Monday: 3,139 words
Tuesday: 5,350 words
Wednesday: Admin
Thursday: Admin
Friday: Admin
Saturday: Back to plotting
For a total word count of 8,489 words for the week.
The crisis I was trying to out-write happened anyway. I wasn’t actually surprised or disturbed by it, because I had semi anticipated it.
I’ll have more detail about the outcome in a Friday post, but the summary is: I was experimenting with writing two books per month, and expected that experiment to run to the end of the year. On paper, the schedule was do-able. It would stretch me to the max and everyone else who supports me, too. But in theory, it could be done.
Even as I was theorizing on paper, in the back of my mind was a fact I’ve learned from years of keeping production records and word counts: Theory never matches with reality. In reality, your word count is always far lower than you think you can manage. So I was wondering from the outset how the far higher word count and ambitious publishing schedule would pan out.
Last week, I called an early halt to the experiment and consulted with my (newish) support team. I’ve made a few changes (which will be in the long post), including shifting back to a book every 3 weeks, instead of every 2. Every three weeks is a far saner schedule. There’s wriggle room in it, which gives me leeway to deal with life rolls and other snags that inevitably arise. This was the issue with the 2 week schedule; An off day or a low word count couldn’t be caught up. There wasn’t room to do it.
Last year I tried keeping a 3 week schedule, and couldn’t manage it–the writing of the books was okay, but the increased production that was needed to release them at that pace drowned me. So I retreated back to my standard book-every-4 weeks schedule. But last year, I was doing everything myself.
This time it’s different. I have help with the production side of things, so I can manage the increased workload. And there’s wriggle room in the writing schedule, so I know that if I have a bad day, it’s not a disaster. It can be dealt with and I can catch up.
t.
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