Writing Diary - 2

 

Tracking June 2001 - December 2001
Date Accomplishments
01-Jun-2001 Alas and alack, have done nothing in nearly a year.  On "Ghosting the Little Bighorn", I hate my POV character.  I haven't wanted to touch it in ages.  On "Spellsmith", I like the character, it's just that the opening scene is too long and drawn out, so I need to find another starting point.  I have decided to set them aside and start to work on the novel I've wanted to do for about six years.  I managed to write, without looking at any of my setup files, a two-page prologue (this may change or vanish in the future), plus a couple of paragraphs of the first Chapter.  Net wordage, about 500. 
02-Jun-2001 Before work I hunted up the working files for the novel, tentatively titled Moömbi, and reviewed them.  Made a few minor changes in character names, town names, reviewed the planetary systems, and the sentient race that lives on the planet of the title.  I took the name for the planet from that of a mother goddess from an East African tribe.  I cleaned up and modified some of the concepts for the natives, as well as the two primary human colony groups that will be involved in the story itself, and then returned to the manuscript.  New wordage, about 300.
03-Jun-2001 Not much done.  Cleared up some major discrepancies between planning materials and manuscript, then added about another half page of story.  Maybe 150 words.
04-Jun-2001 Local writer's group meets today.  Printed out copies of "Ghosting the Little Bighorn", plus, on request, my material for Moömbi.  This includes a precis of the African folk tale that inspired me to try the book.  The tale itself is a variant of the "Armless Maiden" story; in this African version, the "maiden" loses a single hand instead of two arms.   Did not get home until Very Late [TM].
05-Jun-2001 Decided to update the web page.  Spent most of the day doing things like laundry, making beds, etc.  As the cat can't help with these tasks, I have to do them myself.
09-Sep-2001 Post WorldCon.  Things are changing in life, can't discuss now.  Managed to make edits in "Ghosting the Little Bighorn", based on personal review.  First time I've read it since I did the first draft.  The local workshop group had good things to say about it; I was surprised.  I added some clarifications, deleted some extraneous stuff, fixed a few incongruencies, then tried to tighten some.  The current draft is just under 3300 words; now I need to print it and send it off somewhere.
21-Sep-2001 Dusted off outline for novel, made some changes (totally new names for one character and his family, added some story summary for POV character), then modified prologue and worked on Chapter 1.  Total wordage, about 1000 for day. 
22-Sep-2001 Workshop meeting.  Have decided to take 2nd draft of "Ghosting."  Don't have enough done on Moömbi to submit. 
29-Oct-2001 Reworked "Mistaken Identity" for a new market.  Converted it to 1st person from 3rd, and reduced the word count from 4800 to 3700.
30-Oct-2001 Continued working on review of "Mistaken Identity".  Story now trimmed to 3600 words.  Printed out for hard copy review, as I can often see glitches on paper that I completely miss when reviewing on screen.
02-Nov-2001 Reviewed "Mistaken Identity" and marked up hard copy with changes.  Set aside for later.
04-Nov-2001 Made changes to "Mistaken Identity" based on hard copy review, printed document.  Realized that material deleted from the story also got rid of rationale for the title.  After some soul-searching and review, retitled the story "Maxwell's Law".   Final word count:  3600.
04-Nov-2001 Worked on "Ghosting the Little Bighorn".  Deleted one scene and replaced it with an interchange with a completely different character, added a few items to set the time period of the story and to indicate limitations on the techno-toy that's used in the story.  Cleaned up a few little typos, cleared some confusion, and printed it out.  Final word count:  3500.
07-Nov-2001 Took time to set up master document for Moömbi, the novel, and copied files from one word processor to another.  This would normally be easy, except after I switched, I had to delete a whole passel of hidden codes.  Made some additional changes to the outline.  Continued to work on Chapter 1.  Net wordage for session:  ±1700.
09-Nov-2001 Cut two sections from one POV character out of Chapter 1 and into a separate file for later revision.  Two reasons:  1) they are incidents that should occur later and 2) I realized the alien society the way I had planned it was not going to work.  Spent the evening doing some research and study on a couple of terran animals that live in social groups, which I had seen at one time and thought would make a great alien race. 
10-Nov-2001 Mailed two shorts to markets:  One magazine, one anthology.  Worked on restructure of alien society for Moömbi, and wrote it up.  Developed the names for a couple of countries, a bunch of trees, and some families for aliens in primary culture dealt with.    
11-Nov-2001 Back to writing on Moömbi.  Completely rewrote sections from alien POV, which main character is named Sisivi.  The primary human protagonist is Elizabeth.  Completed first chapter, total word count gain after changes abt. 2250; actual wordage written about 2700.
12-Nov-2001 Reviewed Chapter 1 of Moömbi, then went to work on Chapter 2.  Introduced a few other primary POV characters:  Planetary governor, his son Mahar, and info on the social structure in Planetary capital.  Wordage:  Abt 3000.  Printed 6 copies of Chapters 1 and 2 and prepared to mail to workshop group (mailed 11-13).
28-Nov-2001 A break in writing because ex-employer brought me back for a couple weeks as a temp.  Job over, back to writing.  Primary writing task:  Rewrite on "Maxwell's Law", per request from the editor.  I was allowed 500 additional words; I managed to get the extra information in with a net gain of 100 words.  Printed it out for review.
29-Nov-2001 Reviewed Moömbi, in light of workshop suggestions from previous session.  Made some name changes (1 town, 1 human, 1 animal).  Started to work on 3rd chapter, with further events for Elizabeth and Sisivi, although separately.  Am working into revealing more of both Elizabeth's colony group as well as Sisivi's culture while advancing story.  No easy task.  Day's output:  Approx. 1800 words.
30-Nov-2001 Fixed a couple of typos in "Maxwell's Law", then packaged it up and put in outgoing mail.
01-Dec-2001 Decided to split Elizabeth's and Sisivi's stories into separate chapters.  Thursday's output broke down to 700 words Sisivi, 1100 words Elizabeth.  Elizabeth becomes Chapter 3, Sisivi Chapter 4.  Added another 540 words to Chapter 3 before this update.
03-Dec-2001 Completed Chapter 3, with another 150 words.  Completed Chapter 4, a short one, with another 600 words.  Started on Chapter 5, which deals with Mahar and his next younger brother, Hasho.  We get more detail through flashback on a relationship first mentioned in Chapter 2, 1800 words.  Printed the 3 latest chapters for workshop.  Total wordage for this session:  2550 words.
04-Dec-2001 A good start on Chapter 6, where we meet a few other people in Kingston outside of Elizabeth's family.  Total for session:  1000 words   Chapter 7 will involve Mahar and his brother, and their first days working on the farm.
05-Dec-2001 Got word today that the rewrite of "Maxwell's Law" has sold.  Nice birthday gift, says I.  
06-Dec-2001 Wrote first draft of a 400-word short-short, from an idea based on a classified ad I saw in the local newspaper several years ago.  Completed Chapter 6 of Moömbi, with an additional 1400 words.  Total wordage for day:  1800.
07-Dec-2001 Started and completed Chapter 7, with 2000 words.  Mahar and Hasho adjusting to working on the farm.  2000 words.  Started outlining critical events in Elizabeth's first life crux.  
08-Dec-2001 Completed detailed outline of the set of critical events in Elizabeth's life, as they form a major turning point.  Started Chapter 8, which is first phase of these critical events.  Net actual story wordage:  About 350.  Emailed the 400-wd short short off to an editor.
11-Dec-2001 Realized, alas, that I need to do some restructuring on Elizabeth's family and society.  This coming weekend is a busy one socially, so will probably not get much writing done.
27-Dec-2001 First writing work in a couple of weeks plus.  I outlined a new story, outline about 600 words, and wrote the first draft of the final scene, about 150 words.  Day total:  750 words.

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