Super Squirrel

I finished the second draft of Chapter 3. I had a very difficult time because the character this chapter focuses on didn't like talking. But I was able to get into his head enough to tell the tale and now Chapter 3 is complete.

After my first draft, the Prologue through Chapter 3 was only 8352 words long. Now, however, I'm up to 15951 words. 7599 words is nothing to sneeze at. This also means my story has been pushed above 70k words.

Chapter 4 is going to be a ...

I, so far, hate writing magic. I fumbled around rewriting the same paragraph for several hours. It shouldn't have been that difficult but magic isn't like an RPG. When writing, you can't make statements like The Wizard casts Illusion. No, it never works that way.

Magic is a character much like Vincent or Calla are characters. They are something I have to understand and know so that I can get their interactions down on paper. I have to be able to know how it looks, how it feels, ...

Last night Alice and I got to see Charles De Lint at Malaprops in Asheville. Charles Vess was there too and I don't want to underplay the fact that he signed the out of print, first edition hardcover copy of Peter Pan he illustrated. But this is about writing and Charles Vess, while a great guy, isn't a writer.

Like most author meetings I have been to, people asked Charles questions about writing. He discussed both where he got his ideas from, how he got so good at writing, and ...

I'm forming a habit. Fortunately, it is a good habit to have. I'm finding it much easier to sit down in front of my story and edit. Yesterday I did three full pages of editing for Chapter 2. I've got a single page left to edit and I'll be done with that Chapter.

Editing is fun. I never thought I'd make that statement. You already have the story in front of you so there isn't a case of figuring out what a character would say or do. It is a matter of making the text read better ...

61557 words. That's the size of the rough draft. It seems shorter than it should be. But all of the hours, the edits, the replaying of scenes in my head simply don't count as words. I've cried. I've laughed. And most of all, I've been very proud of the work I've done.

But I'm not done yet. As of right now, I have the prologue, chapter 1, and the first eight paragraphs of chapter 2 in a second draft. I'm also entering the rocky territory of my story known as "the rift". ...