Sunday, December 8, 2013

Novel project

Well, I've made some good progress.
     Since I started last Wednesday (November 27) I've got a bit more than 17 pages, and it's likely to grow in size again soon. Not including extra material, outlines, lists, etc. I'm up to 10,527 words! As a general outline, most sites will recommend that a novel of standard length is 60,000 to 100,000 words, though of course many books go beyond that. Anything shorter than that is considered a novella. Google is helpful with the definition here! :S  "A short novel or a long short story." In essence it's a short novel. Or something more than a short story, whichever you prefer.
     In any case, the development of this story has been interesting. As I start many projects, I began with an ordinary person and had something strange happen to them. After a page or two, it quickly became very strange. Then I said to myself Hey, you've got something there! But this needs a backstory... So I retitled what I had as "Chapter 2" and went on to write "Chapter 1", which was much more serious than I anticipated the project would be.
     I'm at that stage in the project where you just have to keep writing to get all your ideas on the table (no matter how much you/I cringe as I type them out.)