posted
Welcome to this week's Novel Support Group (NSG). Anyone can join. If you're new, tell us a bit about who you are and what project you are working on. Feel free to update the NSG Work in Progress thread with your current projects. Although we can report on any number of things, here is a list of suggestions (suggestions welcomed).
What were your goals last week and did you accomplish them?
Describe what you worked on.
Set goals for next week.
Did you learn something during this week?
Here is a list of things that you can do each week as we work on our novels (suggestions welcomed).
Writing on a novel
Characterization
World Building
Relevant research
=-=-=-=-=
Last Week's Goals
Still very busy at work and doing late nights so I get home and have little brain power. Since I'm doing more programming at work that saps much of my mental capacity. Despite this I still continue to generate ideas. For now, I write those down in the hope I can get some free time in the future. Maybe the weekends?
My goals for next week:
Scene Outlining
Continue outlining this book. Just this morning I came up with an idea for the main character's first try / fail cycle so I may actually have something to "work" on this weekend.
What did I learn this week?
Recently I listened to the SF Signal podcast, episode 108. Whenever I hear that Lou Anders does an interview I either find the article and read it or find the recording and listen to it. Ever since he joined Writing Excuses and did the "Hollywood Formula" podcast I've been interested in listening to him.
SF Signal 108 talked about Sword and Sorcery. Although I do not write that, I have, in the past, written basic quest stories (a la David Eddings, etc.). What I found interesting is that this sub-genre is still fairly active. In fact, they discussed the new Disney movie, John Carter of Mars. I've seen the commercials for it but didn't think much of it. They speculated what would happen to Sword and Sorcery depending upon the level of success this movie has.
Again, although I don't write Sword and Sorcery, it shows that we have literary trends all the time. What was once popular (and died out) can and will become popular again. Fantasy fiction does not have to be this big epic scope. Epic fantasy is popular and certainly makes the publishers a lot of money, but it goes to show that you really should write what you love (and know). After all, you never know when you literary love will become popular again.
What I learned this week: Finishing that one short story was hard. I'm not sure yet if it was because it was a short story. (I do seem to have a problem getting a satisfying ending in something that short.) Or because it was sort of science fictionish (with really bad science). I've got a couple more short story ideas, but for now, I think I'll let my brain swim in the novel pool.
Posts: 4633 | Registered: Dec 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
Oops. I missed a couple of updates. In the past couple of week, I've been working on bits of RITN, mainly moving passages to new chapters and noting what scenes I'll need to write to smooth out the changes.
posted
I've been known to skip an update or two also.
I wrote a little on Stone Within.
A tiny bit of work on chapter two of Two Struggles. That one is taking way too long. Part of the problem is that I'm stuck on chapter two. I keep moving things around than starting at the beginning again. I've probably revised the portions of the first ten pages about ten times.
I find something that I think would go better at the beginning, then move something else to page four and then have to start at the beginning to make sure everything fits in.
Problem is this my MC's introduction. I originally placed half of this or so in the first chapter. It broke up that chapter too much. So I moved it all to chapter two but I don't think it all goes there either. Not sure what should go where though.
Also been working on my latest set of short stories instead of Stone.
I just finished another story so I think I will cut out the short stories for a while and just work on getting two novels ready to go. Two Struggles and Bright Lights. Not counting any stories for WotF that is and the chapter challenge.
Posts: 5289 | Registered: Jun 2010
| IP: Logged |