Post #114  March 5 2018

“How Many Pages Should I Write Today?”

Every writer faces the same question when he or she sits down at the computer in the morning: how many pages, how many words, should I write today?

This is basically a matter of scheduling.  For writers of novels and non-fiction books, it goes without saying that there’s no way you can do the entire work in a day or a week, probably not even in a month. You have to divide it up into chunks, mainly because you’ve got other things to do with your life along with writing. 

Case in point:  I’m currently working on a series of science fiction novels called The Farpool Stories.  I anticipate that when the initial draft of a novel is done, it will come in at somewhere around 250 pages, when formatted for Smashwords.com.  Each page runs on average about 500 words, so we’re talking about 125,000 words in total.  Now, how to divide that up....

I’m doing 3-5 pages a day.  That doesn’t sound like much. But it leaves me with time for other tasks and projects.  Writing 5 pages a day takes me about 3-4 hours, depending.  But it’s 25 pages a week.  Divide 250 pages by 25 pages and you get 10 weeks, about four to five months.  At the rate I have chosen, I can do a draft of a Farpool book in five months.  Plus I can work on other things and have a life.

Could I write more?  Of course I could.  But you should choose a rate that is comfortable and sustainable over a long period, since it’s unlikely you can finish a novel-length project in a few weeks.  There are some writers who bat out a draft in a single marathon session of a month but I’m not one of them.  I take longer and take my time and try to do the thing right from the beginning. 

One the most important aspects of this writing process for me, when engaged in a lengthy work, is “staying in the story”, mentally.  I find that a daily regimen like I described above is a great way to do that.  Even away from my desk, I find my feverish brain cogitating on the next scene, the next sentence.  Sometimes ideas for snatches of dialogue or plot variations will come to me when I’m working out, mowing the lawn, eating dinner, watching TV.  I want that. 

Every writer approaches this differently. 

I’m also a detailed outliner and planner, when it comes to writing a novel, or writing anything.  I’ve covered some of this in earlier blog posts, but I work from the beginning to build a fairly detailed outline, with character sketches and setting and background details readily at hand for the actual writing.  Sometimes my outlines and sketches are detailed enough to be lifted and pasted into the novel text as is, or with little change.  That makes life easier, as long as it advances the story.  The story is everything.  I’m even been including an Appendix of some of this material at the end of The Farpool Stories, for readers who just can’t get enough detail on my imaginary world and its people.

That’s a little peek behind the curtains at the logistics or the mechanics of daily writing life.  I plan to do more of this sort of thing again. 

My next post comes on March 12.

See you next week.

Phil B