Current Events > CE Writing topic -- This Time It Won't Purge? Edition

(+) Yeah! (+)

I've taken procrastination to a new level. Somehow I've planned out 3 different series in the past week. That's 30 books in total. Two of the series take place in the same universe and the third one has 15 books in it. That's crazy lol. Now I'm obsessing over small details so I don't have to actually start writing.
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The problem with such a huge series is once you sit down and start writing it, after you get a book or two in, you'll probably lose interest and want to move onto a different idea!
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spanky1 posted...

The problem with such a huge series is once you sit down and start writing it, after you get a book or two in, you'll probably lose interest and want to move onto a different idea!

The cool thing about that 15 book series is that it's broken up into 5 different trilogies that each tell a new arc of the overarching story. The protagonist in trilogy 1 dies in the first book and one of his friends becomes the new protagonist of that trilogy. The second and third trilogy are about a different character (who is a relative of the second protagonist). The 4th and 5th trilogies each focus on new protagonists in the same family. I've been watching JoJo's Bizarre Adventure again and got inspired lol. Following a bunch of different characters should keep things fresh, plus each trilogy is basically a different subgenre (all of them are sci fi though).
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Up to 86K words, and just two short chapters left. I'm thinking maybe 89K total by the end of it. Then on to editing.

But now, I crack open a beer. It is July 4th weekend, my broskis, and I am going to get so fucking drunk for three days in a row. I mean I'm gonna get hammered.

See yall Monday.
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I want my writing to feel more diverse. Talking about using more characters that are non white nonmale, but I suck shit at making them feel like living breathing characters. I want to write good characters but I'm afraid of coming off as racist or sexist. Any advice?

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Don't worry about diversity. Just write good characters.

Aaaand done. :3

Ended up being around 87K words, and exactly 200 pages in word.

Now comes the editing phase, lol.
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spanky1 posted...

Aaaand done. :3

Ended up being around 87K words, and exactly 200 pages in word.

Now comes the editing phase, lol.

Congratulations!!!

DuranOfForcena posted...

not that i was writing much lately before, but my PC being on the fritz now has ground all my writing progress to a halt. it's pretty lame. i actually jotted down some notes in a notebook the other day for the first time in like a decade, so there's that.

lol I actually decided to start in a notebook this time. Kinda messy but I like it.

580 words done for chapter one. Either that'll be half or the stopping point, I'm not sure yet. I'm not really used to writing bite sized chapters but the cliff hanger feels fairly compelling as an "end" vs a mid way point.
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So I never had a ton of sales on my first self published book, but that wasn't surprising because I never did any advertising (waiting until I get more books up for it to be worth it). But man, I just checked out my book on goodreads and it has a 5 star review that is amazing. Goes in depth and is articulate and glowing. "One of the best books I've read all year". Feels good, man.
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A woman or women in general? Genetics is what comes to mind immediately. Women are just more adept at magic. Or it can deal with the origin of the magic. Maybe women were blessed or men were cursed. Maybe it was bestowed by a deity that prefers women.

I hate how much I give up when it comes to writing. Sometimes I have ideas that could work in book format. But I look at it and think 'wow, this wouldn't ever sell', then I just keep it to myself, and never write a word of it. I'll maybe revisit it in my head, think up a cool scene, and think 'wow, this would be really fun to write' then remember how it's gonna be a failure, shrug off that feeling, then forget about it.

I hate that about me lol.
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Slayer_22 posted...

I hate how much I give up when it comes to writing. Sometimes I have ideas that could work in book format. But I look at it and think 'wow, this wouldn't ever sell', then I just keep it to myself, and never write a word of it. I'll maybe revisit it in my head, think up a cool scene, and think 'wow, this would be really fun to write' then remember how it's gonna be a failure, shrug off that feeling, then forget about it.

I hate that about me lol.

Just write for yourself! And if you really want a book, do what I do and self publish. The satisfaction comes from the creation imo, not the sales numbers. And hey, maybe one day you will make some decent sales, and if that happens then great.
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@Romes187 Hey! What's the status on your book? >:3
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spanky1 posted...

@Romes187 Hey! What's the status on your book? >:3

Hah its been "finished" and just haven't had the umph to do anything with it. Sent it to a few friends to read but haven't gotten anything back because I don't think they have the time.

Sent it off to two agents and got rejections or no response so haven't given that too much thought

Thinking about hucking it on amazon, but I want to get more eyes on it at some point.....6 month old is sucking up all the time.

Yeah you should just do the KDP thing. You can even print out a physical copy of your book.
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spanky1 posted...

Yeah you should just do the KDP thing. You can even print out a physical copy of your book.

I just don't think I have the effort to market it right unless it does all that automatically

Eh, you shouldn't even market if you only have one book anyway. I just did it mostly for the experience of holding my own book in my hands.

Once you get a larger library of books in your back catalogue, then you can worry about marketing, as it becomes profitable then because people will ideally read through your whole catalogue.

I do understand though, it can be a hassle to go through the whole thing. Gotta find a cover for the book, gotta format and do the keywords and blurb and stuff.
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Why do some past tense words, like lifted and gritted, sound so weird and wrong? :\

She gritted her teeth sounds weirder than she grit her teeth.
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Gritted does sound weird. And lifted. They just look wrong when I'm writing them, and I just find myself wanting to delete them immediately.
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I finished a short story for the first time in a while.

It's as bad as everything else I work on, but I...tried, at least. I hadn't felt motivated enough to work on anything due to a medley of issues, namely pretty severe depression, so I'm happy that I at least pushed myself to finish something.

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DuranOfForcena posted...

congrats! sometimes it doesn't really matter how it turns out, and what's important is just the act of writing itself and finishing something and getting that practice and accomplishment in. but in any case, the first draft of basically any written work is usually pretty bad. i bet if you take a month and come back to it with fresh eyes you will be able to go through and improve it significantly. what's it about?

I'll probably just call it good honestly, I edited it as best I could and went through it a few times. I feel like it's about as good as it can be...which is still bad, but still.

I could link it here or send it to people if anyone wanted to read it, because it's very short, but I dunno if anyone would be interested, and I'm not confident in its quality at all.

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DuranOfForcena posted...

how long did you let it stew after you finished drafting it and before you did some editing passes of it? if it's any less than a month or two i would definitely try just shelving it for now and coming back with fresh eyes. it can be really surprising what more you notice about things you write when you come to it after distancing yourself from it for a good chunk of time.

that being said, if you think it's at that level now i'd welcome it if you wanted to share it. or if you decide to let it stew and go through it again later, i'd welcome you sharing it then too.

I only waited a few days between writing and editing, honestly. I'm bad about revisiting stuff later on.

With that said...ehh, forget it in general. I got some of my friends to read it, and while two liked it, two of them seemed to absolutely hate it. I've lost any small amount of confidence that I had again, and I kind of want to just delete it and forget it at this point.

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DuranOfForcena posted...

well that's a shame. do what you want, but if i was in your shoes, i definitely wouldn't delete it, even if i didn't want to share it. if you only had a few days in between finishing it and doing an editing pass, it's still basically a rough draft, and like i said before, almost all rough drafts of any written work are terrible. so your friends who said they liked it were probably just being nice lol. but personally i've found feedback from friends to mostly be completely lacking in value. the most i've ever gotten out of any work i've shared with any of my friends is "yeah, it's pretty cool." if they are just telling you they liked it or they didn't like it, that's not really very useful feedback anyway, so i wouldn't let it affect your confidence so much.

I'm just bad at revisiting older stuff. I start to forget some details and I'm less passionate about the concepts at that point, so I'm inevitably less invested in it. I try to edit ASAP so I can work on it while everything is fresh and I have it all lined up in my head.

Maybe it's not the best process, but it's what works for me overall.

I felt like I was done, but I got pretty critical feedback, including some frustrating opinions that kind of contradicted one another. One said that I use too many adjectives, while the other wanted me to use more. I guess my style is just generally bad, because I tend to use a fairly consistent amount that apparently isn't right in some form.

Overall, I'm just kind of frustrated with myself and feeling very discouraged. I've been trying to write stuff for years and years, but I never seem to get it right. I shouldn't have tried writing anything while I'm so down and feeling awful about myself otherwise, I guess, but my initial reaction is to quit trying for good.

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M3sterybumper posted...

This is reminding me of how I felt when I used to write things for school. I guess this is how fanfiction writers who give up on their stories feel. Its not a good feeling for sure. I would encourage you not to give up if you can and keep pushing back that wall.

It's just super frustrating and disheartening. I've been at this for a long time, and I evidently still haven't made any significant progress. I felt like I was starting to get a style down that wasn't awful, but I guess I was wrong.

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Well after finishing the first draft and sending it off to my beta reader, I completed my celebratory week long drunken bender. Now it's Monday and time to get back on the saddle. I need to write the blurb next and then onto the outline for book 3. :)
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M3sterybumper posted...

Just gotta keep at it. Maybe periodically publish it, even if its just for yourself so that you can feel some progression.

Ehh, nothing I write is anywhere near good enough to be published. It's just something that I have to accept at this point.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/pminamu05xqzjm7/I%20Saw%20Him.docx?dl=0

Honestly though, I'm just kind of over it. If anyone wants to read a short but evidently pretty bad story, there you go. I'm going to try to not let it get me down any more. I'm still feeling really down about myself and my writing at the moment, though.

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Would be a shame for this to purge.

I want to get back to writing, but I've completely lost interest in everything I was working on previously so I'd have to start from scratch

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Man I haven't been writing much lately. :/
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