Hey Folks,
For the past three years, I’ve considered taking Dean’s Anthology Workshop. It’s live, on the Oregon Coast. It’s $650 plus hotel expenses, plus travel. So not cheap (at least for me).
But I’m still considering it.
Now, though, a recent attendee — and one who has attended the thing SIX times — has decided to blog about the experience.
In a series of blog posts, best-selling dark fantasy author (and now editor) Ron Collins is going to dissect Dean’s Anthology Workshop. If you’ve ever even thought about taking that workshop (on the coast) this will be an important series of posts to read.
He posted his first “overall” entry today. Dean references it in his own blog post. I’ve listed both of them in “Of Interest” below.
***
I noticed I’ve slipped into the habit of making an early entry here, kind of a what I expect will happen on the day, and then a late one, detailing what actually happened.
That seems like a good format to me, since I’m trying to share the ups and downs of the writing experience. (In my private world, I pretend you get as much from my notes as from the “Of Interest” section I keep tossing out there.)
To that end, this morning I headed out to the Hovel early, spent some time waking up, then started on the novel.
And somewhere along the line I realized I’d mentioned a victim’s “father-in-law” earlier in the book, then in a later chapter had a detective trying to find out who her “father” (not father-in-law) was.
Oops. And the problem is compounded because learning a father-in-law’s name wouldn’t be nearly as difficult as learning a father’s name.
Sigh. Such a small mistake, but one I have to fix, obviously. But there are tons of ripples. Frankly, it would almost be easier to prove her father and her father-in-law are the same guy than it will be to fix this.
But I’ll get through it. So that’s what I expect today. I expect to have to trudge through stuff I’ve already written, without, I hope, having to throw away too much.
When I first noticed the problem, I got an overall sense that at the end of the day the problem will be in the past and I’ll be back in the flow and moving ahead with the story.
I hope that’s how it works out. We’ll see. I’ll consider the day a success if, at the end of the day, I have a clean story I can start with tomorrow.
***
Well, a pretty good net gain today. A LOT more, actually, than I thought I’d get, all things considered. But I probably put in 5 or 6 hours to get those new words. A LOT of shifting things around, etc.
And in the end, I still have a little more to clean up tomorrow before I can get back up to clear flying on this thing.
But I’ll take it.
See you tomorrow.
Of Interest
See Dean’s “Nifty View On Two Weeks Ago” at https://www.deanwesleysmith.com/nifty-view-on-two-weeks-ago/.
See “Face the Strange, The Adventures of a First-time Editor” at http://typosphere.com/2018/03/10/face-the-strange-the-adventures-of-a-first-time-editor/.
See “Why Young Readers Need Real Books” at http://www.thepassivevoice.com/2018/03/why-young-readers-need-real-books/. Be sure to read The Passive Guy’s comments. (grin)
Fiction Words: 2481
Nonfiction Words: 540 (Journal)
So total words for the day: 3021
Writing of Stern Talbot, PI—The Early Years
The Case of the Sliced-Up Secretary
Day 1…… 3207 words. Total words to date…… 3207
Day 2…… 3079 words. Total words to date…… 6286
Day 3…… 3870 words. Total words to date…… 10156
Day 4…… 2481 words. Total words to date…… 12637
Total fiction words for the month……… 33100
Total fiction words for the year………… 84405
Total nonfiction words for the month… 4980
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 24310
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 116735
Calendar Year 2018 Novels to Date………………………… 2
Calenday Year 2018 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
Calendar Year 2018 Short Stories to Date……… 0
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)………………………………………… 29
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)……………………………………… 4
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……………………………… 182