June 2010 Archives

Coming in at 64,879 words, I have completed the first draft of the Code Breakers Club. Wow! I'm over the moon with joy. The climax came together pretty well and I feel like I have most of what I want in the book. I'm going to celebrate an extra long weekend and then look at the novel next week to bang it into shape before I show it to anyone and get feedback. Yes! I'm quite excited about this project.

Here's the only weird thing that I have to deal with. I have to review my Barnabas Bigfoot series before I send it off to the editor for notes, so it looks like I'll be doing double duty this month as I revise two different novels. It's a bit daunting, but I'm up for the challenge. Just have to make sure I keep the two separate.

The easiest solution is to set aside a time of day for one book, followed by a workout, then I'll tackle revisions to the other piece later in the day. I'll see how that works. Hmm, let me super ambitious and try to start work on a new project as well. Am I insane!!!??? Let me stick to two novels for now.

I'm so close to the end of Code Breakers Club. Last week, I did some research in Drumheller to figure out what to do for the climax of the novel. Now I just have to screw myself into my chair and write. The only problem right now is that I have a bit of heat stroke (note to self: bring water for future bike rides). I might not be able to focus on the novel until tomorrow, but I'm pretty sure that I'll be done the first draft by the end of this week. My incentive to finish is I've promised to buy a new computer when I've completed the first draft. Let's see how it goes today.

You can't top this for a Friday ender. I managed to write 10,000 words of my Code Breakers Club novel through the week, bringing my word count to 50,000. I have two major sections left to write, and I think I can bring the first draft in at around 65,000 words, which is a little long, but that's what revision is for. I hope to get to the start of the climax by Tuesday, when I have to hit the road to do some school visits. The great thing is that I'm headed south to Red Deer and Calgary, which means I can do some research on the road. The climax of the novel is set in Drumheller's Horsethief Canyon, and I plan a little excursion there so that I can take pictures and get a feel for the place. The hope is that this will make the climax come to life.

As you can guess by the entry, I'm pretty pumped about how the week ended work wise, but that's not all. Last week, I sent some rough ideas to an editor at a publishing house, who was a fan of my mystery novels. She just sent me a note saying she really liked the ideas and has to organize an editorial meeting to figure out which one(s) to develop. Wow. I can officially take this weekend off without any guilt.

Tomorrow, I'm going for a bike ride and looking for this fabled waffle truck in Edmonton. I owe myself a sweet treat to end off a sweet week. Yay!

Totally strange day. I woke up this morning and mowed the lawn because I couldn't stand to see the tall grass any longer. Once I came back into the house, a creative wave washed over me and 4,000 words later, I had a large section of Code Breakers Club done. The characters are now in China looking for the next clue, and I'm pretty confident that I'll have them on to the next leg by either the end of tomorrow or Thursday, which means I'm careening to the novel's climax. I think I have to mow the lawn more often. I haven't churned out 4,000 words in a while. The book is sitting at 44,000 words right now, and I figure by the time I'm done, it will be a 65,000-70,000 word y/a novel.

I'm having a blast trying to figure out a code for the China section of the Code Breakers Club novel. So far I've had to figure out elements in the periodic table along with Chinese music notation and tangram shapes. I'm not sure if anyone will appreciate the work I had to do once the novel is done, so maybe I'll build a code breaking kit as well so that kids can try to crack the same codes in the book.

I'm not complaining about this, but I'm finding that my creative zone is now between 2:00 pm and 5:00 pm. I just knocked out 1,500 words today, compared to a measly 1,000 words yesterday morning. If I remember correctly, I hit my stride yesterday around the same time and did my best work in the afternoon. I'll stick to this mid-afternoon pace for the next week or so and see how far I get. At this point, I'm happy to be able to pick up the manuscript after a week off. Now I just have to push up the daily word count.

What a week. I had a great time at the Children's Festival. All the code breakers were awesome. Yesterday, I had my final session and drew the name of the winner. The winner was a boy named Hudson. I will name one of my characters after him.

This morning, I read the names of the kids in my sessions and I loved all the names (even the joke name Booger, which might make a good nickname). If you don't mind, I will go to the bucket of names if I ever need names for future characters in my other novels. Thanks to everyone for playing.