Negative Wordcount

If you've ever talked to me about writing, especially writing productively, then you probably know that I'm a big fan of tracking your wordcount. It has so many statistical uses. For example if you know how many words you can produce per hour (on average) then you can:

1. estimate how long it will take you to complete a project
2. set realistic weekly or daily goals
3. push yourself to reach those goals
4. bill yourself for hours that you're going to work and treat yourself like a professional with realistic goals and deadlines

Of course, there are also drawbacks. If you push yourself to hit wordcount goals, you may settle for sub-par writing. You might see your goals pile up on you and get overwhelmed. Or, as happened to me today, you may have to delete a section of your writing and come up with a negative word count.

There are of course methods for dealing with each of these. I view my wordcount goals like I view plot structure models. They're good for analysis, but not necessarily good to think about when actually writing. This allows me to focus on writing when I'm writing, and then look at my wordcount afterwards. If I need a little extra push when I'm sitting at 349 words, and my goal is 395, I know I can do just a bit more. But if I get to 349 words and I'm struggling to come up with more, my kids  need me, or I have to go to work (at my other job, because as we all know writing is work), I can be satisfied with where I got and get back to it in my next writing session.

To avoid overwhelming goals, I just don't set cumulative goals. My goal for every day right now is about 492 words. That is a little less than an hour of work when I'm in the middle of a project. A little more when I'm starting out a new project or trying to get my head into a new scene, chapter, book, etc. When I started setting goals, I would freak out if I didn't hit my goal for two days and I'd add them to my next writing session. After a rough week, that might mean that I'm trying to write 3600 words in one sitting. I've done that before, but it can be terribly demotivating if I don't have the proper momentum built up, or if I don't have the time to commit to a six hour session. So my numbers don't roll over anymore. I might get ambitious sometimes and set a weekly goal, but that's entirely situational.

Now for the reason I'm writing this post at all. Negative wordcount.

There have been a number of times that I've been racking my brain to figure out how to finish a scene, or where to go next in my book. Usually, and I discovered this from a writing newsletter from Dave Wolverton, this is because I'm not satisfied with one or more choices I've made. I did something wrong and it's affecting the story so much that I can't continue until I go back. (Usually I discourage going back to edit your story while writing the first draft, but that's a topic for another time.) When this happens, I give myself some time to review the scene and find a better solution, one I'm more satisfied with. Then, when I go back to make the changes, my wordcount calculator shows that I've not only failed to add words but I've actually gone backwards.

The first time this happened I was devastated. I looked back at my productivity and saw an encouraging upward trend, and then all of a sudden I was in the negative. But when I analyzed what I was feeling, I recognized that I actually felt good about what I had written. The material was better than what I had originally produced, and I knew I had made the right choice.

Now when I hit a negative wordcount day, I am excited. It means that I'm progressing my story in underlying ways that make it a better product. To fall back on a well used saying; quality over quantity. I'm increasing quality in the long run while the quantity suffers a bit in the short run.

While I wouldn't recommend simply deleting whole pages just to get a negative wordcount, it's useful to remember that statistics are just numbers representing events in real life. They're tools for us to use, not masters for us to bow down to.

So, celebrate your progress, even if that progress is measured in the negative.

This is Incredible!

I subscribe to a newsletter from David Farland (aka Dave Wolverton). I have to recommend his regular emails. They have incited me to examine my craft and he gives much good advice.

If he's not your cup of tea, then find someone else. Brandon Sanderson and crew have created Writing Excuses, an excellent podcast on writing. Alexa Donne has some great advice on her youtube channel.

Professor Jane Friedman has a wonderful course on publishing in the Great Courses

Or look for advice from your favorite writer. I'm sure there's a paper or interview somewhere on the internet.

My point is, you have resources. Learning how to write is a master's degree level endeavor with very little feedback from your professors. Take some time to learn about the craft. Just remember to write too.

What are some resources you've used?

So Many Things

I am the 4th of 7 children. Right smack dab in the middle. I never really needed to be interested in things. Most everything that was cool was what my big brothers liked. Music, TV shows, toys. I didn't really need to think about clothes either because I just got them from my big brothers. This, coupled with my personality, led me to generally just going with the flow for a lot of things.

Then one day I was a big kid and I needed new shoes. I didn't know what I wanted. I never had to think about it. I saw other kids with zipper pockets in their shoes and thought that was cool. I liked converse high tops. But I didn't really know what to look for in shoes.

This happened again as I got old enough to go house hunting for myself and my new wife. My father was in the military, and so we usually just lived in military housing. I just moved my box of stuff (I had a bit more, but I tried to keep everything that was important in one box and then a suitcase for clothes) into whatever new place I found myself. Moving every couple of years. When it came time to get my own place,  I didn't have much insight. I didn't know square footage, building type, materials, not to mention how much it would cost up front. I knew some things I liked or didn't like, but there was so much more that I had never thought of.

Finally it happened again. As a father and husband, one of the things that my wife did was the grocery shopping. I would help out every once in a while, but she was the one in charge. Then she stopped working. I mean her body stopped being able to do the things she normally did, like walking farther than one side of the room to the other, getting enough oxygen, pumping blood to everywhere she needed, that kind of stuff. Life changed, and I took on the shopping. I had always just eaten whatever, but then when it was up to me I was daunted by the sheer number of bread varieties. Which pasta sauce was the one my family would like? Which kind of fruit snacks or cereal?

I thought I knew what I wanted, but when faced with making the actual choices, I realized there was so much more than what I had expected.

Writing a book is similar. I've often planned for a book. Writing outlines, character studies, doing world building. But when I start writing I realize just how much I didn't think of. During a scene, my character would stand up and walk to the other side of the room to grab a cup. But what else was on the shelf? Was it a sticky mess that he had to pry the cup up from, was there a certain cup she wanted but it was dirty so she had to decide whether to clean it or use an inferior vessel, or was the room sterile and clean with the exact cup in the exact place? Was the cup on a counter, on a dresser, in a cupboard, suspended from goo? What does it smell like? Then, what was my character drinking? Does their culture drink water? Is water safe to drink in this technology level? Is there a more common drink, or a specialty drink that they want?

I'm happy to report that in each one of those situations I eventually figured it out. I know some of the traits I want in shoes, I have a home that fits me, and I know what kind of bread to buy. Though every pair of shoes is a new adventure.

Each time I write a story, I get a little bit better at knowing what questions to ask before hand. Going in, I know how to set a scene, I know what generally will be happening, and I know the basics of the environment and culture.

But there are still questions that don't come up until I'm actually writing. I'm getting better at knowing how to answer these questions, but they will always be with me. That's part of the fun of writing, solving new problems.

So, if you get stuck facing questions that you didn't know you'd need to answer, just keep writing. You'll get to know what to look for, and what you like. Even if you've already planned every detail, there are new details that you didn't know to look for (did you know, for instance, that bread used to be good for you).

Every new book is going to bring new questions to overcome. Face them by writing. By the end of the book, you might finally realize what your first chapter should have been. Good new is, at that point you can go back and revise. You don't even have to refinance.