In today’s Journal
* Quotes of the Day
* That third quote
* The upcoming topics and a short tale
* The Journey Home: Part 8
* The second quote
* The Numbers
Quotes of the Day
“The common denominator of success — the secret of success of every man who has ever been successful — lies in the fact that he formed the habit of doing things that failures don’t like to do.” Albert E. N. Gray
“The courage to take the first step. The discipline to take the next one.” FarnamStreetblog.com
“It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place.” H. L. Mencken
I absolutely love that third quote. It explains a lot about the reaction I sometimes get from others. You know, when I tell someone something that costs me absolutely nothing but my time and will benefit me in absolutely no way, and they react as if they believe I’m lying to them and trying to take advantage. Sigh.
The upcoming topics and a short tale
Sometime today, during a break in my fiction writing, I’ll be looking over the myriad topics my anonymous acquaintance handed me. That in preparation for the series of topics on Heinlein’s Rules and Writing Into the Dark. Stay tuned.
I’m taking my time a little, sneaking up on the idea of writing and posting those topics, partly in the hope that another particular person will subscribe to the Journal.
That person, in an email a month or so ago, mentioned that he might want to write a novel in the world of my current Future of Humanity (FOH) series.
I was flattered and immediately told him that would be fine.
Yesterday, in passing, I asked how the novel was coming along. He wrote back that he’d been thinking about it a lot and would have to see whether maybe he could get something down on paper.
I’m hopeful and pulling for him, so I told him he might want to subscribe to the Journal because I have a series of topics coming up….
His response is something I’ve heard hundreds of times from writers at various conferences. The utterance comes out after they’ve approached me in the lobby or bar of the conference hotel and want to talk about their novel. Usually right after I ask how the novel’s coming along.
The Journey Home: Part 8 is coming along quite nicely. Yesterday due to a variety of factors, I struggled a little to get to my 4000 word daily goal.
But by “struggled” I don’t mean there was any fretting over individual words or scenes. It only means I forced myself (discipline) back into the chair one more time after a break, put my fingers on the keyboard and wrote until I’d surpassed the daily goal.
I also love the second quote of the day, revised a little for writers: To write a novel only takes courage and disclipline: the courage to write the first sentence, and the discipline to write the next, and the next, and the next.
And trust your characters as you’re writing those sentences.
As I keep saying, the story—what you write—isn’t important. It’s only a few minutes’ or hours’ entertainment. As such, it doesn’t matter in the slightest. If you’re a writer, what matters—what is important—is that you write.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
See “The Big Reason Why OJ Simpson Got Off Murder” at http://dyingwords.net/the-big-reason-why-o-j-simpson-got-off-murder/.
See “The Common Denominator of Success” at https://fs.blog/great-talks/common-denominator-success-albert-gray/.
See “Inkitt raises $16M led by Kleiner Perkins to publish crowdsourced novels in ‘mini-episodes’” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/inkitt-raises-16m-led-by-kleiner-perkins-to-publish-crowdsourced-novels-in-mini-episodes/. An exciting bit of news. BUT BE SURE TO READ PG’S TAKE.
See “Bat Masterson, Writer” at https://killzoneblog.com/2021/03/bat-masterson-writer.html.
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………………… 630 words
Writing of The Journey Home: Part 8 (novel)
Day 1…… 4891 words. Total words to date…… 4891
Day 2…… 4495 words. Total words to date…… 9386
Day 3…… 4515 words. Total words to date…… 13901
Day 4…… 4078 words. Total words to date…… 17979
Total fiction words for March……… 22206
Total fiction words for the year………… 221214
Total nonfiction words for March… 4330
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 503600
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 271574
Calendar Year 2021 Novels to Date…………………… 4
Calendar Year 2021 Novellas to Date……………… X
Calendar Year 2021 Short Stories to Date… 3
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 58
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 217
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31
Disclaimer: In this blog, I provide advice on writing fiction. I advocate a technique called Writing Into the Dark. To be crystal clear, WITD is not “the only way” to write, nor will I ever say it is. However, as I am the only writer who advocates it both regularly and publicly, I will continue to do so, among myriad other topics.