Today I went back over what I've written for Bugzters, so far, and made some shifts that may help the story, later. May add some to it. It's still reading too flat, but now I think I can make it better and more detailed once I get into the serious rewriting stage.
For example, I added some of Mr. Smith's background in, and made it seem like he might retire and move to be near a son in Florida. That added to Taylor's dilemma; she's all too aware that Alex and Mr. Smith are her only two friends, so if they leave she'll have none. She's also coming up with off-beat phrases and ways of looking at the world, using Kant to determine what is and is not right and proper. She even references Machiavelli, once.
That helped me add another thousand words to what I've got, so far, but it's still probably going to come up short. I won't know till I'm done. Oh well, I'm not going to let myself obsess over it. The story will be what it is, and if I don't make it to 50,000 words, I don't. Won't be the first time I crapped out in this challenge.
I think part of my problem is that I've been writing for so long and gotten nowhere with it. Not really. That makes it hard to keep going. I've made a little money off my books, but not enough to mean anything. I've made mistakes and missed opportunities, true, but I only saw them as such once they'd already happened or passed me by. Twenty-twenty hindsight is worse than useless in cases like this. It winds up hurting you and making you doubt every decision you make. How you should have gone left instead of right. How you should have done things differently when you had the chance instead of making a choice which, only later, turned out to be wrong.
I've got so many signposts like this in my rearview mirror. Funny how you can't think of the correct turns you took or the decisions you made, to counter them. I've grown to believe that people are all secretly masochists at heart. Maybe that's why the heroes in my books turn out to be more like sadists; who wants to read about a loser wimp?
Damn, I should charge myself a hundred bucks for venting moments like this.
For example, I added some of Mr. Smith's background in, and made it seem like he might retire and move to be near a son in Florida. That added to Taylor's dilemma; she's all too aware that Alex and Mr. Smith are her only two friends, so if they leave she'll have none. She's also coming up with off-beat phrases and ways of looking at the world, using Kant to determine what is and is not right and proper. She even references Machiavelli, once.
That helped me add another thousand words to what I've got, so far, but it's still probably going to come up short. I won't know till I'm done. Oh well, I'm not going to let myself obsess over it. The story will be what it is, and if I don't make it to 50,000 words, I don't. Won't be the first time I crapped out in this challenge.
I think part of my problem is that I've been writing for so long and gotten nowhere with it. Not really. That makes it hard to keep going. I've made a little money off my books, but not enough to mean anything. I've made mistakes and missed opportunities, true, but I only saw them as such once they'd already happened or passed me by. Twenty-twenty hindsight is worse than useless in cases like this. It winds up hurting you and making you doubt every decision you make. How you should have gone left instead of right. How you should have done things differently when you had the chance instead of making a choice which, only later, turned out to be wrong.
I've got so many signposts like this in my rearview mirror. Funny how you can't think of the correct turns you took or the decisions you made, to counter them. I've grown to believe that people are all secretly masochists at heart. Maybe that's why the heroes in my books turn out to be more like sadists; who wants to read about a loser wimp?
Damn, I should charge myself a hundred bucks for venting moments like this.
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