Work in Progress Week Two
That’s the end of the second week as I continue to draft a novel during the month of November. I’ve written twenty-five thousand words which means I’m halfway through completing my target of a 50k draft within four weeks. Week three, next week, is traditionally the tough one, akin to hitting the wall in a marathon. I find that by the middle of this week, concentration tends to slip along with being bogged down in that mid section of the novel which can be in danger of dipping a little in terms of plot and intrigue, potentially failing to live up to the explosive start. That is something that can be addressed in the second draft, but if it does happen, it knocks the confidence to an extent, and with fatigue setting in, it’s my least favourite part of the process; having to keep up the wordcount while dealing with sections of the story that may not be living up to expectations. I don’t want to waffle on for the sake of it during this week, so it does present its own challenges. I’m making sure I have my chapter plan up to date, and have a clear indication of what I should be writing next and why, in order to make this as easy as it can be.
The final week is the best. Home straight with the finishing line in sight. At this point I’ve no idea if the story will conclude early. It has happened and that’s always a good feeling. It maybe I will need to keep going past the 50k mark to finish the first draft. At this point in the month I can’t call it.
I’m a little closer to understanding how the novel is going to conclude. I’ve come up with ideas and made some notes and I believe it is quite dramatic. How the story then finishes up in the final chapter, I still don’t know. I have vague notions and hope these become more concrete in the coming days.
I’ve been researching the history of witches and witchcraft via books (I can’t really tell if some posts online are accurate, or whether they are AI generated assumptions). Being able to speak with someone who understands this subject and what it means today would be helpful. I know there is a museum dedicated to the subject so I imagine I will be paying them a visit soon and see where that takes me.
All in all, my writing is going well and I’m excited for this. In my own mind, this has been the easiest novel to draft to a standard I wasn’t expecting, which is a nice bonus. I believe it was Hemingway who said the first draft of anything is shit. I understand what he was getting at, but I’m happy with how my first draft is reading so far, so I can’t ask for anything more than that.