Scrivener

January 1st, 2021…Up and Running!

Peter Germany Editing, Life, Outlining, Planning, Preparation, Writing , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Good evening! 3964 words edited on Black Blood this afternoon. I think it’s going to be a slow process, but if I’d done the note taking as I was writing it in the first place then I wouldn’t have to do it now.

I am also going to try and step up in my preparation for writing a story. I mentioned the other day that I’ve sketched a little of the location in a story I’m working on. Well, today I’ve printed maps out of the area and will be making notes on them and sketching out details for the story. It takes place in the future in a real town, so that’s helped a lot.

The way I’m seeing this developing I think it’s going to pay off really well all the background work I’m doing. I’ve had a lot of these thoughts for stories 8n the past but have failed at including them because I forget about them as I’m writing. So all these notes I’m taking I’m going to add them to the scene notes tab in Scrivener and hope I don’t forget them!

Right! That’s me done for the night. I’m going to watch the end of this movie (Spirited Away), and then call it a night. I’ve got an early start tomorrow so a good nights sleep is important.

Good night, and rock on!

A cold Dizzy!

Good Morning, 28th of December 2020

Peter Germany Cat, Editing, Horror, Horror Writer, Life, Mental Health, Outlining, Planning, Preparation, Writing , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I’ve kind of had a week off from writing. I was expecting to use it to get through the Christmas period but I didn’t need to in the end. Yes, it was still tough but thanks to all I’ve learnt, all the help and support I’ve had from the people I love in my life I was able to manage it better than I was expecting to.

Raven going for a majestic look 😊

I was also a little stuck with where I was taking Black Blood. I kept trying to add words but it was becoming very evident that I wasn’t prepared enough to finish this draft. So last night I began making notes. I didn’t start reading through the draft, I just copied some notes I’d scribbled down while writing the later stages of the story and did a few sketches. I’ve never really done the sketches, well not since Owen and I were working on From the Shadows a very long time ago. I found doing the couple I did last night really helpful, okay it brought a problem I hadn’t expected but I think I can find a way around that, or work it into the story.

I’m going to start the read through today, with the aim of having it done by the New Year. It’s a lick over 50k words and I think I can manage that. I’ve looked at my work rota and I definitely think it’s doable. Especially as I’m not going to be doing a full edit. This is a read through to figure out what I need to add and take away. What I need to do to get the ending how I want it, and to give it the depth and weight it deserves.

I think it’s also time to move this draft into Scrivener. It’s going to be helpful to be able to break it down into chapters and scenes and then I can insert or remove sections much easier. I can also have additional information that I’m compiling in there as well. I think that’s the way to go.

Right folks! I’ve got a little tidying before I can start working so I’m hopping off here. Have an awesome day!

1st Of December 2020

Peter Germany Editing, Life, Mental Health, Nanowrimo, Planning, Preparation, Writing , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I had some bad news today which took the wind out of my sails a little.

I had got some words written but I have tallied them up, and when I do I know it’s not going to be many.

I’m not going into details, it’s that one part of my life I don’t discuss in public spaces.

Back to the writing side of things. I did manage to set my goals for the month and put them on my dry/erase board. I’m thinking a lot about my NaNo story and the little details that’ll need adding in for the second draft. I’m probably going to finish this draft and then transfer it to Scrivener and back it down to scenes (haven’t got chapters sorted yet), and then I can rewrite the ones I know I need to and add and take anything else that it might require.

As with any NaNo project (well, of mine anyway!), I’ve got a lot of work to do on it to bring it up to an acceptable standard. The system I’m trying to refine is a four draft system: 1st draft, digital edit, paper edit, final draft. I’m not sure that’ll be how I end up working but that’s an aim at the moment. With a NaNo storey though, that first draft is going to be a lot tougher than a normal first draft. I’ve left maybe three quarters of the grammar and spelling mistakes and there’s a problems like characters being forgotten about, sub plots being left unresolved when I wasn’t intending for that to happen.

But, it’s NaNoWriMo. I know that’s the case. I know there’s a big cleanup coming and, honestly, I’m quite looking forward to it.

A Productive Day 2-4-17

Peter Germany Editing, Planning, Writing , , , , ,

I didn’t make a start on a short story like I was hoping but I did manage to knock out all the work I needed to do on the Fan Fiction piece. I created a Scrivener file, sorted the story into chapters and scenes, put my notes into the chapter/scene summary’s and added additional notes as I was going. I then added a few notes for scenes that I need to add to tie it all up, although I think some of that I’ll digress from when I come to writing them, but it’s a place to start.

I was working on this pretty much from mid-morning and didn’t finish till pushing seven this evening. Towards the end of that time I was drifting a little, but it felt really good getting so much done today.

I’m going to crack on this week with getting these edits done and try to get this fan fiction piece wrapped up. I’ll be outlining as well, and hopefully I’ll get on that short story.

I’m going to wrap up now, finish watching this episode of Red Dwarf and then get some reading done.

Good Morning

Peter Germany Editing, Writing , ,

In line with what I posted last night he’s a post 🙂 
I’ve not been up long and it looks a bit miserable out there today. I seriously doubt I’m going to get any words written today. Once I finish work at 3pm I’m going to wash my car (it’s at the point where the seldom used rear doors can’t open due to the build up of dirt). Then it’s home to clean out the henhouse and then I’m off out tonight with a couple of friends.

Tomorrow I’m thinking I may look at my vampire collection and start doing some of the edit notes for it. I may create a new Scrivener file for it as the current file isn’t the best format, I’d like to set it up so its in a novel with parts file for it. But that’s a minor detail and won’t take long.

As I said in my post last night I’m thinking about starting to type up what I’ve got written on the Avoiding The Game rewrite, so I may begin that tomorrow as well. All that will be after I’ve washed a motor home.
Have a good and productive day everyone 🙂 

A Productive Day

Peter Germany Editing, Writing , , , ,

Despite what I wrote here yesterday I didn’t do any writing at all. I spent the day playing Football Manager and watching the score lines from the final day of the premier league season coming in.

Yes, I felt bad and very lazy about this.

Today though, I wrote 3100 words by about 1pm and then this afternoon I read through some Beta Reader notes for my vampire collection.

I emailed the latest, completed chapter off to Owen and I’m eagerly waiting to see what he thinks.

Now, as I said yesterday I think I’m only going to be able to work on Project Apollo when I have access to the Scrivener files, so why I’m on my lunch breaks at work I’m going to get back to working on the Avoiding The Game rewrite and I’m going to try and write on Project Apollo in the evenings. At worst I’m going to try and get a few thousand words done on Sundays.

But I’ll see how that goes 🙂

Ready, Set, GO!

Peter Germany Life, Writing ,

Good morning all. I had last night off from the writing. Once I’d gotten home from work and sorted the henhouse out and had a bath and dinner and tidied up a little it was pushing 8pm so I decided to rest my brain a little. That does mean I’m already behind on my 1000 words a day target but hey, I’ve got time to make it up and I’m being realistic here. If I do manage to end the year with an average of 1000 words a day that’ll be something close to a personal miracle.

So today, I am gearing up to do some words. I’m writing this post to get my brain firing a little and see if it helps get those first few words written when I open up Scrivener.  I’d like to get a decent chunk of words written this morning so it leaves my afternoon open. I’ve got a few little jobs that I keep putting off that I’d like to do today (that’s not going to happen but if I say I’m going to try it makes me feel like I’m making an effort 😛 ).

That all said, I’m off to get writing. What’s everyone else up to today?

Putting Notes Together

Peter Germany Planning , ,

I’d set aside tonight to work on putting together all my electronic and handwritten notes that I have on The Residents, and I’ve got to say how much easier it is putting all of the data together. Chrystalyn and I have spent many hours brainstorming (a quick ten minute brainstorming on Skype often turns into at least an hour conversation) and we’ve got a lot of the world building and character work done. The story is pretty well thought out as well and I think the next big part of that is working out a timeline for the story. That’s not something I’ve done so I need to look into it a little and see what tips I can pick up.

I still need to get the handwritten notes added to the file and work my way through the files to clear out any repetition that there is bound to be in all the copy and pasting I’ve done tonight. A lot of the notes I’ve got are a little cluttered so there is some repetition that I need to work through. But I’ll do that once I’ve been through and added all my hand written notes, and then it’s off to Chrystalyn so she can add anything I’ve missed 🙂

Finding The Best Approach

Peter Germany Books, Editing, Insperation, Life, Vampires, Writing , , ,

Despite wishing I was more able to at least do a little planning I am a discovery writer and I think it’s something I will always be, but since using Scrivener I think I’ve found out something about my method.
My current WIP, I’ve had sitting gaining dust since I first started it in 2009, has always been a collection of short stories that tie in together. I hope the way I’ve written them means you can read them on their own, but me being the control freak I am I’m putting them together in their correct timeline and will hopefully release them as a single volume. So having some sort of organisation as to what happens during the course of these stories was needed. Most of my ideas for how they built to an end game were kind of hazy, but since I’ve got Scrivener and since I’ve taken the decision to throw myself into my writing how I should have down three years ago, I can see where I want to go with them.
This is the first real project I’ve tackled with Scrivener and I’m glad I choose this one as it does allow me to set the individual stories into a proper timeline and it’s very easy to put notes into the sections further down the line. For example: in one story I have a character who later on will be the subject of an investigation and there were certain elements that sprung to mind as I was writing an earlier part of her story. So normally I’d rely on either memory or a postik note, neither of which work especially well for me, but with scrivener I can go to the section in the file where the later events will take place and write these little details in the notes section of the file.
I can also tweak the simple synopsis’ for later stories as I’m going and I can jump between the ten different sections I have for this collection without having to open up ten separate windows.

What does this have to do with being a plotter or a pantser I hear you ask; well, it means I’ve noticed that as I’m writing I’m planning events that will happen further down the line. Looking back I’ve always done this, but I’m slow and I’m just sussing it out now.

 

The last two months I have really thrown myself into my writing, the last month in particular and I’m actually feeling like I can write again. For so long I’ve felt like I’d lost something, I think that was that spark of creation and a lot of self belief. Since the middle of March I’ve written two complete short stories and two chapters on Project Apollo, I’ve also read through and edited six other short stories. All in just under three months. All I have to do now is keep this focus, this determination because its time I pulled this altogether. With that I am getting a little help. My local Facebook NaNo group is incredibly supportive and welcoming. I have friends who are writers that have always been there to support me.

I’m finally feeling good and excited about my writing again, it’s been far to long since I’ve had this feeling.

 

A Flash Post

Peter Germany Books, Editing, Short Fiction, Vampires, Writing , , ,

Evening all; this is just going to be a small, quick little post (so ignore all typos and other mistakes I’ve made).

I’ve already adjusted the order my vampire series so it fits better into the timeline. Thankfully I’ve only had to move two stories about and one of them doesn’t have anything in it which I’ve had to change to fit in better. It’s a pretty self sustained little story that one.

After going through the first of the collection on Sunday it occurred to me that I have a character that’s mentioned who docent appear anywhere else in the series, so I’ve fixed that.

What I’ve come to realise as I’m working my way through these is that I’m going to need to go over them all again and make sure the continuity is good and in building, and giving the characters some more depth in their back stories as well as getting the surrounding details accurate.

After loosing last night to writing 950 which I’ve trashed today I’m at least a day behind where I wanted to be and I think I’m going to have to revise my expectations a little as I’ve got more work to do. Scrivener is helping a lot; It’s made me think of the bigger picture and it’s giving me an easy way to make notes in the one file so when I come to need them I don’t have to go looking for them in different folders.

That’s enough rambling for one night. I’m going to dive into a book then bed. Come tomorrow evening I need to get dome plotting done.