I have to admit that yesterday was a good writing day. HUGE shock. Nearly up to the kind of daily wordcount I enjoyed while writing the first two books. Not quite, but nearly...
I'm not sure what it is, if it's being a full time write-ist, or if it's that the way I work's changing. Now days I seem to only have a half day's work in me. Four hours. After that, no matter how long I sit in front of the computer, trying to make blood come out of my ears with the sheer will of forcing words onto the screen, it doesn't really help. I can spend another four hours, struggling, and get about an hours worth of work done.
Book 3 (I still don't have a new name for the thing) feels a lot different to write to me. I get the feeling I'm thinking more with this one. Being more careful with the individual words and sentences. Hopefully this means the edit's going to be a lot less painful than it was for DYING LIGHT where I went a bit mad with the old red pen, even though everyone else -- including my publishers -- seemed to love the thing as it was.
A less 'intense' personal edit would be nice. In addition to driving me less mad, it'll also give me time to do other stuff. Don't tell INoGITCH, but I'm beginning to think about asking for a six month extension to my leave of absence. Believe it or not, I'm actually quite looking forward to going back to work. It's all the post launch stuff that makes me wonder if it wouldn't be an utter pain in the arse to keep asking for odd days off the whole time, then disappear off in the middle of a project to America, for my triumphant coast-to-coast tour. Well, when I have the fantasy it's coast-to-coast and I get to stop off in the Midwest for a couple of weeks to do some research for that book I've been doodling here off and on. Oh, and as it's a fantasy, there are dancing girls. Naked dancing girls... no... wait... dancing girls in their bras and pants, brushing crisp crumbs from my beard and feeding me buffalo wings. Mmm, fantasy...
Right, I now have no idea what I was talking about, so I'm going to go make blood come out of my ears. This weekend's going to be an utter bastard to get anything done*, so the more words I get tonight the merrier.
Oh yes -- and the title: it's my birthday on Monday, but She Who Must Be The Nastiest Wife In The World says I'm not getting a party this time. Not after last year. We're still finding bits of tangerine jelly in the conservatory.
Don't look under the bed.
* Which means Mr Internet's going to be switched off till Monday. No blogging or any of that other distracty email stuff.