The Ready Writer

Hello! I haven't fallen off the face of the planet, just busy with 2.5 jobs and trying to get some writing in.  Actual writing trumps writing ABOUT writing.  But here is where I currently stand. I haven't touched my main project in months which has actually been a good thing for me. I've been reading, working on short stories, and generally just thinking about who I am as a writer and that has done me a lot of good. As I grow older, I find myself really trying to take the time to think introspectively and to think about who I am now, and who I want to grow to be.  This is especially good for me while I try to craft and create my writers "voice."   So, let me introduce myself: I am a horror writer. My influences come heavily from American Southern Gothic literature and American Spiritualism.   And knowing that now, my writing is taking shape. I'm finding my voice. All this time I didn't think I had a writing voice, but I do! I have ...

Hello, Hello! Camp Nanowrimo Update:  4592 words. American Gothic Update: This series will be coming in May.  April is tooooo hectic for me to be able to pen it out, but its coming next month :)  For my post today, I just wanted to share a couple of small things that have inspired me lately.  I wouldn't say that I am in a slump, but words are flowing a little slower than usual.  Maybe its because I'm a writer with 2 day jobs, or because I'm working 6-7 days a week.  I dunno.  It doesn't matter in the scheme of things. As many of you know, I'm working on my first novel projects.  One that I plan on publishing traditionally, and one that I plan on publishing serially.  But as a short story writer, I feel very much out of my comfort zone.  A friend of mine came last summer and helped me immensely with the outlining process (which is not the same for everyone, but I didn't even know where to start). But outlining is ...

I have written about writing resistance before, but seeing as I am currently in a slump, I thought I would bring the topic up again. I'm having some troubles with a short story. I wrote one for a deadline and because I had only finished the draft the day it was due for submission, I didn't get a chance to edit it.  It got rejected (which wasn't a huge shocker to me), and quite frankly I was a little relieved because that meant that I could polish it. I found another place that was accepting submissions, so I thought "Perfect!" and I got to editing. Only I wasn't really editing.  I was just cutting. My story was well over the word limit for this particular journal, so I just started cutting.  I chopped and chopped and chopped and eventually I just had a collection of fragmented sentences that were sort of going in a direction, but not really telling a story.  In the midst of all of this cutting, I missed the deadline for that journal too. So I scr...

Hello everyone! Just a quick writing update before I head for vacation later this week.  There probably won't be an update next Monday, and the usual Weekly Writing Progress posts will resume in March (I'll do another quick update before then). As I've mentioned, I am in rewrites for my main project.  I finished the rewrite of chapter one (and it is somewhere just over 2,000 words). While my rewrite is going better than I anticipated (now that I know the direction that I want to go), I still find that writing long is difficult. I'm so used to writing short stories, that when I try to write something long, I know I tend to ramble. I am sure that is something that will get better the more the write and the more I practice but for right now its a fine line for me between writing not enough, and just sort of...rambling. I've never been one for what I like to call "fluffy" language. I don't like a lot of extra detail, but at the same time, this ha...

So I have to confess that I haven't been the best at writing so far this year.  And yes, I know that the year is still young.  I DID submit a short story in January, and that is exciting, but I haven't done much else. Here are my excuses: -New Years Party -Grandfather Passed Away -Water Heater Leaked -Been working lots of extra hours since my SO lost his job -Applied and interviewed for a job that I really wanted and then didn't get it (which put me in a bad place) -My Birthday Okay. Got that out of the way. But things are on the upswing. My SO starts his new job in March, I'll be back in town (I'm going out of town to visit family in a couple of weeks) and my hours at both jobs will be back to normal (ish). I know I already stated my writing goals in a previous post.  But I'm committing to it (again). Right now. I'm in the process of re-writing the ENTIRE first act of my novel so it works with the plan I have for the next 2 third...

I can't believe it is time for another writing update! I hate to say, but I've been in sort of a slump.  I haven't worked on my main project in a few weeks, and I've been writing sporadically on a short story in 50-100 word chunks. Part of it is because I'm working a lot, so I just write when I can squeeze in a few moments, and its easier for me to work on my short story in tiny chunks than my main project. But another part of it is because I'm just...tired. Between my 2 jobs I've been working full time, and when you work one job that you hate, and another job that you feel stuck in, it feels like a LOT more than 40 hours, and all of that leads to writing resistance. At the beginning of the year, I did a tarot card spread for myself and it told me that the one thing that will make this year successful for me is moderation.  For me, this doesn't necessarily mean cutting out things that I want to do, but rather it means allowing myself to not do ...

Hello Readers! Sorry I have been away.  Last week was sort of...well...not great.  But I did get a little bit of work done. I am in the process of typing up Act I.  I have typed up chapter one so far.  As I type up Act I, I have some goals I want to hit: Delete all of the other POVs except for one of them.  I was attempting to do a multiple POV thing, and I didn't like it, and so I have decided to do it from a single POV.  I know this means that I am going to be deleting like, half of what I have hand written, but that's how writing goes sometimes.  And overall, I think it will help my book be better. Change one of my characters from a mystical/fantasy type character to more of a mortal psychic character.  My character needs to be "gifted" but she was feeling a little too deus ex machina for my taste, so I'm tweaking her a bit. This doesn't seem like a tremendous amount of work, but I'm not quite ready to do big edits yet.  I'm j...

So its the last day of NaNoWriMo and while I am nowhere close to 50,000 words, I am proud to have written close to 4,500. Why? Well, I started working on my main project in July,  and I finished the first Act in October at AROUND 8,000 words. I have written over half of what I wrote in 3 months, in just one. That's because I am working that writing muscle. It isn't a surprise that writing everyday is the best thing to do if you want to be a writer. But as someone with 2 jobs and somewhat of a social life, that can be hard. So I try to write as often as I can.  I used the fun frantic energy of NaNoWriMo to test myself, and to see if I could still squeeze writing in at any possible moment I could even if that meant just taking 5 minutes to write 50 words as opposed to sitting down for an hour and seeing how much I could write. And it helped! I find that I am getting better at getting focused faster, words come a little better, and my writing chunks are getting a litt...

So on Election Day (or the day after, rather), I expressed the thought that I may have to scrap my main project because of my villain. I have since decided against that. I think now more than ever, I need to write this story. I am going to make some pretty big changes to the story.  I'm taking out some of the fantastical, making it less traditional apocalyptic horror and more occult horror.  My villain will be less of a political ruler, and more of a religious one, that was able to take over the government, and instead of doing it from multiple points of view, I'm picking one character to tell the story from. However, I still think that this story will be an important one.  I'm separating it from my original idea, because honestly I don't know if I can write it.  It's not that I don't want to, or am too scared to create a political rift, but I just don't think I'm strong enough.  This election is a very emotional one for me, and I'm already har...

So I am still on hiatus from my main project, but that doesn't mean I'm not writing. In order to keep my horror writer brain sharp, I am doing the following: Working on my "affair" or "backburner" project .  This allows me to distance myself from my main project so that I can come back to it ready to edit critically (and next week I'll talk about what those edits will entail). Reading.   I'm a firm believer (but not the only one that believes it) that in order to be a good writer, you have to be a good reader (and by good, I mean participating in the act of those activities). So I am reading a lot of horror and seeing what the greats (as well as the newbies) are doing in the world of horror.  If you want to see what I'm reading, you can friend me on Goodreads.  You can find me under my full name: Brystan Strong. Research. This may fall into both the previous category and the next one, but I'm doing scholarly research on the genr...

So I finished Act I of my novel! Yay!  It's somewhere along 8,000 words.  My last 2 chapters are more notes than actual prose because I realized that I needed to make some shifts, so I didn't want to write chapters that would ultimately most likely just get thrown out.  So, now I'm taking a month off from that project (so I can distance myself a bit from it, and be able to edit a little more critically.) In the meantime, I am participating in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), and working on my "affair project". Here's the thing.  I love NaNo. I have participated in it off and on since I was in high school, I was a municipal liaison once, and have made a lot of friends doing it, but I have NEVER made it to 50,000 words.  I've always burnt out.  And I won't make the wordcount again this year either.  But the issue I was having before was that I was using Nano as a means to finish a project. And I just don't work that way.  Not onl...

So I really liked the last stats post where it felt more like a chat rather than just a list of numbers, so that may be how I do it from now on. I wrote 778 words over the course of the last 2 weeks, which isn't a tremendous amount, but I was also on vacation during one of those weeks and didn't do any writing (though I had hoped to). This brings my total project word count to 8,996. But I did finish chapter 5 and started chapter 6 which is awesome.  I'm still working towards the goal of finishing Act 1 by the end of the month.  I know the editing process is going to be a long one, but studying the genre, and also writing those little flash horror stories have helped me to get my voice back a little bit.  I think I mentioned it in the last post, but I had been struggling with that a little bit during this book.  Not sure if its the length, or the fact that its my first dystopia, or what it was, but the tone and overall voice of this first Act is...messy....

Hello everyone! So I didnt track how many words I wrote each day, but I did write a total of 764 words last week which brings my total project wordcount to 8,218 words. I do have some goals for the month of October.  I want to finish Act 1 by the end of the month, I'm just finishing Chapter 4 right now and according to my outline, Act 1 should carry me through the first 8 chapters.  This means some intense writing days, but I think I'm ready for it.  Right now I'm a little disappointed with my small word count, but I'm halfway through act 1 now and am a little over 8000 words, so I'm gonna shoot for Act 1 being twice that.  And if each Act is 16,000 words, I'll hit right around the 50,000 word first draft I was originally shooting for, so I'm gonna try not to stress too much. The reason for the Halloween deadline is because... ...I want to participate in NaNoWriMo.  I miss the frantic off the cuff writing.  No outlines, no rules, just crazy writing....

Okay, here are the stats: Monday August 22: +100 words Tuesday August 23: No Writing Wednesday August 24: +107 words Thursday August 25: +100 words Friday August 26: No Writing Saturday August 27: No Writing Sunday August 28: +325 words Total words written this week: 632 words Total project word count: 6702 So this week wasn't my best.  I worked 6 days and 2 of them were 13 hour days, and right now I am not good at fitting writing into stressful days, which I know is something that I need to work on.  But this last week was much better! Monday August 29: +175 words Tuesday August 30: No Writing Wednesday August 31: +158 words Thursday September 1: +115 words Friday September 2: +126 words Saturday September 3: No Writing Sunday September 4: +124 words Total words written this week: 698 words Total project word count: 7400 Okay, so I didn't do as well as I thought, now that I've counted the wor...

This week was another good week! Here are the stats: Monday: +104 words (started Chapter 3) Tuesday: +138 words Wednesday: +171 words Thursday: No Writing Friday: +125 words Saturday: +131 words Sunday: +317 words Total Words Written This Week: 986 words Total Project Wordcount: 6070 This was a good week!  I got through chapter 2 which is kind of sluggish, which is something that future Brystan has to worry about. I started Chapter 3, which is gonna be a good one, but one that will push my writing skills.  I am NOT a speech writer, however, one of my characters has to give a very powerful speech.  I wrote the speech, but looking back, it is pretty sparse.  It's just the skeleton of what I want it to be.  But, once Act I is done (which according to my outline is the first 8 chapters) then I start edits, so I am looking forward to fleshing that out and adding the meat to the bones. Anyway.  New goals for t...

Sorry for the late stats post this week.  I'm battling a cold and we had a big remodel in our apartment on Monday.  But here it is! Monday: +135 words Tuesday: +137 words Wednesday: +138 words Thursday: No Writing Friday: +128 words Saturday: +121 words Sunday: +222 words AND I finished Chapter 2! Total Words Written This Week: 881 Total Project Word Count: 5,084 Yay! Hit 5k! Also I accomplished ALL of the goals I set for the week. You know the old saying "If it aint broke, don't fix it."?  Well, I'm going by that this week.  Goals are the same: 6 days a week, 100 words each session.

It is amazing that I got ANY writing in this week, but here are the stats: Monday: +118 words Tuesday: +93 words Wednesday: No Writing Thursday: +148 words Friday: +112 words Saturday: +148 words Sunday: No Writing Total Words Written This Week: 619 words Total Project Word Count: 4,203 words I'm pretty upset that I didn't hit ANY of my goals this week.  I didn't write at least 6 days, I didn't write 1200 words, and I didn't hit 100 words per writing session. Also, I didn't finish chapter 2 (but I'm REALLY CLOSE) This was a pretty bad writing week.  But, similar to last week, it was an AWESOME friends week full of spontaneous road trips, the beach, fun centers, late night pie excursions, church picnics, and movie nights.  This is what summer is supposed to be made of.  I also had a job interview (update: didn't get the job) and did some work on our patio, and lots of working out. Do I need to learn to be more assertive with...

So, this last week wasn't the best writing week for me, but it was an awesome friends week.  Sometimes treasure hunting, spontaneous road trips, and s'more surprise parties just have priority over writing.  Sometimes.  Anyway, here are the stats: Monday: +202 words Tuesday: No Writing Wednesday: +132 words Thursday: No Writing Friday: No Writing Saturday:  +173 words Sunday: +435 words Total Word Count: 3584 words Word Count for the Week: 942 words So I didn't win Camp NaNoWriMo this time around.  But that's okay.  I've outlined a novel, finished chapter 1 and am 2/3 the way through chapter 2.  I'm happy with what I've accomplished. I also didn't accomplish the goals I set for the week.  So I will keep them for this week. Goals: 1220 words this week. Finish Chapter 2 Write at least 100 words per writing session Write 6 days (at least) this week.

A pretty successful week this week! Monday: +241 words  Tuesday: +118 words Wednesday: +114 words Thursday: No Writing Friday: +179 words AND I finished Chapter 1 Saturday: +319 words Sunday: +232 words Current Status: Chapter 1 is done at 2091 word and chapter 2 is started Total word count: 2642 Words written this week:1203 Camp NaNoWriMo update: At this rate you'll finish August 17 (better than September!) I accomplished my goal of writing 6 days this week, and for each of those writing times to be over 100 words.   I'm making strides and getting words down.  No new goals for this coming week.  I wrote 1203 words this last week. Working for 1220 this week.  We'll see what happens!

Hello everyone!  Here is my writing progress for the week.  Remember, I am only working on the one project, which I am currently calling "Project Reboot". Monday July 11: +188 words Tuesday July 12: No Writing Wednesday July 13: +256 words Thursday July 14: No Writing Friday July 15: +309 words Saturday July 16: +84 words Sunday July 17: +239 words Weekly Words Written: 1076 Total Words to date: 1439 Current Status: About halfway through Chapter 1. Camp NaNoWriMo Update:  Remember, my goal this month was to write 5000 words, and camp nanowrimo says that "at this rate I'll reach 5000 words on September 2nd." omg. No.  Hafta step up my game!! Some Goals: 1. I want to be writing AT LEAST 6 days a week.  I'm giving myself 1 day off because my Tuesdays are crazy.  But ultimately, until my schedule calms down and I can write 7 days a week, I want to write 6. 2.  I want to write at least 100 words during t...