Five Pages a Day

I was reading a book recently from an author I like and he had a little video at the end of the book (e-book) that talked about his writing process.  He turns out long books, but they're action-packed, and quite detailed in the way you know comes from doing lots of research on obscure topics before writing about them.

I was surprised to hear he found he writes the best when he only writes about five pages per day.  That's it.  He said writing more in a day didn't create worthwhile or good content because it seemed he was working hard to produce volume, not quality.  So he sticks to writing a little each day, but focuses on doing it well.

I'd like to write a book someday.  I realize to do this you need a topic or a story.  And in today's market, even to get the approval of friends or family, it's got to be darned good.  And I'm not there yet.  But someday, when I have the gripping, thrilling, exciting, fun story with the crazy unexpected twist ending, I'm going to be ready to plot it all out...at five pages a day.

I like the idea of not cramming to get it all written so quickly that you lose sight of quality on a page by page level.  I also need to do a lot of work on my writing first, which is one of the reasons I started this blog as my experience in technical writing and talking to my children isn't exactly the best practice for writing fiction.

On the other hand, I could write one of those "board books" for children that have only about ten pages in the whole book.  I'd be done in two days.  Pity I don't draw as well since that seems to be a requirement for those types of books.

The Big Boy Update: Climbing back in.  He's figured out not only how to get back into the "contraption" (a bouncing toy with toys all around it) and the "scoot-about" (the saucer.)  Last night he tried for twenty minutes to get out of the scoot-about, only to climb back in when my husband rescued him.  Today he got into the contraption, which was on the lowest height for my daughter, and jumped up and down vigorously while aggressively whacking and attacking the enticement toys all around it.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  She's found her feet.  She likes to hold them and look at them and play with them.  She's better at catching the left foot with the left hand than any other combination.  Today, I put her in clothes without socks so she could see her feet.  She wasn't interested, so I thought it was a one time thing.  Twice later, when I was changing her, she did it again.  It appears being naked helps her notice her feet.  So she hung around naked tonight for a while investigating her toes and flapping her arms.

Right-size Countdown:  11.3 pounds to go