5336 words today. I broke the 10,000 mark and doubled the word count of the manuscript today. 🙂
Someone asked about the health benefits I’m seeing from this challenge. So far, I am sleeping a lot better and I have a lot more energy throughout the day. Not sure if it’s excitement because I’m starting something new, or because I’m getting consistent exercise everyday.
DICTATION
I pushed my dictation speed today. My first session was 916 words, which was a little disappointing because it’s what I did yesterday. That equates to around 30 words per minute, which I can easily type. I pushed myself harder in the second session and netted a nice 1100 words, which is just about where I want to be, maybe around 1200. But honestly, 1100 felt pretty good and the text was still relatively clean. I may be able to get more. But we’ll see. Easy does it…
Oddly enough though, I noticed that the faster I dictate, the faster I pedal. It’s a weird subconscious thing I guess.
CRAFT STUFF
I’m experimenting with a hero type I’ve never written before. He’s a sensitive, introverted, head over heels for a woman who never loved him, and can’t let go. He’s overpowered by strong women in his life, and alpha male types trigger him. LOL
The challenge I’m finding, as someone who has never written this kind of character before (except for in a short story once), is striking the balance between being inside the character’s head and advancing the story. I feel like things are progressing a little slowly so far, but I just finished reading an urban fantasy novel today where there’s DEEP love thoughts in every chapter, and the series does crazy well (it’s got shades of paranormal romance, but not 100%). As far as my novel goes, I think I can get away with more than my “critical voice” is telling me.
My guiding light is continuing to steep readers in the character’s head using the five senses, even during narrative sections, and using clean seams with well-placed turns of thought. It keeps things moving. Then, end with sharp chapter endings to keep people turning the page.
ANOTHER WEIRD THING
I’ve been talking about how I’ve been curious how writer’s block would manifest itself. I reached a section in the novel where I wasn’t quite sure what would happen next. My instinct was to hop on the bike to see what would happen.
Sure enough, I had a good dictation session and didn’t experience blockage. The odd result though is that the scene came out a little strange (compared to previous sessions). Not sloppy, but thin. Because I wasn’t sure what I was going to say, it sounded really weird as I said it. It almost felt like I wasn’t speaking, honestly. Not sure how I feel about that. LOL. Ultimately though, there may be something to the phrase “speaking your way through uncertainty.”
THE GPS IS BEEPING WITH AN ETA
If this novel is 50,000 words, I’m approximately at the 21% mark. If it’s 40,000, I’m at the 26% mark. This means I’m rapidly approaching the first typical rough spot of a novel. I’m actually starting to feel it—I had some pangs of doubt about the story today. The critical voice is starting to speak to me and sow doubt.
What it’s saying:
#1: This isn’t urban fantasy.
#2: The story is moving too slowly.
#3: No one is going to care about the hero.
#4: You’re going to nail the cover but blow the story.
#5: No other author in the UF space is telling a story in this way.
The voice is getting louder which means that a rough spot is right around the corner.
The scary part is that part of the voice may be right, but I’ve got to keep charging forward and trusting my creative voice. There’s a reason my creative voice is leading me down this path. But, as usual, this is turning out to be a very different novel than I expected when I embarked on this project.
My #1 goal right now is to avoid getting trapped inside the theater of my mind and keep pushing forward.
PROGRESS TRACKER
Words: 5,336 (916 in session 1, 1100 in session 2, 1026 in session 3, 2294 typed by hand)
Calories: 150
Miles: 4.5
Time on bike: 90 minutes
TOTAL
Words: 10,762
Calories: 400
Miles: 12.0
Time on bike: 240 minutes (4 hours)
