The time for procrastination has ended! (Is there ever really any time for procrastination? Well, I guess James Bond villains are great procrastinators when it comes to killing a captured Bond.)

I’m starting my new schedule to finish Nethermore by the end of July. Now, it’s an aggressive schedule, and I understand that, but I’m putting these stepping stone goals out for everyone to see so that I’ll feel the pressure of trying to meet them. I’ve discovered that if I don’t have pressure and deadlines, then I don’t work as well.

I’m venturing a guess that the book is going to run around 200,000 words. Now, where I haven’t written very many books (one, to be exact), and I haven’t figured out what my natural novel length is, there’s a good chance that I might finish the book and still not have reached the 200,000 word mark. I do have a good enough feel for the story to know that it won’t be any fewer than 100,000 words. But for goal purposes, I’m guessing 200,000.

This means: 15,000 words a week. 2500 words a day, six days a week. 800 words an hour (based on a 20 hours a week). I recognize that this is an aggressive schedule. And I’m committing to it. If I don’t do this, you can call me liar and throw rotten fruit at me. I’ve got to get aggressive or else my dreams of publication can be flushed down the proverbial toilet.

This equals to roughly 80 days of writing. If this works, then I’m going to institute this as the way I write every book: a burst of manic speed followed by a month of revising.

I figure that I have about 20 hours a week that I can devote to writing the book. And there are certain things I’ll have to do make sure that I hit those 20 hours, otherwise I’ll end up wasting my time in piddly pursuits, and July will come, the harvest will have ended, and my book will still not have been written.

In order to make the most of my 20 hours, these are the rules I must follow when writing:

1) I must treat it like a second job that I have to show up to. When someone asks me to do something during my writing time, I can say, “Sorry, I have to work.”

2) I must work at night, away from home, with the phone off. I have trouble waking up really early if I don’t have an external thing waiting on me (work, another person, the monsters under my bed demanding to be fed). I work best at night, and since I like being with people, I have to write in a place away from where people can contact me.

3) Internet access must be turned off on the computer while I write. Otherwise I will find something else to interest me and wind up on a tangent. Which reminds me, did I tell you about my new favorite website? My brother Dan sent it to me earlier today. Check out their pumapard link too!

4) I have to write in what I call a nonlinear style. A lot of people do it this way. It just leaves room for me to forget details that I inevitably will forget in plot, character, setting and whatever. It’s okay if it doesn’t make complete sense the first time around, as long as I can come back through on the second draft and add those things back in. The first draft is for blazing through, telling the story as best I can. Second draft is for fixing things. If I accept that it’s all going to be a mess at first, then it’s more likely that I’ll actually get the thing written.

There will be frequent updates on this site. I’m hoping to get a word tracker at the top of this thing within a week or two. And I’d also like to get little stickers to put on the online calendar. Each day with a sticker represents a day that I did some writing on Nethermore. But I’m not holding my breath just yet on all these little features. Remember, the point of this website is to help me finish my book not for me to make the website all pretty and stuff. At least not yet.