The Week in Words - 1/1/25 - 1/12/25
Time spent in the trenches of preparation
Output - Data
Total: 11,806 words (21 pages [4,284] + 7,522 typed)
Days Writing: 11/12 days (.916 WrPCT)
AWD: 1,073/day
Words Added to Manuscript: 915
Ratio: 8
Longest Day: 1/1/25 - 1,947 words typed
The Still Bleepin’ Counts Award: 1/6/25 - 342 words typed
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Output - Synthesis
Damn dawg, it’s been like a month since we sat down and talked about how Avalanche is going. Well, where did we leave off?
Invisible work. I finished reading through Levi and Maribel so far, and didn’t wind up in the fetal position after 15 pages which is good. I feel like I’m getting things right, and reading through everything helped me feel fairly confident with moving forward, like, it showed me how to move forward.
The way was clear. I had been collecting stray notes and ideas for everything while I read, and it came time to execute.
Since my biggest foe is running out of gas after the first act, I don’t immediately just start writing (apparently this is called “pantsing.”) I have to start by figuring out the beat sheet, this time for the city’s period of accelerando growth.
I had the historical events but very few sinews—those thin strands of gossamer that hold a plot together.
So I started asking questions. And it turned out that logging leads to growth, a growth whose fuel dismays Levi. And this dismay is contrasted against Maribel’s realization that she doesn’t age, that people are noticing, that leaving might be the only option.
As we did the cycle’s beat sheet, we used the outline for the whole story as a guide. Going into this pre-writing process, I’d thought that I had two cycles left in the storyline, Boom and the Flood. Yet, as I went through all the material I had, what naturally occurred was alignment: the cycles as I had them only covered halves of one whole. A’boomin’ led directly to a’floodin’, and one informs the other.
That was kind of a bitchin’ victory because it was clear I was way closer than I thought. But I still didn’t have the individual units of the dramatic arc.
I spent the next couple weeks figuring out the note cards for the individual scenes and sequences. This allows me to figure out POV and time frame and pieces of dialogue and important details beforehand.
It’s a buttload of a pre-writing, but honestly it’s all because it allows me to write tired way more easily. When all the track is laid out like this, all you gotta do is turn on the headlight and push the handcart forward toward Publication Station (that is ridiculous, but I’m keeping it).
And but so, I finessed out the cards for seven scenes, then got really fuckin’ itchy to actually write something. So I listened to my gut.
I pulled down the first notecard —
Scn. - 1st (M) - Ageless, Ageless - Mar. 1875-Sep.1875— and set to work.
Input
Data
Book: Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner
Starting Page: 0
Ending Page: 117
Days Read: 4
Pages Read: 117
4/12 days (.333 rPCT)
Avg: 29.25 pgs/day
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William Blake’s “All Religions Are One”
Synthesis
I’ve been trying to get more into modern literature as I get closer to finishing Avalanche. It’s clear that I’ve gotta know the market and the landscape a little bit, and that I can’t show up knowing absolutely nothing about what’s out currently.
I’m starting with Rachel Kushner’s Creation Lake, a book that showed up on a lot of the year-end lists that I saw.
Through the first hundred pages, I’m not sure if I like it even though I’m learning things. I like the way Kushner handles text messages, for one thing, and it’s been fun reading a book that actually involves phones (I spent a lot of 2024 reading period pieces). I’ve never known how to write during a period with smart phones, but this book is showing me subtle ways of handling it.
We’ll see if I wind up liking it. It’s on these lists for a reason, and maybe that reason is an absolutely kickass ending.
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