I forget how often I’m supposed to check in on this thing, but I’m writing the hell out of Back in Black (and Blue), the sequel to Hard Day’s Knight. I pounded out a little over 10,000 words this weekend, and got another 4-6,000 words between Monday and Tuesday, to put me past the 35,000 word mark. I’m pretty happy with where the book is going, and I’m thinking now that it will probably top out at around 60,000 words, or roughly the same length as The Chosen and Hard Day’s Knight. I like that, because that’s where the stories feel right to me. I could certainly go back and put in more filler, flesh out some descriptions, but I’m no Tolkien, so don’t look for that in my work.
Since I didn’t go to West Virginia this past weekend, I’ll probably head out Friday and go hole up in the mountains and write. Depending on what I get done this weekend, the potential for me to finish up the first draft by Sunday night is pretty real. Then I’ll go back through it at least a couple of times and then send it off to a couple of beta readers for review.
Book sales are slow but steady, I’m averaging better than a book a day, which is an improvement. I uploaded two new books last weeks, Red Dirt Boy and The Christmas Lights. RDB is a poetry collection, and I’ve gotten one sale out of that. The Christmas Lights is a holiday short story, and I don’t expect to see much movement there until next winter. I also cleaned up and re-uploaded Returning the Favor, my first collection of poetry and short stories. Scrivener is turning out to be a really great tool, and my trial period is expiring soon, so I’ll have to bite the bullet and pay for it.
We’ve been digging out of the Snowmageddon down here, which makes my friends in the North poke more fun at the Southerners. But it’s not the snow that’s the issue, it’s the ice that fell after six inches of snow that has made travel tough. I’ll drive through snow all day long, as proven by my presence at the office Monday, but when the ice starts to fall, my ass is staying home. Then this morning I used a CD cash and a plastic putty knife to try and scrape my truck’s windshield, because I don’t own an ice scraper. I live in North Carolina for a reason, and the fact that I only have to do this crap once a year is a big part of that!
John, I’m your sponsor for this check-in. Great check-in post!
I live in Minnesota where your Snowpocalypse is, for us, “a light day.” 😉
I’m wowed by the volume of words you’re capable of ripping out in such a short amount of time; very nice job.
That’s great you’re doing so well. You have to just let the story lie when it’s done and not try to manipulate it into a word count it doesn’t need. Best part of epublishing right there is no set length.
Hope the sales keep improving!