Words, words, words...
Lately on occassion I've been doing something called "Word war". Group of people all start at the same time and, for a predetermined length of time, they all write. The winner is whoever wrote the most words.
In the group I've been doing it in, out of the 3 or 4 of us I've been consistantly winning. The few times ago (4 or 5), I had no preconceived ideas of what I'd work on, and then... something just started pouring out. After 4 or 5 wars, averaging 800 words for 20 minute spans or so, I've gotten this story up to 4000 words, and I have no idea where it came from, where it's going, and it continues to surprise me as I write it.
It's also probably the best thing I've ever written. I'm not really sure what this says. But damn. 4000 words. I feel simultaneously like it's moving too fast and too slow, which probably means it's doing ok- I'll see when I actually go back and draft. But this is what doing nawrinamo must be like- plowing forward, not letting myself edit or redraft, just keep going. At this point I'm deliberately not allowing myself to think too much about it when I'm not actively writing it- I've had really good luck just seeing what comes out so far, I don't want to spoil it. If I get stuck or it starts to suck, sure, I'll think about it, but for now... I have a vague sense of where it's going and how some of it will fit together. It still feels like it's at the beginning of the story, but it's about to get to the "middle", I think. (The last 20 minute span I had expected to be taken up with an involved Council meeting, but instead the main character had a weird dream, and then talked to a friend. So that killed that 20 minute war. 815 words, though. So the council meeting... I'm deliberately not planning it, but I know that however it goes, the next stage of the story will start soon afterwards.)
It also, for once, isn't nearly as totally Zelaznyan as a lot of my short stories tend to be. It still is a little, but it doesn't jump out and slap you around this time. (At least, I don't think so.)
4000 words of totally unplanned fiction, and I reread it and actually think it's cool. That's a strange feeling. Meanwhile a story with a plot and a ton of work on worldbuilding sits there and stagnates. There's a moral here, I'm sure. (Though I do still think the worldbuilding I've done is cool, and hopefully I'll use the setting eventually.)
I don't really write that much, so having something that I'm actually interested in working on and finishing is novel (pardon me) and intriguing. I'll stick it on a website somewhere when I get the time, so people can see it. (I suppose I'll password protect it or something, since while I don't actually intend to try to publish it, one never knows.)
Arg, I just thought of a direction I could take it... must... stop... thinking about it...
*sigh* Ok, back to tedious data entry.
In the group I've been doing it in, out of the 3 or 4 of us I've been consistantly winning. The few times ago (4 or 5), I had no preconceived ideas of what I'd work on, and then... something just started pouring out. After 4 or 5 wars, averaging 800 words for 20 minute spans or so, I've gotten this story up to 4000 words, and I have no idea where it came from, where it's going, and it continues to surprise me as I write it.
It's also probably the best thing I've ever written. I'm not really sure what this says. But damn. 4000 words. I feel simultaneously like it's moving too fast and too slow, which probably means it's doing ok- I'll see when I actually go back and draft. But this is what doing nawrinamo must be like- plowing forward, not letting myself edit or redraft, just keep going. At this point I'm deliberately not allowing myself to think too much about it when I'm not actively writing it- I've had really good luck just seeing what comes out so far, I don't want to spoil it. If I get stuck or it starts to suck, sure, I'll think about it, but for now... I have a vague sense of where it's going and how some of it will fit together. It still feels like it's at the beginning of the story, but it's about to get to the "middle", I think. (The last 20 minute span I had expected to be taken up with an involved Council meeting, but instead the main character had a weird dream, and then talked to a friend. So that killed that 20 minute war. 815 words, though. So the council meeting... I'm deliberately not planning it, but I know that however it goes, the next stage of the story will start soon afterwards.)
It also, for once, isn't nearly as totally Zelaznyan as a lot of my short stories tend to be. It still is a little, but it doesn't jump out and slap you around this time. (At least, I don't think so.)
4000 words of totally unplanned fiction, and I reread it and actually think it's cool. That's a strange feeling. Meanwhile a story with a plot and a ton of work on worldbuilding sits there and stagnates. There's a moral here, I'm sure. (Though I do still think the worldbuilding I've done is cool, and hopefully I'll use the setting eventually.)
I don't really write that much, so having something that I'm actually interested in working on and finishing is novel (pardon me) and intriguing. I'll stick it on a website somewhere when I get the time, so people can see it. (I suppose I'll password protect it or something, since while I don't actually intend to try to publish it, one never knows.)
Arg, I just thought of a direction I could take it... must... stop... thinking about it...
*sigh* Ok, back to tedious data entry.