Happy Wednesday! This week’s post is powered by coffee, chocolate, and a severe lack of sleep. Oh, and an over-excited writer who finally collated all of her notes with Happy Planner discs and hole punch!

Let’s jump right into the review.

My Writing Goals for 2nd – 8th December 2021

• Write 3000 words for Running The Asset. (Hit 75,305 total words)
• Block out the sex sequence

How Did I Do?

I succeed in adding 3,020 words, taking the word count to 75,325. But getting the word count this week was brutal. I was only hitting 450-500 words most days, though Monday was an exception with 1014 words. It’s similar to last week.

I think the problem stems from some growing doubts over the story’s opening. Basically, a couple of months ago, I hit upon the idea of having Adam and Elle already knowing each other, intimately. It worked, and it helped me move along through the story… until a kernel of doubt started niggling me. Had I made a mistake? Had I wasted valuable writing time–and somewhere in the region of 15K words on the new opening?

I started dragging my heels with the writing, fearing that my lastest words would end up thrown out. Not wanting to continue on at a slug’s pace, I sat down and thought through the outline. And came to the conclusion I knew in my heart was coming. I was right. I’d made a mistake in rejiggering the start of the story.

When I’d stumbled upon the new opening, I knew there was a risk of it being a mistake. But I’m glad I did it. By putting Adam and Elle together with what they each believed to be a one-night stand allowed me to get to really know them and see how far they need to travel to be a real couple.

Once I’d decided to go back to the original version–with some tweaks noted for the edit–I picked up where I’d left off and wrote on as if the original outline was never changed.

Just a note on word count. I never deleted or moved the original scenes; they are part of my total word count for the novel. The new-going-to-be-deleted scenes will continue to be part of the word count until I get to the editing process.

I just missed the 3K word goal for the week. I came in at 2,947, taking the manuscript to a total of 72,305 words.

This Week’s Goal

• Write 3000 words (taking me to 78,325)
• Block out the next scene

That’s it for today. Thanks for stopping by, and take care.

Susan