Writing the End of a Story

Blog Post No. 409

I started the new novella, Break/Interrupt, on August first. The day after I finished the first draft of the Invasion Novel. I had hoped to be done within a month and have a tight 30 000 word story to show for it. Now it’s the end of September and I’m at 60 000 words. I’m not sure exactly where things fell off the rails, but I’m finally starting to wrap things up.

Ending a story is tough. Through most of it, I have fun wandering around, playing with the ideas, figuring out the character and their place in the world. Since it’s a new perspective on an existing universe, I have some connecting tissue to write, but most of it is an exploration. It can be fast and exciting with no limitations. At the end, everything slows down. There’s no room left to do anything other than wrap things up. Just coming up with an ending can be hard. They have to make sense and be satisfying for the reader. Trying to write them gets to be a slog.

The Summer Slump

Blog Post No. 408

I’ve been seriously trying to be a writer since 2013 when Adventure Worlds was founded and the group of us wrote bad short stories and tried to edit each others work without really knowing what we were doing. Even back then, I’ve always struggled with writing over the summer. I’ve never been sure exactly why. Other people have offered reasonable suggestions ranging from spending more time outside and/or vacations to the general atmosphere of the season. I’ve never thought those reasons really fit my situation though. I don’t usually go on vacation other than maybe a weekend visiting friends or a day trip to an amusement park and I’m not a big fan of summer because it’s hot and I am a wuss who can’t handle it.

Consuming as a Writer

Blog Post No. 407

I feel like over the last few years the posts on this blog have tended to be more about whatever is going on in my life in the moment and less about thoughts and ideas. It’s easy to just knock out a few hundred words about the week when I have an event or reading going on, or if I’m starting or finishing a project. It’s a little more difficult when I’m just at home trying to write every day. I just did an update last week, and since the only thing that has changed is the word count, I want to avoid repeating myself (more than I already do). I had the idea for this topic a while ago and it’s been sitting in my draft folder so I figured I’d give it a shot.

Update

Blog Post No. 406

It’s been over a month since I started writing Break/Interrupt and I’m not finished. I think I’ve done well, though. I wrote every day and after 31 of them, I was at 37 000 words. That’s good. That’s almost a good novel pace. I’m not closing in on the end of the story, though. And that’s bad. Once again, the story is too long and it’s taking me too much time. Not that there is much I can do about it but keep writing and try to focus on the goal with as little extraneous writing as possible. Its the same problem I had with the Invasion Novel and I had hoped to make better progress at being efficient with my writing. I have a mountain of editing ahead of me, and the length of the novella is adding to it.

The Oddity of a Virtual Launch

Blog Post No. 405

The virtual launch is over and while I did very little to facilitate it (or likely because) it was a success. Though I’m not sure how to quantify a success of such a thing. At a physical event you can count of number of people who showed up and how many books you sold. I suppose I could go by views, but with so many different elements spread out over multiple digital spaces, that’s not so easy. I could go by engagement and I did get some good feedback on the silly video I made for the event, but again, I’d have to go around and calculate the comments on all the posts and I don’t want to. The easiest and most kind to my ego is to look at the things Christian, Brittni, and I did for the event.

Virtual Launch – Tomorrow

Blog Post No. 404

I messed up. I was so surprised by the news last week that I wrote a post about not going back to the Day Job for the rest of the year when I should have made a post about the virtual launch that Adventure Worlds Press is doing tomorrow (Friday August 14th). Since we released three books this year and we haven’t been able to do traditional launches we decided to put together something online. It’s strange to think that the book I’m promoting, Broadcast Wasteland, came out in April, but since time has lost all meaning in the pandemic, I’m sure it’s fine that I’m launching it now.

Called Off

Blog Post No. 403

As you probably know, I’ve been home from the Day Job since early March. There are a lot of people in similar situations, and to be honest, it hasn’t been too bad for me. With Employment Insurance and the Emergency Benefits, I’m not really losing much money. (Some months may have even been better than what I sometimes get since the Day Job fluctuates so much). With the various stages of opening (for better or worse) across the province where I live, some folks have been going back to work, and many more are scheduled to when my area hits the third stage and schools open. As for me, I’ve been officially informed that my Day Job won’t be reopening until 2021.

A Novel Success

Blog, No. 402

Success can be measured in different ways and often comes with it’s own shadows of failure. At the most basic sense, the first draft of the Invasion Novel is finished and that’s one bit of success. How long it took me, how overly long it is, how much work there it to make it readable, are all realities that come along with it, but I did it. It’s done (for now) and that’s an accomplishment. As I said last week, my plan (as it stands in the instant that I’m writing this) is to let the draft sit for August and September while I write and edit the next novella.

New Working Project: The Fourth Novella

Blog Post No. 401

It’s a new month and more than halfway through this very strange year. The first draft of the Invasion Novel is done. It has been my working project off and on since the end of 2018 (before The Neon Heart was released). That’s not so good. If my memory serves me, though, it was written mostly in two big chunks. The first half (though closer to a third than a half) was written primarily over the summer of 2019. I had started before Neon came out in April of that year, but the bulk of the writing was done between the release and September when I put it on hold to write Broadcast Wasteland. The rest of the book was written during this pandemic from April (the release of Broadcast) and now. (Though to be honest I’m still working on it for the rest of the month including tomorrow).

400th Post!

Blog Post No. 400

Seven and a half years of writing weekly and a couple of years prior of ten spotty posts. Add them all together and you get 400 posts on this blog. Hurray for me. Looking back on the post for number 300, I remember not many people were impressed. That’s fair. As I say most end of the year posts, it’s a personal goal that means little to anyone but me. It’s probably more engaging for readers if I can make some of the things I write here interesting. (Which I hope I do). Achievements like numbers and years are for me. Maybe one day if I can find a following for my books, those readers will care. Though, again, I’d rather they care about the books than some blog that I scrape out each week.