Military Science Fiction

NaNoWriMo 2022 Reflections

Peter Germany Cat, Editing, Horror, Horror Writer, Life, Nanowrimo, Sci-Fi, Writing , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I wrote 50082 words for this years NaNoWriMo, hitting the target at about 9:40 last night.

This years NaNoWriMo got off to a slow start for me, I didn’t get caught up until the 23rd of the month, then I had a couple of days ahead of the goal, then a couple of days behind and then I brought it home on the last day.

It was a month where I was feeling like I was chasing the goal each day. My lowest word daily count was 247, while my highest was 4026.

The month started off with a busy schedule at the day job which didn’t leave me much time for wrangling the words. I’d write before work, then during my breaks and then get stuck in after I got home. Most of the time when I was writing at work I’d not really be able to get really in-depth with the work, but I did manage to get some words down. These feel more like I was thrashing out a synopsis of the scene/chapter I was working on. I’ve now got a lot of little synopsis to build from.

Other scenes I’ve managed to build a pretty solid part of the story which won’t need much tidying up when the time comes.

Where I’m at now is I’ve got a lot scenes scattered throughout the document and I’ve got to start figuring out how to connect them all. I don’t think it’s as bad as I might be fearing, but there is a bigger problem I’ve come up against. Originally I saw this as a three book arc, but was worried I wouldn’t have enough to fill three books. Now that I’ve started it, I think I’ve potentially got a lot more than three books worth of story to tell. I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me with this one.

This story, working title ‘War Child’ has been one I’ve been wanting to tell for quite some time, but have been intimidated by it. I feared I wasn’t capable yet to do it justice. But after some encouragement from friends and peers I decided to dive in head first. I’m so glad I did. This is going to be one where I think I am going to be pushed as a writer. I’ve spent so much of the last year trying to get stories finished and ready to either self-publish or submit I’ve forgotten what it’s like to begin crafting a new world.

Away from the writing part of NaNo I didn’t get much chance to host or even attend write-ins. Between the manic work schedule at the start of the month and a slow cash flow it just wasn’t on the cards. The one I did manage to host turned into a solo session. Which was okay, I got words down. It’d have been nice to get a few faces there though, hopefully next year I’ll be in a better position to be the ML I really want to be. I don’t feel like I’ve had the chance to step up how I want to. Between Covid and non-writing matters that have cropped up I’ve not really been able to dedicate the required time and effort to it that I’d have liked.

What’s next? I’m going to continue with War Child, but I also need to get The vampire book ready as I’ll be releasing that via the Welcome To My Nightmare tier on Ko-Fi. So I need to pull my finger out and get that final pass of edits done!

23rd Of November 2022

Peter Germany Editing, Horror, Horror Writer, Nanowrimo, Sci-Fi, Writing , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Good morning! I have sucked at blogging this month. I was planning to blog every two to three days but I’ve had a lot going on this month. Especially at the start of the month. I got behind quite early on and I’m almost back on course. I’ve managed to keep it about 5000 behind target and now I’m about 2000 words off.

I’m at 36007 words and think I can hit the target. I know I’ve got days where I won’t be writing, or if I am it’ll only be a few words. But there’s still a lot of time for me to get the words done. If I keep this momentum going then I’ll easily be able to make the 50k.

I’m not worried about that, what is on my mind at the moment is how many moving parts this story has. I knew it was going to be complicated when I started. I’ve always felt not ready to handle it. I have a hand written draft of fair chunk of this story somewhere but I knew it wasn’t what I envisioned. I didn’t exactly know what it needed to be, I just knew I wasn’t ready to write it. But, then I thought I wasn’t ready to write it twenty-three days ago and I’m thirty-six thousand words into it now, and there’s so much more I need to write that I planned for this book. I mean, a lot. I’ve barely scratched the surface with so much of it and I’m looking at it and thinking this is going to be either a really big book or I’m going to have to rethink my initial plan of this being a three book series. I was worried that I wouldn’t have enough material for a three book series, but depending on how this story goes will mean I need to rethink the entire series. I might even just write the whole thing out from A to Z and then break it down where it works the best.

But that’s something I need to think through, I might reach out to a couple of more experienced writers and see what they think.

I hope all of you are doing well. I don’t say this enough but I appreciate every view, like and comment. I write this blog for myself. It’s something I enjoy a lot and knowing people read my ramblings means a lot to me.

Right, I’m off to get some words written. Have an awesome day, folks!