The Official February Writing Challenge Thread.

[MichaelWallace]

Here is the original thread proposing the challenge. There is still time to sign up, and if you only feel up to running the half-marathon, we can encourage that, too.

I'm not going to keep an update of everyone's progress (no time!) but each participant can edit their status within their first reply. I warmed up my fingers this morning so I didn't have to face the blank page of my first chapter tomorrow.

Day 0 (-1?) - 0,700 words. Total: 0,700.
Day 1  - 2,000 words. Total: 2,700.
Day 2  - 2,000 words. Total: 4,700.
Day 3  - 2,000 words. Total: 6,700
Day 4  - 2,200 words. Total: 8,900
Day 5  - 2,100 words. Total: 11,000
Day 6  - 2,200 words. Total: 13,200
Day 7  - 2,000 words. Total: 15,200
Day 8  - 2,100 words. Total: 17,300
Day 9  - 2,100 words. Total: 19,400
Day 10 - 2,000 words. Total: 21,400
Day 11 - 2,200 words. Total: 23,600
Day 12 - 2,300 words. Total: 25,900
Day 13 - 2,100 words. Total: 28,000
Day 14 - 2,100 words. Total: 30,100
Day 15 - 2,100 words. Total: 32,300
Day 16 - 2,100 words. Total: 34,400
Day 17 - 2,200 words. Total: 36,600
Day 18 - 2,100 words. Total: 38,700
Day 19 - 2,000 words. Total: 40,700
Day 20 - 2,100 words. Total: 42,800
Day 21 - 2,100 words. Total: 44,900
Day 22 - 2,200 words. Total: 47,100
Day 23 - 2,000 words. Total: 49,100
Day 24 - 2,300 words. Total: 51,400
Day 25 - 2,300 words. Total: 53,700
Day 26 - 2,300 words. Total: 56,000
Day 27 - 2,100 words. Total: 58,100

                        (Sheila Guthrie)

[Sheila_Guthrie]

Hey, everybody, where are ya? I hope you are busy typing/penciling away at your manuscripts. 

I'm just getting started for the day, but will update later.

I re-sized the logo, for use as an avatar or in the signature line:





And the original, which you can change as needed:



If you want to use any (or all) of these, click on the image, which takes you to a Photobucket album I made. Click on the image thumb under whichever one you want and save it to your computer. Then you can update your profile, or signature, or use on your blog.

[michaelabayomi]

Is it just me, or has the law of diminishing returns started to set in already?

Day 1: 2,400 words. Total: 2,400.
Day 2: 2,100 words. Total: 4,500.
Day 3: 2,200 words. Total: 6,700.
Day 4: 2,100 words. Total: 8,800.
Day 5: 1,200 words. Total: 10,000.
Day 6: 1,800 words. Total: 11,800.
Day 7: 2,200 words. Total: 14,000.
Day 8: 2,100 words. Total: 16,100.
Day 9: 1,600 words. Total: 17,700.
Day 10: 3,300 words. Total: 21,000.
Day 11-13: 0 words. Total: 21,000.
Day 14: 1500 words. Total: 22,500.
Day 15: 1500 words. Total: 24,000.
Day 16: 1500 words. Total: 25,500.
Day 17: 1500 words. Total: 27,000.
Day 18-19: 3,000 words. Total: 30,000.
Day 20: 2,500 words. Total: 32,500.
Day 21: 2,500 words. Total: 35,000.
Day 22: 3,000 words. Total: 38,000.
Day 23-24: 4,500 words. Total: 42,500.
Day 25-26: 2,500 words. Total: 45,000.
Day 27-29: 5,000 words. Total: 50,000.

[pamclaughton]

I'm diving in tonight. I've been averaging 500 pages a day, so it's going to be an interesting challenge to up it to 2000. I'm debating whether to continue with the WIP which is about 15 pages in and not really fleshed out, or to dive into a totally new project that is more plotted out for this month. Any suggestions? Do most of you plot first or figure it out as you go?

[MichaelWallace]

I'm diving in tonight. I've been averaging 500 pages a day, so it's going to be an interesting challenge to up it to 2000.

That is an ambitious target.

[Sheila_Guthrie]

Pam, 500 pages? 

I quit. 

[cblewgolf]

Thanks for the reminder.  Haven't written anything new in a while so I need a good kick in the arse.

[Mel Comley]

yay! I managed 2078, but feel a failure already as I have to take the day off tomorrow, It's my Mum's birthday and she needs pampering big time! ;-)


Happy writing guys and gals!  As Ty Pennington says 'Let's Do It'  

Day 1 - 2078
Day 2 Relatives b'day D/O
Day 3 - 2002   Total 4080!
Day 4 - 2035   Total 6115!
Day 5 - 1300   Total 7415!
Day 6 - 1030   Total 8445. Had a visitor and needed to do some research for tomorrow's writing.  
Day 7-10 1591 Total 10,101  Life got in the way this week, sorry!
I didn't report in daily as I've had an horrendous past few weeks. However I managed to get 26,737 words completed. That means I'm 17,000 away from the end of my novel. I hope to have it completed in a couple of weeks. So I'm very happy. 

[Colin Taber]

I'm done for day 1.

I managed to still have a bit of gas in the tank (I'm in the middle of a fight scene) so ran up to 2,300 words.

I imagine tomorrow I'll spend most of my quota finishing off said fisticuffs.  

EDIT - Here's my updates

Day 1 - 2,300 words - Total: 2,300
Day 2 - 300 words - Total: 2,600 (a full day at work then hijacked by an evening work function)
Day 3 - 800 words - Total: 3,400 (again, a full day at work then hijacked by an evening work function, but I expect to eventually make it up)
Day 4 - 1,300 words - Total: 4,700
Day 5 - 3,300 words - Total: 8,000

PS - must remember hash tag: #60kinFeb

[KevinMcLaughlin]

Writing away right now!  I'll edit in a tally once I'm done for the day. 

[MichaelWallace]

Whew, I made it! That first day is brutal. I scraped out 2,000 just before I ran out of time. Off to the doctor and then I've got a bunch of other work to do. Nice to see people coming along.

[dgaughran]

.....and I'm done!

Day 1: 2,100 words.

Did it over two sessions of about an hour, roughly the same word count each time. Did about an hour of prep before the first session (it's a historical and I'm only part way through the research for this sucker!), and about twenty minutes before the second.

I don't feel tired, I feel great! Let's see how that keeps up!

Congrats to everyone else. Let's keep on truckin'

[pamclaughton]

Pam, 500 pages? 

I quit. 

Yes, I write 500 pages a day, and plan to write 2000 tonight, I'll win this thing in a few hours at that rate!

That was a typo, should have been words. I average 500 words a day.

Would love to hear people's insight on how they plan to approach this challenge. If you can write 2000 words a day, how much of the story do you know going in, is it planned/outlined ahead or do you wing it?

[dgaughran]

Would love to hear people's insight on how they plan to approach this challenge. If you can write 2000 words a day, how much of the story do you know going in, is it planned/outlined ahead or do you wing it?

I'm working on a historical novel that I started writing in March 2010. However, I stopped writing it after 2000 words or so, being full of doubt etc. (I was still querying at the time) and won't be using anything I wrote before (it wasn't great). Then I started self-publishing in April, and got sidetracked by other projects.

I had done a lot of the research (read a couple of history books, made extensive notes), and already had a rough outline of the first half of the book, and a very, very sketchy outline of part of the second half, which I bulked up a bit yesterday.

Because it's historical, and I haven't finished the research and the research I have done isn't fresh, I have to do a lot of prep before each session. The 2k words only took a two one-hour sessions, but I had to do a lot of prep work before the first session and a bit before the second, so it was probably 3.5 hours of time total.

I'm using that Freedom program someone recommended (for blocking the internet), and it's fantastic.

[Sheila_Guthrie]

  Pam! I figured it was a typo, but dang, that was an awesome amount of work while it lasted.  Man, you could work one day a week and still have 52 books at the end of the year.

:::tears down idol of Pam, retrieves keyboard from trash:::

I'm working on a novel that is already started, though I did have an outline of the main events and when they should happen. Something seemed off about the days, though, and in going back and double checking, I am not liking what I see. I found two large hunks of time when nothing happens, even though the events are supposed to be fairly time-sensitive.

Enter the other secondary plot. Ta-da!

Oh well. Back to work. 

[Gretchen Galway]

ARRRGH, my 11 yo son is home sick (just a little). He is a relentless PITA, poor lovable sweetheart, and I'm trying to tune him out groaning about the homework I'm making him do. Why should I be the only one to suffer?

Aarrrrrgh. I've only hit 100 words so far. This time yesterday I was already at 2K.

But I'm in California, so there's still time. There's always the XBox.

[MGalloway]

Would love to hear people's insight on how they plan to approach this challenge. If you can write 2000 words a day, how much of the story do you know going in, is it planned/outlined ahead or do you wing it?

For this, I'm winging pretty much everything...which is something I haven't done for about ten years or so. I'm already in the middle of writing a bunch of short stories, whose very basic plots/ideas I wrote down several months ago. As I wrote here I'm pretty much making a giant "compost pile" of stories/ideas that I will then push aside for a few months after the month is over. When I return to the pile, I'll pick out a dozen of the best ideas and rework/edit them into something publishable. I have no idea how well this will work...

[Tony James Slater]

Hello there Kindle Board types!
I rather like what you're up to!
So much so in fact, that I've joined Kindle Boards to get some action...
Okay, that came out wrong. A piece of the action, that's what I'm after!

I read about this grand endeavour in David Gaughran's blog and it spurred me on to take up the challenge - well, if you'll have me.
Like Dave I am a glacially slow writer - I have only one book out and it took me six years to write!
Apparently that's not good for business, so I'm in desperate need of a kick up the proverbial - otherwise there's a very real chance I'll die before I complete book 2. And I'm only 33.

I'm coming pretty late into this and you folks must be flat out with your own efforts (or flat out suffering from the headaches caused by those efforts) so I'll stop waffling and get to the point.

I write comedy travel adventures. Silly ones. I've done one (set in an Ecuadorian animal refuge) and the next one (set in Thailand) is 20k words in because I've been forcing myself to do 1,000 words a day.

I'm gonna go for it - the whole bag of rice, 60,000 words... because that will bring the next book within an easy decade of completion  :0)

Oh, and if it's allowed I might sprinkle a few of my words around on other projects (don't worry, if I make a mess I'll wipe it up) - I'm doing a short adventure, designed to take advantage of KDP Select, which just needs another 10k doing to it. "Just another 10k?" I must be mad. But then, I am talking to myself... so. I'm Tony. Lovely to meet you all. Today I wrote 2,305 words across 3 projects, and now I'm going to shut up and let you all go to sleep. Or maybe that's just me... anyone else here in Australia (where it's already the 2nd as of 2 hours ago?)

Thanks guys (n gals)!
Tony

Ps. I have no profile here yet as this is my first post. If I make myself a profile tomorrow, will those words count? Yes, desperation is setting in already...

[JoshuaPSimon]

I admit starting mine a bit early, writing 8615 words from Saturday through Tuesday.  However, I know those technically don't count.  

Day one result - 2,234 words (broken out over two sessions, before work and during lunch).  I'm glad I got this in early since I won't have time to write tonight.

[Sheila_Guthrie]

Oh, hey, we've got a new vict --er, member! Welcome, Tony. Good to have you join us on the boards, and in our challenge. No one is going to beat us if we don't make the goal. Well, I'm pretty sure that won't happen. 

Speaking of which, I'd better get off here and get back to my novel.

[Sybil Nelson]

Update:

Day1: 1,242
Day2: 2,087
____________
Total: 3,329

I didn't get the 3,000 words I wanted to yesterday but I'm still in this thing. The good news is that I've started to find my main character's voice. I'm planning three 1k word writing sessions today. I've also decided that when I hit 15k words, I'm going to treat my self by ordering a cover for the book. That will be great motivation. And once I have a cover, it might even be more motivation.

[David 'Half-Orc' Dalglish]

I've been struggling to get back into the rhythm after moving into the new house, so I'm gonna use this as my kickstarter. I'm even going in on a handicap: 0 writing today. Starting tomorrow, time to get butt in gear. I can hit 60k. I will hit 60k. Oh yeah.

[Gregory Lynn]

I haven't done squat today and am taking my wife to the doctor in a moment so I am not sure I'll even be back in front of a keyboard until six or so.

Can I do 2100 words tonight?

Yeah, I think so. I have the story in mind and pretty much just need to make it leak out my fingers.

[dgaughran]

I still have a lot of energy, and was thinking of writing more, but maybe it's best to conserve for a tricky chapter tomorrow. Is that the best way to approach this? I've never done a challenge like this before...

...oh and there is a hashtag, #60kinFeb

[MichaelWallace]

If you've got more energy I say go for it. It's nice to bank a few hundred or thousand words because there's bound to be a day when you're definitely not feeling it.