Three Hours a Day: Update and a Correction

Last week I talked about my plunge into the six-figure strategy proposed by an agent. This is a plan to reach a six-figure salary by writing three hours a day in the morning and marketing three hours a day in the afternoon. My report was posted on Thursday last week, when I was 4 for 4—four stories over four days. I finished the week with five stories. But I also finished the week with very little marketing, perhaps an hour or so in the afternoon. So where am I now?

Like many other writers, I keep notes on paper or on my computer (and sometimes my phone) of ideas for stories—novels, novellas, full-length novels. Over the previous two or three months I’d come up with and rejected a number of story ideas, but six or so remained, blinking at me from the page but never stirring enough interest to get me to start writing (or typing). But last week pushed me to write.

 

The psychological pressure to produce verbiage over three hours pushed me to take the risk of developing a story every day, of trampling doubt and hazy thinking to make an idea into a character with a plot. Each day I finished a complete story—beginning, middle, end. I might not be happy with parts of it, but overall the story felt finished.

 

Marketing was an entirely different matter. After editing in the afternoon I explored outlets for each story. Some journals are clear about what they want and don’t want. What they don’t want can be more important than anything else. If you send a noir story to someone who prefers humorous cozies, you’re wasting your time. But even then, as all writers know, a story that matches the guidelines of theme, etc., may still not catch the editor’s eye. So far I’ve sent out three of the stories.

 

What else did I learn?

 

In a composition class in college, a professor took me aside and pointed out that I had a habit in my writing that I should work on. Manuscript in hand, he pointed to the opening paragraph, which he approved of, and then the following paragraph, which he said just went around in circles. “That’s what you do,” he said. “You keep writing while you decide where to go next, and then you write on.” Under pressure to take an idea and complete a story in three hours I managed to break the habit of writing while I thought about where to go next. 

 

As you can perhaps divine, I didn’t take on the challenge for this week. I’m not writing a short story every morning this week. But the idea is worth adopting—writing according to time instead of scene or pages or words. I’m considering trying it again, perhaps once a month. I’ll let you know. Right now I'm developing story ideas--a sentence or two, perhaps a paragraph, that gives the general idea. I like having a known starting point even if everything that comes after that is totally different.

 

Correction: During NaNoWriMo, my total output was 40K words, not 48K. That was wishful thinking. 

Three Hours a Day

A successful short story writer once explained that she wrote a new short story every morning and edited a draft of an older story in the afternoon. This sounded like an admirably disciplined approach, and I’ve remembered this part of her talk for almost forty years. Recently an agent talked about his strategy for getting his clients to a six-figure salary. His advice was simple: writers should write three hours a day and work on marketing three hours a day. Like many of the other writers on the zoom program, I wondered if this was sustainable.

 

When I begin a new novel, I set a word quota for the day and usually reach it. My basic goal is 1,500 words, but the day’s results may range from 800 to 2500 words. For this year’s NaNoWriMo I logged in 48k words over the month (and after taking off most weekends). But I did not always write for three hours. I compose by scene, any one of which can be long or short but always moves me forward as I want, allowing for surprises, digressions, corrections and additions to earlier scenes. But the question of time doesn’t arise.

 

With the idea of time nagging at me, I decided to try a week of writing for three hours each morning. Because of other commitments, I couldn’t commit to three hours of marketing in the afternoon, and will set that aside for another time. (Any excuse will do to get out of three hours of marketing.)

 

I began my three-hour commitment on Monday morning. How am I doing? So far I’m four for four—four short stories written over four mornings, spending three hours each morning doing nothing but writing fiction. 

 

What have I learned? The time pressure changed my process. Sunday evening I began wondering what I’d write the next day since I’m not working on a novel (that would have been easy). In a file of short story ideas I found one that had been rattling around in my head without any sense of urgency. But once I knew I’d be writing soon the story began to feel warm, taking shape. At ten in the morning I was on my way, and at one o’clock, I was done, with a three-thousand word story. I set it aside to marinade, as it were, for revising at a later date. 

 

On Monday evening I once again wondered what I would write in the morning. Would my discipline dry up? I had a vague idea and held onto that through the evening. In the morning I went to work and after three hours had another three-thousand word story by one o’clock. Wednesday and today, Thursday, went the same with an idea in the previous evening and a three-hour sprint in the morning. Today my story is only twenty-five hundred words so I’m writing this blog to fill out the time.

 

The difference between this challenge and my regular approach to short stories is time. I don’t usually put myself under pressure to develop a story on a certain day at a certain hour. I prefer to take the time to think about it, let it take shape, and write it when I feel ready. The challenge has made me much more prolific, at least as far as short fiction is concerned, and I now have four stories to polish and send out. By tomorrow lunchtime I may have a fifth. I haven’t yet decided if I’m going to try for a second week. I’ll let you know. 

 

 

The History of a New Book

For participation in a book group I usually buy a copy of the book so I don’t have to worry about renewing it with the library or returning it to a friend. For a group beginning this month I ordered the title from one of my favorite second-hand sellers. Four years old, this copy was listed as “like new.” When I unwrapped it, and began riffling through the pages, I was convinced the book was brand new, unread. 

 

The easiest way to evaluate the newness of a trade paperback book is the binding and cover. There is no sign the cover was even opened—no fold or crease along the edge of the spine front or back, no wrinkle in the spine, and the tightness of the pages intact.

 

The only sign that the book had been opened was the inscription on the half-title page: “To Molly, Hope you appreciate this book as much as we do. Love to you! David & Marti 1-’17.” Some readers don’t like finding inscriptions or notes on any book they buy, even when they know it’s second hand and likely to come with a few. Not me. I’m curious about where the book has been and who left their reactions and additions hidden among the paragraphs. But in this one I won’t find anything.

 

It looks like Molly didn’t even open the book to check the contents, scan the first page of the first chapter, or read the acknowledgments at the back. Except for the inscription, the book looks and feels pristine. 

 

This kind of discovery of something purchased second hand shouldn’t surprise anyone today—so many books circulate through libraries and online bookstores that we all get brand-new copies occasionally. But this one surprised me because the person who gave it as a gift clearly loved it, and gave it to someone thought to be a kindred spirit.

 

So what book is it? This week I’m beginning a group discussing When Awareness Becomes Natural: A Guide to Cultivating Mindfulness in Everyday Life, by Sayadaw U Tejaniya (from Shambala Publications). 

 

I’ve been trying to recall if I have ever so misjudged a friend with the book or other gift I’ve passed along. Friends and I are quick to share what we like to read (or eat or see on TV), but there are sure to be pockets of surprises for me as well as for them.

 

So, as I ponder this book’s limping arrival in my life, I’ll wonder about Molly and what she disliked on sight about this book. Or if she ever ran into David and Marti and had to tell them no, she didn’t love the book as much as they did. Or did she just say yes, she read it but now she’s forgotten what it was about? This is for all practical purposes a new book but it already has a history--as a brand-new book in a bookstore, as a gift to Molly, as a reject in a second-hand bookstore, and now as my ticket into a zoom book group. I’ll be thinking of Molly and her friends as I read. And I'll be wondering at the irony of her rejecting this book in particular, a book with the theme of mindfulness or awareness of the reality we are immersed in daily. 

From Pantser to Plotter

For most of my writing life I’ve been a pantser, at least I’ve regarded myself as one. When I begin a mystery novel or short story, I have an idea about a character in mind, and from that I populate her or his world and the kinds of problems that person would face. This can be a slow process, at least it is for me, so I’ve learned to make note of possibly useful ideas as they appear whether I’m ready for them or not. This means I usually have a list of author lines, scene details, questions a character would raise, and the like. But in my latest work-in-progress I’ve been doing things differently.

 

Peter Dickinson once said that by the time he started writing, his outline was so detailed and fleshed-out that there were no surprises awaiting him as he wrote from chapter to chapter. I can’t say I’ve approached that this time, but I understand what he was talking about.

 

A couple of months ago I had an idea about a pre-teen girl being witness to a man dying from a hunting accident. Called as a witness in a criminal trial, she was aware of undercurrents in the questioning and managed to steer clear of them thanks to solid preparation by her father. I thought this sounded promising and made a note. Two days later the threads from this initial idea began to run outward, and I made more notes. By the end of a couple of weeks I had a tight synopsis that covered several stages in the development of the plot, half a dozen characters playing significant roles, and a climax that was a little hazy but, I was confident, would become sharper as I went along. I set the synopsis aside and let the idea germinate some more. 

 

The publicity around NaNoWriMo came at just the right time, when I was wondering if I should begin writing or set the idea aside as already stale. One of the pleasures of being a pantser has always been the moments of discovery, when a character surprises me or a turn in the plot gets more interesting than I expected. But with NaNoWriMo nipping at my heels, I decided to open a new file and follow my synopsis. I finished NaNoWriMo with 40,000 words (I took most weekends off—that’s the competitive writer in me, covering for failing to reach the 50K goal) and I now have 54,000. 

 

The twists and turns of the story, the discoveries of character and alliances forming and tearing, the questions of truth and justice were an added layer I hadn’t covered in my synopsis. Right now I’m on the home stretch—I can see the end becoming richer and more interesting, no longer hazy and predictable. But I can’t rush it without damaging the larger story.

 

Writing this new mystery is the closest I’ve come to being an plotter. So far I’m pleased with how the story idea developed and the writing stayed close to the original idea but I can’t say I’m confident that this will be my path forward from now on, in both short stories and mystery novels. Nevertheless, it’s a change, and I’m all for change if it means growth and discovery. 

NaNoWriMo Final Report

Image by Engin Akyurt from Pixabay

This is the first year I’ve tried NaNoWriMo. In   October I came up with an idea for a new suspense  novel, a stand-alone featuring a character with some problems I wanted to explore. Over the coming days various scenes and aspects of the story came to mind, so I jotted these down and soon had a list of moments in a scene, or a number of scenes. Enthusiastic now, I wrote a short synopsis. With this in hand, I figured I could stay focused on just moving forward with the story rather than going back and rewriting and adding, etc. NaNoWriMo seemed to arrive at just the right time.

 

I ended the month with 40,508 words. After taking most Sundays off and an occasional Saturday, I averaged 1,558 words a session. The low daily count was 825 words on November 1, and the high was 2,296 on November 16. If it weren’t for NaNoWriMo, I probably would have set my daily word count at 1,500 words, which has been average for me for years. 

 

This month of working on my new novel, tentatively titled “Renee’s Trial,” included time spent on short stories. I worked on the novel in the morning, and on short stories in the afternoon. I don’t get much in the way of a word count after writing the first draft of short fiction. My short stories usually go through a dozen drafts and sometimes end up totally different from what I originally had in mind but the word count changes little. Four stories were published this year, so I don’t mind the slow process.

 

I signed on for the Sisters in Crime FB NaNoWriMo group but never participated in their “write-ins” and other events. It was enough to know they were out there. I checked in to see how my fellow writers were doing, sharing my totals when I could. The program created a definite buzz and energy and I’m sure that helped keep some of us going.

 

Would I do this again? Yes.

 

NaNoWriMo worked for me because I used October to prime myself to focus on something specific rather than a general idea of, Gee, I think I’ll write a novel in November. I knew where I was going and much of the path I wanted to take. Because I wasn’t doing any editing along the way, or at least very little, I was adding words instead of deleting them (an all-too-common practice for me). So, yes, in similar circumstances in the future, I would definitely sign on for NaNoWriMo again.

 

Right now, as I look at my draft and my list of total words per day, I’m estimating that I can finish the first draft before Christmas, and bring it in at 75K words or more. That will be a very good ending to an otherwise miserable year. 

NaNoWriMo: First Report

NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month, has been around since 1999. I probably became conscious of it about ten years ago, never giving it much thought except some curiosity about how it worked. This year I decided to give it a try.

 

In the middle of October I got an idea for a new novel, my agent was reading one I’d just revised, and the promos for NaNoWriMo were everywhere, a reminder that some people needed to get writing and others did not. I began dutifully on November 1, and now have 16,831 words. That’s not the number writers are expected to have if they’ve been keeping up with the daily quota of 1,667 for fourteen days. That would be a total of 23,338 words. 

 

I confess to slacking. Sunday is usually a day off for me, and November 7, a Saturday, and the next day had me riveted to the news on both TV and cell. Monday was a return to normality, and I’ve had three very good days this week, with totals all over the official daily quota.

 

My daily quota is usually around fourteen hundred words, and sometimes a great deal lower. After I have a draft I do a lot of revising, mostly cutting and trimming and clarifying. Words disappear, clarity emerges, and I let the whole thing sit for a while.

 

I probably would not have made as much progress as I’ve to date if I hadn’t found a new idea for an entire story instead of a glimmer of a character in a scene. This story was so clearly shaped in my mind, with the rising and falling action, the total story arc, that I jotted down significant moments, turning points, and revelations until I had a page of eight fully realized paragraphs, which I turned into a nearly complete synopsis. Little details that usually emerge later popped up, and were jotted down. Once again, I mused on how different the beginning of this novel was from earlier ones. 

 

NaNoWriMo offers an online community, which I brush up against occasionally, and will now use to post my moderate progress. If nothing else, it’s fun writing at a time when you know thousands of others are doing the same thing under the same umbrella. But I’m still taking Sundays off with little hope of making up the missing words later. That doesn’t matter. I’m almost one quarter the way into a new novel, and for once I have a pretty good idea where I’m going. 

Reading around the World: The Middle East (1)

Several months ago I undertook a project to read a novel by a woman from every nation. I listed 197 nations plus Palestine. The idea was not mine but came from a friend, now deceased, who talked about it occasionally and how much she enjoyed hearing the voices of women from other parts of the world. After a while I was intrigued enough to draw up a spreadsheet and even posted it on my blog, but it came out almost unreadable. Instead of trying that again, I’ll talk occasionally about my recent reading here.

Over the years I’ve read a number of novels by women from other countries, mostly from South Asia, and have a strong library of their work. Even so, I wanted to begin with a blank spreadsheet and choose stories and novels that are mostly current among the readers of each country. That means writers who live and work in their native land. I’m less interested in ex-pats living in the United States because their audience in this country cannot be discounted as an influence on the creation of the story. Nevertheless, I’ve read several books by displaced writers working in English and found them satisfying and enlightening. 

 

Once I made the decision to focus on women writing and living in their country, when at all possible, the kind of literature I encountered deepened in terms of presenting a culture that required more thought on my part to enter and appreciate but the experience has been worth the effort. Certain western tropes didn’t appear, or at least not in the same way, and overall the fiction was much more enjoyable and interesting. Of course, anyone, myself included, must acknowledge that writing in English must influence the writer, and so, whenever possible, I looked for books originally written in the writer’s native tongue, assuming that wasn’t English or, in some cases, French or another European language. These requirements with exceptions have evolved so I’m not bogged down in a search for the “perfect representative” book. So, what have I read?

 

I’m working my way through the Middle East and North Africa, and I’ve posted reviews of several of the titles on Goodreads.

 

Chaos of the Senses by Ahlem Mosteghanemi (Algeria)

Chronicle of a Last Summer by Yasmine El Rashidi (Egypt)

To Keep the Sun Alive by Rabbeah Ghaffari (Iran)

All That I Want to Forget by Bothayna Al-Essa (Kuwait)

Wild Thorns by Sahar Khalifeh (Palestine)

Girls of Riyadh by Rajaa Alsanea (Saudi Arabia)

 

Two books that are probably better known in this country (USA) are not included. Both The Bastard of Istanbul by Elif Shafak (Turkey) and The Last Days of Café Leila by Donia Bijan (Iran) are interesting novels by women born in their respective countries but now living in the United States. Each novel tackles the circumstances for women but the stories are as much about life in the States as life in the old country. Immigrant women return to their family’s country of origin, linking two cultures and exploring unanswered questions. As interesting and rewarding as these novels are, they have the feel of being written by someone who is now an outsider with extensive knowledge of the country in question, with a shifting focus on the US and a now foreign land. For these and other reasons, I have chosen to focus on books written by authors residing for most of their lives in their native land. 

 

Next up is So Vast the Prison by Assia Djebar.

 

As I mentioned in a FB post, I’m always open to suggestions so if you have a book you think would suit this list, do let me know. This project is a long one and I’m not in any hurry to finish. I like the world tour and the women I’m keeping company with.