The Weekend Went Well

I heisted the tracker idea from Nicole.



I've always thought it was cute, and it fit today because I feel like a prune. (I am either fighting off a cold, or catching it slowly.)

But, I did get nearly 8500 words done this past weekend!

Problem is...

The early part of the story should be more traumatic. I have ideas on how to fix that by changing the flow of the scene/s. I like what I did, but perhaps it would be more effective if I made my changes. I'm thinking about it anyway.

Which I shouldn't be! How can I finish 50,000+ words this month if I spend time reworking what I've already written? The only way I'll ever "finish" is to fast write the length of the novel, then edit.

That is my struggle. I need to learn to just write, then just edit!

So here is my answer. Here's the rough draft of part of chapter 2, and the part I want to change is in brackets. Hopefully, that technique will work for me. It'll screw up the word count to a certain degree, but it will keep me writing and not editing to a certain degree.

Simeon followed John and Marie Andreasson as they strolled through downtown Ketchikan. They stopped at Thomas Basin and Katya’s mother leaned against the railing. Her gaze fell on one of the purse seiners moored in the basin. It was piled high with nets, waiting for the next fishing season to start. The harbor lights highlighted bold, black letters against the stark white hull -- Yekaterina II.

The name was obvious enough. Simeon knew for whom she was named. He could guess there had been a predecessor.

But, Simeon wanted to know more.

What it was about this family that drew the kushtaka to them? He assumed the connection was physical, not mental. Katya had a strong mind, but neither she nor her grandfather had extraordinary psychic abilities. Perhaps, it was the boat that had first attracted the kushtaka.

Where’s the first Yekaterina?

He sent the thought to both humans.

Marie’s mind was flooded with images of a dark, stormy night. The wind howled through the Tongass Narrows, kicking up waves that terrified her. She’d rubbed her swollen belly, worried that her child would never meet its father. Her husband was in the outside waters, at the mercy of nature. “I always hated waiting, worrying, wondering if he’d come home again. I hated that you bought another after that storm. I wanted him to quit fishing.”

“I thought about it myself, and I know Johnny did. But, the sea is in our blood. As fisherman. As Tlingit.” His words were forced out on a tide of emotion, a mixture of love and hate flowing through his heart. “Hell, the sea isn’t just part of our blood. She is our blood.”

John’s thoughts darkened as he pulled up the memory of the vessel’s lights sinking in the black water. He shuddered as he relived the horror that his lifelong friend went through, still alive as the vessel sank down through hundreds of feet of cold, unforgiving water, until the pressure was so great the man drowned in his own blood as his blood vessels ruptured. [Fix this later! It isn’t a friend that dies that night. The man that dies becomes the kushtaka that kills Johnny and is after Katya. Expand on this scene. Maybe here, or maybe in prologue in bad guy’s POV? Or maybe later?]

Then again...

Why am I afraid to make one of their family friend evil? I definitely need more imagry from the night.

But, I also think I need to be a little careful because I sank a ship in the prologue of Starlit Destiny. I don't people to think I can't write a novel without a ship sinking!

;)