#ROW80 R12, Week 1: The shiny things

My new goal this round is to write daily, and I managed that with flying colours — not a day missed yet.

Distracted by my focus on the new, I didn’t start off quite as well on my other goals. I had planned to write a post about the research project, but I didn’t have the data I needed; so I spent the time collecting data, and only wrote a few hundred words of notes. By the time I realised I’d have to get my word count from Conkers, it was the weekend, and I only finished half a scene.

I did get quite a bit of poetry written; just not the stuff I wanted to focus on. Now, all I have to do is turn that same focus on to Conkers…

With such a half-hearted week, I didn’t want to miss reflection, so it’s in this post.

This week, I went back to the stealthy character in Conkers; a thread of the story I haven’t worked on since the middle of last round. On re-reading his last scene, I was surprised by how stilted and boring it seemed. I went through and re-wrote almost all of it, which I think helped, but not much.

By contrast, the first stealth scene I wrote seemed much smoother. I can point to specific things — more varied sentences, less repeated words — that I think are better; but I feel like the biggest difference is that I enjoyed writing that scene.

Specifically, I think I’ve been taking the recent story too seriously. I’ve spent quite a bit of time worrying about getting characters right, researching, and so on, and I seem to have lost track of actually writing interesting stories.

I’m not quite sure what I can do about this. I used to add things to the story just because they seemed funny, and I can make an effort to do that more, and worry less. A fresh start, in a new round, seems like the perfect place to do that. But perhaps I need a plan for when no silly ideas come.

Or perhaps not. I started Conkers because writing badly was preferable to not writing at all, and that was the attitude that got that first stealthy scene the way it is. Maybe it doesn’t need to matter if I don’t feel inspired; what I end up with will always be better that what I’d get if I didn’t try.

I take heart from seeing other people’s progress; in particular, Julie Glover’s post about loving what you do. If I focus on writing something I’ll love to write, hopefully the words will flow more smoothly.

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