Day #9020 - Using My Words

Life keeps drumming along, and I'm equal parts happy and sad that I've been busy and haven't had quite as much time to write about it here. Happy because it means I'm doing other things, sad because I like documenting what's going on for fear that I will forget far too soon.

Now that the play I was an assistant director for at the high school is now over, my evenings have once again opened up. This includes going back to the gym (or at least thinking about it), writing, and author events. For the first time in what feels like forever, my writing has been making progress. Though it saddens me to put my fairy tale inspired project back on hold - it's simply not ready for me yet - this sci-fi thing makes me excited and I've had fun playing around with it and doing some world building. It now has its own composition notebook where I can keep all my thoughts together and I'm hoping to do some more outlining this weekend so more actual writing can happen very soon.

But unlike past projects, I don't want to do too much too fast. I think that's been my problem - I try to get ALL THE IDEAS down ALL AT ONCE and then I get into lulls. Luckily, thanks to the author event I went to at Andeson's this week, I think I've learned how to stop doing that.

Lauren Morrill, me,
& Lenore Applehans

Thursday night I headed to Naperville and got to meet the lovely Lenore Appelhans (Level 2, being rereleased as The Memory of After), Lauren Morrill (Meant to Be), and Lauren Oliver (Before I Fall, The Delirium Trilogy). They were all insightful, wonderful, and fantastic and it was a great little trip in the middle of the week because I haven't been to a signing in ages. I've written a review of Meant to Be over on my book review blog and if you love Shakespeare, England, and love stories with quirky nerdy girls, then this is the book for you! As for Level 2, I have it on my Nook and can't wait to jump into this action packed tale of the afterlife.

Me & Lauren Oliver

But back to the writing part. Lauren Oliver's writing method was what struck me perhaps the most: she's currently working on three books at the same time, and she says she is able to do this 1) because she has no other hobbies so she rewards herself on a good day of writing with more writing and 2) because unlike other writers I know/have heard of who set a minimum word count for the day, she sets a limit. If she's working on one book, she'll go for 1000-1500 words a day. If she's doing two books, she'll do 750 words in one, then 500 in the other. If it's like now when she's doing three, she writes less in two and is copy editing the third.

As soon as I heard this, it was like a light went off in my head - how brilliant, right? She says that way, she's not binging on words. Even if she's in the middle of a scene and wants to keep going, she knows she'll still feel that way tomorrow and it actually makes it easier to jump back in and keep momentum. Needless to say I love this and will be trying this out in my own life.

Another writing announcement I have is that my critique partner and I have started a short story blog as a means of helping us practice skills and play with new ideas. The site is called Stories by SaM and you can check it out at http://stayradish.wordpress.com. Since May is Short Story Month, we're each taking turns writing a story a day following the daily prompt posted on StoryADay.org. We're doing this blog style so we can get comments and feedback from people, so please don't be shy!

And that, dear Internet, is what's been going on lately. For the most part. Well, it's as much as I'm willing to share with the PUBLIC for now. And since I forgot to post this last week, here's my April favorites video for you all to enjoy!



Hope you all have a fantastic weekend =)