Hitting the wall – 730 x 730 Challenge – week 5

Well, it’s been a tough week for the challenge and a tough week in actual life.

Things started well as I was able to smash through the finale of Zombie RiZing 3: A Fate Worse Than Beath. I’m so happy with how all of the elements came together – there was a nice back-story thread, bringing readers into the events on RiZing day, there was a new magic, new enemy and an epic battle at the finish. What more could you want from a Zombie RiZing book?

I was also good news on the audiobook front as my first novel, Kings of the World was released this week. If you haven’t checked out Audible yet, please do – such a cool way to experience books.

But then everything was turned on it’s head. Poor Abby found herself suffering from seizures (very common for Rett girls) and ended up in hospital for two nights. As anyone with kids going through a rough patch knows, it’s all hands on deck – parents, grandparents, siblings. Poor Dabs!

I struggled to write during that period and out the other side. It’s very difficult to refocus your thoughts and, as much as you want to bounce back to ‘normal’ again (what is normal anyway), it’s easy said than done.

On top of that I had to confront the War & Quel script that had been bogging for a couple of weeks. See, I’d been nudging along at a snails pace but putting my energies into Life and Beath where the words were flowing. But now that was done I had nowhere to hide.

It hit a point where the word count was in threat for the week for the first time – needing about 1200 on the last day. So, I kinda sorta pulled a swifty. You see, before the challenge I had plotted out Zombie RiZing 4: Creeping Beath, and, well, I started writing that instead. But my word count today includes the pre-plotted out words, so I’ve probably cheated to get over the line, but without it I would’ve been close (say, within a few hundred).

So, for the third week in a row I go in with no momentum on my major project.

But, I have a plan.

I need to get stuck back into War & Quel and the only way I can see the rut being overcome is by collecting my thoughts on the entire project. The only way I can do that is to read to manuscript from start to current point. So, that’s the weekend project. I’ll be able to note down the 2-3 plot points that are not quite there, fix them and move on! Finally.

Weekly Words: 6059 (+939)

Total Words: 33,710 (+8160)