During my last novel update in March I talked about how I was setting the small, reasonable goal of working for 2-3 hours a week drafting my new novel. This involved a lot of planning with my creative time in that I’d set aside one 2-3 session (usually after work, but sometimes on the weekend) a few days ahead of time, then treat it like a regular appointment and not schedule anything else during that time.
This has been going really well—I literally haven’t missed a week since New Year’s, and that’s equaled out to a LOT of novel progress.
The disadvantage to this system, of course, is that it’s SLOW. I can get a lot written in 2-3 hours a week, but it’s not as much as I could be writing in 4-6 hours or 6-9 hours or 10-15 hours if I were writing every weekday. I try not to kick myself about this too much, but it’s still something I think about.
The other good news is that the plot, characters, and scenes are all coming more easily than they were back in January. Now when I sit down to write I feel refreshed, ready, and excited, and find myself putting the scenes together more easily than I was back in the winter. That’s really good.
I’m also spending a lot of time during the week planning and thinking about the novel: as in, I’ll be sorting through what I need to write during the next session and in the chapters beyond. When I get a good idea I’ll jot it down in my pocket notebook, or the scribble pad I keep on my bureau, or sometimes even in my Novel notebook if it’s within reach so it doesn’t get lost—though I do a fair amount of plain ol’ remembering too.
I’m also workshopping novel chapters with not one but two writing groups: one here in Toyama and one online back in New Hampshire. Both have been REALLY helpful with giving feedback and letting me know what is and isn’t working, so I’ve been really lucky to have both of them (shoutout to Will, Lindsey, Leilani, Kevin, Gary, Denise, Josh, and Ricky—you guys are awesome). Before each group session I spend a few hours going over the chapter I’m submitting and sprucing it up a bit—so in a sense, I guess some weeks I’m spending more than 2-3 hours on the novel, just not on the drafting stage.
Moving Forward
I’d still like to increase the number of days I spend writing per week, but I’m afraid to overextend myself in this department because I don’t want to make promises to myself I can’t keep—and also because I’m still REALLY busy. When things cool down, I want to reassess my priorities and give novel-writing more time on the calendar, but for now, I want to keep up the steady pace rather than going overboard.
I’m also at a point where I’m facing a major life change (i.e., my teaching contract in Japan finishes at the end of July) and I’m working on my next step. Regardless of what I end up choosing, this will definitely involve more than a little life upheaval, so I’m expecting this to interfere with my creative work during that time. I’m trying to balance a lot of things with this life move and seem to be doing a good job so far, but want to make sure novel writing (or any of my other endeavors) doesn’t fall too far by the wayside. A few weeks without writing during a major life change is perfectly fine, but a few months without writing definitely isn’t.
That’s all for now—it’s back to work for me, and probably for you too ;-)