Frac crosses the finish line (half-marathon)

[radfrac_archive_full]

25,087 words.

With three and a half hours and almost a paragraph to spare.

I set a goal and met it. It feels so weird to... succeed.

And the decadence of stopping at 8:30. Like I was gettiing away with something.

I even learned some things.



Check it out: There's a difference between knowing how to write and knowing how to perform the process of writing. Over the last week I suddenly found myself doing the second one. I didn't learn it consciously. It just started to happen. Like when you learn to speak or walk. You can't see yourself doing it. You're just suddenly doing it.

Or this: I wouldn't have understood it if I hadn't just had it happen -- it's better not to have a crush on the story. Better not to love it the way you love your blanky. Not to need it to Be Somethign. If it's too precious, you can't change it or you might hurt it. I'd already decided this story could be bad. That meant I was free to begin to learn how to build it properly.

They tell you and tell you, but you can't believe it until you do it yourself.

The story itself, eh. I don't know if it can become anything, or if it has to stay an exercise. The exercise, though, is not over.

The next thing I need to do also seems clear to me. I have to set another goal and deadline, and meet it. This one fis or actually letting other people into the process.

Tricky.

I'm pleased with what I wrote, but I also feel like heaping caveats onto anyone I show it to -- "It's not my usual thing," "It's a light piece," and like that.

So: It's not my usual thing. It's a light piece. It's not... ok. Look. Let's just say it. It's not Literary, dammit. I have been calling it "The Gay Fantasy Potboiler" in my head. Sometimes I add "With dragons." That's what it is. That's what you get.

{rf}

Comments

[sugarpunfairy.livejournal.com]

Gay fantasy potboiler with dragons!!!!!! Awesome! Do we get to read it?

Ooh ooh ooh

[inlandsea.livejournal.com]

...waves hand frantically in the air.

Add me to the potential, nay definitive readers list. ('Cause unlike the Vancouver novel that I begged, begged to read, this one Must Go Forth to Your Public.)

So, when will it be ready for the first read? (note I wrote, 'first' read - it doesn't have to be perfect at this stage. In fact, it can suck. That's what feedback is for.)

Fairy sparkles! Mouse squeakings! Wine and roses and bravos galore, all for you today.

[kainhighwind-dr.livejournal.com]

Did someone say gay dragons?? :D