Wordcount Wednesday

I'm just going to say this now: I hate the flu. Despise it. I got nailed with it twice this past week. It took me out of commission for two days and then again this past weekend. As a result, I've been having some trouble bouncing back. I still managed to do some writing, but again, not enough.

As of right now, Failstate #3 is at 53,087 words. That's only 4,180 more than last week. I'll have to step it up some more if I can.

Wordcount Wednesday

I'm going to keep this quick. Life has been conspiring against me lately when it comes to writing. Now it's flu. Grrrrr.

So right now, the third Failstate book is weighing in at 48,907 words, which means I added 12,242 words since the last time I checked in. Not good enough. I'll need to knuckle down and keep working.

Wordcount Wednesday

Remember that goal I set for myself last week? Where I said I hoped (as impossible as it might seem) to have Failstate #3 done by the end of April.

Yeah, I have a feeling that's not going to happen.

This past week, I did my best, I really did! But I was kind of stuck. I only was able to write 7,948 words this week. Granted, that is a little more than last week, but it's not going to be enough. My grand total is now at 36,665 words. Again, not too bad, but not good enough, especially since I finally introduced a character that should have been in the book 10,000 words ago.

Ah, well. That's what editing is for. All I can do is say, "Onward and upward!"

Wordcount Wednesday

Well, back at it then.

Last week, I finished up my edit pass through Numb, trying to find and eliminate some of my common "writing tells," the over- or poorly used phrases that pepper my works. Once that was done, I decided to take a little break. It was Holy Week, after all, and as a pastor, I had enough on my mind as it was.

But Easter is now done and past. I'm back on the Coke . . . er, the drink, that is. I hope that was obvious. And I'm feeling the itch. The itch to write about superheroes again. So I'm back onto Failstate #3. The last time I reported in three weeks ago, the new manuscript was at 22,248 words. After working on it for the past couple of days, it's up to 28,717 words, an addition of 6,469 words. Not too shabby for only two or three days' work.

So what's my plan from here on out? Well, I'd like to finish this monster in the next month. That leaves me about 27 days. I honestly don't think I'll be able to make it. I'd be surprised if I can. But I still might be able to. I'd have to write about 2,750 words a day, which is a bit high. I'll do my best to try, but I'm not going to be too disappointed if I can't do it.

In the meantime, have you entered my Goodreads giveaway?

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Failstate

by John W. Otte

Giveaway ends April 10, 2013.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Only 104 people have entered right now. That's still pretty good odds, and you've got a week left to enter. So get on it!

Wordcount Wednesday

As I announced last week, I've taken a break from Failstate #3. Instead, I've spent the last week sifting through my old friend Numb, cleaning up the text so we can hopefully do some advance reader copies. It's been interesting revisiting this one. It took me a while to get going, but I think I've done pretty good. As of right now, I've made it through 153 pages out of 330. Not too bad.

Hopefully I'll have this one done in the next few days. Then it's back to Failstate #3's first draft.

And now I have to get off the computer and get some sleep. I seem to be coming down with some sort of cold and that's not good, especially since the Failstate: Legends launch party is this Saturday. Even if you can't be there in person, there are details in the Facebook invite about how you can join us via Ustream.

Good night, all.

Wordcount Wednesday

Ever have one of those days? I've been having one of those days for the last three months or so. Okay, so that's a bit pessimistic. At the least, it's been one of those weeks. Unfortunately, I had a hard time getting it out of first when it came to writing. As a result, I didn't get a lot added to Failstate #3.

As of right now, Failstate #3 weighs in at 22,248 words, meaning I added 4,980 words over the past week.That may seem like a lot, but I think most of that was added at a writing retreat I was at today.

And, truth be told, I'm not sure if I'll be able to add that much in the coming weeks either. I realized I need to start work on an old story, the one that prompted me to start Wordcount Wednesday in the first place. It's been almost four years since I started it, but Numb is going to be published by Marcher Lord Press this fall. Thing is, I (hopefully) have grown a bit since I wrote that, so at the prompting of my publisher, I'm going to do a sweep through it to see if I can polish it up even more.

So Failstate #3 might be put on hold for a few days so I can do that edit sweep. But once that's done, I'm intending to crack down and get #3 finished.

Wordcount Wednesday

Don't call it a comeback!

Or do, I guess. It's time to resurrect an old standard here at the Least Read Blog. It's time for me to resurrect Wordcount Wednesday, mostly because I need a good kick in my rear to keep me writing. So every week, come back here and see how far I'm making it in my current work-in-progress.

So what's that new project? Why, Failstate #3. The working title is "Failstate: Reflections," but it might change to "Failstate: Refractions" at some point. I'm still mulling that over.

As of right now, Failstate: Reflections is weighing in at 17,268 words. Hopefully that number will grow every week. If it doesn't, I hereby give you permission to yell at me.

Wordcount . . .

. . . never mind. I won't call it a "Wordcount Wednesday" two days late.

So I haven't added any new words just yet. I spent the last week or so reading Failstate #2 (I still don't have any idea what I want to call this thing). Thankfully, I've come to realize it's not the mess I thought it was. There's a fun story in there after all. I'm actually quite relieved to learn that.

I still think some stuff is missing, but I'll get to that in a moment.

Those of you who have been reading my blog for a while know that, when I first wrote Failstate, I hit kind of an interesting snag. For some reason, I wrote that story in such a way that the plot would only have been possible if a week had eight days in it. In this blog post, I detailed how I created a calendar and, using Post-It notes, figured out the chronology.

This time around, I realized that I didn't have an eight day week to worry about. Instead, a lot of the events happened in what you might call a temporal vacuum. With very few exceptions, I didn't ground the scenes into a discernable timeline. Days were just scattered through the story and that really didn't work. So, once again, I got out the calendar sheets and started to work.

Here's before:

If you look at that mass in the top page, that's part of what I'm talking about. A lot of scenes with no discernible anchor points. I basically wrote down chapter numbers and a brief, one or two word description of the action for reference. Like last time, I wound up with an "orphaned" chapter, one that needs to be slipped in somewhere.

After putting together the mess, I sat down and took a closer look at what I had. I tried to keep in mind some of the "missing pieces" that I noticed, stuff that needed to be put into the story to make it flow a little better. This is how the calendar looks now:

So there we have it. The purple Post-Its represent new scenes or chapters that have to be written. So all in all, not too bad.

There were a lot of victims in the process, though. I cut several scenes that just didn't do much of anything, including about 7,500 words in one gigantic axing.

The next step is to start work on the notes I've taken and see how this all gets stitched together. Onward and upward!

Wordcount Wednesday

Or Thursday, I guess. Technically. If you want to be technical.

I want to be asleep right now. I should have gone to bed a while ago, but I didn't. And I'm glad I didn't. I'll pay for it in the morning, but I am pleased to announce:

Failstate #2 is in the can.

I just put the final words to the page. The epilogue is done. And this monster weighs in at 118,247 words. For those playing at home, Failstate is about 100,000 words. So the sequel is going to need to slim and trim down a bit.

But not now. Now I plan to go to bed.

Wordcount Wednesday

Okay, I am in so much trouble right now.

Let me explain why. As of tonight, Failstate #2 is at 90,579 words. That means I added 11,840 words this week. That's awesome!

Except I'm supposed to be wrapping this up. And I'm pretty sure I'm nowhere near the end yet.

Buckle up, folks. This next week is going to interesting.

Wordcount Wednesday

And things were going so well, too.

This week, things kind of slowed to a crawl. I was able to write 4,865 words, bringing the grand total of Failstate #2 to 78,739 words. Wow. Not good.

But I do have some excuses. Want to hear them?

Too bad, I'm going to give them anyway.

Part of it was the long weekend. I was out of town with family and that didn't give me a whole lot of time to write.

But more importantly, I wound up hitting a wall last Wednesday. I'd gotten up to the point where I'd figured everything out and then said, "Well, now what?" And I had no idea. So I had to take a little bit of a break to figure out what needed to happen in the last several thousand words. I wrote out a list and that seems to have cleared the logjam.

So clearly, I won't be meeting my self-imposed deadline. But that's okay. Because I think the end is in sight.

Of course, that's what I said almost two years ago when I was writing the first Failstate. Hopefully I won't half-life it this time also.

Wordcount Wednesday

So here we are, ladies and gentlemen, with a little over a week left in the month, I've made it to 73,874 words, meaning that I was able to write 13,227 words this week. That's getting better, but I'm still unsure that I'll make it by the end of the month, especially with Memorial Day Weekend coming up. But that's okay. I'll make it eventually.

Provided I can find my way out of the corner I'm in now. I seem to keep finding them in this manuscript.

Wordcount Wednesday

You ever experience an epiphany? I needed one, and boy, did I get one earlier this week.

As I've said, I've been working on the sequel to Failstate. It is, as of yet, untitled. I'm working on it. Well, not really. That's not important. What is important is this: I was feeling a bit stuck, a little bit blocked. I was writing a few thousand words here, a few thousand words there, but it felt very much like I was spinning my wheels and not going anywhere. I knew what the story was supposed to be. I knew what needed to happen. But for some reason, something that I couldn't put my finger on, I knew something wasn't right. I was missing something.

The maddening thing was this: I had no idea what I was missing. I had no idea if I had taken a wrong turn somewhere in the plot. I had no idea if I had made a major mistake somewhere along the line. Just this persistent feeling of "wrongness."

But then I had an epiphany. And it's thanks to, in large part, sleep deprivation.

This past Friday, our church had a youth lock-in. I didn't stay for the whole thing. Instead, I went in late, played a game called Underground Church with the kids, learned a game from them called "Ninja" (apparently quite popular in our local high school), and played another game with them called The Werewolves of Millers Hollow. I didn't get home until 2:30. My mind didn't shut off until 3:30.

Needless to say, when I got up at 7:00 the next morning, I was tired.

In that state of sleep deprivation, I tried writing. Didn't go so well at first. But then, with half of my brain shut off and desperately craving sleep, I had the epiphany. I realized what was wrong.

I was missing a bridge.

I don't want to go too much into the plot right now because, hey, I'm in the middle of my first draft and things are in flux. But for a long time, the plot of the story was feeling a bit disconnected. There are two distinct . . . well, phases to the plot. And while I thought I had found a way to link them together, I really hadn't.

On Saturday, I realized what the bridge had to be. It was right there in front of me the whole time. I just hadn't spotted it.

And that's all it took. My "muse" is humming along. I'm feeling the desperate need to write. And my wordcount shows it.

Right now, Failstate #2 is at 60,647 words, meaning that I've been able to add 11,957 words this week. Holy cow! I'm almost tempted to keep writing right now to break the 12k mark.

In spite of that, though, I'm still a little worried. My self-imposed deadline of May 31st is looming large and I have a lot of ground to cover yet. And I'm also a bit worried about different details of the plot. I'm not sure I'm doing them all justice. Oh well. Time will tell.

Maybe I'll have another epiphany along the way.

Wordcount Wednesday

So I'm starting to make good progress. Failstate #2 (great working title, huh?) is now at 48,690 words. That's an additional 7,801 words. I'm almost at the halfway point. And I'm even feeling a bit better about the story.

But I'm also running out of time, I think. I need to get this done by the end of May. Will I? At this point, I have no idea. Keep watching, true believers. The next few weeks are going to be interesting.

Wordcount Wednesday

So here we are, a week later, and Failstate #2 is weighing in at 40,889 words, meaning that in the past week, I've added 6,513 words. That's good. I've managed to eke out a little more. Not quite as many as I had hoped, but it's a step in the right direction.

My problem is this: I'm not feeling great about what's happening in the story. I can't quite put my finger on it, but something feels off right now. I don't know if I'm suffering from a tiny bit of writers' block or if my subconscious is trying to tell me something. Hard to say. I guess the only thing I can do is keep working and hope that I'll break through it soon.

Until next week, then!

Wordcount Wednesday

Again, not a lot of forward progress. Right now, my WIP is at 34,376 words. That means that over the past week, I've added 5,238 words to the manuscript. That's a little better than last week, but not good enough. Hopefully once things have slowed down a bit in summer, I'll be able to do better.

So what am I working on? Glad you asked. I know I've been keeping mum on what this WIP is for a while, but the news kind of broke on Facebook earlier today. My extremely wonderful agent, Amanda Luedeke, reported this little tidbit:

John Otte's books 2 and 3 FAILSTATE series, in which the teenage superhero battles a horde of superhero zombies (book 2) and uncovers the mystery behind the reappearance of fellow superhero Lux (book 3), to Jeff Gerke at Marcher Lord Press, in a nice deal, for publication in 2013, by Amanda Luedeke at MacGregor Literary.

That's right, my current WIP is book #2 about Failstate. And that's right. Superpowered zombies. This is going to be fun.

Wordcount Wednesday

So I'm doing a little better. Over the last week, I've added 5,051 words, bringing my grand total to 29,138 words. Like I said, a little better, but not good enough. I think part of my problem is that I was writing a chapter that didn't quite feel right. It bogged me down.

I still can't reveal much about what the story is, but it's still proving to be fun. Hopefully I'll be able to do better this coming week.

Wordcount Wednesday

Okay, so I seem to be a little lost right now.

Or maybe a better metaphor is I've hit a wall. A big one.

My current WIP feels a bit stalled out. I know where I need to get to, but I'm not sure what path to take. Add to that Holy Week, and I haven't been making much progress. Since the last time I've checked in, I've written 3,318 words, bringing the grand total up to 24,087 words. That's . . . not good.

Someone want to hand me a chisel? Or at least a well-worn rock hammer? I need to kick this in gear and get moving.

Wordcount Wednesday

Okay, so I still don't have any forward momentum to report. This week has been spent getting ready for the release of Failstate. Doing edits, looking over galleys, freaking out and curling up in a corner . . .

Um, I mean . . . doing manly things. Yes, that's what I've been doing.

Oh, well. It releases soon, people! And here's the last of the book trailers to whet your appetite.

Wordcount Wednesday

Whereas last week was productive, this week hasn't been. Well, not as far as my WIP is concerned. As of right now, the WIP is weighing in at 20,769 words, which means that I was able to write 4,016 new words.

But I'm not too worried. I've been working on edits for Failstate. Speaking of which, did you see this starred review from Publisher's Weekly for Failstate?

Oh, and did you also see the latest book trailer?