Monday 22 March 2010

Funland: Week Two

The fact that I'm posting this today rather than yesterday as would have been logical is actually a good indication of how well last week went.  That is to say: not well.  I came down with a cold on the Monday or Tuesday, and by Wednesday felt ill enough that the thought of a day writing held no appeal whatsoever.  I soldiered on, and got over it pretty quickly, (and frankly it would probably fall firmly in the category of man-flu anyway), but I did slip a little on my targets,and it certainly wasn't much fun.

Partly because of that, partly because I misjudged, and partly because some sections ran on longer than they perhaps needed to, I discovered that the first part wasn't going to end where I'd intended.  The plan is for the novel entire to break down into five novella sections of about 20'000 words each, and I was determined to get the first part done.  In the end I scaled back some of the wilder things I'd had planned, which I suspect was a good move anyway, the original ending would have been so lengthy and over the top that it would have overshadowed everything that came after.  It finished up at about 21'500, which meant I was still going at half five on Saturday.

After a lazy one-day weekend, however, most of my enthusiasm is back, and I'm still on target.  Another benefit of binge-writing like this is that the sense of achievement and reward is fantastic - knowing I'm two weeks in and I've written a fifth of a novel is a great feeling, and makes it that bit easier to keep pressing on.

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