I reviewed my progress and read over my outline and realized I’d run through all the plot I’d worked out during my first leapfrog session (thank you, again, Linnea Sinclair), so tonight was spent working out the next hop.

I’m in the middle of chapter six, and this hop should take me to the end of the first third of the book.  I should adjust my counter as this book is much more likely to be about 120K rather than the 90K I’ve been saying on the counter [but the percentage goes up so fast when I’m only aiming at 90K].

Since there is a lot of existing content from my first draft well before I split the story into thirds (of which SanClare Scarlet is the second), reworking it is a bit tricky.  I can’t just follow it through because things have changed and need adjusted.  There’s some stuff that should just go away, no matter how I like it.  And then there’s some stuff that’s going to be even more useful this time around.

It’s funny to read through this very rough draft — there are parts of it where I had a *terrible* time maintaining POV, mostly because I wasn’t paying enough attention to that — I was just throwing all the ideas, words, etc., at the page as fast as I could type.  But it’s funny to read my usual third person limited turn into third person omniscient with no warning.  I point and laugh at myself, clean it up, and move on.

Maybe I should figure out how to do one of those sidebar counters.  But!  Until then — Whoo-hoo! Almost 20%!  This is a rough section that’s going to need some work, so much more slow-going… 

I actually cut a lot out of this existing part and I still made some blazin’ progress.  Some of what I cut includes info that needs to get put in somewhere here very soon in a different configuration, so that might slow me down a little.

Things are going well, but we’re still pretty far away from getting everyone to Court where I can start having all kinds of Fun with Intrigue! On the journey there, however, a legend is building which will complicate matters muchly once Court is reached :)

Made not as much progress as I’d hoped today — intentions thwarted by lunch plans going awry, post-storm/weekend tourist traffic in downtown Chicago, and just… y’know… stuff.  But still.  10%!  Woot.

“Life!  Don’t talk to me about life!” — Marvin from Hitchhiker’s Guide

Real Life^TM has been busy and full of stuff and traveling and exhaustion, so no actual typing on books has been done since my last post (le sigh).  However, that doesn’t mean the work hasn’t been ongoing.  During my long, very damp drives through the state of Indiana, I worked on the backstory and plot of La Cause.  This idea is still new and shiny and not fully-formed, so any thinking time I get to spend on figuring out this new world and its people, I use.  The important part of writing is the putting-the-words-down part, but the percolating, thinking, planning, etc., time is essential, too.   It just can’t be all that gets done, or I’m basically a daydreamer and not a writer.

So this weekend, there will be much typing.  With La Cause it may all be notes and scribbles about the story and no actual wordage, but with Scarlet, there will be word-counter progress made!

Right after lunch…

Yay!  I’ve hit Existing Stuff (that will need rework but is still usable) and made really good progress with bridging stuff (no slogging today!) and am very, very happy!  Next up: Chapter Four!

And now for a treat, I’m off to get ready for the Mae concert at Schubas!  *so excited!* 

That’s what it felt like today.  Getting through this bit at the beginning where everything for part one of the book gets set up is work, I tells ya–WORK!  But, yay! Six-percent!  And if tomorrow goes well, I’ll reach the big chunk of existing stuff at last!  *does little dance*

I keep smacking my own hand and scolding myself to not go back and futz with the rough spots right now.  I even put a note in telling myself to skip over to the next event and go back and fix the bridging scene later because it was being a major roadblock.  The minute I did that, I knew how to proceed and thus was able to delete the note.  As someone (sorry!) in that fantastic panel at WisCon said, you have to give yourself permission to suck [during first drafts].

I switched word counters because the other one is much more complicated to use *and* (important consideration) doesn’t look cute on my new blog.  Okay, this one isn’t cute, either, but it’s clean, and the faux shadow-on-white-background on the other counter was bugging me.

I’ve been working on my new writing site for several days, and it’s now ready for primetime! I’ve titled it Complete Fabrications and Vicious Rumours, and from now on, I’ll be posting any writing-related thoughts there and crossposting them to LiveJournal.

Please check it out, and let me know what you think!

On one of the LJ communities to which I belong, this topic came up, and while I pondered my answer, I thought it would be worth posting what I came up with here on my Complete Fabrications site.

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