a week in words
what I wrote this week, at a glance.
“How much do you write each day?”
I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve been asked that question, but I do know I’ve never really managed to answer it—in large part because the answer varies wildly depending on countless variables. The type of scene I’m working on, what other responsibilities are on my plate, the state of my physical and mental health—even the weather can affect how much I write in a given day.
The biggest thing that I’ve noticed affects my output is where I’m at in the story. If it’s early in the book, I tend to write slower because I’m still figuring out the characters and the world and doing more research than writing; if it’s the end of a book, I feel like I’m careening down a steep hill on a bicycle—speeding along wildly fast, but with a nagging fear that I won’t reach the bottom in one piece.
Right now, though, I’ve hit the sweet spot with the book I’m working on where I’m about 1/3 of the way in and everything is flowing smoothly, so I thought it would be a fun experiment to keep a writing journal for the week and take a look at not just my word count each day, but to give a little insight into what each day looked like, how I approached the scenes I was working on, and how different factors affected the day’s output.
Monday:
Getting into the rhythm of the week means I’m off to a meandering start, but past me left off on a cliffhanger on Friday, so I’m excited to dive back in and work on this scene. It doesn’t hurt that there’s a lot of banter here, which is one of my favorite things to write. Not sure I’m 100% sold on this hero’s name, but we’ll put a pin in that. Finished the scene with a nice and neat little button. After I called it a day, I realized one side-plot that played a somewhat big part in today’s scene is feeling a bit weak. I’m considering taking the whole subplot out entirely, but for now I’m going to leave it in and see if its roots strengthen as I move forward.
1,865 words.
Tuesday:
Forgot to charge my laptop while I got ready this morning so it’s currently at 1%, so I’m working from bed while it charges. I don’t keep a charger in my office intentionally to force me to take breaks to recharge myself as well as my laptop (I think Adam Silvera told me this tip ages ago and it stuck with me.) I’m also interspersing writing sprints with baking today, so writing like mad while the dough for Alison Roman’s salted butter and chocolate chunk shortbread cookies chills for 2 hours, then taking a break while getting them into the oven. Then I get a nice little treat before going into round two of writing.
Quite a few new characters to introduce today, and I need to find the right names for them. I really enjoy coming up with names for characters, but something I’m being especially mindful of is that the names for these characters are as distinct as their personalities. Because they’re being introduced all at once, I want to minimize any reader confusion about who’s who—this means each name starts with a different letter/sound and I try to diversify the endings as much as I can.
The shortbread turned out pretty damn perfect, and they gave me the burst of energy I needed to finish the day strong. Clocking out with two scenes done, which constitutes a chapter written. My worries about the gaggle of new characters blending together seems to be unfounded—they’ve all got pretty distinct personalities and I love the dynamic between all of them and the main character.
2,678 words.
Wednesday:
Oops, did I say I finished a chapter yesterday? Well, today I decided it actually needs another scene to close it out. At this point in the process, the division of scenes and chapters is largely based on vibes and this might change down the road, but in the interest of transparency, I am still working on the chapter from yesterday! Unlike yesterday’s scenes and the bevy of characters they introduced, though, this first scene is just the heroine and the love interest, and while they’re still firmly in the enemies stage of their enemies-to-lovers journey, I want to make sure there are seeds of longing underneath all the spiteful banter and casual death threats.
Got a little diverted in writing this scene because I realized I needed to edit a scene a few chapters back for continuity, but it was a pretty quick fix. Finished this scene and the chapter total is now at 4,310 words, which feels a bit chunky compared to my usual chapters, but I have to remind myself not to get caught up on this right now—that’s something for future Laura to sort out during edits. Right now, I just have to keep going.
Started writing the next scene, but cut the day a little short because I feel a migraine coming on and I don’t want to push it.
Total: 2,504 words.
Thursday:
We aren’t off to the strongest start today because that migraine I felt starting up yesterday afternoon blossomed into a beast. I’m finally sitting down to write at 1:30 in the afternoon, because the Anadin I took kicked in, but I know I only have a short window before it comes back and I want to limit screen-time as much as I can. I probably won’t hit the word count levels of the last couple of days, but if I get through a thousand words or so, I’ll be happy.
Also worth noting that the next scene also involves a bit more physical action, which is something that comes a bit less naturally for me than the banter-y dialogue-heavy scenes I’ve mostly been working on this week, so even without the migraine, it would probably be a slower day.
Here we are a few hours later and I did not even get to the action-y bits, but I’ve managed to get yesterday’s scene wrapped up and I set up the stage for tomorrow. Hopefully this migraine will go away by then so I can tackle it with a clear head. Now I’m off to lie in a dark quiet room for a while and do some knitting.
Total: 1,117 words (plus, finished one sleeve and the collar of my Storm Sweater)
Friday:
Hallelujah, the migraine is ebbing and I’m feeling about 90% better. It’s the fight scene today, but after a good bit of procrastination and watching the fight scene between Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones in Zorro about half a dozen times (purely for research purposes, of course) I buckled down and got to work and once I got into the scene, it flowed pretty seamlessly. Like many things, I built it up in my head to be a lot more intimidating than it actually was. Will I remember this lesson the next time I sit down to write a fight scene? No, probably not.
Finished the fight scene and rewarded myself by writing a swoony, bantery scene between the heroine and love interest and closed out this chapter on a high note.
Total: 1,706 words.
Right now, I’m writing Monday through Friday and keeping my weekends free to rest and recover. In a few weeks, when my deadline creeps up on me, I probably will work through the weekend too, but I’m trying to keep that boundary in place as long as I can to prevent burnout. Which means that at the end of the week, I wrote a total of 9,870 words.
Which is pretty good, in my view! I’m really happy with how this story is plugging along and I’m looking forward to picking it up again on Monday. And while I’m not any closer to having a solid answer when it comes to how much I write in a day, I actually think the practice of keeping a writing journal was really helpful, and I might just keep doing it for my own sake.
What I’m…
reading: Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry (so far, it’s a delight on audiobook!)
watching: When I’m deep into drafting, there is something about a crime procedural that just scratches an itch for me because I find it hard to get invested in long storylines. As a category, procedurals are…a bit hit or miss, but I’ve been getting into Elsbeth, which is a fresh take on the genre, and once I finish that, I’m going to dive into the new season of Poker Face.
baking: A couple of weeks ago, I made the Banana Bread Roll from the cookbook Smitten Kitchen Every Day for Real Housewives Night at a friend’s but I set a slice aside for my boyfriend to try and he hasn’t stopped raving about it since. He says it’s the best thing I’ve ever made, and given how much I bake, that is a serious compliment. Of course I have to make it again, and I’ve got some browning bananas on the counter that I don’t want to go to waste!
knitting: A few weeks ago, I suffered horrific tragedy when someone (okay, it was me) accidentally put my beloved Storm Sweater in the washing machine and it came out…well, unwearable. Since then, I’ve been working on a new one, in the same yarn, with a year and a half more knitting experience under my belt. Maybe it’s just the optimist in me, but I’m looking at this as a blessing in disguise and I think this version of the sweater is going to turn out even better than the original! I’ve only got one sleeve left so I’m hoping to finish it in the next couple of days. Below is the before and after of the original Storm!
