Got a novel/play/screenplay in your head? Get it on paper! Here is the page count thread for hopeful and actual writers.

[wilbur]

Are you a writer in need of some motivation? Post here each day or whenever you can with your page count. Or post your hopes for how many pages you want to write each day and then come back and see if you managed them. Even if they are rubbish, at least you will have them down on paper and can make them brilliant at a later date.

I will start. I am hoping to write a second full-length screenplay before August 2008. I have two days a week where I have time to write my own stuff and I am aiming to do 5 pages on each of those days.

Just finished. Did about 12 pages and feel great but also have no idea how I'm going to cram it all into 60 pages as I'm up to page 22 already and not yet at the bottom of page 2 of a 6 ad a half page outline that has got a fair few important emotional scenes to come. Oh well. Not going to worry for now.
Who else has been writing today?

Am writing tomorrow - but well done on twelve pages. And surely you will cut and revise it down when you're done, so that's not a problem at all.

I used to work in tv, and in every programme felt that I had waaay too much stuff to go in, and every time I would cut it down and it would just get better and better until it was down to length.

I'm trying to apply that discipline to the novel at the moment, and cut out all the deadwood (while, I fear, writing in new bits of deadwood at the same time, but that's another story)

Welcome VS, and don't stop. Then I don't have an excuse to either

waves belatedly to tooticky as well.

oh wow, I haven't looked for a couple of days and you've all been doing terrifically! wow at 12 pp!

I've done 1.5 tonight and going to bed, shattered. ds will no doubt have other ideas in an hour's time.

PhDlife - it's 12 script pages so sounds more than it is.

Well done for doing 12 pages Toots! Fab! I'm sure you will find plenty to reorganise and you'll fit it all in, it doesn't sound like you're too far off the page count - at least you're not on page 47 with only a third of the story covered.

And well done for your work PHD - it's all steps in the right direction.

Hello, Victoriansqualor - welcome! Feel free to post any time you feel like stopping and we'll give you a kick some encouragement.

Hmmm, why can i never get underlining to work?

hmmm have been busy with dd2's birthday and dh feeling sorry for himself so have done nothing will crack on tomorrow (wanders away to thrash self with branch and enforce writing more)

Toots, don't do yourself down - 12 pages is still 12 pages!

I'm thinking of mine as eating an elephant, one page/bite at a time - or 3 and a bit, tonight

good luck frizbe

wilbur, the secret's in the shift key. (let it go, let it gooooo )

g'night all

Thanks Wilbur and Phd. Well done with the 3 and a bit. I like your elephant metaphor, Phd. This thread can be like the mayo and seasoning that helps it go down.

Frizbe, put that branch down. Hope you have a good day.

ok the branch is down, but have not had chance to do anything more today, however dh is working late tomorrow, so will get time then!!

I am hoping to crack on a bit tomorrow. Sneak it in among the paid work when conscience allows!

god, it's a slog tonight. brain off with the fairies. have ground out a bare half-page and am kind of wishing it was already 9:30 so I could go clear the kitchen up, shower, and go to bed. Go on, someone give me a carrot. Or a stick.

urgh, 1.5pp and another .5 of notes, brain all gone, ugh.

I'm writing today too. Still slogging on, some good bits, but hitting more and more snags that I need to stop, think about, work on, rewrite, still be displeased with. Might hit the half-way point next week (I thought it would be this week, but too many snags and a stomach bug put paid to that)

Good to see everyone on here, though; it's encouraging. Would love to know more about what everyone else is writing though, and even see some bits one day.

And the secret's in the shift key?! Why has no one told me this before...

I am just about to head to do some writing. Just have to unpack groceries and put another wash on first (twas ever thus), and try to strike out again . I have proper free time this afternoon, bliss, so will check back in later.

FFS

Phd sounds like it was tough. But you did it! Well done. You'll never have to do last night again.

Wilbur and Vonsud - I'm joining you now. But I've also got a mad urge to run to the health food shop on the high street for a lentil roti thing. Will write a scene or two, dash and get back for more.

Obviously I just went straight for the roti. But then I wrote six scenes so not too terrible. Am a bit behind with work now though.

wilbur, you've got to put the --'s around every word!

toots, hope you enjoyed your roti - sounds like it was 6 scenes' worth of good . Stuff work.

okay I can't write anything tonight - ds has been playing up and I am far too as well as tired and only just now getting to pc.

So let me tell y'all about my project -

it's CHICKLIT! (are y'gonna throw me off your high-falutin' thread now?! ) I'm partway through ch.10; the next chapter is the... oh crap, what's that word.... climax! when the heroine goes to the dance and the hero... well I'm not sure, I thought he was going to get in a fight with his brother, the false hero, but lately I've been feeling less sure about that. It is light stuff but coming easily and crucially, it's fun to write. I fantasise about getting paid for it but right now, am just concentrating on getting it out. (In my spare time.) I don't want to hand it round for reading til I've got a whole first draft, in case I lose my nerve.

am now wondering whether I am calm enough to write...

Got to post to acknowlege Phd for 'coming out' as a chick litter! Hope you simmered down enough to work. My 'oevre' is not high falutin' at all. Populist comedy drama about real people trying to do the best they can and failing then pulling something out of the hat. Actually one of them does something really, really stupid then has to try to redeem herself. Am too shy/self conscious to give any details. But I might ask very nicely for readers at some point too pretty please.

Brothers is good phd. Fights are good. Dances are energised arenas (appealing to your academic side). I'm interested.

aw shucks toots, thanks that's very kind of you.

decided on lotsa MNing and a glass of wine instead of writing tonight. I so need to go to bed.

oh and bags I get to be one of your readers when the time comes - that sounds like the sort of thing I'd read, for sure

I've had an idea to write a series of short stories for ages now but whenever I think of the plot I get bored and put it off. Definitely need some motivation (kick up the arse) but because I write ahead and move paragraphs around, I'll go by word count if that's ok.

Am finally not as overloaded with stuff as I have been so I should really crack on with it - aiming to do 8,000 words of plot (not the endless notes I keep doing) in the next week

Oh and chick lit sounds fairly high brow compared to my chosen genre of whispers fantasy

I'm just sitting at the computer posting on here writing notes, i.e. nonsense, because I'm too tired to think straight and actually carry on with the revision. Still, it is Friday night.

Nothing to apologise about in popular, or fantasy or chicklit for that matter - in my tv life, it's definitely the case that it's much harder to make something popular which appeals to lots of people, than it is to make an arty documentary about architecture or something, and I suspect that the same is true of writing as well.

And I am in fact living proof of that. Having failed to write a popular book taking the piss out of makeover tv (or rather, not failed to write it, failed to get anyone to take it on), I have gone over to the arty side. I am now writing a 'literary' novel (although I hate the phrase) about the resonance of place, and history in places. It's not quite as bad as all that - the story is about a girl who finds herself drawn to a particular place, and in unwravelling the story of that place, discovers that she has to face up to her own history as well. I am hoping that there is enough plot to stop it being too up itself, but am pretty sure that no one would want to publish it. Even if it does have a dance energised arena in it. Where does that come from Toots?!

well I finally wrote something this morning, though it was not what I was planning on
A poem, of all things came into my head whilst I was brushing my teeth so with dh wandering around getting dressed and the kids all clattering past my ankles back and forth, as they do, I managed to get it down on paper. Despite the interupptions of 'what are you doing mum?'
now feeling quite pleased with myself despite it not being the writing I was supposed to be doing.