"Red Sands" Week Nine

[kristen999]

Assembled the tattered chapter twelve into something I am very proud of and to date is my favorite chapter. This story is very emotionally draining so it bears out in the words. I worked eight days in a row, but stall managed to write 4k words of chapter thirteen. I'm actually amazed that I got that much written, but when you sit to write 500 words at a time they do add up.

My goal this week: Finish chapter Thirteen and start Fourteen

By the end of fourteen I'll be nearing the final laps of this marathon. By then I'll know for sure if it will be 17 or 18 total chapters.

As far as posting, I plan on condensing the total story into 12 or so sections for ease of reading. I'm not a fan of digesting a gigantic epic in one sitting because you miss out on tiny details, but postings that spread over more than thirty days can get a bit old. I think I'll find a happy medium :D

Comments

[coolbreeze1.livejournal.com]

You are moving along at a great pace! It really is amazing how quickly 500 words a day adds up. I need to learn to pace myself and be able to sit down, write 500 words, and stop. Can't wait to start reading this!

[kristen999.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I don't stop myself at 500, but I do try to at least write that much. There are a few times when its 300 or 900 in a single night and then on my days off is when I do about 1k-1.5 k depending.

I can't wait to be done writing it!

[rubygirl29.livejournal.com]

I'm waiting for this, you know. :-)

[kristen999.livejournal.com]

Yay! I'm at the point when I want to be done writing it..lol

[tridget.livejournal.com]

From a reading perspective, it is exciting to hear about the upcoming stories.

From a writing perspective, I love reading about the unfolding process. It always gives me ideas or inspiration. on how to tackle of approach stories. I like the idea of pushing through a small bit at a time. It helps get around the ups and downs of the feast or famine approach.

I have enjoyed some serial stories this year. It needs to be emphasized that serial stories are not WIP's. They are complete tales with enough length, complexity and depth that they warrant posting in sections.

[kristen999.livejournal.com]

With this chapter there are two flashback scenes that I don't have as fleshed out as the stuff in the present. So, I've been writing out those first, then will write the flashback all the way through and split it in two and slice them into place I'm done.

Yeah, I so agree about WIPS and serialized stories. I think I might post a discussion about that later in the week :-P

Thanks for the support!

[susnn.livejournal.com]

So, when do we get a teaser about Red Sands? Looking forward to the discussion about serialized and WIPs. Count me, myself and I in on the side of those who love opus magnums that come in one long lovely file. It lets me pace myself... and if I wind up reading it all in one sitting and miss some details, that is remedied when I reread it. My experience has been that anything worth reading in one sitting is generally well worth rereading.

[kristen999.livejournal.com]

So, when do we get a teaser about Red Sands?

Oh man, I wouldn't even know what passage to pick. Hmmmmm..

Okay, beware this is me being all venty and it is not directed at you at all :D

My experience with posting long stories all in one sitting was fairly neutral. I think more people would have read "Imago" if I had posted it in parts instead of seeing a single 50k word story and passing it by because of lack of time.

My biggest reason for posting a serialized story is most of my f-list don't have two or three hours to devote to reading something. I don't know how many fics I booked marked that were over 50k then never got around to digesting them.

As far as posting ten, 10k chapters, I'll admit being selfish. Some of those chapters took weeks to write and research. I'm not paid to write. My 'reward' are my readers' reactions to particular hard fought chapters. I don't expect a reader to leave feedback on each chapter,(some do which is awesome) but it's nice to see them on a few, or at least at the end of the story.

And I lost count the number of times a reader posted on a random chapter something to the effect "I'm waiting to read this when its all done," never to hear from them again. I'd rather have not known someone had planned on reading it, only to have no idea if you did, and either didn't enjoy the story, or plain forgot to come back to it because it was printed out or put on a kindle.

The post I plan on making though is the difference between a WIP and a serialized story. WIPs are stories that a writer is posting as they go which I can’t stand vs. a completed story that is posted in parts which is what a lot of people do.

I understand your view about sitting down and reading something on sitting, but you also say something when you’re done :-P