How about a “Write 500 words a day” thread?

[snowqu33n]

I’ve previously benefited from MUNOWRIMO thread and I am working on another novel, but I want to stay consistent.
Any writers out there? Novelists, non-fiction writers, poets, or people who need to get their shit together to meet a deadline?
The goal is consistency, an achievable amount every day.
You can post your daily goal and how you are doing with it.
You can tell us the type of writing you’re working on, or just your daily word count.
Anybody interested?

I know this isn't quite what you had in mind but I belong to a website called 750 words a day which has the same premise.
It counts the number of days you've posted to keep you motivated, I'm up to nearly 1400 :-)
Definitely gets me writing every day. Does cost £4 a month though but I can access it anywhere there is an internet connection.

I wouldn’t say I’m a writer of any kind - but I have always enjoyed writing. I’m in maternity leave at the minute (only two months left :( ) and I promised myself that when baby became more consistent and settled in themselves, then during naps, I would try to write something - anything!

So far so good! I maybe manage between 200 - 500 words a day… but I have only been doing it for a month. I’m writing a story that has been in my head for a long time… no idea if it’s any good or if anyone other than me will read it! But it’s a personal goal of mine and I am loving the experience of having the story develop literally under my pen as the ideas evolve naturally :)

how about you?

Hello to PP and welcome to anyone who wants to join

@Elise72 that’s interesting, thanks

@HappyHolidays22
That’s great - I’m also writing mostly for my own enjoyment!

I have finished two chapters of my second book. I’ve had the plot in my head for ages and I have taken notes here and there but not managed to sit down and actually write for a few months.

Today I wrote about 580 words. I want to just keep chipping away at it. The last book seemed to come easier but maybe that’s just me remembering the better days! I’m hoping that if I keep going and tell the story, I can go back and edit it into something readable after.

I'm also aiming for 500 a day although FT work and a 7yo often thwart that. I'm using WriteTrack to monitor progress (mostly lack thereof). It does help motivate me though rather than being paralysed at the bottom of the 80,000 word mountain. Also, once I've done 500 words I don't feel guilty about stopping and putting the TV on...

@HappyHolidays22 What a lovely way to spend your maternity leave. A book and a baby! I find writing very relaxing. I hope you manage to get a few chapters done before the baby arrives.

@snowqu33n Well done for starting a second novel. Is it the same genre as the first or something completely different? I've written two novels but need to finish editing both. That's what I struggle with the most. I'm fine writing the first draft, it's coming back to it that's the problem. I tend to stick to writing short stories and poetry. I LOVE writing those.

@ElsieT23 It's very hard to stay motivated, especially when Happy Valley is available on catch up! I've watched all 3 series now and wanted to write crime fiction/thrillers afterwards. I like genre switching from time to time.

Hi @Bella43 I remember you from a previous writing thread! Welcome.
I am sticking with the same genre (mystery) but this time I‘ve had a bit of input from a writing mentor and I am very pleased with the opening chapter.

Editing is tough, isn’t it? I got so scared to work on my previous novel after I finished it, in case I looked at it and it was cringeworthy, but if you don’t write something, you have nothing to edit. It has to start somewhere.
The other problem I have is not knowing when to stop editing and tweaking and polishing certain parts, and then failing to spot a plot hole!
I’m considering getting someone else to edit a bit earlier in the process this time, but I‘ll figure that out when I have a first draft done.

@ElsieT23 Yes, that’s the struggle, carving out time to write when you have lots of other things clamoring for attention!

Today I got up early and wrote 586 words. I’m not in the UK so we’re 9 hours ahead of GMT.

Wishing you all a productive and happy day!😁

@snowqu33n Ahh I can't believe you remember me. I've been writing for years though so it makes sense! You've inspired me to start editing again. I've done chapter one today and feel like a weight has lifted. I think what the problem was, like you said, knowing when to stop tweaking and polishing. I'd changed the beginning but this wasn't working so I lost heart because I'd spent hours on it. Now I've had a few months away, I can see it all with fresh eyes. I've gone back to the original beginning but kept a few sentences here and there because they work better. I'm really pleased with what I've done so thank you for motivating me! It sounds like you've had a productive day as well. I like the idea of a writing mentor. I also like your plan to have someone read through the draft sooner rather than later. That should make the editing process much easier. Mystery is such an interesting and popular genre. Do you read a lot of it and what inspires you to write it?

Excellent @Bella43 that’s what I hoped this thread would do for people.

I have also had a good writing session today, 1,267 new words, and better than that, I feel like the characters are beginning to reveal themselves, if you know what I mean.

I like mystery partly for the plot puzzles and partly for the characters. I read a lot and also watch TV mysteries. Family get annoyed when I pick out the victim and the murderer in the first ten minutes!
I like the characterization of, say M.C. Beaton, who can carry dozens of books with the force of Agatha Raisin’s personality, but the mastery of plot that Agatha Christie has is amazing. I recently read her Parker Pyne short stories and she hardly tells us anything about him at all, it’s all plot with very succinct details of each character.

Wishing all writers an inspiring and productive day!

It’s really interesting to read how much writing everyone has done over the years! I’ve always struggled to ‘start’ because I’ve never felt like I have a ‘full’ plot or ‘complete’ idea. I know that the details of a story often start to develop once you’ve started… but can I ask - how do you all go about plotting your stories? Do you have it planned out end to end including the detail? Or some other way? Xx

@HappyHolidays22 Hello and welcome to the thread!

There’s a constant debate between writers about plotting vs. ‘pantsing’. It’s just about whatever works for the writer.

I personally like Terry Pratchett’s idea of having certain plot points as ideas and writing from one to the other. I think he described it as being like looking out over a deep, cloudy valley and seeing a treetop here and there poking out of the clouds. He said something like: You have to make for the nearest tree, and then write yourself to the next one, and the next, until you get to the end of the book.

However, some people prefer to plan out the entire plot before they begin, with charts, timelines, maps, etc.
JK Rowling is said to have done it that way, and even drew sketches of scenes.
PG Wodehouse is another example of a plotter, whereas Stephen King is said to be more of a ‘pantser’.

You can find a lot of information online or read interviews with authors. S.King has written an autobiographical book about his writing methods.

@snowqu33n I'm three days in and the editing is going really well. The draft is much cleaner than I remembered. I guess I lost faith for a little while but a break can do so much for spotting errors and seeing the imagery all over again. It's sad isn't it when you've read something so many times the images are not fresh anymore.

I definitely need to read more mystery. I think I could learn a lot from it because it's so clever. The drip feed of clues must be very well executioned I guess. Characterisation is my passion too. It's the little details that can bring someone to life.

I'm glad you've had a productive day as well. I love it when the characters reveal themselves. They become so vivid and seem to drive their own stories. I find that an exciting time because the plot seems to branch out from my original plan, if you can even call it that. @HappyHolidays22 I often draft novels from a list of bullet points and go from there! I'm even worse with short stories. I just write them, often in a day or two, put them away and edit them a fortnight later. I tend to have edgy characters in them and build on atmosphere. They're slice of life stories, domestic fiction mainly.
@snowqu33n I love Terry Pratchett's description of treetops poking out of the clouds. Sometimes I just have clouds! 😂

Busy day yesterday so only about 200 words. Today I wrote almost 600 but am wondering if the scenes are in the right order. I will keep going for now and rearrange it later if it doesn’t flow well.

Have a prolific and enjoyable day’s writing today!

Hi, is it ok if I join? I’m writing a novel, or a collection of short stories. It’s hard to be sure as the word count currently stands at around minus eight thousand. I need a fresh start.

Five hundred words a day sounds within reach, in the past I’ve committed to other challenges like nano and not kept up with it. It’s affected my confidence. I am going to try to write a very very short story each day just for the habit and confidence building value. This morning I wrote around 260 words outlining a short story about an encounter between a woman and a wolf. Then I wrote and deleted several first paragraphs of my novel.

Hello and welcome @Guillebeauxit's so lovely you've decided to join us! 😊 Confidence is my achille's heel too. I left my novel alone for a little while because of it. Thanks to this thread, I'm back to it and making progress with editing. I love writing short stories too. I love your idea of a woman and a wolf, I'd like to hear more on that. Is it fantasy you write or all different genres?

@snowqu33n Any progress is progress so well done on your word count 👏 it's all going in the right direction. I edited five pages yesterday and a few more this morning. I also tweaked the synopsis because the original one made it look like a certain character starts the story but they don't. They're a main character who comes in during chapter two. It made for a confused chapter one with the other synopsis so I'm glad I've sorted that now. I didn't know how to fix it until I did some freewriting on my phone. I use my phone a lot for problem solving. I'm sure your scenes will come together when you get back to them. Sometimes a break or a walk with the dog helps me rearrange scenes when I'm stuck.

Thanks Bella 😊 I’m looking forward to getting to where you are, editing a completed manuscript! How are you finding it? What would you describe your novel as, genre-wise or otherwise?

The woman and the wolf was a dream I had, it made its way into my morning pages. I set a timer for fifteen minutes first thing each day and write whatever I can, an exercise in becoming unstuck and to develop some writerly habits. My biggest challenge is finding the simple pleasure of writing without the paralysis that worrying about writing well can cause. I rewrote it as a poem later that day. It might make it into The Novel as a bit of folklore shared round a campfire or something.

I’ve been wavering from one genre to another so much I’ve decided to keep trying to tell the basic story in all the genres - it started as a comic Nordic-noir style mystery about missing pets. Now it’s evolving into an exploration of grief and the search for, and rejection of, meaningful connections set in a physical landscape of the most appalling loneliness. Probably not commercially viable but the writing is its own reward.

The word count is still a negative number but I hope by keeping up 500 words a day to be ready to start a fresh version of my story without deleting it all as I go!

Ready by April 🙏

This 500 words a day is just right, a doable demand.

Hi @Guillebeaux good to have you with us!
Very much enjoying reading everyone’s posts about their writing.
I just heard about morning pages a couple of weeks ago, it sounds very useful for seeding ideas. I might try it sometime when mornings are a bit less full on.

Yesterday was no go for me, too many things going on, but today I managed over 630 new words and a bit of tidying up of previous sentences.
I think this time I might have a more lengthy first draft and therefore more line editing eek 😬

@Guillebeaux I think I've lost sight of the fact that I should be glad I've got a completed novel in the first place so thank you for that, 😊you'll get there too. 500 words a day will one day turn into a novel. I've already done a full edit after studying on the Curtis Brown Creative Edit and Pitch Your Novel course - which was excellent - but know that it needed something more. After putting it away for a few months, I decided to up the romance. I've written a few extra scenes and will be adding these in when I come to it (I've already decided where it'll slot in. I've upped the romance only slightly, just enough to give the plot a little lift).

My novel is historical fiction. It's set during ww2 and throws a light on women left behind on the homefront so I'd describe it as domestic fiction. I've edited a few more pages today, not as many as yesterday or the day before but as long as I chip away at it I don't mind. I think I'd lost my confidence in it because I'd read it too many times and it became over-familiar. On that note, I'd say beware of deleting your stories. No writing is ever wasted so maybe all you need to do is save them and come back to them another time. I have a word document full of half stories/poems and ideas. I come back to them weeks, even years, later and finish them off. Your wolf poem/folklore around the fire sounds wonderful. That's storytelling at it's best! You can't beat a good campfire tale.

@snowqu33n Well done on your word count! Onwards and upwards 😊I haven't heard of morning pages either so I'm going to have a quick look at that later. I love hearing about all different ways and incentives to get writing. My first draft was lengthy too but I read somewhere that done is better than perfect so keep going!

@Guillebeaux Your missing pets/grief/loneliness ideas all sound like something I'd be interested in. Sometimes stories blend into one or branch off into something else altogether. I've merged two short stories together in the past and the dialogue/plot have worked really well because of it. I would never have thought of those ideas or twists and turns in the storyline otherwise.

Great work snowqu33n having a day off to do other things is probably a good idea in the long term? Did you hear about morning pages on the radio recently? I think that’s where I learned about it but I can’t remember the exact day and time or even the station (probably radio 4) and only caught a snippet of the broadcast. Googling suggested there are pros and cons but so far it’s helping me a lot.

Thanks bella, those words are so encouraging. It’s so easy to erase as I go yet I don’t have that problem with morning pages so maybe I should try physically writing the chapters by hand and apply the same value to the words? The difference with the stream of consciousness stuff is you’re not supposed to reread it. I like the setting for your novel, we don’t have nearly enough stories about women in conflict. Are you drawing upon family history?

So I'm a writer who works in bursts. I did (my version of) Nano last year in which I wrote 250 words a day for the whole month. I can usually carry on the momentum of that once the original month ends but then I had a miscarriage so all of my writing ability and impetus died as well. Not sure how to get it back.

Pre-Covid I would write 500 words a day for Nano on the train to work and at lunch time but now I work from home.

Currently I have one complete YA fantasy novel of 96k that no one wants to publish (despite 10 years of work on it) and one incomplete YA fantasy manuscript of around 60k.

Hello writers!
Welcome @TheBirdintheCave sounds like you’ve been writing for years, it’s great to have you join us. With 60k words it would be a shame not to give it an ending, wouldn’t it? Or maybe start fresh, but re-use some scenes or concepts? Can you remember what stirred you to write your earlier books?
You could always try something completely new and exciting.

@Guillebeaux I read about morning pages in a reference in a. book for illustrators. I am also going to art school part-time and I have a younger children’s book written that I want to illustrate eventually. At the moment I’m mostly working on drawing skills though. Along with everything else 🤣

It’s funny you and @Bella43 are talking about writing longhand, by coincidence I wound up doing that today while waiting to pick up DC from swimming. It actually felt much easier than opening the computer, so I got a lot written. I also rediscovered my original notes for the book with lots of useful ideas. Happy 😃

There’s something so lovely about a fresh page in a nice notebook.

@Bella43 I really appreciate how encouraging you and the other posters are being on this thread 😊

@snowqu33n Haha yes, since I was four and my grandma (an English teacher) showed me how to write a poem. I used to write endlessly. I'd kill for that passion and intensity now 😂

And yes, it will be good to get the second book finished at some point. It's all mapped out in my head I just need to write it down. Unfortunately I keep thinking of ways to improve or tighten it which would mean going back to the first few chapters and changing them, something I don't really want to be doing in the first draft.

Ahh thank you for your kind words @snowqu33n I think it's lovely being part of such a supportive group, that was the one thing I was lacking on this writing journey. I'm with you on the joy of finding original notes for your novel. That happened to me when I'd literally lost the plot. I knew I'd written it down somewhere and thought it was in a word document. I couldn't find it anywhere so had to draft the rest of the novel from scratch. About a week after I'd finished, I found the original plot written on a piece of paper. It was almost identical to what I'd written apart from a few new bits here and there (which I loved), so they obviously went missing for a reason.

Hello and welcome @TheBirdintheCave I second what @snowqu33n said about finishing your novel. Don't be disheartened about not having found a publisher for the first one. It only takes one person to love it enough to publish. Did you try agents or were you submitting directly to publishers? I've recently subscribed to Mslexia magazine. They list all different agents and publishers looking for new writing. I sent my novel to a few agents but no takers so far. I haven't tried for a little while now because I want to get all the new scenes in and give it one final edit and polish. In that sense, I'm glad it hasn't landed in the right hands yet. Don't give up on yours either. Sometimes a break from it while you work on something else is all you need. I wrote a lot of short stories and poetry while I put my novel down to rest. Some of them were completely different to my novel. It was nice to experiment with different genres and a very different voice. My novel has a gentle tone. My short stories are more about atmosphere and tension.

@Guillebeaux I find freewriting really unlocks my imagination. It's good for poetry too. I often use word clouds as well when writing a poem. It's surprising how many words and images you can come up with from just one single word like 'snow.' My novel was the short story that didn't want to end. I'm fascinated by ww2 and grew up in a small village similar to the one in my novel. I wanted to incorporate that sense of community and people pulling together in difficult times.