Is there such a thing as writing too fast?
That occurred to me this week as I really hit my stride on my latest novel, “Twin Moons Rising.“
I am zooming through this one, which feels great, especially since I hope to submit it for Pitch Wars next month.
I’ve been writing an average of 1000 words a day these last couple of months, but lately I’ve been reaching as high as 2000 – NaNoWriMo levels of writing output.
In June, I shifted my writing time to first thing in the morning. I usually get up at about 5:30 AM to write, when my mind is fresh and I haven’t tackled any of my work issues yet.
This week, I’m trying something else new – changing my writing venue and removing as many distractions as I can.
Starting yesterday, I closed out all my other applications on my Mac, made myself a cup of hot tea, got out my writing chocolate (that’s totally a thing), and went to it.
The results over the first couple of days are encouraging. My daily word count almost doubled, so I should finish the first draft of this novel faster. And I’m more engaged in the story as I spend longer, more intense stretches writing in my fictional world.
On the other hand, I wonder if I’m shortchanging myself somewhere else. My subconscious writer brain often comes up with new ideas in my downtime – new directions to take the story, new ideas for my characters. If I move through the story faster, am I missing out on some of these ideas? Is my writing a little more pedestrian, a little less rich because of it?
Or will those same ideas present themselves with more regularity because I’m more “in it”?
I really don’t know.
What I do know is that I love being so immersed in my fictional world that I almost forget the real world exists for an hour. I love seeing tasting touching hearing feeling it better, and I would hope that comes through to my readers.
It’s a grand writing experiment – and you know how I love those.
So for now, it’s full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes.
Put on your seatbelts – it’s gonna be a bumpy ride!
To my writing friends, how do you balance writing speed and your subconscious writer mind?
You need both bursts and breaks to allow your writing to perculate or age to the perfect blend of word flow and detail development while allowing for the time to review and intensify your senses on the plot, characters, and story scenarios and connections to build suspense and relationships as the sweet words make the sum of the parts much better than expected.
Maybe with shorter sentences, punctuation, and formatting so it gets published, but that can be fixed in editing. And have good coffee and background music in the morning write times. Use a bit of wine or quality enhancement treats for evening writing. Just use quantities that do not overwhelm your mind. Or your bladder.