Some thoughts on writing

Yesterday, I wrote 1,721 words on my work-in-progress, otherwise known as my WIP. Today I wrote 1,652. Proud of myself, except that it got me to thinking about measuring writing, if you can do such a thing. Most writers I know judge their daily progress by words written. They set a daily goal—for many it is a thousand words. And they judge themselves at the end of the day and then at the end of the week by how many words they have written. Lord knows I’m among the guiltiest.

Mostly here I’m talking about mysteries, because those are the authors I know who fall into this word trap—and I hasten to add that not all of them do. But bear in mind that the average mystery runs about 80,000 words, so if you wrote a thousand words a day, it would take you eighty days to write a novel, not counting weekends, holidays, and those days when the words just don’t flow.

The downside to all this is that there’s a temptation to set increasingly more difficult goals for yourself. Mine used to be a thousand words a day, but with this new novel the words seem to come easier and I’m averaging about 1500 a day. So now that becomes my goal, and if I only make a thousand, I feel somehow deficient. I’ve slacked off, not tried hard enough, given up. It becomes a contest with yourself.

Of course, the goal of writing should be quality, not quantity. But that somehow eludes many of us. My mysteries these days are indie published, which means I publish them. So I have no deadlines. I may say to myself that I want to get this novel out in time for summer beach reading, but there is no contract under which I’ll be punished if I miss the deadline. No one cares but me.

On the other hand, some among mystery writers—and I’m taking this from posts by Sisters in Crime—believe that what really matters is getting that first draft written. Just pile up the words. You’re going back to revise and edit anyway, and that’s the time to seek quality, not quantity. Some writers do five or ten drafts—or more—before they are satisfied with a manuscript.

I don’t. I tend to write it, go back and check for inconsistencies, awkward phrases, repetition, etc. But I rarely if ever revise to the point of changing major structures in the plot. So what I write is pretty much what stays there and becomes the final book.

When I moved from writing western historical fiction to mysteries, a move I haven’t really finalized yet and don’t intend to, I discovered a whole new world of everything from rough drafts to agents and publishers and, most of all, promotion or marketing or whatever you want to call finding clever ways to say, “Please buy my book.” But one big thing I learned was the difference between plotters and pantsers. Plotters map out the book in advance. Well before that first sentence, they have down on paper what is going to happen in each chapter, how it fits into the arc of the book, and so on. They know how each character looks and feels and how they will act. When  you write historical fiction, this is easier, because history gives you the road map.

When you’re a pantser, like me, that road map is not there. Literally, I write by the seat of my pants. I have a general idea, and often it’s the first sentence that gets me going. But then I’m off and rolling—at least that’s what I hope. The plot unravels as I write. Frequently I can’t tell you until well into the novel who is the murderer, sometimes not even who is the victim. My characters surprise me and take the book in wildly different turns.

Texas novelist the late Elmer Kelton used to say, “Listen to your characters, and they will tell you what’s going to happen.” I have known very few authors who disagree with this.

With the cozy mystery I’m currently writing, a culinary novel set in contemporary Chicago (my hometown), I am fortunate because the plot easily moves along, often without my interference. For instance, yesterday when I was napping and semi-asleep, I worked out the backstory that the protagonist needs to know to solve the mystery. So now I have notes that will carry me forward for several days. And I find maybe the mystery is going to be a small part of the story. The relationship between characters is the main story.

Writing, for me, is an exciting process of discovery. But I wish I could get over the fixation with word counts. Even as I say that, I’m checking to see how long this blog post is and finding its way longer than most. Sorry.

Learning about myself

I think I have learned something about myself as a writer. It's about time, after almost forty years. But last night, when I bemoaned having written only one sentence for the day, I went on to reach about 1200 words for my day's total. Not record-breaking, but respectable, especially when I remember the beloved history prof who used to say “A page a day (250 words in the day when we used the Courier font) is a book a year.” No, 1200 words is respectable. But I wrote those when everyone was gone, and the house was quiet.

Today went by in what kind of flurry I don’t know. I spent almost two hours on the phone with various tech people, sorting out what was wrong with my printer—all the color prints came out yellow. After all that time and a lot of self-testing of the printer, I was told I need new color cartridges. Usually the printer warns you, “Magenta ink low,” and such. But it said nothing this time. So tomorrow I buy cartridges and await a follow-up call from Hewlett Packard. To be fair, both HP and Staples were courteous to a fault, and I was grateful for their help—it just seemed silly to come up with such a simple, obvious solution after all that folderol. The rest of the day was absorbed in fixing dinner for company tonight—Jacob’s friend Max and his grandparents plus Jacob’s parents—and in a pleasant lunch with a longtime colleague from TCU. And, yes, a nap. So I told myself when everyone left tonight, I would write. This would be my new schedule: at night, writing my thousand words would be my priority, above blogging, Facebook, reading, all of that.

But after the company left, Elizabeth wandered in and Jordan, who was about to tackle the dishes, wanted to sit, have another glass of wine, and visit. So the evening wore away, and then I found myself, as I so often do, in the kitchen doing dishes. Actually it’s never a chore—she had stacked them—and it doesn’t take long. But the goal of writing began to fade.

Still I came to my office about 8:45 and started to write—and pretty soon I had doubled that 1200 words. I know not all of it is golden, and I’ll re-read and wonder where my head was. But I’m getting words and ideas on paper. And to my mind it’s a pretty good start on January 3 for a new novel.

So maybe I’ll try a new routine: I’ll blog, take care of business—personal finances, marketing, etc.—during the day and write at night when the house is quiet. I’m not making resolutions this year, so I’m not putting this in that form. It’s just an experiment I want to try. We’ll see.