Tag Archives: Twitter

Rabbit versus Snail: who edits quickest?

12 Sep
Snail race

Image by nojhan via Flickr

Oh, THAT’S Where I Left My Track!.

It’s so easy to be distracted.  And, even with the best of intentions, sometimes life just takes over.  Or ‘the day job’ does.

In their fabulous blogpost S.C.Green blogs about how easy it is to delay productivity and get pulled off track.  At the end he asks the question “Have you ever got derailed and struggled your way back?”  It got me to thinking about my writing process …

I’m one of those people who plans upfront, then once I’ve got the chapter outline sorted, writes the first draft at full pace.  My current WIP first draft took three months start to finish.

And then comes the editing.  The second draft seemed to go slow – editing out all the unnecessary waffle and clichés I’d put in as I sped through the first draft.  But, if the second draft was snail-like in speed compared to the rabbit-like first draft, the third draft is an elderly snail who gets out of breath after less than a minute!

So, there’s no doubt about it, for me editing is a long haul task.  And the thing about long haul is it’s super easy to get distracted – Twitter, Facebook, a new novel by one of my favourite authors, the garden, whatever! The payoff takes such a long time with editing it gets me yearning for something more immediate.

But, as S.C.Green says, no matter how many excuses I can come up with, the editing isn’t going to do itself.  Meaning – however slow an editing snail I am, I have to keep focusing on my track or I’ll never reach my destination.

I guess that’s the thing with writing – you’ll never be a novelist unless you actually finish the damn thing!

Happy writing :-)

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To Comp or Not to Comp?

13 Aug

Do you enter writing competitions?

A couple of years ago, back when I’d just started writing stories, I did a creative writing course.  The course assignments were to write short stories, and so at the end of the six month course I had a handful of them and was left wondering what to do next.

Now I was still very green in terms of the world (and craft) of writing, but having been enthused by my tutor’s encouraging comments and a decent course score, I decided to enter my stories into a few competitions.

I didn’t do too badly, a couple got good placings and a few others reached various shortlists.  But the stories (and my style) were very much apprentice work.

Inspired to improve, I’ve been on a steep learning curve ever since – using courses, feedback and conversation with fellow aspiring authors to develop my writing.  So it’s been a while since I entered a competition.

But when I  stumbled across the summary of writing competitions at http://www.writersdigest.com/competitions/writing-competitions the sight of all those fabulous opportunities made me think, perhaps I could write a short story and enter one.

I’d just grabbed my notepad and started jotting down ideas when it hit me; I was getting sidetracked.  I’d happily followed the link from Twitter to the writing competitions, forgetting why I’d sat down at my laptop in the first place!  I’d planned to spend time on  the third draft of my novel.  After all, those revisions aren’t going to do themselves!

But that unexpected link has reminded me, short stories (and competitions) can be fun.  Maybe, as I bask in the joy of a completed third draft, I’ll let myself write a short story.  Just for the fun of it.

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Business Card Facelift: The ‘Tweetcard’

10 Mar

My business cards have arrived!

But there’s something rather different about them.  When considering my options for business cards to give out to the people I meet at the York Festival of Writing – organised by the fabulous Writers Workshop
http://www.writersworkshop.co.uk/festivals/index.shtml
 – I discovered a new and exciting option – Tweetcards!

They’re like business cards, but funkier.  Instead of the usual stuff like name, address etc, these cards have your Twitter name, your blog and your email address on – all the stuff a modern writer needs to communicate.

I knew the moment I saw them that they were exactly what I needed.

So, I signed up immediately via GoodPrint’s – www.goodprint.co.uk – speedy online service and less than twenty quid and a few days later my Tweetcards arrived.

Not only do they look awesome, they’re cute, to the point, and colourful.  Absolutely perfect for all that networking I’ll be doing with other writers at York.

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Aiming high: how many words a day?

6 Sep

Words-per-day.  Just about every book about writing tells you it’s good to have a target.  Something to aim for.  Something that helps you step away from Twitter, YouTube and all the other fabulous, shiny distractions available and write, actually write, your novel.

But what should that word count be?

Well, Wikipedia (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiction
) states professional writers usually produce 500 to 1,000 words a day.   But, this doesn’t seem to be the case for everyone.  In the Guardian article Ten Rules for Writing Fiction (
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/20/10-rules-for-writing-fiction-part-two
 ) Sarah Waters gives her daily minimum as 1000 – sandwiched between Graham Greene’s 500 and Jean Plaidy’s 5,000.   And, of course, Stephen King is well known for his 7-days-a-week daily target of 2,000 words.

But these are professional writers, what about us aspiring authors?

For myself, writing between full-time work and other commitments, I average around 400 a day during the week, with extra at the weekend (depending on how social I am).  Pretty good, right?

Wrong.  On the dynamic twitter feed #amwriting I see people achieving way, way more.  1,000 words, 2,000 words and above are all common place.  It makes me feel quite inadequate!

So, I decided to set myself a stretch goal.  I’ve taken a deep breath and signed up for NatNoWriMo.

If you’ve not already heard of it NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month to give its full name, is an annual event that’s been running since 1999.  The goal, and it’s a big one, is to write a novel in a month.  Sounds impossible right?  But last year 167,150 around the globe took part.  32,173 even succeeded.

The aim is to write 50,000 words in a month.  November to be precise.  There’s a load of advice and guidance on their website
http://www.nanowrimo.org
 and online forums galore.  All available for free, to help us budding writers keep going through the pain barrier as our exhausted fingers begin to fuse to the keyboard.

And exhausted we will be.  Splitting the goal into a daily target, in November I’ll be aiming to average 1,666 words a day, that’s roughly 12,500 per week.

So, stock up on the groceries, unplug the telly and hold the phones.  NaNoWriMo … I’m ready!

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