At one time, I had envisioned having a completed draft of this story done by May 1st. It was to have been a version of the story I was happy with, one I could send out to my workshop friends, get critiqued and fix the errors and rewrite glaringly out of place scenes by the end of the summer. Then I could give it to some members of my target audience and test the book by their standards.
I am tired of sitting around, willing the book to be done. I've been telling myself for months that I have to act to get a result, but the message has never seemed to reach my fingers. But now it has.
What has brought about this change? 4 things:
Time
I still want to have this story ready by the end of this summer. I know it won't get back to me from my Workshop group before summer ends--if it does it will be a miracle because of its length. However, I would still like to run it by my chosen, target audience members. And I'd like them to be reading it around Halloween when the story is set.
Hours
The longer I spend writing the more I can do. I know this. Yet, the past few months, I have persisted under the belief that I can spend 1 hour in the morning and 1 in the evening and get the book done. But I spend a lot of those hours surfing the internet, or trying to find the right music to write to. If I am going to get this story done then I am going to have to spend more time on it each day than I have been.
Target Audience
Red King is a Young Adult story. That means teens. And that means my chosen, target audience readers will not be the right age forever. I have to get this thing done, before they are too old to care about the story because the characters are too young for them.
Endless Drafts
As I said, I've been going over this again and again and again. Sometimes you have to try a thing before you find out it's no good. That's what I've been doing and now that I have found what does and does not work, it is time to do what works.
So this has been the plan this last week: finish the latest draft by August 1st.
Why August 1st? Because I still have a some scenes to write for the first time. And I have some chapters I'm going to be completely rewriting. So the very end of July seems like a more realistic goal than July 23. That extra week is essential. Though, I'm not sure if even that will be enough time. But it is something to shoot for. And I must shoot for something, or else I will never reach it.
What is your struggle in completing your story? Do you, too, struggle with complacency in your writing routine? If so, what do you do to overcome it?