Progress report

Yesterday I hit 20,000 words. Hurrah! Having said that, this is not as far as I had hoped I would be by this point, but I did go on holiday which threw a large spanner into the works. When I got back I had all but forgotten my main character’s name.

I am still managing to meet my 1,000 words per day target but at the moment it is hard going. I am in a difficult stage of the novel where events are being set up and characters characterised, and that requires a lot of thinking for every word written.

It is not dull to write exactly, but I don’t feel myself really wanting to write it either, and because this section will define the rest of the novel I am scared of getting it wrong. There is a lot going on, particularly with some complicated interactions (at least by my previous low standards) between characters, which are made all the more awkward because for continuity reasons the timing of events needs to be quite precise.

Whatever. Novel writing is difficult. Man up, Dan.

The other thing I am working on is getting chapter 1 up to a standard where I am happy for it to be read. This is where you come in – if you want to – because I am looking for people to read the first chapter and a sort of prologue bit that comes before it, and tell me what you think.

Combined they are about 5,000 words, and it is really important that I get them right because a) they are the first bit readers (including agents and publishers) will see and b) if I am doing anything seriously wrong I want to stop doing it right away.