January 2024 in writing
Fixing all the arcs In January, I continued drilling down into each of the arcs’ beats and structure, moving between index cards, spreadsheets, markdown tables, and good old bullet points. (Switching between these media also served as a way for me to review my previous work and ideas, often sparking ideas on how to fix or improve the old structures and scene ideas.) A number of the old Draft 2.
complex plotting: tools and approach (december)
(December in Writing) My third POV is re-outlined in broad strokes, and I’m working on drilling down into the scene level. It does feel like the story and characters are coming back alive for me.
However, most of December has been a struggle in writing productivity and focus. I have been improving my tools and outlines, so I’ll focus this blog post on those.
GoodNotes 5 and templates I had purchased GoodNotes 5 for my iPad some time ago.
November 2023 in writing
Summary I wrote and/or edited 28,786 words for NaNoWriMo before stopping failing.
I struggled with my writing for two weeks, then a conversation with Finn helped point me in the right direction. I’m back to the outlining drawing board to try to solve some of the structural issues I’m hitting that are bogging down the second draft. (I could add the outlining wordcount to the month’s total, but I’m still nowhere near 50k.
October 2023 in writing
Progress Summary The second draft is going slower than I want it to, but I’m making good progress. I now have a pretty good Act 1 for each of the three arcs, a beginning that will help propel each story into the second act.
I’m not certain if writing the scenes in chapter order was the best idea at this stage – the first two POVs have gone fairly smoothly, but the problematic third POV kept slowing me down.
September 2023 in writing
I had planned to tackle the 2nd draft of the 1st POV in September. I didn’t realize how much I had riding on this second draft. I wanted to:
fix the overall structure of all three POV arcs, tightening them, increasing conflict, making sure they culminate in a satisfying climax; add description and depth where I had glossed over or skipped it the first time around, including many characters’ names; improve the prose, removing any modern day language, terminology, turns of phrase; adding depth to the world by the way characters speak and think; get into each major character’s head, so I would know how each would react, in specifics, to any given situation; have a better understanding of my world; improve my maps; be able to describe the architecture and fashion and currency and units of measurement; go further in depth in the religions, beliefs, rituals, superstitions, parables, ghost stories, … That’s a lot for a draft.