Mellisonant March - 500 words/day, all genres welcome!

Primping my proposal. Added 198 words to the sample chapters and 824 words to the synopsis, which my agent wanted me to flesh out a bit. It's a tad wordy now, so tomorrow I'll work on making it more concise. Still hoping to email it to my agent on Friday.

I haven't done crap since I finished the proofreading. (Well, I did edit 2 poems and finished the rewrite of a scene from an older project...) I'm still just trying to relax and just be for awhile.

982 words this morning. WIP now stands at 10,000 words and I have reached that stage where I think it's complete rubbish.

But I press on. Because hopefully this feeling will pass soon.

Revised a few chapters in the middle. The new material I added before it has messed up the pacing and now I need to rejigger. It will involve losing some good material, but I'm choosing to see that as an opportunity to play with the same tension and emotions in a new way.

1,400 words this morning.

And I finally have a dead body!

Still tweaking my proposal. Although I might start twerking it instead, if that would better my odds. Somehow I doubt it.

Shara - Yay for the dead body!

Liz - I had the same issue with the revision I just finished. Lots of rewriting looming. I tried to take it one page at a time. Or I'd drive myself batty.

BfloGal - A twerking manuscript would be interesting.


So, got two fun projects going on: creating my cover and writing my blurb. The cover's close to being done. I just need to find some sci-fi thingies like on FT's cover (<---over yonder) or something to make it look more sci-fi. Fun fact: The stock art? I've had it purchased for two years. Yep, and it fits the MC perfectly.

Blurbing sucks, though. I'm not very good at it, and...I just want a blurb that hooks the reader. If I can manage that, I'd be good.

Personal deadline met. Sample chapters and synopsis sent to my agent.

Now taking the weekend off!

Ugh, fallen behind the last couple of days, only writing 200-300 words.

But back on track today with 1,100 words on a new short story. Maybe more if inspiration strikes me later.

Liz - The first draft of my WIP that's releasing in May was 139k. I managed to trim it down to 133k. So...maybe yours needs to be 130k.

Congrats BfloGal!

Sara K - Still, progress is progress, and I'm glad you got more today!


Ugh, been fighting nausea for the past 3 days. Joy.

Still futzing with the cover and blurb. My awesome editor came up with something that will work, so that *might* be the final blurb. Maybe.

The cover? I found some doo dads that look sorta like the ones on the FT cover, and made a "practice" cover and put them on and...I'm not convinced it looks good. I think it they stick out too much, b/c this stock art is cleaner than the one I used for FT. If that makes any sense. Even so, I'd like to see a rough finished version before making a ruling. So, that's been my week. *bangs head against keyboard*

lizmonster said:

Most of the edits make perfect sense to me, but some of them are misreads of characters (which suggests maybe I need to make some things more clear)

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Yes, clarify those things.

and some of them just trip up the rhythm of the language.

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Then they don't work.

I've never done this before. I don't know if the answer is going to be "Tough; change it anyway,"

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Unlikely. I suspect that if it was something they felt strongly about, they would have mentioned in a letter to you rather than leave you to come across it in the ms without a hint of "hey, this is really important!"

Great progress, everyone! Any words in a day are good words. I wrote more than 3,500 yesterday, all history scenes. They are apparently all of the words because none are percolating today. Doesn't mean I shouldn't look at my revisions. Because history scenes don't make progress happen the way actual revisions on the actual WIP do. Funny.

Thanks for the encouragement, Saoirse and lizmonster!

Hope everything gets better - your nausea (just the worst!) and your annoyance with the cover, Saoirse! Sounds like a stressful time! And the same for you, lizmonster, and the trouble your having with the edits! I'm sure you can reach a balance with your agent or editor. I took am doing Camp NaNo - going to be exciting, if nothing else!

Wrote 1,083 words tonight - some on a new story, that'll probably be a flash, inspired by a dream. The rest went on the short I started the other day, and my first dabbling in sword & sorcery.

970 words this morning, and now off to the day job.

Words is words. Even if I suspect they're rubbish words.

I have been having words. Not many words, but words.

Really, though, I'm here just to shout a big

YOU CAN DO IT!

for anyone who needs it. Because you can.

Best of luck everyone!

Thanks, osg. I sure needed that. I've been stalled on both of my projects. I did some freewriting yesterday and I have something to work with. Finally.

I have edits waiting on my teaser which I'm avoiding b/c my muse is more sensitive than I thought. That's part of the reason why I'm stalled. But it must be done...eventually.

lizmonster said:

47-1/2/59. So not a ton of progress tonight. Hit an editing note that makes me think "REALLY? DID I REALLY NOT GET ACROSS THE ENTIRE POINT OF THE STORY HERE???" so I'm quitting for now.

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Seems like a good place to pause.

Saoirse, you will kick out of your stall.

OSG, good job on the words!

I'm working on revisions and hit a wall that actually helps me to clarify what I need to remove from a preceding chapter. It's too bad that I really like that material, but since I get to keep something else that would have messed things up more for not being there, it's a tolerable *whimper* compromise.

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY! Drink and be merry!

(I am very Irish, as if you couldn't tell).

Namatu - Thanks. I'm starting to come out of it now. Freewriting helps. Hugs on the compromise -- it sucks to toss good stuff, but maybe you can use it elsewhere.