Make it stop!

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Senor_Biggles

Well-Known Member
Sep 13, 2015
188
878
51
On the plus side I hit my target for the year nice and early. The problem is that as of this morning it is 176,266 words long and there is no end in sight.

It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until I am dead.
 

GNTLGNT

The idiot is IN
Jun 15, 2007
87,651
358,754
62
Cambridge, Ohio
cce5915a8ccd9e99b4f3b563ce0e2103.480x300x1.jpg
 

FlakeNoir

Original Kiwi© SKMB®
Moderator
Apr 11, 2006
44,082
175,641
New Zealand
Sure, just hand over $5.99 like eveyone else in line ;)
Where i can buy it?
I'm not sure if Sheemiee is just joking with you or not about selling--as he is not actually supposed to be using the message board for advertising products for sale. (unless they are SK-related and in the Buy/Sell/Trade area)

If you are interested in talking to him about purchasing, you could contact him via private message. (Aka "conversation"... you can access this in his profile area under the Information button.)
 

blunthead

Well-Known Member
Aug 2, 2006
80,755
195,461
Atlanta GA
On the plus side I hit my target for the year nice and early. The problem is that as of this morning it is 176,266 words long and there is no end in sight.

It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until I am dead.
Dead is better than the alternative. No, wait...
 
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Senor_Biggles

Well-Known Member
Sep 13, 2015
188
878
51
Well, thanks for the interest everybody, however I’m not going to be in a position to share/sell anything for quite some time.

It’s the first draft I’m aiming to have finished in the next couple of months. Assuming I get that done I’m taking a break from it to go back and knock a short story I have in to shape for submission. The plan is then to come back to this monster and to start the process of editing. It is ridiculously long and I need to knock the guts out of it and lose, by my own reckoning, at least 100k words, probably more. Once that’s done and I’ve prettied it up it will go to my wife for her to pass her judgement on it, and based on her thoughts it will get at least one more edit before I’m ready to show it to anybody else. And by that point, assuming I haven’t completely despaired and put a match to my laptop, I’m going to start the long and no doubt arduous process of trying to find an agent/publish. I realise that’s likely to end in sorrow and heartache, but by that point I fully expect to have spent eighteen months to two years on this thing and I want to give the little fella (as he’ll hopefully be by then) every chance.

So to summarise, going to be some time before anybody has a chance to look at this, but rest assured I will let you all know when/if that happens.

I’m looking at this whole thing as a training exercise, teaching myself how to write and becoming disciplined enough that I try and write something every day, or at least write more days than I do not write. So I may or may not get a passable piece of work at the end of this.

The next one though, that’s gonna knock your socks off.
 
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Senor_Biggles

Well-Known Member
Sep 13, 2015
188
878
51
606 days.
323,275 words.
First draft of my first (only?!) novel finished this morning. Half an hour ago I left the hero walking away from a burning building into the night.
So now the rewriting and the editing begins. That's the real work apparently.
F*ck.
 

Moderator

Ms. Mod
Administrator
Jul 10, 2006
52,243
157,324
Maine
606 days.
323,275 words.
First draft of my first (only?!) novel finished this morning. Half an hour ago I left the hero walking away from a burning building into the night.
So now the rewriting and the editing begins. That's the real work apparently.
F*ck.
Congratulations! Don't feel bad if you have to kill one (or more) of your darlings. ;-D
 
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Mr Nobody

Well-Known Member
Jul 9, 2008
3,306
9,050
Walsall, England
606 days.
323,275 words.
First draft of my first (only?!) novel finished this morning. Half an hour ago I left the hero walking away from a burning building into the night.
So now the rewriting and the editing begins. That's the real work apparently.
F*ck.

Yes, I'm locked in rewrite Hell myself right now. Have been for...oh, about six or seven weeks. I'm losing count.
But then the whole thing's been problematical. What seemed like a very solid set of ideas, with pruning back from 250k likely, turned out to only be good for 75k before I reached the end. And that was before the pruning. And it's a crime novel, so 90-100k is pretty much the benchmark.
Then it has to go off for editing, because I'm already at the point where I'm going word-blind to it and just want to throw the lot out of the window (and you should never just rely on yourself, even though editing is the other half of what I do to earn me crust...and crusts are just about all I can afford, given the way that side of the publishing game is going).
It's an intriguing last image you've got there, though. Best of luck!
 
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