Monday 15 May 2017

Word Count Wobbles

You might have noticed the word count meters I have on the right-hand margin of this blog. It helps my readers keep track of where my projects are and helps inspire me to write more. The book I'm currently working on the most is The Masked Man of Cairo: The Case of the Purloined Pyramid, a neo-pulp detective story set in 1919 Cairo. I'm almost done with that, but I've been almost done for a couple of weeks. At first I thought it would be 60,000 words. Then I upped it to 65,000. Then a minor character sent the plot sideways and I corrected it to 75,000. Now I really am almost done and it will be 75,000 words or a little less.

This is unusual for me. I can usually guess the final word count of a novel to within 5%, even before I start. I know how a story feels to me. Perhaps it's because this is a new genre for me.

You'll also notice that annual goal of one million words. I just reached the one-third mark on that yesterday, but of course we are slightly more than a third of the way through the year. I'm going to have to pick up speed if I want to hit that goal.

Then there are the other two books. Emergency Transmission, the fourth in my Toxic World post-apocalyptic series, has been on hold for the past couple of months. I'll get started on that again the first week of June. Last but not least is The Saga of Egil Thorfinnsson and the Weaklings, a historical fantasy about Norse Greenland. That was a novel that stopped dead in its tracks years ago before I really hit my stride of daily productivity. I've put it up there to remind myself to finish it someday. And I will. Someday.

Then there's all the ghostwriting I'm doing. . .

I update the word count meters every Sunday if you want to watch my progress!

1 comment:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

The story decided it had more to tell.
I can usually peg mine within five thousand words.

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