4 Week First Draft Update

It's Monday and a brand new work week, although my writing week actually runs from Friday to Thursday. It's a math, time travel thing!

So I wrote about 2500 words on Saturday and, as is my custom, took Sunday off to do other things. I'm just over half way through the first draft of Book 1 in my new Sissy Jupiter space opera series, and I'm enjoying the process so far.

Some ask me about the quality of the writing and my answer is honest. Because I'm writing to get the story out, I don't stop to check spelling or whether I've used the same word over and over, like I used to do. That just slows me down. But it does mean that the first revision - the heavy revision where I check for inconsistencies and grammar and pronoun use and all those other wonderful things - will take longer.

That's okay because my logic, such as it is, suggests that I'd rather spend the time fixing things once I feel I have found the story. I'd hate to go through the effort of revising as I write, because if I have to cut out whole sections or rewrite them entirely, then that's wasted effort. So I want to get the story out first, warts and all. Then, make sure it's the story I want to tell. And then, when I pretty much have the story down, I'll do the heavy revision.

I'm a few days ahead of schedule in my writing goal of 4 weeks, which is great because I have other work that needs to get done! But then I hope to spend another 4 weeks with my revisions and edits and adding in some colour and nuance to the story. Then, once I have the beta version done, I'll send it to select readers for feedback.

If all goes according to plan - and that's a big "IF" - I should be able to write, polish and publish a book in the Sissy Jupiter series in 3-4 months. That's the goal: 3 - 4 books in the series in a year.