Write Club begins and I get inspired on the way out the door.
Write Club started this week and (like I suspected) it’s hard. On Monday we got our first prompt and we were off to the races, but I was about the slow and steady pace. Of course, my first idea came to me about 10 seconds before I jumped into my car to head to work, so I had to talk to myself for my entire commute to work so I wouldn’t lose it. Trust me when I say that if I hadn’t spent my time in a conversation with the idea--it would have been lost.
Now it's time to turn my inspiration into a story.
Upon arriving at work I promptly fired up discord and headed over to the The Writer’s Block where I brainstormed the idea I had been discussing in the car. I got to keep the main themes (the parts that still made sense after running them by the writers I respect), but the details changed a lot. As usual when it comes to writing my first idea was a bit of a bust, but it planted the seeds that I could turn into a story. The brainstorm planted some more and what we discussed turned into 6 pages of notes. I printed them out on the work printer (naughty naughty) and called it a day.
My stories don't write themselves.
I was off to a good start. Day 2 I spent working on my character(s) and Day 3 I spent outlining the story. Both of those went somewhat smoothly, though if I had it to do over again, I’d probably combine them into one day, and leave myself an extra day for writing. I see this story going about 2000 words, though if it goes 4000 I wouldn’t be surprised. Now it’s day four and I have 500 words. I’d feel more comfortable if I had 1000, but I’m hoping to make up the difference tomorrow.
I evaluate my performance.
So far, not bad, right? Wrong. I’m getting nervous that it won’t make sense. That I won’t have a story when it’s all said and done. That my writing won’t stack up. (One of the other writers--I’m not naming names here--wrote 9000 words already!) I’m getting nervous that my character(s) won’t be unique. Won’t be believable as characters. Won’t be dynamic, engaging, interesting. You think of something you want in a character and mine won’t have it. Maybe I’m just trying to sink myself (I wouldn’t put it past me).
What’s next?
More writing. I’m not kidding. I should probably plan on writing (and erasing) at least 5000 more words if I want to hit that 2000 word mark. And after that a bunch of reading (of my own story), some more erasing, and hopefully I have enough of a story left to only need a few hundred more words. I’ll be crossing that bridge between now and Tuesday.
After Tuesday - things get really interesting, because we move into serious critiquing. I’ll have 7 stories to read in 2 days and I’ll write 7 synopsis. Then I’ll choose my favorite two and write in depth reviews. This is what I signed up for. This is Write Club. And I just talked about it.
Thanks for all of the support.
None of this would be possible without the other seven sacrifices. You are all an inspiration to me. The first thing I do every morning is tune in to The Writer's Block and read what you've said while I've been sleeping. Actually, I always have one eye on The Block because I hate missing out. I think it's called FOMO and I have it. I expect our band of eight to continue on for sixteen weeks in this way. No quitting (and all that). Everyone is strong and capable. Basically, what I am saying is, I'm outclassed. And I love it.
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