Susanne Winter

And another fun day!

On the bright side I did get the podcast episode published. And I was really glad that I hadn’t moved the recording to today because today – my voice was basically gone.

Now I do know that I have a hard time playing music when I don’t have a voice which is ridiculous but today I learned that I can’t really write fiction without my voice either.

Also I have a headache and an aching throat all day.

All of this makes me think about the advice I read about author blogs that no one wants to read about how hard it is to write. Well, I’m still thinking it is more like moderately hard but today there were no words. And every day with no words is making the rest of the month more interesting and colorful.

I also tried to research books that might be similar to the one I’m attempting to write and found that a) this does not seem to be a genre, which I find weird (but then maybe I looked in the wrong place), and b) every single sample and book I downloaded was one I just couldn’t read. Not that they were necessarily bad, it’s just a kind of book I dislike so much that I don’t want to spend time on it. Huh.

My husband said I needed to invent a new genre. I am a bit doubtful about that. But I’m thinking there must be something I’m missing because I know there are books that deal with the same kind of themes I want to touch. Only I seem to have looked in the wrong place.

Which is completely okay but it made me think for a while that maybe I don’t want to write this book after all.

On the other hand that thought seems to be a normal part of my process. There are people who are just so passionate and enthusiastic that they think their book is the best thing since sliced bread most of the time, and then there are people like me who have an idea, think, „This would be just so cool and awesome!“ and then lose all their enthusiasm for most of the process. Usually when I pick it up weeks later I like it again but while I’m writing it? Not so much.

I’m working on it, though. There must be a way to condition myself to love the process as well.

Unfortunately positive thinking doesn’t seem to work on me. Every time I tell myself how much I look forward to writing this, and how awesome this will be, and how much fun I feel like a kindergarten teacher talking to my inner teenager. It’s eyerolling all the way.

Well, there’s always tomorrow.

And if not it won’t matter anyhow.

Still feeling sick, still procrastinating. And another thing to throw me off my game in the morning. Nothing serious but something that was occupying my thoughts.

That’s the thing with creative work, you need your mind to do it, and when that is elsewhere creativity is harder.

But I did write another 1,513 words.

I’m still way behind, and I’m also hoping to write some more after dinner (just like I did yesterday, and then I fell instantly asleep at 8.45).

Well, I will manage 50,000 words this month at least. Seems like it will not quite be a walk in the park.

Being able to write fast doesn’t really help if you don’t spend time writing. Huh.

So that was a bust.

I think I declare this to be a sick day.

I barely have a voice, and I have started coughing.

Most of the day was spent helping my son get ready for his trip, though, and then sitting next to my phone waiting for updates on his progress. He arrived safely, managed to step on the bus in the wrong direction, and then get off at the wrong stop. It was a realy nailbiter.

He has arrived safely now, but somehow I’m still not in the mood for writing.

So word count still stands at 2,032. Not the 20,000 I had hoped for by now.

I knew it was a stretch goal, didn’t know it would be that hard.

So today was all about procrastination. I think I’ve heard Sarah Painter (of the excellent „The Worried Writer“-podcast, and the equally excellent book, „Stop Worrying, Start Writing“ (Amazon-affiliate-link) call herself the „queen of procrastination“ but I might be the empress.

Mind you, there were lots of very important reasons for not writing more. First I did actually sleep in – which I never do – , also I’m having this bad sore throat and cold, and then my husband was set on making lasagna for lunch which meant we both were working in the kitchen for two hours (yes, his cooking is a bit excessive; it is rather delicious, though). Then I helped my son choose furniture for his new room which took quite some time as well. I can tell you, the choice of cheap wardrobes on IKEA is appaling. Who needs a wardrobe with just a rod for hanging stuff and no place to put sweaters or t-shirts or anything? In the end we decided on just getting a dresser instead. Since he wears jeans, tees, and sweatshirts exclusively his needs to put things on hangers are rather negligible.

And then I took a shower, and then it was already 5.30. Yes, in the afternoon.

And then my husband wanted to mop the kitchen floor. (I was sitting in the kitchen at this point.)

But.

I prevailed. I sat on my butt and started writing, and after 42 minutes and 37 seconds (why yes, I’m using a stop watch) I had finished writing 2,032 words. Phew.

Of course I’m hoping to get some more in before I go to bed in an hour.

And of course I know that that was a freakishly high word count for that short a period. But the opening scene of the novel is based on a personal experience, so it was somewhat easy to put myself in the main character’s shoes.

The opening scene so far starts with this:

“Come on Maya!” my husband shouted from above me, “You can do this!”

Yeah, right. How I hate people telling me what I can and can’t do. Every breath was like fire in my lungs, my heart beating so fast that it felt like it would jump out of my head, and my legs felt like jelly.

Of course I had hoped of hitting 10K today but that doesn’t seem to have happened. On the other hand when 5 pm came around and I still hadn’t written a single word I became a little worried, and feared that I wouldn’t write a single word today.

So yeah, 2,000 words is not too shabby. But now I’ll disconnect from the web and write a little more.

So I’m guessing that you all know what NaNoWriMo or „National Novel Writing Month“ is. If you don’t, click the link, I’ll wait.

Now intially I wanted to be all sensible and not participate this year. Instead I planned to finally finish the trilogy I’ve been working on. Then an idea hit me, in a completely different genre, of course, and I decided to write a novel in November after all.

My initial – very insane – plan also involved blogging the novel as I write it but I have to admit I had a change of heart. No live-blogging of rough draft. Sorry. But I’m guessing we’re all better off if I just write the story first, and then go over it at least once before I let anybody see it.

But.

I still want to let readers participate in the marvelous adventure that is writing a novel real fast. So not only is there a widget in the sidebar that let’s you see how much I wrote, I will also try to post here often to talk about the process of writing.

The other insane thing that I had planned to do was trying to write 10,000 words a day for the first five days of November. I am rather doubtful that I will actually manage to do that but I’ll try anways.

So far I have procrastinated on outlining very successfully which means instead of a finished outline I have plans for three scenes already. And 2 1/2 more hours this day to get more.

The novel is called:

Chocolate is not enough

Married with a kid and about to turn 40 Maya decides to turn her life around:

This time the weight will come off!

Of course life has other plans.

Stay tuned…