Three Weeks to Go: Progress Report...

Thursday my second draft went over the 40,000 word mark.

(Admittedly at the start of the year I already had a handful of the early chapters typed up.)

3 weeks to go...

I've still got chapters to go of course, but I have now picked back up the latter chapters of the first draft after writing the new ones in. A few scenes have moved position too and I feel they're now in the right place.

I can see where I'm heading. The fact that the first half of the draft is still missing scenes is another thing entirely...

(The last time I reached the 40,000 words stage was with the first novel I tried writing- in the last century!)

Although I don't use Scrivener to it's full potential (at the moment) it has definitely helped my progress. With Word, I was always conscious of how little I seemed to be producing, but now I get to the end of the chapter and I'm surprised by the word count.

(Changing the font really does help with the writing.)

I print out each chapter as it's finished and then slip them into clear plastic sleeves, they're then held together with a couple of green treasury tags. As the stack has built up it's made the novel feel more real.

My original assumption was that this story would end up around 50,000 words, but that may have been an under estimate. By the time it is finally completed- some time next year- I'm hoping 60,000 words may be nearer.

This week, the big peril scene in Chapter 19...






image from pixabay.com

Counting Down...

I have one month to get my manuscript in to the RNA's New Writers' Scheme. Fortunately I can submit a partial if that's all that's done.

At the moment I may just get the second draft finished, the manuscript tidied up, my form filled in and do the best I can on the synopsis...

As I've rewritten this second draft I have discovered how I make substantial progress, as well as realising that just because I think there's only a few missing scenes to fill in, my brain can think otherwise.

Starting out on draft 2, I believed I probably had two or three scenes each in two, maybe three new chapters to fill in the gaps. How wrong I was!

Still working on it...

Honestly I'm not sure how many new scenes there are, but I've added five chapters that were missing from that first draft.

There is still a lot of work that will need to be done in the next draft, improve the first half, then there's odd bits that need reworking, narrative changed to scenes/dialogue, descriptions added and character arcs checked. And that's before I start the editing process!

Even though all this work lies ahead I'm satisfied with all I've achieved so far, also what I've learnt about how I write and plot.

But most importantly I've learnt to trust my subconscious; those random bits of dialogue that don't seem to serve a purpose at the time, do fulfil a role later on...

When I do get the RNA's reader's comments back I am expecting quite a lot of pages to read and consider, then decide where I go from there.

For now it's get this draft complete.

Wish me luck...



image: pixabay.com