My Latest Endeavours

A week ago today I uploaded the prologue to a novel yet to be completed. Since then I have written a general outline and a plan for that novel, and since then I have written the first 2 chapters, the project currently clocking in at around 14,700 words, which is quite impressive given that I only started writing this project 7 days ago. Although back in November/December 2013 I wrote the ending to this particular project, I didn't re-start it from the beginning until a week ago now, which is what brings me to the crux of this post. I've often wondered how novelists are able to write a full book, edited and shelved, within a single year (of course they already have a publisher and agent most likely, plus experience etc.,) which is when I thought about an experiment.

Writing Order

You see, when I wrote SKYSCARR (began August 2011, finished the first draft July 2013,) I already had an idea for the ending in mind and had also sketched out the entire storyline just as I've done with this new project, but this time I made a slight twist that I think has made a great difference: To write the ending first! Now this of course is only mildly different to what I had previously done with sketching the outline and therefore describing the progress of the narrative, but alas, this is not very effective for me and I will tell you why. The reason, I believe, is not so much to do with story progression, but rather character development, because when you write that final chapter there is the final product right in front of you, the character living and breathing as I want to see him in the end, his responses to the situations as I wanted to see him and everything that I would otherwise look forward to, over and done with.

Yes, I know, I've squashed the primary anticipation of when the story ends -I hope- rather poignantly, but this is but a small price to pay for keeping a clear head as I make my way through the novel, which I think makes one stay on track, to keeps one's wits about the story so as to not make shortcuts that might otherwise ruin the story and crush the excitement as a result of lazy, sloppy writing, because the writer was focusing too much on the endgame. Always remember folks that if you write badly to begin with and the novel's dry and stale, then why should a dear reader stay with you from chapter 1 through 20. Just a thought.

Writing Quotas

Yes, yes, all great writers have 'em: Stephen King writes at least 2000 words a day, and doesn't leave his computer till it's done. Iain Banks did a similar thing, writing on average for about 3 months max to get a first draft finished and many other writers all do similar things, following day orders and to-do lists almost, shuffling down the road to a novel's completion. When writing my first novel I didn't use any such things, which lead to me hitting a wall from time to time, periods where I'd not write anything for a month! This problem has been addressed as well because I've set myself a quota of 2000 words per day and have been keeping to it, in addition to my new year resolution of reading for at least an hour per day. This is why I've managed to write over 10,000 words in next to no time; it doesn't take a genius after all to note that 2,000 words every day in a 7-day week equals 14,000 words. That's pretty much a short story completed, two weeks later (28,000) we're talking novelettes and the week after that of course taking us over 40,000 words, which is technically where a novel-length work begins. Given these simple mathematical sums, we can therefore deduce where exactly a novel will end if we keep to that quota. To apply that to my new novel would mean that -given a target draft length of 70,000 words- it woulds in theory take a little over a month to write on this schedule, which is a hell of a lot shorter than doing the same in 2 years.

Writing Time

Of course I realise that writing big amounts is foolish unless it's any good, which is what second drafts are for, but it's good to think that the first draft can be over and done with very quickly because the clock is always ticking after all. But the final point that I will address is time; when are creative juices flowing optimally? When should one put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard and bash out that quota. Well several months ago I spied an article on this (in either the Mail or Guardian I think) where the thesis was to write during the morning when the creative juices are -apparently- flowing optimally, citing George Orwell as an example, who -according the article as I remember it- often wrote first thing in the morning, sat in bed with his typewriter upon his lap. I've been trying this as of late, going to bed at 12:30am and rising at 6:30-7:00 am and I have found it a great help; in fact, I think has become my favoured strategy. What I do is quite simple. Write 1000 words, at least, first thing in the morning, taking time to read what I wrote yesterday to tidy up any superficialities like spelling etc. Then what I do is go about my daily routine and when I'm fully awake -in the afternoon or evening for example- I tidy up what I wrote in the morning -apparently writing when still half-asleep leaves you with quite a few typing mistakes to correct- and move on to complete my second 1000 words. This is soon followed by my reading for the night (currently Cloud Atlas & i-Robot) which totals into at least one hour.

Now of course one has to remember that I am but a lowly student whose life is inundated with work and textbooks to read and assignments to complete, which is partly the reason why I write in the morning so early, because it still leaves me ample time to print, write and read things associated with my course, which can itself offer some inspiration from time to time. Ultimately I thought that I should share this change in tactics and use it as an addendum to my post on writing uploaded on January 13th. I hope that both serve you well!

Thanks for reading.