Mike Douton's Stuff and/or Junk

It’s time for another look at this whole writing thing to pair up with the theory that if I talk about it, I get all motivated with it. I saw this post over at Chuck Wendig’s Terrible Minds and decided to go with it.

How goes the current project?

It’s going. I’ve got a great short story I’m shopping around and I think it almost found a home except for some miscommunication. It’s that one I got personal feedback on and I asked “Hey, there’s a new version? Interested?” They liked it enough to send me feedback so I thought I’d ask. The answer was “Glad the feedback helped. We’d like to see something new.” So I got all excited and off it went again. Whoops. They meant different new. Not updated new. Vagueness sucks and I felt like an ass. But I’m still optimistic that some of the markets the original version of the short story was too short for might be interested now that it’s longer. It’s an awesome story so I’m still feeling positive about it.

The novel is making progress. What with a small infant, free time is very spotty but I think I can still get it done by my birthday. I’m on the cusp of Act Three. It’s hard to tell a word count since I’m hand writing the thing. Why? Because reasons. I estimate it’s around 45k. I think there’s another 20k in it. That’ll be plenty for the first draft even if it’s a bit short for a final count. There are various places where I just make a note to add more and then keep pressing forward. Not constantly going back and editing Act One ten thousand times is a large reason why I’ve been hand writing this right now. There’s lots of room to meat it up in draft two.

The story itself is evolving nicely. It’s taken some unexpected turns from the outline I had been working with. And it’s miles away from the original outline from when I first started this. But that’s good. I want this to move about organically. Within the confines of my direction of course, but I want it to have wiggle room rather than shove it into a box it doesn’t want to go to.

I’ve also found myself noodling about the next novel, the Connecticut godpunk one. I’m actually looking forward to diving into the next book once I finish the current.

How’s the bigger picture going?

Well it’s getting better. My time management still sucks, but I’ve gone past rubber stamp rejections. It’s always nice to get new opinions on the writing. Sometimes a writer gets it in their head that the people close to them are going to always been nice. So yeah. There’s more positivity going on there.

Strengths and weaknesses?

Well I’ve mentioned plenty of times that my time management sucks. I tend to get too wrapped up in beginnings. These things float around in my head so much but it’s always the front end. I think part of it is my tendency to let some things show up organically but it’s a double edged thing. Sometimes thing meander around without ever going anywhere. But I’m getting better at that. Outlines help a lot. When I get off track, I just go back to the next bulletpoint. My outlines change, but they’re still plenty helpful.

Strengths? Time management is getting a bit better. And I think my story ideas are too. They’re evolving. I like what I’m doing with the current space pirate novel. I’m mixing up the perspective with it. Seriously excited for the next though. I’m going to do my space pirate novel justice. It’s been with me too long to consider anything else. But seriously, the next one is going to be intense.

So that’s that. I’m going to use some of this free time I have right now and see about getting some more work done.