Update: Another Major Milestone Achieved · 12:44am Jul 4th, 2019
So close now to the end.
Despite being quite productive lately, I haven't really posted anything in nearly two months. What's up with that? Well, I've been slogging away on a major project, especially in the last two months. I resumed working on this behemoth of a fanfic on the day I posted Royal Treatment, and while I've been doing a lot less in the way of writing sprints since my big productivity blog, I haven't allowed my pace to falter since.
Today marks my 54th consecutive day (including my birthday) where I've written for my main project for at least 2 hours, and at least 3 hours of time spent writing total. Most days, I've done 4. So, this brings me to a milestone I never thought I'd reach for any single story, ever:
Yes, I actually write on a screen that small.
300,000 words.
It's a weird feeling, being this deep in the story with a substantial amount still to write. I've been moving at an average clip of 3,000 words a day for this story, so if I can maintain that for the next three weeks, I might actually finish the draft before Bronycon, earning me a much-needed rest. In terms of structure, I'm nearing the halfway mark of the story's third and final act, or around the last eighth of the fic. With luck, another 50-60k should be enough to bring it home.
Then the revisions begin, including some needed rewrites/major tweaks to the first act.
Best of luck. I'm hoping this long weekend in the states will let me put aside some distractions and get back to actually writing.
Congrats. That’s a lot of words.
I'm just impressed you can write so much without posting anything. I'm actually working on a short story (I'm hoping it'll be around 15k words at the most) and I don't want to post it until I'm done. I'm putting everything I've learned about Lovecraft's writing into this story and I want it to be a complete experience for readers when I post it. Though the temptation to just post it as is and continue from there is killing me. Doing a good job of resisting so far, but I highly doubt I could stick it out for even a quarter of the length you've written.
Good luck man. Anyone who actually finishes one of these things has my respect.
5083906
Thanks, and best of luck to you as well! Have you tried my challenge of setting aside X amount of daily time? Here's hoping you can get back on the horse, either way.
5083910
It's weird thinking that I'm quickly approaching the length of all my other horsewords combined.
5083936
Thanks, man. It's the same story I was telling you about at last BC. Hopefully I'll have a finished draft a month from now. After having written this many words, same. I didn't truly appreciate how difficult writing a mega door-stopper like this was until I actually sat down to do it.
5083930
It's hard. Very hard. But I'm doing it because I know my beginning will have problems. I've already rewritten it completely once, and it's looking I will have to do so again. Beginning the story properly is just something that you can't always know the solution for until you've written everything else.
Once I get the story done and start publishing, I'll be able to maintain a fairly fast update schedule (8-10k words per week) without worrying about falling behind, since I'll only need to edit/polish chapters instead of writing them as well. It also guarantees potential readers that the story is going to be completed eventually, and not suffer the fate of myriad other epics on this site that never get finished.
All that's keeping me sane is the nearness of the end as well as being able to talk with a couple of people about it. I've been so inundated with this story and world recently that I'm constantly bursting at the seams to discuss it.
5083992
Now that I'm on holiday, I was finally able to try out the challenge. My sprints weren't so good, with the longest one being 425 words. I think I wasn't focusing enough on pure speed and occasionally stopped to revise on the fly, not to mention forgetting the thread of the plot because it had been so long. By the end of the day, however, I'd gotten back into the groove enough to finish with a total of 2,593. Mind you, this was the first time I'd opened Scrivener in close to a month.
I did about one third of my effort into Fairy School (working title), the young adult adaptation of a dream my wife had about a snarky goth girl going to a school where changelings steal kids. The rest was for The Adventures of Fuzzy and Empire, my fighter pilot buddy comedy. Maybe I should look at beginning another story to give me more variety.
5084325
Multiple projects can help creatively, yes. One odd thing about the challenge is that, while it's meant to increase your word count and productivity, there are no word goals for it. Your count will go up once you get into the habit. The most important thing is setting times for yourself and to hit those times 7 days a week. I actually had the exact same issues as you when picking up my long project after a long hiatus. I had to keep going back and checking back to see what I'd written earlier, in order to maintain continuity. Keep at it, and you'll find it easier to write longer work once you've gotten back into the groove, since chapters will be so fresh with you adding so many words to the story every day.