written is practice.

Like many writers I have “cuts” on every novel I write. Cuts are publishable words of fiction. Because I wrote them in the first place, I count them toward my overall totals, but they don’t end up in the novel. I guess this would be similar to the way a film director gleans a 2-hour film from 3 or 4 hours or more of raw footage.

All of that said, I had far more cuts from this novel than from any other. Again, I hope that’s because I’m coming off a year-long hiatus. As I’ve said before, I considered this my ‘practice’ novel. Anyway, I’m not gonna worry about it. I’m putting it behind me and moving on.

I’ll read over BO8 one one more time, not critically but as an overall cycling session, and then I’ll send it to my first reader. After that I’ll publish it and move on to the next project, whatever that may be. And get back to storytelling being fun.

I hope you’re doing the same.

Talk with you later.

Of Interest

See “August Regular Workshop Sale Starting!” at https://deanwesleysmith.com/august-regular-workshop-sale-starting/.

See “Aphantasia: Writing Fiction With No ‘Mind’s Eye'” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/aphantasia-writing-fiction-with-no-minds-eye/. Just interesting, and I hope none of you suffer from this.

See “The Best Ebook Subscription Services for Every Kind of Reader” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/the-best-ebook-subscription-services-for-every-kind-of-reader/. Grain of salt. What is “right” for a reader is not always right for a writer.

The Numbers

The Journal…………………………………… 540 words

Writing of Blackwell Ops 8: Philip Dunstan and Macy Marie Corman (novel)

Day 28… 1515 words. Total words to date…… 59599
Day 29… 2030 words. Total words to date…… 61629
Day 30… 1126 words. Total words to date…… 62755 (Done)

Total fiction words for August……… 13935
Total fiction words for the year………… 66431
Total nonfiction words for August… 12680
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 118920
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 185351

Calendar Year 2022 Novels to Date…………………… 1
Calendar Year 2021 Novellas to Date……………… 0
Calendar Year 2021 Short Stories to Date… 0
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 67
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 217
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31

Disclaimer: Along with discussing various aspects of the writing craft, I advocate a technique called Writing Into the Dark. WITD is “the only way” to write, but it is by far the easiest, most liberating, and most fun.