Writer Senses

Though my blog's primary purpose is updating readers about my novel's progress, I like to deviate from time-to-time with insights from other writers and discussions about the craft. The past (almost three!) years of writing has been enlightening, and since the beginning, one of the most important tools to my growth as a writer has been Scribophile.com . Writing is a solitary pursuit, and for an  ENFJ  like me, particularly difficult in that respect. I enjoy the social aspect of storytelling. Comic and writing conventions featuring popular stories like Star Wars , Lord of the Rings , or, more recently, Avatar , are awesome because they incorporate the celebration of story. What excites me most about my story is the possibility that it will unite people, that people will be so fascinated with it that they want to talk about it, laugh about it,  shake their fists at me over it. To that end, Scribophile has been a laboratory in which to test this aspect of storytelling. I...

Current Word Count: ~146,000. Current Page Count: 655, double-spaced. Listening to: Forest of Illusion: Chrono Cross OST ____ As crazy as it feels for me to type it, my book is 3/4 complete. If learning Hebrew, work, and a possible internship don't kill me this year, I estimate that I will have the first draft of the story finished by Spring 2013. Have I said this is crazy yet? I love what has happened with the story. Plotting a long tale is a daunting prospect. Stephen King says that plotting is like trying to excavate a skeleton with a jackhammer. It might be good for getting big rocks out of the way, but once you get close to those bones, you have pull out your chisel, hammer, and brush. The metaphor is apt. While I always knew of a few big bullet points on the timeline of the story, the rest of it grew organically. Ideas, plot twists, and even characters invented themselves as the need arose. The story has gone directions I never would have anticipated. I consider this fact ver...