WIP challenge - goal-setting (get ready, get set...)

[littlebutfierce]

OK! We've now confirmed the participants (thanks all!) & sorted out the buddy groups.

I've changed the comm layout to include the track option on individual posts, in case people do want to have a post for their buddy group to comment w/daily progress reports. I'm thinking maybe like the weekend to-do list posts in do_it -- here's an example -- where people post as a method of accountability, & to get commiseration & encouragement from other people.

Anyone want to talk about goals? I know we all said what our goals were in our sign-ups, but maybe your goal has changed? Or maybe you want to talk about it a bit more in depth. I'll put mine in a comment.

I'll try to find time before work Monday morning to put up an official "yay, let's go!" starting post. :)

Comments

My goal

[littlebutfierce]

The fic I want to finish this month is a crossover between Ookiku Furikabutte & Princess Nine -- so basically a v. baseball-centric fic! I need to finish re-watching P9 in order to reacquaint myself w/the characters (I haven't watched this series in years!).

I've got about half of the fic drafted already, but I'm not sure it won't just take me the rest of the month (or longer ;_; ) to get to the finish line. Especially b/c I really do need to brush up on canon. & there's so much other anime I want to watch too right now...

If I end up surprising myself & finishing the fic way early (doubtful!), I'd like to write at least one more square for mundane_bingo. The minimum word count for that challenge is 250 words only, & the squares seem to suggest mostly ficlets to me anyway (& I lean more towards short fic in general), so that should be do-able even if I don't have a lot of time left.

Re: My goal

[intothisshadow]

Sorry, not sure how I managed to reply to you instead of leaving a reply to the OP!

[mystiri_1]

I have a 'long' fic for Final Fantasy VII that I want to write at least 2,500 words on. Now, technically, this shouldn't be difficult - I know that I can sit down and write double that in a couple of hours if I'm motivated, but getting motivated for longer fics if hard for me because the finish line is so much further off. It's also a bit different as the pairing is Aeris/Sephiroth, and I mostly write yaoi or gen fics for this fandom.

After transferring a lot of my work to a new flash drive, I have added to my goal, as well. I created a separate WIP folder for stories that are half-done/incomplete, and was kind of horrified by the number there are. So I also want to finish two of those. These will probably be either Final Fantasy VII or Kingdom Hearts, as that is what I have the most of.

[pyrasaur]

Long fics can be hard to keep pushing through, I hear that. Are you planning to post the longfic for public reading?

[mystiri_1]

I don't usually post unfinished works, partly because I am one of those people who cringes over spelling/grammar mistakes - especially if they're my own. I've been debating whether to treat this as a multi-chapter story, and post it that way, but I'm leery of the fact that that almost makes it easier to push it aside as being at a point of completion, even if the whole thing isn't done. I would rather leave it as a massive WIP than do that, as I have already procrastinated enough. I think I might do better to create a 'WIP' filter instead. If so, then it would probably open to this group and those on my access list who are interested. I kind of like that idea - I think it would be useful as a way to keep track of things in this challenge.

[pyrasaur]

Yeah, there are definitely pros and cons. Last time I wrote a longfic, I posted each chapter as it was written. While it sucked to reread and find inconsistancies and typos, I found it helped to know that people had started reading the story and would be disappointed if they never got to read the end.

Sounds like opening the fic up to a small group would be a good compromise, though! I'm familiar with FFVII, I'd read.

[mystiri_1]

I've added you to the filter, if you want to read. I figure I'll post what I've got so far as my starting point later today.

[pyrasaur]

Awesome, thanks for the add.

[littlebutfierce]

Heh, I have a WIP folder too, & yes, the number of documents kinda makes me wanna cry. (Although to be fair, a lot of them are bits of writing I rattled off for my daily 750 Words & that I realized I wanted to work on & keep, so... yay? But also eeek!)

Go you for trying a pairing that's more challenging for you, especially in a long fic.

[mystiri_1]

The sad part is, these are only those fics which I had stored on the flash drive - those fics which I grabbed with the intention of working on them somewhere other than at home. I'm too scared to look through my actual documents folder.

This is actually one of the pairings that used to make me go 'WTF?', but one of my f-list writes them, and writes them well, so I wanted to give it a shot. It's funny how these things start to make sense if you think about them long enough.

[pyrasaur]

My sign-up goal was a plotbunny for Mother 3, in which a seemingly clueless character actually knew the big plot twist all along. I've been thinking about this fandom conspiracy theory for ages, it's just a matter of arranging it into typed words.

But I'm trying to get my novel ready for e-publishing soon, so I'll probably just focus on the current copyediting instead of starting a fic project. The novel is a high fantasy medical drama with all non-human characters. Needs lots of attention to editing because I want it to be clearly meant for an adult audience (as opposed to the standard fantasy publishing attitude that "all non-human characters" = "talking animal story for kids").

[littlebutfierce]

Hee, the novel sounds intriguing!

Just to clarify--will you still be participating in the buddy system part of the challenge, etc.?

[pyrasaur]

Thanks!

Yes, even if I don't end up writing a fic myself, I'm still willing and able to discuss writing, cheerlead, concrit or whatever for my group.

[littlebutfierce]

Cool, thanks for being willing to do that despite your change of plans.

[notunbroken]

My goal is to write a fic from start to finish during NaNoWriMo. I originally wasn't sure if I would need the entire 50,000 words to tell the story, but as I've been outlining I've decided that I'm gonna go ahead and make that my goal.

I started dreaming up this fic over a year ago, now. At that point, I was in grad school and really didn't have a whole lot of time to devote to creative writing (I did, however, get some practice writing a quality product in a short amount of time when I had to research for and write my entire thesis in the span of five weeks). I started writing out some random scenes and setting up a detailed outline...then, of course, my hard drive died without a recent backup.

I couldn't just give this plot up after it's been building in my mind for so long, so I chose to start over. And the timing was pretty much perfect for deciding to write it during NaNo. I also promised myself that I would do my first NaNo when I finished school, so that has worked out well, too.

The fic itself is going to be long (obviously) and angsty. It's a Battlestar Galactica AU, breaking off from the early fourth season. I'll keep the description vague, just in case, but it basically involves one of the main characters discovering that s/he is a cylon. This is a pretty popular premise within the fandom, but I'm doing an unique spin on it. Plus, most of the other fics of this type that I've read have been short, and I think a longer story is necessary to cover the amount of fallout that would happen.

Wow, seems like this comment managed to turn into a novel of its own!

[littlebutfierce]

All the people writing longfic make me go *_* b/c that's so beyond what I can do. I'm not being self-deprecatory -- much! -- I just think my ideas & the way I work best as a writer are best suited for short fic, so I admire those who can do other things & have the stamina for longfic!

I'm sorry about your hard drive dying & you losing the beginnings of that fic, though, ack!! Good for you for deciding to give it another go!

[intothisshadow]

Mine is a Stargate Atlantis, Todd the Wraith/OFC smut fanfic that I've been writing since December. Health problems, fear of writing outside my usual fandom and sheer procrastination have gotten in the way in a big way. I set out to write pure smut/PWP but I'm 1500 words in so far and no smut in sight and I think I'm wrestling with that too, that maybe there's more story there than just a fun romp in the hay so to speak.

My goal still is to add 1000 new (is that a word even?) words by the end of November (more would be lovely, but 1000 is the minimum). I've been thinking about how to achieve that - maybe set a weekly requirement of 250 new words? Because I should be able to get that - it's always the starting that's difficult; I can usually get out a lot of words as long as I can make myself start and then force myself to stay at it for a while until it starts not to feel like pulling teeth.

I'm also trying to get out of habit of editing while I write - I can get stuck on a paragraph or a sentence for an hour trying to decide on the best way to say what I want to say.

[littlebutfierce]

Hahaha, I've had PWPs started that suddenly got plot in them. It's such a surprise to me when it happens, heh.

Starting can be the difficult point for me, too--I've now mostly gotten in the habit of giving myself permission to write crap, particularly at the beginning of a writing session. Like I'm giving my brain permission to warm up. It feels kinda good to allow myself to feel okay about writing an entire page of crap that can be discarded!