The Journal: Bradbury, and the Novel Is Finished

In today’s Journal

* Quotes of the Day
* About Bradbury’s Quote
* The novel is finished
* I’m a lucky guy
* Of Interest
* The Numbers

Quotes of the Day

“When I started writing seriously, I made the major discovery of my life—that I am right and everybody else is wrong if they disagree with me. What a great thing to learn: Don’t listen to anyone else, and always go your own way.” Ray Bradbury (thanks to Phillip M.)

About Bradbury’s Quote — I believe the only way to “not listen to anyone else” when writing is to trust and listen only to that innermost part of yourself: your creative subconscious. If you write in any other way, you are of necessity listening to everyone else.

Some would say I learned to write by listening to Dean Wesley Smith. But I didn’t.

All I learned from Dean was to trust myself and my creative subconscious, which I’ve fed over the years with the mechanics I’ve learned about language and the techniques I’ve learned about writing.

Focus the conscious mind to learn mechanics and techniques and to absorb the world. Then unleash the creative subconscious and allow it to apply what you’ve learned.

The Journey Home: Part 1 is finished. It came in at 30 chapters and about half-past 47000 words. When it ended, the day was still young. So I took a break, then cycled back through the last few chapters, ran the spell check, and sent it out to my first readers.

Today will probably not be a fiction-writing day. I’ll go through The Ark and apply my first readers’ recommendations that I agree with. Then, with a little luck, I’ll find some appropriate artwork, create covers for The Ark and The Journey Home: Part 1, and publish The Ark.

At over 79,000 words of publishable fiction (so far) this month, I believe I have “won” NaNoWriMo. (grin) If I can do it, you can do it. A new month begins on December 1. Or a new 30-day period begins tomorrow.

I’m a lucky guy. Sometime today I’ll get to meet Sheriff Joe Arpaio at a book signing in Tombstone. Not an inappropriate setting for the modern-day Wyatt Earp.

Talk with you again soon.

Of Interest

See “Children of Quarantine” at https://www.thecut.com/2020/11/covid-19-pandemic-kids-mental-health.html. The article is rife with story ideas. Personally, maybe someone should have asked this question before locking everyone down.

The Numbers

The Journal…………………………………… 360 words

Writing of The Journey Home: Part 1 (novel)

Day 1…… 3373 words. Total words to date…… 3373
Day 2…… 3312 words. Total words to date…… 6685
Day 3…… 3292 words. Total words to date…… 9977
Day 4…… 3794 words. Total words to date…… 13771
Day 5…… 4482 words. Total words to date…… 18253
Day 6…… 3379 words. Total words to date…… 21632
Day 7…… 4550 words. Total words to date…… 26182
Day 8…… 3326 words. Total words to date…… 29508
Day 9…… 6033 words. Total words to date…… 35541
Day 10… 3847 words. Total words to date…… 39388
Day 11… 4704 words. Total words to date…… 44092
Day 15… 3516 words. Total words to date…… 47608 (done)

Total fiction words for November……… 79230
Total fiction words for the year………… 442508
Total nonfiction words for November… 17550
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 183390
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 625898

Calendar Year 2020 Novels to Date…………………… 7
Calendar Year 2020 Novellas to Date……………… X
Calendar Year 2020 Short Stories to Date… 13
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 52
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 214
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31

2 thoughts on “The Journal: Bradbury, and the Novel Is Finished”

Comments are closed.