Category: writerly resolutions
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Writerly resolutions for 2023
The big goal for the year is to get the novel third draft done. For that, I’m thinking I have the following measurable goals: Finish the last of the research reading (only 6½ books right now). Character bios for major characters Do a highlighter read (per Matt Bell, pp. 128–133) Read and annotate the printed…
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Writerly resolutions for 2022—the post mortem
My resolutions for 2022 were a bit gentler and perhaps not so measurable. I had a bit of a mid-year pivot on the novel where I decided to focus on a research binge after I finished draft two in July. This did give a nice visual where I had stacks of books that shrunk (and…
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Writerly resolutions: November status
Continuing the research this month. My trip to the USHMM was productive and the stacks of books are dwindling, although research has generated some new books to read so the stacks have gotten a little shorter. I had hoped to get them down to nothing by the end of the year, but it looks like…
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Writerly resolutions: October status
And still more research work. Next week I will spend a couple days at the USHMM research center for more primary source research. I’ve been adding occasional new reading to the stacks of books which will be evident to those closely inspecting the pictures accompanying these posts. I had hoped to be done with research…
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Writerly resolutions: September status
Research continues apace. I discovered a PhD thesis courtesy of the exhaustive index at the USHMM website that is almost exactly what I would have wanted to read at the start of this process. I am definitely going to do a research trip to DC in November to visit the research center of the USHMM. Meanwhile,…
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Writerly resolutions: August status
No fancy graph this month as it’s all-research time for the novel. I’ve managed to get eight of the books from my leftover research stack finished as well as going through ten survivor testimonies from the Yad Vashem website that had transcripts (there’s no way I would be able to follow spoken Hebrew with my…
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Writerly resolutions: July status
Draft two is DONE! I managed to trim about 5,000 words in the process, despite adding a new chapter in the middle, so that’s a good sign. I will need to print this puppy up to be able to read and edit for the revision stage and I’m planning on doing some significant research reading before…
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Writerly resolutions: June status
Back on track this month with the novel. I missed writing a few days and had a few days of very low word counts, but for the last week and a half, I’ve made a point of advancing at least two pages a day through the printed first draft manuscript in the revision process which…
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Writerly resolutions: May status
No good reason for this month’s poor progress on the novel other than life intervening. In theory, I can finish this rewrite still by the end of June, but I suspect it will be July when it happens. Once that’s done, I end up diving into some heavy-duty research to make sure that I can…