Opening Up about After the Fall

On the one hand, I want you guys to know when I’m working on a project, so you know that this whole Allison the Writer isn’t dead.  On the other, I don’t like talking about my projects, because there’s always the chance that this undisciplined procrastinator of a writer will run out of steam and shelf the thing forever until I get more inspiration.

I think that at this point, it’s safe to say that this project has actually taken off.  So I’m going to ramble a bit about it.

So I’m writing a book again.  I’ve been thinking of what I want out of the experience, what my goals are for the project,

• Self-publish something that’s bigger and better than Seaport.  I could work on that story for millions of years if I so desired, but why should I obsess over fixing its flaws if I could just take it for what it is, and write something better to prove that I’ve improved since then?
• Experiment.  Experiment with new themes, a new setting, a new voice, and challenge myself to use them.  For this story, I’m writing in the first-person present-tense.  I am, not I did.  I’m walking, not I walked.  I used to hate reading that narrative style; I also hated reading poetry.   But I gave writing poetry a try and I rather like it now.  Perhaps I’ll enjoy this too.  Perhaps it’s that little change in scenery that’ll make this book all the better.
• Improve.  Take everything I learned the hard way about Seaport, everything wrong with it, and apply what I learned from those mistakes to After the Fall.  For starters, I really rushed with Seaport.  I thought I could write something over a lazy summer and publish Draft 2 to the world.  I’m writing a novel now – this will take time.  I’m hoping to be done with Draft 1 by the end of this year, and then I’ll bug all my writing friends about beta-reading.
• Novelize.  I’ve been writing for years, but never have I actually written more than 15,000 words in a project (to my knowledge).  The average length for a middle-grade novel is 30-50k words.  I’m aiming for at least 25-30k.  Mind you, I believe in quality over quantity – the word count isn’t what matters, but I feel that if I didn’t rush myself, Seaport could’ve been a novel, not a novelette.  I want to see if it’s possible for me to write an evenly paced and substantial novel-length body of work.

That said…

And so it begins.