My Year in Writing {2016}

2017.

A new year.

2017 always sounded like one of those far-away numbers, you know? Just fancy it being here now!

Time, my roadlings. Time is mysterious.

This last year of 2016 was in many ways a tough year for me, but filled with good things too. 🙂

If you’d like to see my Top 12 Books I Read in 2016 and other miscellaneous info about my reading life this last year, you can check out my post on my book blog! You know, in case you’re curious. 😉

This post, however, is all about my year of writing! (I know, I know, you would never have guessed from the title…)

2016 Writing

I wrote 71,854 words in 2016. Which… is less than my usual 100K, but I will be thankful for it. 😉

Since 51K of that was NaNo, my non-NaNo writing amounted to 20,720 words… which is why I feel like it was a slow year. Most months I was writing 2K in a month, which… well, let’s just say I won’t get my enormous 100K+ monster books written in a hurry at this rate. But all the same, I’m very pleased with the writing I DID get done, and I think I needed a slower, casual year of writing anyway. We’ll just go with that.

WRITING THAT I DID…

I started The Library in the Stars and wrote 51,000 words of that — huzzah! (Now I just need to write the ending. *cough*)

I “officially” started The Other Half of Everything, wrote part of the first chapter, and proceeded to keep writing it out of order later on in the book in snippets. Oops? 6,000 words this year.

Filled in holes in The Secret of Kedran’s Wood and did editing on a few chapters and officially finished the first draft of Part 1! *celebration* I also started the next chapter, wrote a bit of that… and proceeded to keep writing it out of order later on in the book in snippets. Oops? (Wait, did I just say that earlier? *cough* Apparently it’s a trend.)

I wrote 6,800 words of KW2 this year.

On that note, I’m convinced Tare ambushed me and made me write an extra thousand words post-NaNo solely to be able to show Teague that KW is still ahead of OHE in the word department this year. Nicely played, Tare.

And we will NOT talk about the fact that I’m over 63,000 words into it and only a third done the story. AHEM.

And I wrote over 3,000 words of The Invisible Mask, and hit 20K, which was very exciting! I consider the “opening” done, so I’m kind of thrilled about this.

Rewrote an old short story, Midnight Fear, which used to be just over 1,000 words, and now is just under that. Very pleased with the rewrite.

I also wrote that Silmarillion Awards Strangest Character presentation post poem, featuring Tom Bombadil and Puddleglum, which was 800 words.

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Other than that, I wrote another 1000-ish words on random things like my New Year’s poem, short story Hairdo Havoc, The Silver Forest, and other Kedran’s Wood series jots, including Book 4… even though I’m still on Book 2. Yeah, don’t ask. #TareAndChessClubProblems

PLOTTING THAT I DID…

I did various plotting on various books, including The Silver Forest and The Invisible Mask, but mostly for The Other Half of Everything and the Kedran’s Wood series (mostly KW2), and for The Library in the Stars.

The biggest news was The Library in the Stars exploding into being, out of a bunch of different previous ideas, and being plotted and started.

I also had some exciting “clicking” moments for Once Upon a November, The Siren and the Skyship, and my short story Hairdo Havoc.

And new ideas happened too, of course. My Fairy Godmother Muse has been quite busy.

I suppose I should be grateful I only have half a dozen new “official” ones, if I include The Library in the Stars? (Which did actually combine some ideas, so maybe I’m at about the same number? I don’t know, my Fairy Godmother Muse confuses me so much these days.)

• Painting Rainbows (Underground Rainbow spinoff involving heists & the painter artist Kevin Johnson)
• From That Shadowy Land (inspired by various ballads and featuring Faeries)
• The Treasure of A Distant Storm (futuristic London short story)
• Wintertale (I don’t even know. Thankfully, it’s a short story)
• (And an untitled novel to be written sometime farrr in the future, involving fantasy tropes)

#FairyGodmotherMuseProblems #PlotBunnyProblems

OTHER RANDOM WRITING FACTS…

• Best writing day: 7,589 words (Nov 27.)
• Completed my 7th NaNo!
• Was an ML on my own for the first time
• Was interviewed!
• Got Scrivener (a.k.a. the Preciousss <3)
• Started a book review blog and managed to write 61 posts on that during the year!
• Additionally*, I wrote 76 posts on this blog
• Yes, that is 137 posts total this last year
• Somebody save me from myself

*I typed that as “addictionally” the first time. Oh the irony.

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And that’s about it! Overall, not a bad year (Fairy Godmother Muse and her antics notwithstanding). ^_^

I don’t know what this new year of 2017 will hold for me in the writing arena (and I’m avoiding making plans, since historically plans and I do not mix well together — they tend to laugh at me, attack, knock me out, steal my everything, and leave me looking very foolish) but I’m looking forward to finding out! 🙂

How was your year of writing in 2016? Do you have problems with a Fairy Godmother Muse of your own? Any exciting writerly pursuits in the last year? Tell me all!

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P.S. I’m thinking of going on a blog/internet break for two or three weeks… so I may disappear for a bit and come back around the end of January, give or take. Just a heads-up. Have a great month, everyone! ❤