Word Count Addiction

We all know who we are and there are thousands upon thousands of us out there. We are writers who judge their own success by their daily word count. Addicts that can’t get up for that cup of coffee, or go to the grocery until they reach an acceptable total for their sitting. It’s a grind. It’s a habit. But we writers all do it to keep going.

Nationally, there are many writing groups that pound the keys in mutual suffering. They count together. They are writers who cheer each other on, support those feeling weakened as they lag behind, and generally keep up the word count progress like hamsters racing on the wheel. I’m currently signed up for my local romance writers’ chapter for a 70 day challenge, which is called the Sven Challenge. It stands for 70 days of sweat. The web site has a buff man sweating, which isn’t a very pretty analogy for our toil, but it’s apt.

I’ve done these national and group challenges before. My Circle of Crones writing group tended to put out smaller challenges four times a year before we petered out. I’ve also been a NaNoWrMo, National Novel Writing Month, winner three years running. There are a lot of us out there and not all of us are unpublished wannabes, either. Jennifer Crusie participated in NaNoWrMo's November torture. She wrote in her blog, http://www.jennycrusie.com/, about it. I had to laugh, because she sounded just as miserable and as frustrated as the rest of us trying to keep up the pace. Word counting is a writer's jogging. You breathe hard, sweat buckets and all to get the raw material of a story out on the page.

It’d be ridiculous if it weren’t so necessary. Word counting is not a new writer’s game, in point of fact. Famous, long gone authors did it too. Anais Nin got paid for each word of erotica that she wrote for her anonymous benefactor. She kept diligent records. So did many of the authors, such as Dashiell Hammett and a plethora of depression era authors, who were paid a penny a word. There are whole hand typed and edited marred manuscripts with little word count scribbles in the corners out there. I wonder if authors like Jane Austen did it too. I can imagine they wrote notes to themselves with their quill and ink in the margins: Great day for Jane! She writ 500 words for the day!

The camaraderie is what is important nowadays. No longer do we writers slave away in attic rooms or corners of the parlor, isolated in our thoughts whilst the world goes on outside. They counted words alone, but we count words together. Writers now have a window via the internet and a voice, usually whining about their lack of progress, but a voice nonetheless. We’re cheerleaders for each other, and each word counts. I’m a word count addict and I’m standing proud with my brethren. You better believe that I’m tallying up this 500 plus word count toward my 70,000 word goal. You can bet your bippy that my Sven Sweat Challenge is 524 words richer. Come mid-March, I'll be posting a high five for having made the 70,000 word count total. Go team!

A New Beginning

Whenever I start a new story, as I did yesterday, I tell myself what I tell my students: write the map first. Plot out where you’re going, know your central conflict, understand your characters better than they understand themselves. Not once have I followed my own advice. To me, writing is like solving puzzles. I know what should happen just as I know what a Rubrics cube looks like when it’s solved, but I don’t know how I’m getting there. Stories are mazes where I can surmise what the plot/resolution will be, but it will surprise me just as much as my audience when I get there.

In Stephen King’s book, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft he writes that he intended in his book Misery to have Annie Wilks, the crazed nurse, to kill Paul Sheldon and if I remember correctly, to rewrite the death of Misery in a book stretched with his skin Memento Mori style. Ewwww…I know, but King says that Paul Sheldon was such a strong voice as he was writing the book that he wouldn’t be killed. He, the character, as he was being written figured out a way to save himself from crazed ass Annie’s axe. My characters are just as stubborn.

This new story I’m writing is called Brass and its set in the Steampunk universe of San Francisco. I’ve been thinking about writing in this genre for weeks after I read about an open call at Samhain. Me, being me, thought, gee, that’s so me! I’m like so knowledgeable about things Victorian, seeing as how I’m an ex expert from Boston in 19th century prints, and well, I also write fantasy, and gosh golly, I love the clothes. Why couldn’t I play with the genre and see what happens? I have until April for the deadline, right?

Then I started running into Steampunk EVERYWHERE. My friend Tannia in the U.K. posted a link to a site: http://www.datamancer.net/ saying that she wanted the steampunk computer featured. I want it too. Also, I’d like the flash drive, if anyone cares. I began floating through many sites, then reading books. Currently, I’m reading Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. He’s a bit hyper, but I’m riding through it. I also discovered much to my self-disgust that my cousin’s husband, James P. Blaylock writes Steampunk and is, well, famous for it. I think he tried to explain the genre to me at the reunion this summer but gave up because I was so obviously clueless. I have Steampunk, the new short story collection by the Vandemeers, on order. He’s featured in it. Let’s all hope that he forgives me when I tell him that I read his story.

My new story, Brass is just beginning. I wrote a plot summary, but just as Stephen King, I already know that my main character, Celia Cushing, will take the lead away from me eventually. My characters always do. This part, the beginning, is always the easiest and most exciting, when I’m fitting these personalities into a new reality, setting obstacles in their path and writing them out of the forest. The revisions will be harder, when I discover that my path was too simplistic or that I need to write new twists or even new characters into the plot. That’s another dilemma, though, and for another post. Meanwhile, I’m steaming forward. *shakes head at wisecrack self*

December 2009

Introduction:

I write stories that I would like read by all and sundry. A little feedback from readers is always welcome. Did the story reach out and grab my audience? Did my characters hang in their minds for awhile while they wondered what had happened after? Was there enough of a plot to capture their attention, so that they cared enough to keep on reading?

Thus, I’m blogging my thoughts about writing. My name is Theresa Wood. I’m a language arts teacher. Yes, I teach writing by day and write for my own pleasure in the off hours. I’ve had two stories published so far in a now defunct on-line magazine called E-muze. I won an award once from Writer’s Digest for a short story. I’ve written three books. One, a thriller set in the art world of Boston, something I happen to know a great deal about, given that I was a gallery director there eons ago. The book title changes frequently, but only because I still like the original, The Artful Dodge and it’s copyrighted to someone else. My second book is also set in Boston, but of the altered universe variety, with a werewolf heroine and an icky villain bent on world domination through magic. I’m still editing this one. Again, I seem to have a problem with titles. Called Mirror World, this one is an Alice through the looking glass story wherein the heroine wakes up after an attack to find that she now sees bizarre mythical creatures.

Because I can’t seem to stay away from urban fantasy tales in my writing, or my reading, my third book is set in the Northwest forest where I also happen to be living at the moment. It is also still in rewrite and called Once Fey. The main character is a kick butt girl that discovers she is a traitor to the fey realm and has been banished to live among humans until she redeems herself. Again, I’m rewriting this one to have a more romantic bent so that it’s ready for the RWoA Golden Rose this summer.

This blog is all about writing. I don’t plan to rant much about my personal life. I DO have one, but this blog is about the writing. I read quite a lot too, so I’ll probably write about that. For several years, I have been a member of a very cool group of writers known as Circle of Crones but our numbers have dwindled due to all the 'real' life stuff that interrupts writing all too frequently. I’m currently a member of the Romance Writers of America, the Portland branch. I like relationships with other writers.

I’m open to comments on writing, or getting to know fellow writers, agents, and/or publishers. Please contact me.

Cheers, Theresa Wood