(The following is cross-linked from sarawhitford.com.)
In the last couple of episodes of A Writer’s Journey: From Blank Page to Published, Terrance Zepke and I talked about Nine Ways to Write a Book. We discussed various methods for organizing your ideas before you begin writing.
Well, in this episode, IT’S GO TIME!
Let’s say you have a great idea for your book — maybe you’ve started outlining, or maybe you’re planning to pants it, but either way, you just need to get the first draft written before you worry about anything else. How can you make sure that happens?
Earlier this summer, I had an idea for a novel. I used index cards to come up with scene ideas, and then I intended to get started writing. I had been at it about a week — towards the end of June — when I saw the invitation for the #JulyWritingChallenge on Twitter.
Founded by Kristy Acevedo in hopes of using an online writing challenge to spur her on to finishing her young adult sci-fi novel over the summer, the #JulyWritingChallenge ended up turning into something much more, with a core group of members all cheering each other on as we all posted our daily word counts. Those of us who benefited from the motivation the July challenge provided became worried as the month neared its end. We wanted the challenge to keep going, so it turned out that I was nominated to lead July, and then #JulyWritingChallenge participant and published romance novelist, Samantha Garman, agreed to take September.
We now have volunteer leaders who will carry the challenge all the way through next summer. To learn more about the challenge, go here, but in the meantime, listen to this podcast where you can hear me, Kristy and Samantha talk about finishing our projects through the writing challenges, as well as other tips and tricks we’ve learned along the way.
Continue reading and listen to the podcast here…
Any comments?