(vol 2) Chapter 07: “To catch a breath”

2015 WORD COUNT = 9403 words

Its two months into 2015 and things are going well. This time last year I was just getting my head around blogging and trying to work out how I was going to make my mark on the world. It was a topsy-turvy year with a lot of stopping, starting, stopping and backtracking.

I’m feeling better about everything this year. My confidence is growing, my writing is improving (I’ve been told) and I’m more focused and determined with what I want to accomplish before Dec 31^st.

THE EPISODIC FANTASY THING

I’m only two episodes into FRACTURED DAWN but I’m feeling really good about it as a project. I think it’s going to help me side step that fear I have of tackling something bigger. With the episodic, 1500 word a fortnight structure, it gives me a little space between episodes to think about where I want my draft to go next. Whether it’s expanding a scene past its bare bone version, changing out characters that seem excess or just creating an extra scene to fill in gaps, I can take it slow and build the story deeper as I go.

I’ve got a wider story planned and I’d love to keep going with it for a long time; like an ongoing soap in short story form. Who knows what will happen down the line? As long as you people keep reading it I’ll keep writing it. And, hopefully I can get enough momentum on the project to perhaps bring the fortnight releases down to weekly.

FLASH! A-AH

It’s been another good weekend of Flash Fiction results. Scratch that; it’s been awesome.

After some kind words by judge Deborah Foy for CHRIS AND MIKE vs THE LESSER-SPOTTED DRAGON it was over to Flash! Friday where I picked up First Runner-Up for OXYGEN, the tale of an astronaut who accepts his depleting air supply means he’ll never leave the moon alive. I’m extremely grateful for some very, very nice comments by my fellow participants.

As if that wasn’t enough, my entry for Angry Hourglass titled CLOSING TIME picked up First place. That’s my third win of the year and I’m more than over the moon with joy.

You can read all three of my entries here.

FOUR DIGITS FOR THE WIN

And finally there was a fantastic coming together with some fellow FlashDogs on Sunday.

I’ve struggled recently to find time on the weekends to get stuck into the various contests and read/comment on other author’s stories. I can’t tell you how bad I’ve felt seeing people leave kind words for my own writings and not giving anything back.

That changed when I started to see rumblings on Saturday that the posting quota for last Fridays contest had broken 900. This got people excited and so I joked, saying that I hadn’t left any comments yet and that we should aim for 1000.

I awoke on Sunday determined to give back to the Flash community and read others work. When I opened the site my competitive streak perked up upon seeing the comment count was at 969. That meant I only needed to leave a minimum 31 comments. That wouldn’t be a problem, would it? My fantastic wife and my extremely well behaved son gave my some space Sunday afternoon and I set to work.

I tweeted a few updates every now and then and other FlashDogs responded. I began to feel cheered on, lapping up the great comradery, as we as a group closed in. Others were commenting too and, together, we raced towards that 1000 finish line.

When Rebekah posted that we’d succeeded it felt like an earth shattering, Guinness Record kind of moment. I wanted to reach through cyber space and High-Five all the others.

And that’s it; a great week for my writing. Normal service will resume next week as a whole slew of blog post ideas came to me on my journey home from work.

If you haven’t had a chance to start reading FRACTURED DAWN then what are you waiting for; head here now. It’s awesome (I know, I’m biased).

And don’t forget, if you fancy exercising that wonderful writing muscle of yours then why not head over to the various Flash Fiction contest on offer, see what spills from your mind onto the page. Who knows, you might even make some friends too.

See you in seven.