Monday, March 15, 2010

S-L-O-W-L-Y I turn...step by step...inch by inch....

I love finishing a book.  There's such a sense of satisfaction.  There it is, your brand new baby, cute as a button and all you want to do is show it off.  Of course, then you have to wait a YEAR or more before that happens . . . .

Unfortunately, I'm not in the last throes of writing the book.  I'm not quite in the middle either.  I'm still in that EXTREMELY PAINFUL part where I'm hoping the whole thing comes together like a giant wedding cake.  I'm still laying the foundation layers right now.

My writing goal is 1250 words five days a week, or 6,250 words a week.  Here we are at the 15th of the month (eeek!  The Ides of March) and I've only been getting about 295 words a day.  S-L-O-W-L-Y the story is coming together, but it's taken me three months to get here, and I have less than three months to go.  I can see me rushing when it comes to deadline time -- and then I have another book to deliver three months after that.  (Luckily, that book is in better shape than the one I'm working on now--at least I have a complete draft of that done.)

I didn't have a breakthrough yesterday, but I did eek forward more than I have for a full week (despite the fact I had a lot of great ideas on Thursday).  So I have pages and pages of scene fragments just sitting there, rather like a giant jigsaw puzzle.  Now to figure out where the pieces go, and how they all connect.  (This puzzle is beginning to feel like all one color.)

I guess I'm a little discouraged right now.  But I have a feeling when I'm done, this book is going to be one of my favorites.  At least, I'm crossing my fingers that it happens.