revisions and replies

Not a lot done in the last week as I have not been terribly well. However my planning for the June Novel Writing Challenge is slowly progressing. I want to be able to sit down on June 1st and simply start writing.

I recently read about a prolific English author who tracks his daily progress by using a chart. Each day he records that day's word count and total word count. Having that visible reminder up could be another way of helping to keep you at it. Thinking of trying the same myself.

I sometimes wonder if I am a perfectionist (which I doubt) or if I am just sloppy (more likely). Every time I look at a piece that I previously thought finished, I find more to be done on it. Take a 3,000 word science fiction piece that I am handing in as a writing assignment for uni. I could have sworn that I wouldn't be able to find anything else that needed revision, yet over the weekend I ended up making lots of minor revisions, having left it to percolate for some days.

A recent thrill - I am a big fan of the author Jack Dann (www.jackdann.com). I first met Jack several years ago after somehow being accepted into a weekend Masterclass that he was running here in Canberra. I learned a lot from him, but most of all, he encouraged me to keep writing, telling me that I had a lot to learn but that it would be worth it. I managed to do another single day workshop with him a year or two later that was also worthwhile. The advice I received from Jack both times was that I had no difficulties with writing page turning stuff, but had to work on plotting. I recently emailed him to let him know that I now had a much better idea of what he meant as a result of my university studies, although I know that I will never be a literary writer as such. I received a lovely reply from him, thrilled to hear that I was making such progress with my writing. Jack will be here in Canberra as an official guest in October at Conflux 5 - the annual sci fi, fantasy and horror convention. He sent me the details of another workshop he will be doing, which I will be sure to get my name down for. For those not familiar with Jack's work, he is a wonderful writer with many published credits to his name. My favourite is the novel The Memory Cathedral, which is about a fictious year in the life of Da Vinci.