Today I was due to start working again, and sorting out a plan of action took – well, not very long at all, actually.
I worked on the family tree novel and ignored everything else.
It was an easy decision really: I’ve accepted that I won’t get to the word count target I’d planned for December, so rather than not meet both targets, I want to get as far as I can with the editing. Funnily enough, this editing isn’t as bad as usual: I don’t know if that’s because I’ve had a break, or because there’s less of it, or because it’s focussed – but I do know it’s going much better and less painfully than usual.
It’s quite fitting as well – the action in the novel starts on New Year’s Eve, so working on it now feels right, as though it’s a good sign. As I said a couple of weeks ago, I’ve done the basic typo/grammar tidying so now I’m correcting issues – jumps in the story, language that doesn’t fit a character, incorrect descriptions. I’ve done the first re-read today and the second will go on tomorrow – I don’t have the whole day so I’ll just see how far I get.
As much of what is left is writing additional pieces I’m satisfied that it can be done through January.
I haven’t completely given up on the other story though – since my last post I’ve added another few hundred words, and nearly finished a really tricky, time-consuming scene (which is the bulk of a chapter) so it’s getting there, slowly but surely. From Tuesday I’ll be on mini-NaNo to get my word count up by the end of January.
Changing my holiday week really did scupper my chance to meet those original targets, because in effect I had 2 weeks instead of one out of December. Still – my failure to write then was so evident that it made sense not to waste the writing week. The most important thing now is not to miss the January deadlines!
You know that saying about falling off a horse and getting straight back on? Well, writing’s a bit like that for me – if I don’t meet my targets or I have a poor week, I have to just keep working away to get back to it, otherwise it’ll never happen and I’ll lose out on all the joy it gives me. I don’t want that!
In other news – it’s nearly 2013 already: I can’t believe how fast this year has passed. There was no Mayan End of the World on 21.12.2012, which was good. Now I have to make resolutions for the next 12 months – I can’t remember what I said last year so I’m not sure it’ll be very useful, but at least I’ll have tried…
I’d like to say to you all, have a happy and healthy 2013 and I hope your creative muse helps you tell the stories/sing the songs/paint the pictures you hope for. I’ll be back on the 1st January 2013 updating you on my mini NaNo – but it won’t be an early start!
Happy writing,
EJ
🙂
Best of luck with the editing/writing, EJ!
Happy New Year 😀
Thanks Dianne – I hope 2013 is a good one for us all! Happy New Year 🙂