Genesis Earth

Summer goals revision

So, it’s getting towards the end of the summer, I’m having a TON of awesome experiences out here in Jordan, I’ve practically abandoned the Quark writing group (for the time being…I’ll be back…), and I’m only 16,000 words into Genesis Earth, which I was hoping to finish before the end of the summer. My daily routine has definitely been flipped upside down since the end of winter semester, and I need to figure out how what I’m going to do with regards to my writing…

So last week I was in Israel/Palestine, traveling with the BYU study abroad group, seeing all the sites and everything, when my flash drive crashed. Real bad. This friend of mine on the trip who’s a data recovery expert downloaded all this software and tried to help, but the drive was not only completely wiped out, it was completely unreadable. Most of my stuff was backed up in various places, but I lost, among other things, my summer journal (NOOOOO!!!!!) and my working copy of The Wormhole Paradigm.

However, this was exactly what I needed to get things moving in the right direction…

Some things to work on

I just recently moved in to a homestay, where I’ll be living with an Arab family until the end of the summer. You can read about it on my other blog. It’s nice to have a routine now, because I have time in the evenings to go on my computer and write.

The Wormhole Paradigm (I’m going to change that horrible title…ugh) is currently at 16,000 words, and I’m finally caught up to where I was by the end of English 318. There is still a LOT to work on, though, and a lot of this applies to The Lost Colony (gotta change that title too) as well. Here are some of my thoughts:

Update from Jordan

So I haven’t updated this blog, and the blog stats show a steadily declining readership. But don’t worry, even though I’m halfway across the world, I’m still writing…

Down to the last stretch

…in more ways than one. School is coming to a close, I’m making my final preparations for the study abroad, and this novel is only one or two chapters from completion (in rough draft form, that is. Very rough draft form). Now that I’m almost finished with this draft of the novel, I’m able to see a number of things I’ve learned about writing from the experience…

I’m starting to get to the really cool parts…

…in both of my stories. In The Lost Colony, Leila, who’s a native of this somewhat primitive civilization that doesn’t understand spacefaring, stows away on a shuttle and experiences space for the first time. Pretty cool! And in The Wormhole Paradigm, tension builds as they set off towards the planet, anticipating that the aliens will intercept them at any time. When they don’t, Mike almost has a nervous breakdown–but that’s about 1,500 pages down the road. Altogether, I wrote 3,000 words tonight. Holy Cow!

There was also a Quark writing meeting today, and it really surprised me…

3,000 words tonight

Just another daily update on my writing progress:

Recap on tonight, and something strange

1,000 words, split between the two stories I’m working on, but something happened that made me a little uneasy…

4,000 words in two days, and the universal law of awkwardness

Yep. 4,000 words in two days–2,100 yesterday for the wormhole story, and 1,900 today for The Lost Colony. Both stories are progressing very, very well. It’s a lot of fun to write in them both.

90,000+ words, 300+ pages, and I’m going to bed

That’s just about it. I did some revision of The Wormhole Paradigm in between classes, and that was actually quite satisfying. After homework, wrote in The Lost Colony for a while, and it’s coming, slowly and surely. I’m tired and starting to get loopy, so I had to end in the middle of a scene, but other than that it went well. Now, must rest…tomorrow…blegh.