Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Budgeting Writing Time

Remember that cozy mystery I mentioned last week? The rough draft is done. It's a very short novel, right around 50,000 words, but that gives me space to add more scenes later. The other short story I mentioned is coming along too. Currently it's around 2,600 words. I expect it to be between 3,000 and 4,000 words when it's complete. I'm already plotting out more stories in my cozy mystery series; in addition to a sequel, I also want to write a prequel short story about one of the characters for a newsletter giveaway. All of this isn't taking into account my other series or all the revisions, editing, and formatting I have to do before I can publish these works.

It seems like I'm giving myself more and more projects to manage in less time. In order to make it all work, I'm going to have to figure out how to budget my time better. Either I could block it out by project or by process (e.g., block out hours or days just for writing or editing.)

Do you prefer to work by project or process? Which one works better for you? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.

2 comments:

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

If I'm going to write, I have to block out time to do it.
Well done and wish I could write as fast as you do.

Steven Arellano Rose Jr. said...

I normally end up blocking out time project by project. E.G.) One day I'll work on my novella and another day I'll work on my short story. If I try to work on one project for several weeks without alternating to another, I get board and lose focus too easily. That's just what works for me.

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