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.

[motherinferior]

Stuck in both ways, really, Wilbur. I should write some more, and I know I could really make the time, and er I'm not. I did see a way around a bit of a block recently...

[wilbur]

Gosh, that looks like a great book, Becs - I am going to order it. I found a book of household management called "How to Get Organised When you Don't Have The Time" was helpful in taming the shambles of stuff in my house, but I am still not very good at establishing a routine so that the basics of life (food, clean clothes, a house that won't give you cholera) are covered on a day to day basis.

MaryAnn - cool, an illustrator, how lovely. Is it a children's book your dh has written?

[NotQuiteCockney]

I'm just finishing up an OU course on writing, and enjoying it.

The website you're talking about is You Write On. It looks good, but I've not used it. I might try putting my final OU assignment on it, as it's long enough.

[thebecster]

I'm so glad to find other writers on MN - it's a lonely business isn't it? Especially unpublished, waiting for the rejections to come pouring in... I'm feeling very nervous about it at the moment. My last day at work is Thursday next week, and then I'll be using my savings to write for a while part time while DS goes to nursery. DH is being amazingly supportive, but I feel so [gulp! what if I'm not good enough emoticon]. But at the same time, I know that it won't matter if I'm not published, I just want to write, even if I'm not successful. When I'm writing I feel as if I'm being self-indulgent for not doing housework/earning money for the family or whatever and when I'm not writing I feel guilty that I'm not writing. Gaaaaargh! Have any of you read Virginia Woolf's 'A room of one's own'? Written all those years ago, but I think it still holds good in terms of it being difficult for women to write unless they have space and money...

[wilbur]

Oh yes, A Room of One's Own - I nearly cried when I read the bit about 20 shilling notes appearing in her purse (because of an independent income). I have one of those penguin classic mugs with the book cover on it.

NQC - that website looks v interesting. Will have to have a snoop round it over the weekend as I have to go and get ds2 from nursery now.

[thebecster]

I have that mug too wilbur . Our writing desks probably look very similar!

[Issy]

Hi wilbur - how do you actually go about writing a screen play? Do you use one of those software packages that help you format dialogue, scene setting etc.? Not that I've ever written a screen play or am likely to, I'm just curious about how one goes about such technical writing.

I will admit to having a fabulously corny plot for a screen play in my head, but it's main purpose is to distract myself in dull meetings by "running" scenes for it in my head. I just can't see myself ever committing it to paper. In true Hollywood-schlock style it's "Sixth Sense meets Cage Aux Folles meets Three Men and a Baby meets Kramer v Kramer".

[wilbur]

Issy - yes I have a software program which does the formatting (you have to get it right as 1 page of a screenplay equates to roughly one minute of screen time). I bought it in America years ago, and should really upgrade it to a more modern one, but I am waiting until I have actually finished this new one before I start spending unearned money on toys. And I'm loving your pitch for your film! "I see dead drag queens who are fighting over the baby they adopted into their civil partnership" Sparkles and angst, sounds fab.

[MaryAnnSingleton]

wilbur - yes, it is a children's book - it is v good,in my opinion but I'm quite nervous about illustrating it ! so far he likes what I'm doing....

[Issy]

"I see dead drag queens who are fighting over the baby they adopted into their civil partnership"

Not quite, but I'm loving your interpretation. Did you find an agent for your first screenplay?

[hunkermunker]

I have found this book very useful.

I find MN is my main block to writing (you don't say!), but I now have my book on DH's laptop, which isn't internet enabled, so I spend more time on there. Well, a bit more time.

I've been writing it for the last decade(!) and have just rewritten the start in a way I'm very happy with. It has several possible endings, so I'm going through it now, writing a precis of each chapter, seeing how to add in extra details, make any explanations flow in the story and not be standalone "well, this is why this happens and that is why that happens". I keep finding bits I have forgotten I wrote and really liking them, so that's positive, I guess

[QuintessentialShadow]

I am cheering you on Wilbur! Thumbs up

(I wrote a novel, so far rejected, but it did come very close! Final boardmeeting with external consultant, sob, he said it was not in line with publishing house usual style... But I got a finnished product at least! Considering whether to have a look again, tweak and send to different publisher.)

Maybe I will join you later, I have started a new one, I am 4 pages in..... We will see...

[wilbur]

Issy - Yes, I got an agent and Granada TV picked up an option to turn it into a TV series, but then the exec who was working with me on it left for a new company and not long after the bbc did a one off drama with pretty much the same premise. So that was that. Then all around the same time I had ds1, and I had completely underestimated the pull of family life. I thought the baby would slumber under my desk while I typed away [cue sound of laughter bordering on weepy hysteria] and all would be fine. So here I am, about 7 years later and starting again at the beginning.

Hunker - I saw that book in our bookshop and was going to have a look at it, but, of course didn't have time. Will take a look next time I'm in there. Good idea to write without the internet distraction. I have a shed in the garden with no internet access where I am supposed to go and get my head down, but all too often I find myself working in the kitchen as its warmer and I'm planning an Ocado shop or looking at house swaps or whatever at the same time as writing. Sigh.

Quintessential - thanks for the cheering on and well done on actually finishing a novel! And 4 pages is 4 pages for the new one - no doubt soon to be joined by more.

[ruty]

i had a meeting with Film4 about my screenplay but then later they changed they remit/minds. And had ds which kind of stopped all my writing time. Am having another one [child!] now so am planning knuckle down to the writing in two or three years. [gulp] Will watch thread with interest though...

[wilbur]

So you and I are in a similar boat, ruty. It is frustrating to get a certain way, have the meeting or whatever, and then it doesn't happen. It quite knocked the wind out of my sails, which is why it has taken me so long to get back to it. Anyway, good luck with your pregnancy - maybe you can use all those breastfeeding hours as story planning time!

Right, I am off to do some work. No really, I am.

[ruty]

Good luck! I'll have to start writing one handed won't I.
It is very frustrating, especially when they rave about your work and then won't put their money where their mouth is. I'd like to know how you get on so keep us posted...

[wilbur]

Well, I've done 4 pages of my short script in the last couple of days, plus I've worked out some problems and done some editing, so I'm quite pleased. 6 more pages this week and I will have hit my 10 page target for the first time in forever.

[Smaug]

Hello, can I join in? I saw this thread last week and thought it could help me get a kick up the bum! I am the world's worst procrastinator; I could waste time for England.

I'm working on a plan for a crime novel. I have two ideas, both of which have been in my head for an embarrassing number of years and I alternate between them. The one I am working on at the moment I am preparing for a competition here: it's more a personal challenge to try and get me working rather than because I actually think I would get shortlisted. I entered last year, so it would represent a big mental setback for me if I didn't get it together this year. I don't even have a time excuse () as I'm SAHM and my youngest went to school in September .

So, the position so far: I have to submit the first 3,000 words and a 500-1,000 synopsis of the rest. I have a long synopsis that I'm currently typing up, which I should be able to whittle down to within the time limit. If I'm honest the end section is a bit sketchy but I think I know what I need to do to build it up. I haven't written the opening chapter, though I do know quite precisely what it contains; I just need the 'right' way to start, then it should just be a case of writing up the rest.

I've got just over two weeks, but I do have a couple of other things going on at the same time... Please tell me to knuckle down and get on with it!

[wilbur]

Knuckle down and get on with it! Did that work? Nice to have someone here with a specific deadline - might get the rest of us going. I have thought about entering for competitions, maybe this afternoon I'll look for some online and see if I can enter. Like your name by the way - am just reading the Hobbit to ds1.

[ruty]

I just wouldn't know where to start with a novel - it is something i would love to do, but it is such a different discipline to screenwriting. It is very hard to write a synopsis before writing the actual screenplay, I find, and I would have thought it would be even harder for a novel. the writing evolves over time, and a synopsis can't really capture that, although easier when the thing is finished. Good luck to you both and I'll be interested to see your progress!

[ELF1981]

does anybody know on average how many words a novel contains?

quick q then I'll do introduction!

[SaveScrabulous]

I don't know about fiction but I was given a target of 50,000 words for my non-fiction book which I imagine would be fairly similar to an average novel (not War and Peace).
Hope that helps until someone more in the know comes along!

[ELF1981]

[Elf waves at the thread posters]

I have two finished, one with 77000 words, one with 77500.

One needs a small re-write at 71000

One in midsts of being written at 34000

all chick lit types. Just need to be brave enough to do something about them!

[ruty]

Have you got the Writer's Handbook Elf? Lists all the publishers. Send a letter and chapter out, go on!

[ELF1981]

I do have the book, I also have a load of things which stops me doing so!! I blame lack of time to proof read / write the sypnosis / research the publishers, agents etc. I work full time, study in the evenings etc... excuses, excuses I know!

I ger nervous as nobody has read it for me yet!