Novel Maths

Last Sunday, as I was preparing my notes for the latest WIP, I told myself it could be written in 4 weeks. Of course, 80,000 words in 4 weeks sounds a little daunting. But when I looked back at the stats I kept for previous first drafts I discovered it took me 6 weeks to write anywhere between 80-92,000 words. And that was with my daughter going to preschool two days a week. Back then I was aiming for 10,000 words a week. That was a great and doable target to meet.

But now I'd have five days, so why not?

Okay, so that's 80,000 divided by 4 weeks = 20,000 words a week.

Then take 20,000 and divide by 5 days (taking weekends off!) = 4,000 words a day.

And that's how I got my daily target.

So far this week I've managed to stay a little above that, which brings me to today's progress:

( #####============ )

21,512 / 80,000 : 26.9%

I'm very happy with the progress. And I'm not just talking about the whole writing maths of it. Sure that's great, I love meeting personal goals but the story's taking shape. I sit down and I'm excited about what's going to happen next. Some mornings I sat down and had no idea what was going to happen, while others I knew the direction. Both ways work for me. I'm what you call a pantser or an organic writer. I take notes, not outlines. I've never been able to write anything which was planned out chapter-by-chapter. Don't know why, just can't do it. But note taking, love to take notes and some chapters are solidly visible inside my mind... but mostly, I see where everything leads naturally...

My daughter got her first merit bug today. It's a little system they have going at her school where they get a certain amount of bugs before receiving a certificate. Very cute. I'm so proud of her, it's only her second week!

So LOST was on last night and I'm totally peed off. OMG, this was the second ep in the second season and I was so disappointed. Got that love-hate thing going again. My gosh, we didn't see anything new. It was all rehashed stuff we already knew about. I mean, the Mike and Walt backstory! I get it, he lost Walt again and it sparked off memories of the first time he lost him. Yeah, that's all good and all but something new would've been much, much better! Please tell me we get some sort of answers soon. What's with the guy in the bunker anyway? Hope it’s a better ep next week!

This weekend we gotta watch MEDIUM and another ep of Supernatural. Yes, looking forward to my paranormal fix... which reminds me, the hubby finished reading ghost yesterday and he really enjoyed it. He also pointed out a few typos and stuff - he's an awesome proofreader who always gives me an honest opinion about what he reads.

Anyway, hope you all have a TERRIFIC weekend!