Write-a-Thon Week Three Report

Posted on July 7, 2012 by Michael R. Underwood

Week three yielded 5361 words, even with a totally lazy 4th of July. The big pushes on Saturday are working really well, as I’m training my discipline and doubling down several times to hit those higher word-counts per session. I used to be able to hit 1K regularly, but seldom more than that. If I can get 2K word days consistently during the Write-a-Thon, that lets me set precedent and expect more of myself when I’m writing.

Up to 32K words, though I’m pretty sure about 4K of that is getting cut instantly due to changing my mind about the opening of the novel. I was able to cannibalize some of the good stuff out of the first beginning, but the rest will live off separately just in case I need to use more.

I’ll get another long session today, but the rest of the week could be pretty sparse, due to Self-Promonado. We shall see.

Write-a-Thon Week One Report

Posted on June 23, 2012 by Michael R. Underwood

Thanks to a strong start last Saturday, my wordcount for week one of the 2012 Clarion West Write-a-Thon is 5217, more than half of my overall 10,000 word pledge.

I’m hoping to continue this success and keep up the momentum for another five weeks. 5K a week for these six weeks would be phenomenal, since I’m at just over 20K words in the sequel to Geekomancy. Keeping this level up would get me to 45K by the end of July, way ahead of schedule.

I’ll be putting in another afternoon of writing today, so I’m crossing my fingers for another 2K+ Saturday. The fingers will of course have to be uncrossed to type, otherwise I’d have to type quite slowly.

Write-a-Thon Check-in

Posted on June 20, 2012 by Michael R. Underwood

Almost halfway through Week One of the Clarion West Write-a-Thon, I have gotten off to a great start with 3893 words, mostly from a great session of writing on Saturday (technically before the Write-a-Thon, but I’m counting it since I wrote on Saturday that weekend and not Sunday.

Here’s my participant page (where you can sponsor me — hint, hint) http://www.clarionwest.org/writeathon/michaelrunderwood

The Write-a-Thon is taking sponsorships/donations through the end of the workshop, so you have a bit over five weeks to sponsor me. I initially pledged 10,000 words in these six weeks, but I hope that my strong performance so far will let me annihilate that goal and keep going. Word count will likely slow down when travel gets more intense for my day job and when Geekomancy comes out, but I need to keep making words so that there can be another geek-tastic adventure with Ree next year.

Check in soon for a big announcement about Geekomancy‘s release! Excitement! Adventure!

Clarion West Write-a-Thon 2012

Posted on June 16, 2012 by Michael R. Underwood

For those of you who don’t know, I attended the Clarion West Writers Workshop in 2007, and it was a huge boost to my writing career. Clarion West allows writers to focus on craft and critiquing for six weeks. Most writers are urged to write a story each of the six weeks as well as critiquing 3-5 short stories by their classmates each day during the week. It’s often described as Boot Camp for writers, and while I haven’t done a military boot camp, my Clarion West experience was certainly a crucible. I’m still applying and re-interpreting lessons learned at the workshop, and Clarion West also gave me a community of peers, most of whom I’m still in touch with and some of whom I see once or twice a year at conventions, keeping up and basking in one another’s successes.

Digression for plugs — Success like Cassie Alexander’s NIGHTSHIFTED, first a three book (and counting!) series about a nurse that works in the paranormal ward of her local hospital; David Constantine’s PILLARS OF HERCULES, a Roman Steampunk action-adventure novel that includes Steam Engines, a Possibly-Divine Alexander, and the secrets of Atlantis; Melinda Thielbar’s MANGA MATH series of manga about kids in a dojo that have to use math and martial arts to solve mysteries; and others!

I wrote my first salable novel after Clarion West (though it hasn’t sold yet), and I’ve tried to keep some connection to the workshop by participating in the Write-a-Thon most of the summers since.

For more info about the Clarion West Write-a-Thon, head here: http://www.clarionwest.org/writeathon

I’ve pledged to write 10,000 words and am hoping to raise $150 this year. My participant page is here, in case you feel like sponsoring me. 🙂

http://www.clarionwest.org/writeathon/michaelrunderwood

Write-a-Thon Report: Week Two

Posted on July 1, 2011 by Michael R. Underwood

My first Write-a-Thon story is done, with a bit over a day to spare. “Can You Tell Me How to Get…” ended up clocking in at 5,600 words, more than expected or intended.

I’m still not very good at writing shorter stories. I will see about getting either tale #2 or #3 to be under 4K (many venues like stories under four thousand words, including some notable semi-pro and a few pro markets).

It will need a lot of revision, but it’s done. This is actually the first short story I’ve finished since Clarion West, since I’ve been focusing on novels. Two more to go!

Write-a-Thon Week One

Posted on June 21, 2011 by Michael R. Underwood

As I previously mentioned, I’m participating in the Clarion West Write-a-Thon, which runs concurrently with the 2011 workshop in Seattle.

My first story for the Write-a-Thon is “Can You Tell Me How To Get…”, a post-apocalyptic cyberpunk muppet story. Yeah, that’s right: muppets.

We’ve hit our participant goal, now we’re looking for sponsors to support one or more writers while we toil away for the next six weeks, sculpting awesome out of pure nothing, fueled by caffeine, madness, and whatever other sins the various writers use for inspiration.

Here’s a short teaser from the story-in-progress:

“Can you tell me how to get to Paprika Place?” Charlie would ask. The ones that remembered him from their TV days would shake their heads politely. They’d been viewers once, tuning in every afternoon to learn their letters and numbers. The younger ones, or the ones whose parents had worked for The Mouse or CapeCo, who’d been forbidden to watch Bunco’s shows, they would just recoil from Fluffasaurus and run back to their houses. Then the guards would come in their sharp black suits and sunglasses and ask him to move along.

Remember kids, don’t talk to strangers!