The chronicles word counter!

msstice said:
Jan 30: Bk1: 114161 -> 114362
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Feb 6: Bk1: 114362 -> 113209

The new metaphor bit is proving challenging but very rewarding to write. This bit is turning into a first draft again, because it's a rewrite, but I'm editing as I go since I know I want to keep this bit in the final.
 
An update but no word count. I'm two weeks into post op and due to some inept needlework, I've lost most feeling in my left little finger. Which affects typing more than you might think. That, along with tiredness and brain fuzz, and I've typed up nothing since surgery.

I'm writing, but it's all over the place. The main novel is, I think, too far along to be worked on with real clarity of thought. But I've been writing out bits for The Forest of Haunts and even some for The Rammelsberg Piper. IOW, just lurching about. I guess that's another plus in favor of a series--there's always something to work on, even if it's just worldbuilding.

I have no idea how many words. Since I'm writing in a notebook, I can report I've written nineteen pages. Sounds quaint.
 
msstice said:
Feb 6: Bk1: 114362 -> 113209
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Feb 7: Bk1: 113209 -> 114112

It was a good call to use a new metaphor that excited me more. After a few days of slogging, today the words just flew out. I'm excited by this new angle which is all one can ask for.
 
msstice said:
Feb 7: Bk1: 113209 -> 114112
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Feb 19: 114112 -> 117149

Still working on that chapter which is turning out to be pretty eventful. I'm not happy with the writing technique (I think it reads choppily) but I'm delighted with the content.
 
msstice said:
Feb 19: 114112 -> 117149
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Feb 21: 117149 -> 118112

The chapter is finally done and is a monster 7500 words long. I really had a lot of fun writing it. This is effectively a first draft now so it will need some extra going over next round.
 
Novel: The Eleventh Book
Genre: Literary Fantasy
Word Count: 46,810 (27+ chapters)
Status: I can't believe it has been a month since my last update. I've been trying to post here every 5000 words, so I'm 1800 pages past my update threshold. Kyra has come upon an obstacle barring her passage from the first part of the 7th circle of Hell. Her captor, a Centaur, has shot an crossbow bolt through her chest, with his aim design to carefully miss any important internal organs but incapacitate her temporarily. (He could heal her if he wanted to.) More critically, she has fallen in love with him. (Centaurs have a way of enthralling women.) Kyra's mother has appeared from Heaven to talk her out of staying with him.

My chapters have increased slightly in average length, and that puts me at about 86K for a projected length. I don't know if I will make it there, but at least that is better than a paltry 50,000 from my first estimate.
 
Typing again, though the little finger is still largely numb. Incredibly awkward, since the little finger is for the left Shift key, which in turn is needed to produce double quotes. Makes writing dialog more than a little clumsy.

Anyway, because I'm back at the computer, I can report the word count on The Tower of Guard is just under 52k. Onward and sideways, the crab said.
 
msstice said:
Feb 21: 117149 -> 118112
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April 4: 118112 -> 122888

Haven't posted in a while, stopped writing for a while because I got an annoying rhinovirus, but it's picked up again, and I'm almost done with a fun new chapter that evolved spontaneously. It does the job of an existing chapter (which I'll get rid of) but in a more entertaining way. Basically, instead of our four heroes sitting around in their "apartment" chewing the fat and making an important decision, they "steal a car", are chased by, and are hiding from, the baddies and discuss the important thing as they hide out. We learn more about them this way, and there's a fun tertiary character in the mix that I just thought of. Who says writing isn't creative :ROFLMAO:. Also word count keeps going up.
 
Novel: The Eleventh Book
Genre: Literary Fantasy
Word Count: 50,362 (29+ chapters)
Status: It's been another month since my last 5000-word update. Most of what I've written came yesterday and today. Kyra was carried across the river Phlegethon (although not named in the book) and is currently traversing the Wood of Suicides bearing the grief of her choice to leave the Centaur (she had fallen in love with him, "if such a thing exists in Hell"). I have reached the word count that I had originally thought was the maximum for this story, but there is probably at least a third of it still to come, possibly more. It's going slowly, but I have made it past the scene that was proving to be a roadblock, and I have an idea of how to surmount the next roadblock already.

Another thing slowing me down is that I've been challenged to write a poem a day, since this is National Poetry Month. I'm halfway through (and actually wrote 2 today, although one was an incidental haiku). 16 more to go.
 
Novel: The Eleventh Book
Genre: Literary Fantasy
Word Count: 55,159 (34+ chapters)
Status: It's been nearly another month since my last 5000-word update. I've made a necessary change at the end of the Hell section, which shortened it probably by 10,000 words. Kyra has survived The Book of Sin, only to find The Book of Death as her next trial. This, the twelfth book, will be a much shorter, more dangerous trial. Unlike the previous book, there is a way in, but no clear route out of it. She can't even read it, since it is totally dark. (The pages are blank anyway, as she saw just before the lights winked out.) My length estimate is back down to around 70,000 words.
 
msstice said:
April 4: 118112 -> 122888
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May 11: 122888 -> 134175

I think my writing is improving and the good thing is that when I come back to chapters I wrote a year or two ago, they still read well.
I'd say I have 20% left to seriously revise and edit (and write afresh) before I can say draft 2 is done, and the story is complete from start to finish.
I'm not worrying about word count at the moment, but I could be in trouble, because I can no longer cut the story somewhere and say end of book 1. That cut I did almost half a year ago, pushing the original ending to a proposed future book.
 
msstice said:
May 11: 122888 -> 134175
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May 29: 134175 -> 132046

I wrote the "last chapter" to see how it looks. I think it will work. The core mystery hasn't been solved, but a disaster has been avoided, at some cost, which should count for a satisfactory ending to this first story. Needs more decoration and foreshadowing everywhere, and I still have to go back and rewrite some middle chapters.

I'm also sensing some authorial peril here: I'm not so excited about some of the middle chapters. That's not a good sign. I think I can discard some of them and move their ideas into the second book, where they may fit better.

I sense some fatigue in myself with this story. In the past that meant I should leave it alone and do something else. I have to keep teaching myself how to stay the course and finish the work.
 
71.5k
Can I call it a second draft when I never really finished the first? This is how it goes, anyway. There comes a time when I've written most of the story, still have a ton of just notes, but I can't make progress until I've smoothed out at least some of the story, especially the early chapters. I need to start to see how the characters are progressing.

So, I'm partway through that process. It involves a combination of writing, cutting, and correcting. At some later time I'll have a clearer picture of the shape of the story and the bits I fill in will be more deliberate and carefully scoped. I call that the third draft. Revision. Whatever.
 
msstice said:
May 29: 134175 -> 132046
Click to expand...
Jun 9th: 132046 => 137662

I'm declaring draft2 done and am in sort of the same state as @sknox : The start and the finish are pretty solid. There are bits in the middle that need a lot more work and are more draft1 or even in a bullet point/fragments stage.

I also had a brainstorm about a subtle change to world-building that might improve the plot and character development and am excited to try it out.

In short: The "antagonist" of the story is a force ("X") that is destroying the world and our heroes quickly realize they have to do everything they can to stop it.

In the current version X is a new flavor of a familiar thing. I don't have compelling reasons for why X is familiar. It allowed me to start the story ominously, with characters dismissing X because it feels like a familiar thing. But I didn't write a suspenseful story where X starts out innocuous and we slowly figure out X is terrible: Bad things happen and we figure out it's X right away.

As I was writing, new characters suddenly appeared that wanted to use X for selfish gain, even though X is destroying their world. I liked the tension these new characters introduced. This in turn made me think that making "X" a completely new and strange thing will improve dramatic effect: Here's strange "alien" tech. Ooh, can we use it? No, leave it alone! Oh no! It's destroying the world! We have to get rid of it! No! I want the power for myself!

Anyhow: I think the proper thing for me to do at this stage is read through the whole story making notes and step back and see how it feels as a gestalt. But I know myself, I'll get nerd sniped and start working on some chapter or the other. But I'll try and be grown up and just read through making notes and no edits.

We'll see how that goes ...
 
Novel: The Eleventh Book
Genre: Literary Fantasy
Word Count: 65,482 (34+ chapters)
Status: It has been a while since I have posted an update. Life sort of caught up on me. I've added another 10K since then, but I'm not sure about the last chapter (which may need to be split). I stumbled into the mythology of my Ezzie Dryar series. For the moment, I'm running with it, since it fits where I want to go. It also gives me a character that I can use in the next novel of that series, Failsafe, which has run into a roadblock about halfway through the story. Kyra may be the means to get through it.

I'm considering writing through this, and then maybe returning to the beginning of chapter 39 and rewriting without the Ezzie character (actually, not Ezzie, but her "twin" sister Cassandra, who is the protagonist of 'Round Midnight). I'm not sure whether I write to the end, or whether I write the alternative version as soon as Cassandra's appearance ends. Actually, she makes a brief cameo in chapter 2, so there is a precedence, however oblique. This novel mostly takes place between 'Round Midnight and Nocturnal. It's 2030. RM ends in 2022, and the characters of Nocturnal are born in 2024. (All 3 protagonists share their birthday.) Kyra was born in 2010.
 
Novel: The Eleventh Book
Genre: Literary Fantasy
Word Count: 70,294 (43+ chapters)
Status: I have been writing steadily since my last update. I've reached 70K, and there are still 3 chapters to go, at least. I haven't gone back and rewritten chapter 39, since I can see an ending in what I'm doing. It has gone full Ezzie. Kyra has been in the void (her void) between multiverses for several chapters now, and has had some revelations about herself, the Tridecagon, and lots of other things. She has a decision to make before she leaves the Tridecagon. That's coming up soon. This draft should end up between 75 and 80K. I'm on the final stretch.
 
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