Today’s word count: 2,224
NANTUCKET total word count: 57,957 words
HARPER total word count: 5,435 words
Today I started with another scene from earlier in the book, and then ended my session with a current scene, but again things were slower than normal. I’ve moved now solidly into the middle of the book, and unlike most days, I didn’t have any idea of the scenes I would be writing. I had to grasp at the last scene I wrote, rather than just having the idea for it come to me.
So I finished the scene rather slowly, feeling a little direction-less. I’m hoping a night of sleep will help. I usually wake up in the mornings knowing the scenes that I will write that night. This morning, though, I didn’t think about NANTUCKET at all.
Instead, as I sat in bed drinking my morning coffee, I heard the bells of the knife sharpening truck going by. Do you get those in your neighborhood? These trucks come by only in the summer, it seems – before it gets so hot that people shut their windows to let their air conditioners keep things cool. The bells sound a little like the bells of an ice cream truck. This year, though, the knife sharpening truck was also belting out what sounded like taped messages. Something about their various services. We can sharpen lawn mower blades, too, don’t forget.
Anyway, instead of scenes for NANTUCKET popping into my head, I suddenly saw the first line of a new story, very much inspired by this knife sharpening truck. Since I’ve sworn to never turn my back on any sort of inspiration again, I spent the next little while scribbling down a page full of notes. And after that, it was time to get on with the day. No new scenes, and tonight’s writing felt uphill again.
Right now, I’m feeling like I’d just like to get NANTUCKET done and over with. Writing wasn’t very fun tonight, so that’s two days in a row where I’ve felt less than inspired. I’m only halfway there, though. My plan is to write 120,000 words, with the goal of paring that down to about 90,000 during revisions. So I am rather solidly in the middle.
I’ll have to write my way into more exciting happenings, I think.
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{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Amazing – I totally never heard of a knife sharpening truck! (But what a great idea!)
.-= rhapsodyinbooks´s last blog ..Folklore and Fairytales on the Web =-.
I think it must be a rather old-fashioned kind of thing – but every summer, they come around our neighbourhood!
That sounds like a fantastic story line! I think summer is much more conducive to writing prompts, especially, as you mentioned, before sights and sounds are shut out due to A/C usage. Good luck with Nantucket!
I’ve been thinking about doing more writing prompts! I’ve never had great success at doing them, but then again, I never had success sitting down to write every day – and now I do! So maybe that’s something to try for the summer.
Keep going. When you’re done, you won’t be able to tell what parts you wrote while inspired and which parts were uphill battles. In fact, sometimes the uphill battles produce good writing.
.-= Cathryn´s last blog ..Re-vision =-.
Thanks, Cathryn. It’s something I keep trying to remember, but when the writing feels so uphill, it’s hard to believe that it could possibly read well. I know you’re right, though – I had proof of it when I reread NANTUCKET originally after thinking it was just so terrible. And I’m guessing that the middle of the book can get a bit challenging at times …
Knife sharpening truck?? Really? I’ve never heard of that before. It sounds like something straight out of a Stephen King novel. LOL
In any event, it sounds like a cool concept…and don’t you just love it when inspiration kind of conks you over the head like that?
.-= Ann-Kat´s last blog ..Blacklisted by Gena Showalter Book Notes and Sunday Sketch (yes, I know it’s not Sunday yet) =-.