DONE!

The first draft of Shadows and Dust is complete, at 88,554 words! It's a little shorter than I originally intended, and the plot bears little resemblance to what I envisioned at first, but I think the changes make it a hundred times better.

There's a absolute ton of editing that I'll need to do, however. The ending is pure deus ex machina, even though I planned for it for quite some time, and there's plenty of characters that I need to introduce earlier. Several scenes (at least) will suffer bloody deaths. There's tons of crappy writing, but that's okay, because it's a first draft.

It's done!

Halfway there!

Like the Bon Jovi song, I'm halfway there, and in many ways, living on a prayer: a prayer to complete the story. I've never undertaken such an ambitious project. Jack O'Lantern was ~50,000 words, and Shadows and Dust has now matched that total. The story of the first novel in this planned trilogy is nowhere near complete, however, and at times I'm staggered by how much more I have to write. But it's a good feeling, because I know I have plenty of plot and character development let to explore.

I recently looked over the outline that I threw together for S&D, and it's amazing how much it differs from the actual story that's coming out. The overall plot structure isn't changing...much...but the details, the how and why, bear little resemblance to what I originally planned. I can chalk that up to how my characters, especially Kale, the protagonist, has revealed himself--his strengths, flaws, and motivations--to me. Just today he threw me a curve when he added another group of people to his "hitlist," and it'll vastly change the way the rest of the story plays out. It's a good change, however, because it will enhance the first novel a lot, and make it stand on its own a lot better.

50k done, 50k to go.

Shadows and Dust goal

I currently estimate that Shadows and Dust will be around 100,000 words long, and I'm currently at 34,800. On 9/30, I'll be taking a trip to Vegas until 10/4, and I want to use that trip to celebrate the completion of my first draft.

This means that I'll need to average around 1,000 words every day. My current output is around 750-900 on the weekdays, and none on the weeknds. Obviously, I've got to step up my game.

Plot changes

As I mentioned in my previous post, I wrote a synopsis for Guardian - Shadows and Dust (my new title for The Guardians) before I began writing the actual novel. I'm now several days into the novel, things are going nicely, and I decided I want to try to plan this one out more than I did Jack O'Lantern.

Except that's not accurate, because Jack O'Lantern was completely unplanned from day one. But still, the point stands that I wanted to do more planning. In the case of S&D, I have a rough idea of how long I want the first draft to be: about 100,000 words. Since I've already created a structure for this book in my mind, I figured I'd write out an outline for the three main sections, along with word count goals for each section. The sections of the book as planned:

I. Novice
II. Squire
III. Guardian

So I started the outline, and of course, the early stuff is the most fleshed out, because some of it's already written, and what isn't will be soon. Before long, I realized that I needed to add another section to the book:

I. Novice
II. Squire
III. Wanderer
IV. Guardian

I finished my outline for the first two sections, and in doing so changed a good portion of the plot. My synopsis was suddenly outdated, and I realized again that my sections weren't well designed. And hence another revision:

I. Novice
II. Squire
III. Slave
IV. Servant
V. Guardian

That's where I stand now. The first two sections are fairly well outlined, the final three not at all. The plot details have changed dramatically from the synopsis, although the overall plot and theme have not. I still know where the story is going, and the basics of how I want it to get there, but the middle two sections are the least fleshed out. It's not a coincidence, since they're also the newest. But as I looked back at my now old synopsis, I noticed that the parts I changed the most - the middle sections - are what I planned the least. It was at this point in the synopsis where I just wrote down the overall arc of what would happen, rather than the details.

The ending hasn't changed one iota, however. One thing that's been consistent in my writing so far is that I don't start a story without knowing how it will end. Jack O'Lantern is the only exception, and that's because it was for NaNoWriMo, and I had no idea what it had in store for me.

The Oddities of Ideas

Ideas for stories pop into my head all the time. I keep a notebook handy at all times for them (or when I get the urge to start writing one of those stories, NOW). A file on my PC and thumb drive dutifully receives every seed of a story idea. Many of the ideas are just crap, and I know it, but they stay there, because for all I know, they might inspire something else when I peruse the list.

I get most of my ideas in two different ways:

1) Reading. I'll be reading a book, and it will trigger something inside my brain. Suddenly, I have an idea for a new story. It could be based on what I was reading in some way, or it could be completely unrelated.

2) Driving with the radio off. I do this about 50% of the time when driving for work. It's a great time to think and let stuff percolate in my brain.

The ideas are never forced. I never try to come up with something. If I did, I'm pretty sure it would suck. My subconscious has first dibs on all creative endeavors.

Now, what's odd about the ideas that are good is that there's no telling when I'll actually start writing. New ideas that are barely fleshed out may demand to be written well before ones that have developed characters and background. For an example, I direct you to Works In Progress on the side bar. Ignore Jack O'Lantern for now (more on it in another post at some point).

There are three novel ideas in there, and they're pretty vague. I'll go into just a tiny bit of detail here.

1) Untitled (Epic Fantasy) - World building. This is my oldest novel idea. It involves a father and his two sons. I expect it to end up being a trilogy.

2) Untitled (Science Fiction) - Percolating. The idea for this novel came after #1. It's about a colony ship.

3) The Guardians (Working title) - Writing. This is another epic fantasy. I expect it to have one sequel, although there's probably room for more. It follows a boy named Kale as he joins the Guardians, an ancient order that protects the world from Evil.

Now, The Guardians is easily my most recent idea for a novel. Wait, let me correct that. My most recent idea that has grown legs and is now walking around, waiting for me to do something with it. I've been developing the Untitled Epic Fantasy much longer. I've done a lot more work with the characters in it, and the basic synopsis has been complete for months. But it's not yet demanding to be written.

A few days ago, I felt close to The Guardians. I suddenly knew the story, knew where it was going and how to get it there, as if it was already written. So I grabbed my laptop and wrote a synopsis, along with some background and world building. Sure, there are one or two points in there that need to be flushed out. But the storyline just came together and knocked on a door inside my brain. "Hi there! I'm ready!" it said.

So I started writing it. The first few thousand words I wrote ended up being cut, as I discovered I started the story too early. But I think it's starting correctly now, and I'm excited to see how writing it goes. I just find it odd that this story has come so quickly to me, compared to other ideas that are waiting for their time to come.