Day 196: Finished blocking volume 3!

I normally don’t write on Sundays, but I woke up early and maybe since I didn’t get much done yesterday—or all last week, really—I decided to do a little work.

I got some editing/writing done on The Spinster Spy. It’s almost entirely rewriting since the original was very rough, and so I tried dictating the scene rather than typing. However, after about 15 minutes of dictation, I found I had forgotten a lot of stuff and had to redo it almost completely, so I just typed it instead.

I know that dictation is mostly just to get stuff down, and from what I’ve read on a dictation Facebook group, many writers will go through it again later to add things like description, etc.

However, this is supposed to be editing a scene I’d already laid down, so I think dictation isn’t going to work here, since I don’t want to have to do yet another round of intensive editing on a scene that’s supposed to be revised. I fully realize my resistance is partly because of my loathing for more self-editing than I absolutely have to do, but it was also frustrating to have dictated for 15 minutes and then realize I’d forgotten some important things and had taken the scene in a different direction than I should have, and that I’d need to completely redo what I’d just dictated.

I am going to have to practice more with dictation, I think, so that I can lay down a cleaner rough draft. The dictation examples I’ve seen from other writers are much cleaner rough drafts than what I do, which makes for more tedious self-editing for me. Many of the writers in that dictation Facebook group emphasize that it takes a lot of practice, so I think I just need to put in the time and be patient.

I’m pretty excited, too—in looking at what else needs to be blocked for volume 3, I realized I only have two more scenes! I’ll be done blocking either today or tomorrow and I’ll be able to start writing the rough draft.

***

I finished blocking volume 3!

Unfortunately, I’ve also started getting a headache. I think I’ll go take a nap.

Blocking: time spent: 1 hour, 11 minutes (volume 3)

Editing: Time spent: 34 minutes (Spinster Spy)

Writing: Time spent: 0 (although I did a lot of writing when editing Spinster Spy, since the original draft had been with dictation)

Writing: Total number of words: 0

Writing: Average speed: 0

Time spent doing other writing-related business: 8 minutes

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