Friday, June 1, 2018

Started writing chapter headings by Joseph Cambermire as they come to me.

I'd sort of decided that I probably shouldn't even write any book without these chapters headings. I have a strange ability there, maybe it comes from writing blogs every day for a dozen years; short, succinct stories with beginnings, middles, and ends.

Anyway, I still have to write the last few chapters of the book, but meanwhile, I've decided that I will set out to revise the book right away when I finish. While it is a great idea to wait a month or two, in terms of perspective, I find that I also lose a lot of my interest. (Which, is sort of the point. Being cold-blooded about what works and what doesn't.) But worse, in waiting I find I don't want to do it, so that's not much good.

So I'm going to start right in. I have the usual changes to the first half of the book to match the second half of the book, plus the one major change of making the protagonist the son of the man who set this all in motion, instead of the man himself.

Makes him more of an underdog, more of a sympathetic character.

Then I'm going to start researching the themes of the book, and adding those insights and info into the story, which will make it slightly more science-fictionish.

My guess is the book will end up between 90 and 100k words, which is pretty much where I want it. It looks like it's going to take between 3 and 4 months to do the whole book, which is longer than usual, but I've decided to try to settle in on that pace. Working Mondays at the store, reserving Tuesdays for Linda and me time, giving myself time for inspiration.

What's the rush, right?

It's probably a silly book, but as usual, as I'm writing it, it's my favorite.

2 comments:

Dave Cline said...

Maybe it's just me, but writing a novel -- for you -- seems to be just too damn easy. Bang, bang, bang. I can't keep up. I started reading (the remainder) of Summer House last night on my kindle, and I'm like 2 or 3 behind already... Sheesh, give a guy a break, won't you? (grin)

So, by all means, pick something REALLY DAMN HARD to write about and take a frickin' year to research and write it. OK?

Duncan McGeary said...

The only problem is that for me to write, I need to be fully engaged or not at all. I never could do it part-time. (Hence working the store for 25 years without writing.)

If I'm fully engaged, then I write at a certain pace, and that produces books.

So works for me works against me.