On Writing

[extrapenguin]

Summer is coming! My new place has a thermometer. Based on observations from that, while 21°C is a perfectly valid temperature to do stuff in, 22°C is too hot and my brains want to melt.

I have written a lot of words for Guardian. I still have more to write. I've also read 55 chapters of Sha Po Lang and holy fuck I love it so much, it's got so many MilSF-type feels from Gu Yun loyal to his country despite the crap happening to him. A+ would recommend.

However, the title of this post is On Writing (instead of On Sha Po Lang) because I have over the past few weeks discovered two posts on writing I wish to share!

One Free Trick: How to Use the Writing Skills You Have to Learn the Ones You Don’t (Arkady Martine) is mostly an essay about how we all have something we're good at, so we can use those bits to push through the harder bits. Then I spent some time wondering what my "free trick" is. Humor, maybe? That seems to come easily to me.

How I Went From Writing 2,000 Words a Day to 10,000 Words a Day (Rachel Aaron) is exactly what it says on the tin. As a hobbyist, I can't do 10k per day, but method one (write a more barebones outline summary of what has to happen in the scene) has so far worked really well when I'm a bit stuck.

Anyway, I am now off to write even more words for the 520 Ex assignment (yay) and then sleep. Mayday is a public holiday here, so I'll probably dedicate Wednesday to words as well!

Comments

[maggie33]

Summer is coming!

Aaaa, don’t remind me. It’s the end of April and it’s basically already summer here. It’s supposed to be still Spring in Poland. I can stand 3 months of summer, but not 5. Just go away, stupid hot sun. >:(

And I’ve read that first article, but not that 2nd one, so thanks for the link. I would love to increase my daily wordcount. Not to 10K per day, not even 2k per day, because yes, I have to work sometimes. ;) But a bit more than now would be very nice.

[extrapenguin]

We still get cold overnight, and the lakes only just melted over the weekend, so it's still spring. They claim it'll rain later in the week, too, so hopefully we'll get a few more weeks of spring! I agree that summer is the worst season. The hot sun is too scorching, and it's too bright to sleep, so it's at minimum 3 months of misery. Boo.

10k per day is only achievable for full-time pros, and even Yoon Ha Lee only writes 2k per day (because he needs time to process), for instance. For a fanfic writer, just getting out those words *faster* would be a bonus - sleep is also an important thing, for instance...

[maggie33]

For a fanfic writer, just getting out those words *faster* would be a bonus

Oh yes, that would be nice, too. Sometimes after an hour in front of the computer I only have like 100 words. It’s so frustrating. :)

[extrapenguin]

Between my assignment and Sha Po Lang, I stayed up until 1am. 0/5, would not recommend!