So yesterday I wrote two words. Well, actually I wrote 4,446
words, which is actually a new daily record for me. But within those, I wrote
two specific words: “The End.”
After just over a year of writing, and 112,956 words later,
I finished the first draft of my first real novel. (Those who know recall that
I wrote a novel in High School, but that was really just a 50,000 word inside
joke)
The story is called Bloodlines, and it follows a man named Matthew Drake. He works for a private security firm, which is hired to protect a team of researchers who are investigating a plague in China. The plague has a ridiculously high mortality rate, and the survivors exhibit very strange behavior. While there, he also starts to encounter some questions about his own heritage.
So…yeah, the above blurb isn’t that great. But I’ve been
busy working on the book, not so much on a blurb.
In the process of writing Bloodlines, I’ve learned a lot
about writing. Looking at my first chapter, and my last, the progression of my
prose is incredible. I am a far better writer now than I was a year ago, and pumping out almost
200,000 words (I wrote a few short stories as well) was a big part of that.
I also have gained an incredible appreciation and sympathy
for screenwriters, specifically regarding plot holes. Good crap, I have so many
plot holes in my book that I’ll need to fix in revision. You could sail an
entire U.S. carrier group through the plot holes in Bloodlines. Phew!
Juggling view points, writing a female character that is her
own character, prose, pacing, engaging the senses, world building, and a lot of
other things I still haven’t recognized yet. I’ve made progress in all of
these.
I finished a first draft. What’s next? (I’ve had a few people ask)
I’m not going to try to get Bloodlines published at this
point. It is still a very rough story, and my first novel, I’ve got a lot of
revising, and a lot of learning to do. In fact, Bloodlines won’t be the first
novel that I want to be published. It is a solid story, but not what I want as
my debut.
Right now I’m planning a novel for NaNoWriMo. NaNoWriMo is
an annual decentralized “event,” basically a challenge to write a 50,000 word
novel during the month of November. So, I’m planning for that, and then I’ll
write it, start to finish, in November.
After that, I am planning on taking Brandon Sanderson’s
writing class during next semester (Fingers crossed.) The homework for that
class is to write a 30,000 novella.
In addition to writing the novella next semester (I write
fast) I’m going to do some revising of Bloodlines, and get started on my next
novel, which will be a fantasy.
Then I’m going to write the sequel to Bloodlines.
Finally, after that I am going to write a fantasy novel,
which I’ve given the working title of “Succession.” That will be the novel
which I try to get published as my debut novel. If all goes well, I should
finish that book early 2016, with a goal of being published by the end of that
year.
So, finishing Bloodlines is a huge milestone and
accomplishment for me, but I’ve still got a long way to go before I become a
best-selling author.
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