Toxic Update #1
20,000 words into this thing, and I'm both flabbergasted and just plain aghasted at my own stamina. My progress is both lackluster and spectacular, depending on how I'm feeling at any particular moment. Writing is like that. It's a constant flux of self-degradation, loneliness, pure elation, willpower wrangling, and guilt. It's hard to really describe the writing process to someone who's never sat down to crap out a book. Possibly because it's more emotional than anything else. Some writers, like the inestimable Haruki Murakami, liken the act to running a marathon. I'd never actually do something as silly as that, so I can't really say whether or not this is true. But it seems logical. The act of doing one thing and one thing only, for a really reaally reeeaaaaallly long time. That's all it is. Simple. And impossible.
Anyway, Toxic is coming along fine. Fine is a good word. A wholesome, salt-of-the-earth kind of word. We'll stick with that for now. And more samples will be forthcoming, to showcase said progress. I'm particularly excited about that part. Samples all around!
The length of the project keeps increasing, which I find to be a pretty common phenomenon. I can plan for a story to be around a certain word count, only to have it blow up into a full-length book. This is actually the rule, rather than the exception, in my case. I find it difficult to include all the elements necessary to tell a good story without a meaty word count. And Toxic is no different. I'd originally planned for Volume I to be around 12,000 words. I'll be lucky if I can keep it under 30,000. Which is fine, really. There's nothing wrong with giving readers more bang for their buck. In fact, I much prefer it to the alternative.
