Moving along

I finally achieved some forward motion in *that chapter* of Quest, with just shy of 1K added today. Chapters in this book run anywhere from 7K to 10K. This chapter is currently pushing 8K, and it's not quite ready to wrap up yet, but the motives and actions are at least aimed towards the resolution.

Considering I worked around a sales rep, several customers, and a long detailed phone call, I did all right. In the last hour I peeled off another 882 words of jotting down plot points that seem like they might happen in *Shann*. There were getting to be too many of them stirring around in my head. The religion got a bit more complicated, and I discovered that I have a third country to plan out, at least on its western flank where it borders both Khairdazh and Nuumour. I also learned that more of the story is likely to take place in Khairdazh than I had thought it would earlier on. Plus there will be a lull in the storm somewhere in the middle of the book in Evdrika. More homework! (She says smiling happily...)

There's been an interesting thread lately at Forward Motion about how many words a person needs to write before they are likely to write a publishable work. The number bandied about in the profession is one million. That is in the neighborhood of eight to ten full-length novels. I'm only half way there! (grin). Probably less than half when you consider that some of mine are a tad on the short side. Or maybe more when you consider that *Heaven can Wait* has been written three times already. Of course, that's not a hard and fast rule. There have been a number of writers whose first or second books have sold and done reasonably well. And some writers, of course, will never achieve publication even on their twentieth or thirtieth novels, should they keep beating their heads on publisher's doors for that long.

Why do I mention it? It makes me think that perhaps I don't need to be too hard on myself if I can't get enthused about another pass on *Heaven can Wait* this spring. I've mentioned before that it (still!) has some major continuity issues. It's entirely possible that I'd be best off re-outlining the story and writing it again completely from scratch, without eyeing the earlier drafts for salvageable bits. And honestly, I don't have the desire to spend the time on that story. Maybe in a year or two I'll be able to come at it with a fresh outlook, but I've been pretty immersed in it, doing the three rounds from June '03 to August '04. If the story keeps coming back to mind, I'll give it another go, but for now, I'm taking it off my roster.

There, I feel better already.

A few more good days should see the end of this draft of *Quest*. Of course, tomorrow morning is shot before it starts because the sales-rep-who-talks-for-hours will be here.

And then another week or so of *False Perceptions*. I haven't received the feedback yet from Zette on the first three chapters, but I'm hoping I'll be able to push through and finish THAT first draft as well fairly soon, once my vacation time with *Quest* has rejuvenated me. And then...it will be *Shann* time.

Optimistic, aren't I? :)

Re-visiting 2005 goals

Goals. Pesky little critters, aren't they? (Much like mice in that respect, come to think of it.) Can't live with them, can't live without them. (And that is where the differences begin...)

First off, I am not progressing as quickly as I'd like on *False Perceptions." My wordcount table tells me that I'm at about 66K, two thirds of my projected word count. My outline tells me that I'm at point 46 out of 60, three quarters finished. Best guess is that I have another 25K to go? Hmm. I guess that's still a *maybe* for mid February at 7K a week.

I need to figure out where I went astray on *Quest to be Queen* near the end of nano. The story started out light and fluffy and funny and it isn't that way anymore. Yes, it is a *real* story, so there have to be serious blocks to Teagren's goals, but I've lost the story voice somewhere. I don't want to simply finish it just to finish it; I want to figure out what it needs and THEN finish it.

The real trouble with my goals is *Heaven can Wait*. There's been a thread recently at FM about knowing when to give up on a story. I have invested a lot of time in the past two years to *Heaven*, but it still has some serious issues. I've written three drafts mostly from scratch. It's way better than it wmas, but I'm not sure how to solve the stuff that's still wrong. Is it worth saving? And if it is, is now the best time to do that? (By *now*, I mean after finishing the aforementioned first drafts.)

I look at the plans that are beginning to solidify for *Shann*, and I am getting really excited about writing that story. But I know I'll never get published if all I write is first drafts. I'm under no illusions that my first drafts are THAT good. (grin)

I do know that I've learned a lot through the books I've written so far. Is it time to say that *Heaven* was a fabulous learning curve, but that it can't take me to the top? Or will I learn enough by continuing to mess with it that it will justify the time spent, even though it may not ever be publishable? I wish I knew.

Mar suggests that I take the book out and re-outline it. Figure out what the purpose of each scene presently in the book is, and therefore which, if any, are redundant. Slot into the outline new scenes that may be needed to drive the plot or characters. Set it aside again for a bit, and then decide how much work it will be to bring it up to snuff. I do know I've learned a lot about outlining since I did the prep on *Heaven*, but it seems scary to outline a book after it is written. Let's say, for argument's sake, that I could be finished outlining by the end of March.

If I'm not convinced it's publishable, but I decide to go ahead and write the fourth draft for the exercise of it, then there's no huge panic to get it done this spring. I can even dig it out in a couple of years when I feel more equipped to fix it, sometime when I have a gap in my writing schedule. Can't see that happening, but I guess it's within the realm of possibility.

That would free me to start writing first draft of *Shann* earlier, if I'm ready, and that DOES excite me. Say, April - July should be well beyond ample.

By then, *False Perceptions* will have sat for four or five months, and I should be ready to hit revisions on it, just about the time the 2ynovel class officially gets to that stage. I don't know if the book is any good; I'm still in the middle of it, and too close to it to tell. But I do know it won't have the same kinds of continuity problems that *Heaven* does, that are causing me to choke up there. The 2yn class ends in December after walking us through the revisions, query letters, etc. So the theory says that by the end of the year I could still have one novel ready to submit, but not two. I think I can live with that.

Then I can either do nano 05, or go into *Shann* rewrites in the fall. I don't have to decide that now.

The thing is, pretending for a moment that I have these two first drafts completed, I've written two fantasies and two sfs. It has seemed easier for me to present the science fiction stories based on a Christian worldview than the fantasy ones. But I've been doing a lot of thinking, praying, reading, etc about how best to do fantasy that way. Face it, I like fantasy better as a genre, at least when it doesn't get too deep into blood magic and stuff like that. So potentially I may not go back to writing sf if I can get this figured out to my satisfaction.

Lots to think about. At least I've cleared the air and revised the plan to something more workable. Yes, I think I can live with this.