2010 Wrap up

Two weeks into the year, I had a heart attack. it is hard to remember what my goal for the year was then, but I think perhaps it was to write 1,000,000 words for the year. At the end of the first two weeks though, i was on target for 1.5 having written 30K each week.

The heart attack changed that, as too did other events of the year. Bankruptcy, losing our house, trying to find a new house. These all took away from the task and pleasure of writing. The year ended though with having written 1,306,711 words. Over 25,000 words each week, and 108,000 words each month. I make no predictions about the next year. I need to pursue a day job as soon as we move and find a place to live.

My writing will be cut I am sure then.

I edited also this year, readying books. The Shattered Mirror is done and just awaiting a final copy edit from my friend Melinda before it goes to publication.

The End of The World was published and has 93 sales through Regency Assembly Press

My total word count is now 3,190,404

Writing and where we are at, what I have accomplished:

Amount of writing, number of words, number of pages

Book Title	Words written in 2010	# of Pages
Born to Grace II, The Turmoil	142,926	476
The Shattered Mirror (A Regency Romance)	98,085	327
Beggars Can’t Be Choosier (A Regency Romance)	102,390	341
Two Peas in a Pod (A Regency Romance)	104,535	348
Terra’s Birthright	78,767	263
Steam and Thunder	102,639	342
Tempest and Sword	108,274	361
Succession Crisis	124,830	416
The Three Lastoleers	82,650	276
You Ought to Trust Your Mother (A Regency Romance)	93,715	312
By the Book	151,404	505
KoTohLan II-Hoveria	100,013	333

Total                        1,306,711        4,356

Synopsis of the Books Written

Born to Grace 2 The Turmoil

This is part of a trilogy, the Born to Grace series. Here Caradoc the son of a duke, third in line to his father’s title starts the series as a squire to a prince of his realm. Now, after adventures in the first book, he is becoming a battle general. A very good one. Also a very good fighter. At his side an effective magus and they help defend their realm which at the start of the book is doing it’s best to help it’s neighbor settle a civil war.

By the end of the book they will be involved in their own civil war as relations of the king try to take power.

The Shattered Mirror (A Regency Romance)

Our hero is a retired sea-captain, wounded in the Napoleonic conflict and our heroine is having her first London season. The war is over and our heroine looks forward to meeting all sorts of eligible men who have been away fighting the war. Little does she realize that the best man she meets is the broken sea-captain that she had grown up near.

Beggars Can’t Be Choosier (A Regency Romance)

Our hero is a near penniless as a lord can be. Wishing to make a name for himself in politics, but not able to find 100 pounds a year to live on with estates rented to pay off debts that his family has incurred. Into his life comes a very rich heiress who has no status, but tremendous wealth. They strike a deal to join together and each shall realize their dreams of status and a political life before they shall part.

Two Peas in a Pod (A Regency Romance)

Two identical brothers return to London society from Waterloo not wishing to do more then rest from years of war. Little do they realize that their lives shall be turned upside down by a pretty smile. Except the one they wish to see they fear is meant for the other and as they switch places with each other, confusion ensues.

Terra’s Birthright

Expanding to the stars, mankind is controlled by the richest planets. This is fine until the colonies begin to think they should have a say also. Someone, on some planet, will be the vote that starts and avalanche of changing how mankind governs itself, or how it will still be governed. Dealing with those concepts in the future as we have dealt with them in the past, is what is explored here.

Steam and Thunder

The first of a duology, what happens if the steam engine was invented in a time period similar to Henry the II? Will the neighboring countries sit still for such technological advances? Will the nobility be quiet as their lands are denuded of men seeking a better life and working in the factories where this new tech is used?

Tempest and Sword

The second book of the duology, we see how those citizens now think they should have some say in their lives. How still the neighbors have issue with one country possessing the technology that advances them further than anyone else.

Succession Crisis

In a world where we see the crisis like Henry VIII to Edward VI. Here though the regents will be out to carve up the kingdom and even have a hand in the kings death, as we see the world through the heir’s eyes and worry that his head won’t be long on his shoulders should the regents have their way. The neighboring countries also want to ensure that the country our hero will rule does not grow powerful and divided regents or a young king is an opportunity to break the kingdom.

The Three Lastoleers (Star Musketeers)

What if the universe, several millenia from now adopts the very essence of Dumas’ France of the 3 Musketeers? What if we see our favorite characters in space?

You Ought to Trust Your Mother (A Regency Romance)

For NaNoWriMo 2010, a regency focusing on a young girl of great beauty realizing that man do not see her other qualities until she meets a lord who she really thinks misses her essence. The truth is he sees her better than any other and our heroine’s mother believes him to be an excellent match. What young girl wants to trust her mother in such things.

By The Book

Not wanting to be a warrior, and not wanting to follow in his father’s footsteps, our hero is stuck, for he is good at being a warrior. He knows though he could be better and reads about it. He reads ancient tomes and adapts those thoughts to his own situations. He writes these down to help train his friends to be better at warfare and they are. Good enough that the local lords see it and through all their success, our hero advances to lead the armies, though his hatred of war is ever growing.

KoTohLan II-Hoveria

This is part of a seven book series. The first was written in 2009. Here the idea is that the gods saw many years before our current events that the ruling dynasty they favored had those who would destroy it from within as well as without. They hid our hero with the aid of some influential people from those who took over. Now the hero is grown and finds he is the heir of the old dynasty. The empire of 7 kingdoms also has been crumbling. He is to visit each kingdom, one per book, and do heroic actions that bring the people behind him to reunite the broken empire. This book sees him forming an army in the southern most kingdom. It teaches him to be a general. A skill he will need to build and also gain the loyalty of men for the threats should only continue to grow in the following books.

Graphs

Books that were read (reviews can be found at David’s Reading List) :

1) Julie & Julia         ​

2) A God in Ruins        ​

3) The Fireseed War         ​

4)Mrs. Kaputnik’s Pool Hall and Matso Ball Emporium         

5)The Keeper’s Son        

6) Servant of a Dark God        

7) The Lost Fleet:Victorious        

8) Jane Austen’s Guide to Good Manners        

9)The Time of Terror        

10)The Art of Digital Photo Painting        

11) Hidden Empire        

12)The Red Wolf Conspiracy        

13)Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict         

14)Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict         

15)A Forest of Stars        

16)Horizon Storms        

17) Scattered Suns        

18)Of Fire and Night        

19)Metal Swarm        

20)Maelstrom        
21)The Ashes of Worlds        

22)Irons in the Fire        

23)Invasion        

24) The Edge of the World         

25)In the Stormy Red Sky        

26) Blood on the Water        

27) The Accidental Billionaires        

28) Towers of Midnight        

29)Banner in the Wind         

30)The House of Durrow Street         

31) Little Fuzzy         ​

32) The Way of Kings        

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By the Book ends

Reached the conclusion of this today, the final scene.

Unlike the first few paragraphs, it is not the same to give a glimpse here of how a book ends. It would be like jumping to the back of the book.

But in my books we try to reach a conclusion. This has some openness in it, for in my mind this is a duology or trilogy. I have always scene the second big section of this work (if you have looked at the map I posted before, the march to the sea) and now while writing this draft of part 1, I laced into the story events for our hero, or his descendants to reach part 3.

By the Book finished at 158,059 words. A good many.

Over the last three days I reread all that was KoTohLan, and I liked what I wrote. I started to edit some of my typing errors, but then I stopped for I want to do a formal edit of the draft later. I read it so I could begin book 2 in the series, what happens after the great tourney. Where do our heroes go, how evil is the Emperor going to continue to become.

Now I have my plan and I shall begin the next chapter and work on how Magnus Thistle evolves his skills.

My goal is to try and complete 43,000 words in the next three weeks. I do not think that the time after Christmas will be spent writing much as I hope we are focusing on prepping the new house to move into and start moving.

So perhaps two more weeks of writing this year.

As there was a Gratitude Log just a few days ago, I feel that i shall forego one right now.

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1,200,000 Words

I just passed the milestone I have been working on for months. 1,200,000 Words for the year. 4000 pages.

Excellent feeling.

Last night I reached the last chapter of By the Book. The chapter was to have three scenes, getting our hero to a ceremony, the ceremony, and then what happens with the menacing enemy that has been working itself into the story for most of the last two-thirds of the book.

It was coming along very well, and I was conscious of my goal number getting closer. Then Cheryl took over the computer so my writing ended for the day.

Today we had an errand for six hours, but I finally got back into the writing and was able to reach the final tape. Like a runner at the end of the race…

There is more to write, the second scene in the chapter has not finished, nor have I then gotten to the third scene.

I will.

I also have to choose the next project which I think will be KoTohLan book two. I am rereading KoTohLan to remember what I wrote. I know that I have to really flesh out the other books, the plan being that it is a seven book series, one book per country of the old empire. I have to reread and look at my notes to see how much work I had

The way I got to 1,200,000 words is as follows

Book Title	Words written in 2010	# of Pages
Born to Grace II, The Turmoil	142,926	476
The Shattered Mirror (A Regency Romance)	98,085	327
Beggars Can’t Be Choosier (A Regency Romance)	102,390	341
Two Peas in a Pod (A Regency Romance)	104,535	348
Terra’s Birthright	78,767	263
Steam and Thunder	102,639	342
Tempest and Sword	108,274	361
Succession Crisis	124,830	416
The Three Lastoleers	82,650	276
You Ought to Trust Your Mother (A Regency Romance)	93,715	312
By the Book	151,404	505

There are also some pages devoted to the editing of second drafts as well.

Three weeks to go, though I expect there will be little time between xmas and New Years to write as we hope to moving into the house at that time.

At the moment though, we have The Gratitude Log

1. Fleece-What a great thing and cheap too. I have a fleece jacket i got in Alaska that keeps me very warm. It has been lower than 40 at night here.
2. The Green Bay Packers— my favorite team and now 8 and 4 for the season. Go Pack!
3. Amazon—Wish lists, iphone aps, the prime shipping deal. It is just way too easy to shop. Brick and mortar will never disappear, but a lot of stores will, and small retail business will have to work hard to think how to adapt.
4. email–in 1994 I was learning to love the internet. Where were all of you, eh? But as I was, I would buy books, sure what little web we had, and attend lectures. One I did at a Borders Book store, had a speaker who had placed his email address on his business card and said that in the next few years (he meant before 2000) we all would do so. And we did. Email is great. I just wish syncing worked like it should and there was no junk mail.
5. Border Book Stores—Just as I love Amazon, i love Borders as well. Amazon has a ton of stuff and they do it well. They do books well also. But they do not do browsing as well as you can do if you are at a book store. I shall miss this store if they succumb. It is a great place to hang. B&N the rival, I shall always remember for the remaindered catalog on old newsprint that used to come out. They are nice, but Borders I always felt had a more homey feeling.

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December is upon us-The last month of 2010

When Writing, I record my progress now daily, and by week and month.

My writing week is Monday through Sunday. It had to start sometime and by doing Monday to Sunday, and then dividing how many weeks there have been in a year and multiplying by 52, or days there have been by 365, I can make estimates of where I will be after a year.

Even though now I can comfortably write 20 pages a day, 6000 words, having the time to do so before we settle into Hemet and begin a job hunt, I have used the gauge to monitor my capabilities. Where when I started 2 pages was hard to find the time to do, now I do ten times that. When I started NaNoWriMo at the beginning of November, I was worried that commitments for the house hunting and purchase would take me away from writing so I wanted to get 8000 words a day, and then the next level is 10000 words a day, which I have done on occasion and think I could make a habit of.

I finished the NaNoWriMo novel in 14 days

                Day                        Word Count
Day 1        8045
Day 2        8253
Day 3        8597
Day 4        8609
Day 5        4081
Day 6 & 7        8448
Day 8        8302
Day 9        8195
Day 10        4201
Day 11        8363
Day 12        6202
Day 13 & 14        12419

You can see that I combine Saturdays and Sundays together and sometimes I don’t write on one or the other. (This last Saturday, the 4th, I did not write anything because of The Brea Borders Writers Group and then staying in Brea area all day.)

You Ought to Trust Your Mother finished at 93, 715 words according to Scrivener, and 5 more than that when I uploaded it to the NaNoWriMo site

A good feeling but it did not mean I finished writing on November 14th for the month of November. I added almost 61,000 more words after that, working on the Conquest Story, now having a working title of By the Book. My November Count shows I wrote 154,657 but that is not how I count months for my word count. If a month does not end on a sunday, then I record the figures until it becomes Sunday, and I start it on the first monday of the month after writers group. The Brea Borders Writers Group meets on the first Saturday, so November did not start for my accounting of writing until the 8th. The first Saturday was the 6th, so that was the last week of my October still. The first week of my November then being the Monday following the first Saturday Started on the 8th and just ended yesterday.

4 weeks of writing, on You Ought to Trust Your Mother, and By the Book, a total of 126,904 words.

Now once I finished the NaNoWriMo project I felt a lot of pressure for 2010 was off. It came out well in the 2 weeks I wrote it, showing me I can write a long book in that time. (20+ books a year pace.)

When the year started, I wanted 30,000 words a week, 1.5 million a year. But at week 3 of January, I had that heart attack and really didn’t write much for 2 months. I also readdressed my goals and thought that 3000 pages might be more optimistic to push for.

As the year continued, I made that goal to be 4000 pages, or 100,000 words each month. 1,200,000 words by the end of the year. Today, this morning we are at 1,176.309. About 79 pages from the finish line. So I’ve added another 50,000 word to the goal for the next four weeks (My 2010 for writing will end on the 2nd)

What also will take up my time this month, is the house purchase, lining up workmen and purchase of appliances and flooring ready to go if we sign on Christmas Eve (My folks sign, they are buying the house and we are renting from them. But we have to do all the footwork.)

The Brea Borders Writers Group

Each month for nine years, though we cancel on some holiday weekends, we meet at the Borders in Brea California for our writing group. Currently we are six members, and three of us were able to gather for nearly 4 hours on Saturday. The first two and half we talked about the process of writing, about inspiration, about not closing yourself off to other novels and television for inspiration, about character studies and traits of people from real life. We talked about lap bands and Leonard Cohen We talked about songwriting for poetry. Then we did our readings. I was introducing my heroine and the team pointed out one thing that I needed to add to her character.

The Gratitude Log

1. Cereal–it is how I start my morning, and it is getting a little boring but it meets the Diabetes and Heart requirements I think. 1 bowl every weekday.
2. Vector Graphics–Can’t really find a freeware or shareware one for the Macintosh. Have been using Numbers to solve that problem. I will have a movie up for By the Book showing how I used it and show off the battle sequences on it.
3. Inkjet Printers & Scanners–Saves the need for faxing. Print out whatever form someone needs me to sign, then sign it, scan it and email it back
4. Arco Gasoline– This is still one of the best buys for gas out here and certainly is saving us money during the recession. Even if it is a BP company and they leaked oil into the gulf. We save everytime we fill up. Why don’t any other chains figure that out?
5. Reading–Without it the great number of stories I think up would be the poorer

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