Hey Readers! Looks who’s back, back again, tell a friend. How long have I been gone, three months, longer? I won’t go into a slew of excuses (even if it includes losing a best friend, leave of absence from Lesley University, and breaking my ankle), I’ll just start the post.

I’m finishing a novel THIS YEAR.

In 2024, I have a simple goal. Finish my novel. Focus on ONE novel, instead of writing 3 or 4 at a time. Doing that makes nothing get finished.

So, I’ve narrowed down to working on just one, and I made the goal of writing 1000 words a day for 30 days. Using timers of 20 mins to write and 10 minutes to rest in order to keep myself on track, and to keep writing.

The novel I chose had the placeholder title of “Zak and Valor,” and I was also workshopping it in my Master’s program at Lesley University underneath wonderful mentorship.

Note that this starts at the beginning of this year, and its just taking me THIS LONG to finally finish my blog post, and update.

Spoiler alert, I didn’t finish the novel that I originally chose, but more on that later.

However, the novel that I am working on,  I am on the eighth draft of this YA fantasy novel, and none of the drafts have been completed. Scrapping everything and starting all over, again and again, just pushes away “The End.”

And like I said in the spoiler alert, I ended up doing that twice more during the YA workshop, starting the draft again, scrapping it, starting again, and scrapping it.

I joined Scribophile’s writing community “Writing Together” which you can find here, where a group of writers meet every Monday through Friday at 10am EST (writers join from all over the world) and write together for an hour.

I simply had to come to terms with the fact that I was my own greatest enemy, and I was standing in my own way. I looked at myself, and told myself that I wasn’t taking my own mess anymore (I actually used stronger language than that, to myself!) and told myself to get out of the way.

I began to make writing goals (and art goals) for myself, and then did my best to meet them. I woke up at 3 a.m., 4 a.m. and sometimes 5 a.m. in the morning, and began to start writing first thing. The flatline on my progress chart began to have a pulse. It was working.

And I will never claim that it was all happening simply because of me. When I told myself to get out of my own way, it was after I got on my knees and prayed. I put a pillow down, and clasped my hands, and told God I wasn’t able to do this on my own, because I kept failing, and I needed His strength.

I wrote down, complete chapter one by Friday. And I did, I did complete it.

And so my 1k for 30 days ended with a little under 8k words total.

But for once, I don’t feel like a failure. Because I know I DID THAT THING. I really did do it. I finally did the writing goals, and I did complete them.  

I also learned something new about myself.

It’s not the outline.

Just back in November, and on my latest blog post before the two guest posts in a row, I said I thought I wasn’t writing because of the outline. ANG! (buzzer-noise.)

Wrong. Because I’m working with another outline right now (shock and horror!)

What it is a small list of bullet points telling me what I think is going to happen, its like seven or eight things, and its slightly telling me what I thought was going to happen in chapter one, and maybe in chapter two…aka telling me what to write.

The same thing I thought would ruin and spoil the story for me, and which was why I wasn’t writing last time.

But I still got the writing done even with the outline this time. The only that changed this time, was ordering myself to get out of the way, and making writing goals, and meeting them.

Maybe I just stopped acting like a special snowflake, and actually did the writing, instead of making excuses. The fact that I had decided what was going to happen in the story before I wrote didn’t make me stop writing…

I wasn’t writing because I didn’t want to write.

And so, I started a brand new goal.

1k a Day for 100 days. Immediately after the last one ended. Still using the NaNoWriMo site as a means for a word counter, so I can keep updating every day and tracking my progress. I’ve made a commitment to not just finishing my novel, but to my career to be a successful novelist. My only enemy is myself, and I’m not standing for it anymore. Outline, no outline, I’m getting the writing done.

As you can see, I ended up with a little under 40k words done, not 100 words.

And then I started over, not a surprise to me, or my mentor. In fact, my mentor understood entirely and encouraged my creative process.

As you can see, with scrapping and starting over, both of my goals ended up unfinished, and I had no novel.

Then I came across a Neil Gaiman quote.

And that struck me. Because the real reason I keep starting all over, is that I realize what I’m writing isn’t a success. It’s a failure. The story isn’t good enough. I can see that the draft is heading to a dead end, so I just scrap it, and start writing a different story. Over and over, rather than write a failing story, I try to start over with writing a perfect story. So I end up with nothing done.

Well, buck to all of that! I am going to finish a failure. Then I’ll just rewrite and revise and edit and make a success out of that. I think I just forgot that a rough draft isn’t supposed to be perfect.

Rough drafts are supposed to ugly and dirty and messy. They’re supposed to be something you want to hide away, and don’t let anyone see. And that’s why you then clean it up, and tidy it up, and edit it, and make a second draft.

Then it’s the second draft that you let others read and get feedback on, the second draft is the child that’s well-clothed and fit enough to go out in public to be viewed.

Well, now that I’ve got Neil Gaiman reminding me to write it anyway, write through the pain of a non-perfect first draft, I’ve finally named my novel, and have been faithfully hammering away at it.

I’ve named it Dark as Light.

Don’t go too crazy over the cover. It’s a free cover I got off a design site called Poster My Wall, and I just really liked it. My story isn’t about angels or moon cycles, but the main character is black!

*The novel has a new title, Ring of Galiroth, but I didn’t change the cover yet! Pronounced Gale-Wroth.

I began writing the draft on May 13^th, and I made the goal to write 80k words by August 31^st 2024. Stephen King said a first draft should only take 3 months, so that’s what I am aiming for.

As of May 17^th, I have this…

…. many words!

15,601 words.

Then as of today, June 28th, I have….

23, 361 words!

Look at me now!!

My goal is 800 words to 1000k words a day.

I have ONE more thing to say, and then we’re out of here!

I AM FINISHING MY NOVEL IN 2024.

Until next time, readers!

P.S.

I was thinking of naming us something else besides “Readers.” I have to think of it. Any ideas in the comments? Let me know!

I’ll be back next time with some news and updates!