How fast a writer are you?

[L.L. Maurizi]

Way slower than I should be. When I am hitting a groove for a few days I can punch out like 5k words in 3 days easily. Then I have months where I hit less than that. I am trying to write more. It really comes down to just not letting myself get distracted as much. Procrastination is also a big issue, but that's with everything and not just writing for me.

I "suffered" from procrastination for a long time, then I suddenly stopped. For some reason I started finding more pleasure in doing everything as soon as possible, so that I could dedicate more time to other things (in quite a revolving circle)

 

[Miles Lacey]

How fast do I write? When I began writing my work in progress at least two of my co-workers hadn't been born! I really do need to start getting a move on or else I'll be collecting the old age pension before I finish it.

 

[L.L. Maurizi]

How fast do I write? When I began writing my work in progress at least two of my co-workers hadn't been born! I really do need to start getting a move on or else I'll be collecting the old age pension before I finish it.

This gave me a good laugh! I'm glad I started my morning on this forum!

Being a slow writer is not necessarily a bad thing. My follow up question would be: has it been this long because you don't write for long periods of time, or because you simply take your time writing/world-building/dialogue-polishing etc?

 

[ThinkerX]

How fast do I write? When I began writing my work in progress at least two of my co-workers hadn't been born! I really do need to start getting a move on or else I'll be collecting the old age pension before I finish it.

When I came to this site, I had a list of half a dozen unfinished novels I deemed 'salvageable.' A couple of them were 'finished,' but none have been published - though that may change next year. There are at least two I might try to finish (time and energy and success of other projects depending). They date from just after 2000.

 

[L.L. Maurizi]

When I came to this site, I had a list of half a dozen unfinished novels I deemed 'salvageable.' A couple of them were 'finished,' but none have been published - though that may change next year. There are at least two I might try to finish (time and energy and success of other projects depending). They date from just after 2000.

How come there were none published? Don't mean to pry. Just genuinely curious, since I'll start working towards it soon for my first book.
Did you just not want to? Or maybe focused only on traditional publishing and still had no luck?

 

[ThinkerX]

How come there were none published? Don't mean to pry. Just genuinely curious, since I'll start working towards it soon for my first book.
Did you just not want to? Or maybe focused only on traditional publishing and still had no luck?

I had a completed rough draft for what became 'Labyrinth: Journal' - but it was pretty horrible, and after the rewrite, it became clear it was the first in a series. I did write book two of that - 'Labyrinth: Seed,' but since then I have been working on the 'Empire' series. Rule of thumb, adopted way back when, was I wouldn't publish the first book in a series unless I had at least a rough draft of the last book. Hence, eight novels to the second rewrite stage of better AFTER coming here and only publishing them this year. It took that long.

As to the others: None were completed when I came here: I got mired in the 'muddy middle' with 'Falling Towers,' though I had an ending in mind. That one will require a bit of a do-over on the worldbuilding.

'To Cross the Sea of Shadows' was another one I got lost in the 'muddy middle.' Fixing it should be fairly simple - one character goes from male to female, plus bringing the worldbuilding end into line. One of the characters in it is a prominent 'off-stage' figure in the 'Empire' series.

What I term 'Dael/Misty' has some parts that are very good, if bleak, and some other parts that are so closely modeled after AD&D they'll need to be thought out anew.

As to getting published, I knew right from the start I had a greater chance of winning the lottery than attracting the attention of a traditional publisher (though I have a pile of shorter stories that I will send to various magazines). Hence, it was go Indie or let them sit.