Over the Hump ...

The month is half over, I've written a bit more than 30,000 words and the story is probably less than halfway done. Following Chris Baty's advice in his book (No Plot, No Problem,available here) for week three, I've started attempting to leapfrog through this novel so I actually reach the end of the novel somewhere aroung the 50,000 word mark. This means writing some scenes, but leaving others as brief descriptions. E.g. [Main Character travels to X by boat. It's cold and wet. Someone gets eaten by the sea monster.] Then write some more. Throw in some more short scene references. Keep going. This process does move the story along, but sometimes leaves me feeling like I've left out important stuff. Still, Chris does give the writer permission to go back later, after the 50,000 word deadline was reached at the end of the novel and there's still time left in the month, to go back and start filling in those sketched in scenes.

So, I figure I'm really kind of sketching in the plot in this draft. Trying to get the whole story down inside of 50,000 words, leaving out some detail, but including enough that I can go back later and have something to actually revise. And more importantly, a whole novel at the end of the month. If I'd continued as I had been, I would have hit 50,000 words about halfway through the novel and probaby continued past the November 30th deadline before finding the end of the story. This way will be more challenging, but the increased pressue to get the thing DONE may help keep the internal editor at bay.

Now, my editor is getting some work these days, on posts like this, on work related projects, but she is getting time off while I work on the novel. Instead of shipping the editor off to the Internal Editor's Spa and Retreat Kennel for the month, it's more like she gets sent off to a sound-proofed room in the attic for a mini-vacation, complete with any amenities she wants while I'm slogging away at the novel. A compromise that' s mostly working.