It's Monday....

Have you had your Writing Excuses yet?

I'm home for a fabulous weekend and we are getting much needed rain so onward with chapter 4.

Let the marathon commence!

I am away from home for a few days and I am planning to do some serious writing. Let's go with the stats:

Updated!
Beginning word count: 5440
Ending word count: 7443
Status:  About half way through chapter 3 right now.
Goals:  Finish chapter 3 and get about halfway through chapter 4.  I finished Chapter 3 and started chapter 4 but I am not as far in as I wanted to be.  Total words written just of 2000.  

I'll update later tonight with my progress.  And now it is story GO time!

Endings

I've talked earlier about my love of Avatar and The Legend of Korra.  Legend of Korra just finished it's first "book" and I wanted to share some of my thoughts about the ending.  As always spoilers ahead.

The plot for this book has not been slow at any point.  Even the side plots with the pro bending have been pushing things ahead at a good clip.  The last two episodes took us to a higher gear.  It was breakneck and I think it suffered because of the speed.  Episode ten left Korra and her friends in a bad space.  Amon had taken over the city.  Lyn Beifong was stripped of her powers and the airbenders had left the city.  The only ray of hope was General Iroh bringing in the fleet.

The Korra creators wanted something different then Avatar with Korra.  Avatar had the same overarching enemy who grew clearer as the story progressed.  Korra does not.  The reveal that Amon and Tarlock were brothers came out of no where.  It was the one stagnant part in the story progression.   Nowhere in the previous episodes was it ever hinted that Tarlock had a brother.  If they had laid any hints earlier I would have been happy.  But as it is it felt like they didn't play fair.  There was no way for the audience to know that Amon was a blood bender faking the firebender attack.  The firebender attack lead a false trail that he might have a tie to Mako and Bolin.  Three things in a story usually implies meaning.

I did like the final confrontation between Korra and Amon, but again I felt that having the airbenders captured and appearing on the stage was another cheat.  It comes back to foreshadowing again.  Korra finally learning to airbend in that moment was amazing.

I loved the scene in the boat where Tarlock decides to sacrifice both himself and his brother, that was amazing.  I hope that the writers don't undermine that by having them survive.  I loved the real tension in the story between nonbenders and benders.  I hope that plot is not dead.

The very end of episode twelve when Korra finds the avatar state, heals herself and heals others did not feel earned.  Especially that she can drop in and out of the state at will.  I am worried that she's reached her goal too quickly and the next three books she won't have a goal to reach for.

And let's just say it.  I hated the way the romance was tied up, meaning there was no resolution.  Mako ended up looking like the biggest jerk ever.  If that is not resolved and complicates things in the next book I might walk away from the series.  I don't care who ends up with whom.  I do care that they act like human beings about it or if they are acting like jerks they have that pointed out and dealt with.

I'm looking forward to the next seasons.  According to the press releases they are supposed to delve into the spirit world next.  I look forward to Korra trying to manage that.

It's Monday!

Have you listened to your weekly Writing Excuses?  This week is all about the villain problem.

My progress this weekend ended up stalling out.  I've had a request to assemble skirts for my dancing group and three of them needed to be done now.  I'm still working on them but we are in the end game.  Writing did happen, just not much.  Tonight the skirts get turned in and then writing shall be going full tilt with an extra bonus of all day Friday I will be in the mountains of NC, in a lovely little house with only my first draft.  I am planning to make the most of it!

Rolling and rolling on

The words came harder today, but I'm in a groove.  I still added over a thousand words to my count leaving me just under 5k.  I'm sure this is minuscule progress for some people.  It feels like I am inching.  But my day has about 4-6 hours where I am awake and not keeping my child from concussing himself, breaking things or otherwise being a force of nature.  And some of that time is used for such pressing issues as getting a shower or making sure we can walk across the floor with out tripping on toys.  I've been pulling 2-4 hours away for writing most days.
I am hoping to finish this draft in early Sept, unless something goes insane.  If I can keep up this pace I can do it.

While we are on the subject of rough drafts....

I just did a scary thing.  I started this book back in early May.  It is based on an earlier story that I've been trying to find the right form for since I was in high school.  This time I think I have the right form.  Over the last two months I have been grinding out words slowly.  Computer troubles hampered most of May.  Time commitments have been dragging me down, but slowly I have managed to crunch out about 3k of story onto the page.  And yesterday I reached the gestalt where all my ideas just poured out and I wrote an outline for the story that is over 2k.  This from a gal who's daily word output has been 200 or less.  But they were the wrong words.
While I was outlining I realized that my character was starting in the wrong place.  There wasn't enough pressure on her to take the opportunities being offered her.  After all she was starting in a place where she had shelter, food and clothing. It needed to be worse.  Today I wrote the beginning of that scene.  And it's right.   The words flowed.  They aren't all the right words, but it's much closer then before.  I need to do a bit of editing with my old stuff to blend the scenes back together, but it's close.  There is a map to the end (or at least close to the end).

After ripping out the beginning:

Still writing....

First drafts is eating my brain.  I've reached the time where I need to world build and outline.  If I had a neat and organized brain all of this would be done before I start drafting but I don't.  I have to dip my toe into the waters of the story for a bit.  The heavy bits of research are done, or at least a lot of them are done.  But now I need to find the structure of the story.  This part always goes faster for me.  I wrote at least 1300 words of outline [make that 2400, I stayed up a little to late] (not included in my draft) already today. Once I have a guide I am hoping my own word count will speed up and I can make progress.  I have a weekend "retreat" at the end of the month and if I can plow though a few chapters on my day away from the munchkin it will be amazing.  I want to be done with this before the snow flies.

All together now.... Get Back to Writing!

Surfeit of life

So life has gotten away from me.  First it was cooking for 20 for a weekend, then storms and power outages and now cooking for the 4th of July.  Although I have been silent here I have been progressing on the rough draft of doom.  It has reached over 3400 words.  It's not much but it is a heck of a lot more then when I started.  The alphasmart helped a ton.  I was able to write even when the power was out. 

Hopefully the weather will not give us 80mph winds again and life will be calmer for the rest of the month.  Until then have another episode of Writing Excuses.