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Right now, I’m doing a short story a week (create, edit, proofread, submit) for the next weeks. It’s both an exercise is getting a lot of different things done, but also in doing multiple projects at the same time. In the past, I’ve worked on short stories and neglected then novel, or worked on the novel and neglected the short stories.
So what I’ve been doing here is writing the stories at lunch time, then in the evening, I do the novel. Final edits and submission for the story is Saturday morning. It’s an interesting experiment in managing the time of two projects. I’m leaning towards short stories that won’t require any research, and it’s forcing me to look at what I do need to research for the novel versus what I can make up.
I’ve been trying to do this as well, and I must say, it’s hard work! I’ve kept up this schedule since January and it has been really rewarding. It has been really meaningful for me to feel accomplished at the end of the week by “actually completing” something in the form of a short story. I designated Saturdays as my short story day (because my husband is home and can take my two toddlers out for a bit while I write!) and then I spend the rest of the week working on it. Tuesday and Thursdays are dedicated to my novel (I’m currently in world build stage. I hope to start writing it on August 1st).
I must tell you, it’s a difficult schedule. But a rewarding one. One that I’m glad that I decided to do. I also have found that I don’t get to “submit” mode by the end of the week. Often I get to “read for critique” mode by the end of the week. I feel like I’m ok with that…but like I said, I have 2 young children, so my schedule is funky. I’m also taking two courses on EdX and writing two blogs which take up my Mondays/Wednesdays/Fridays.
I don’t know if you are looking advice, but I’ll share one of my “best practices”–I have two Moleskines: An organization one for outlining (and keeping all of my project straight) and one for writing the inspiration that comes whereever I go. Organization is key and I’m so glad that I have something portable for it. I tried to do it with my phone, but I found that the technology was a hinderence rather than a help. Pen to paper for organization and inspiration is incredibly helpful to me.
Best of luck with the next for weeks! It’s a hard schedule, but an awesome one!
This is how I handle multiple projects, which is how I usually work:
I’m not even going for critiques on the short stories. Because then, once I do that, they’ll sit until I get the critique, and then I’ll be thinking, “I need to revise this.” With the story I just got out, it’s 20+ year old idea that I’ve tried three times and have never been able to execute. I submitted the last incarnation, I focused on getting a first draft done, then I could fix it in revision. Instead, I didn’t let my natural process come through, and I revised it in ways that led to its rejection. This time, the short timeline led me to let the process happen, and I was surprised with what I came up with. It was scary, too, because I kept thinking, “But you’re not revising it.” And yet, the story worked the way it was.
Doing a schedule is actually one of the hardest things for me to do. I don’t play well with them because they are too left-brained for me. I mostly just need broader goals, like I want to accomplish X by the end of the week or finish X today. When I did my first story, I wrote most of it during lunch, but on Friday, I spent another two hours at night finishing it up for edits the next day. I was prepared to work as late as needed to get it done.
For the novel, it’s been primarily one scene a day. I’ve thrown word count to the wind. I don’t think about it when I’m writing the story — I don’t even have it on my netbook — and I don’t think about it when I write the novel. It’s remarkably freeing for me not to monitor the word count. I’m trusting that the story will come out generally where it needs to be, and the edits will take care of the rest.
Linda Adams wrote:Doing a schedule is actually one of the hardest things for me to do. I don’t play well with them because they are too left-brained for me. I mostly just need broader goals, like I want to accomplish X by the end of the week or finish X today. When I did my first story, I wrote most of it during lunch, but on Friday, I spent another two hours at night finishing it up for edits the next day. I was prepared to work as late as needed to get it done.For the novel, it’s been primarily one scene a day. I’ve thrown word count to the wind. I don’t think about it when I’m writing the story — I don’t even have it on my netbook — and I don’t think about it when I write the novel. It’s remarkably freeing for me not to monitor the word count. I’m trusting that the story will come out generally where it needs to be, and the edits will take care of the rest.
If the process works for you, that’s what matters. I’m not saying you can’t learn and tweak it, but it’s a lot like writing; what works for one person won’t work for another.
I’m always juggling multiple projects, and some are always falling to the floor, but that’s the best answer I can figure out so far. Until I learn something that works better for me, I’m sticking with it. (And it is, literally, juggling – it leverages the one strength I have, a working memory which is capable of things most people don’t believe.)
By the way, about the story you didn’t revise: revision only exists to fix problems. If the story works the way it is, then there’s no reason to revise it.
Wandering Author wrote:By the way, about the story you didn’t revise: revision only exists to fix problems. If the story works the way it is, then there’s no reason to revise it.However, it is largely taught that stories need revision, that the best comes out in the revision. It’s also very common to hear the phrase “My first draft is crap.”
I do so much revision and editing thorughout the process of getting the first draft I rarely need to do major revisions either. I don’t often say I don’t have to do major revisions because I’m afraid I’ll be attacked or people will start to think I think my words are golden and don’t need to be worked on. They do, they just don’t need revision that often.
Ashe Elton Parker
"Just love me, fear me, do as I say, and I will be your slave." ~ David Bowie as Jareth in Labyrinth
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Member since 1998.
~*~Linda Adams wrote:Wandering Author wrote:By the way, about the story you didn’t revise: revision only exists to fix problems. If the story works the way it is, then there’s no reason to revise it.However, it is largely taught that stories need revision, that the best comes out in the revision. It’s also very common to hear the phrase “My first draft is crap.”
I understand why this would worry you, but if the story is good, then it’s good. Now, even if it is good, perhaps if you let it sit a while, you’ll find there are ways to improve it. I can’t say one way or the other, since I haven’t seen the story.
Speaking as someone whose first drafts usually are crap, every now and then, everything will fall into place, and I’ll write something I don’t need to revise. Proofreading, obviously. Or a tiny tweak, just to point something up. You’re the final judge of this, obviously. I’m just saying that what you’re taught means little (it is commonly taught you need to use an outline, too
) and what you hear means less. What matters is the story you’ve just written. Does it work? Is it good? It is the final answer to what it does or doesn’t need.Actually I was never taught I needed an outline.
Somehow I never ran into that in school. I’ve just seen it everywhere else since!Linda Adams wrote:Actually I was never taught I needed an outline. Somehow I never ran into that in school. I’ve just seen it everywhere else since!Be very grateful for that, then. Teacher after teacher insisted we had to have an outline to write anything. Since I escaped school, I’ve learned how to deal with them, but I was under so much pressure to outline, I was literally incapable of learning how to do it at all. I tend to be that way when it comes to pressure; leave me alone, I can learn how to do something, but pressure me, and I’ll freeze up. I was well into my forties before I could so much as hear the word outline (in that context) without my mind deteriorating into white noise punctuated by screams of panic.
Sometimes I suspect there are things I could make more use of, if I hadn’t been taught to flip out at the mere mention of them. In order to learn how to outline – and although I still am much more of a pantser, I have outlined stories first and then written them – I needed to begin by outlining a story I had already written. Once I learned to do that, I could take the story in my head and outline it. (I’m not saying I followed the outline religiously, but I doubt I’ll ever be capable of that.) All my teachers were so busy standing over me shrieking “outline!” that I didn’t have the chance to try this method until I got away from them. And even though I’ve learned how to use them, I still tend to tense up and have a much harder time because of that experience.
(Note: I did actually have a few good teachers, here and there. Without exception, they noticed that I seemed to be capable of writing without outlining, and left me alone. There were other teachers who eventually gave up and left me alone, and still others who never cared enough to bother insisting on much of anything, but in my experience, one trait of a good teacher is the ability to notice that a student has worked out their own way of doing something, and as long as that way works, leave them alone to get on with it.)
Sorry for the ramble. Outlining beats out even diagramming sentences as my greatest phobia from my school days. I hated diagramming sentences, and found it pointless, since I already had at least an instinctive understanding of everything I was “learning”, but at least I managed to do it well enough to satisfy them. And I didn’t care enough about math to get too worked up when they put pressure on me. But English class mattered to me, so when a teacher started in on outlining, it was a real problem for me.
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