Well, the deadline for the 3-Day Novel contest has passed, and regrettably I didn't make it. My hat's off to anyone who was able to write their manuscript in the allotted time. I cannot imagine how they did it.
Who knows? Perhaps if I had more than a day and a half's preparation. Perhaps if I had known about the contest far enough in advance to really map out a story, outline, and follow through. Perhaps if I'd had more than just the premise, and a vague idea of where the story would go. Perhaps if I hadn't worked for two shifts smack dab in the middle of the contest, but I don't want to make excuses.
It was hard. Sometimes the pages would just words would just fly out of me, and the pages would start to pile up. Other times I would stare at the screen and hardly be able to connect enough sentences to make a paragraph. If the average manuscript submitted is 100 pages, than I could not possibly turn mine in for consideration because I didn't even get half way there. I'm sure my story will, eventually, make it to 100 pages or more, but as of right now the story isn't completed.
That's the silver lining. Sure, I didn't finish my manuscript, and I am disappointed, but the upside is I did write around 40 pages of a story. 40 pages is nothing to sneeze at; over a weekend. I also realized that if I give myself realistic deadlines, which I never do, I could possibly finish a project or two.
I have 3 Screen plays, and 6 plays laying around in various states of completion, in addition, to 4 scripts that are complete that I don't know what to do with, and now I have 40 pages of a novel. Looks like I need to get on the ball and start pushing to get my work out there, produced and hopefully published. I sure don't want to wait tables for the rest of my life.
2 comments:
Dude, my new habit is to take one of those 200 page comp books (the ones you can't rip the pages out of) and scribble out ten pages, five days a week—weekends off.
By the end of the month you've got a 200 paged draft.
The key is to play it like an improv scene -- you go with whatever you muse puts out there (IN INK) and you keep playing the scene, no matter what, until the 10 pages are up, or end of the month arrives.
Throw Aristotle out the window and make the biggest mess possible. As Chuck Palahniuk (author of Fight Club) says, “You’ve got to shit your lump of coal.”
I am well aware of your exploits. I am a devout follower of the firevaney and the audioraw, you crazy cat.
Right now I think I just need to complete the projects I have on my plate before I start another one.
Post a Comment