Slow progress is still progress

Robin Sloan launched his Kickstarter project on August 26 with 4,500 words. By November 18, 84 days later, he had a stack of boxes filled with the printed book.

Now, granted, Annabel Scheme is a 30,000-word novella and not the huge beast I’m working on. (I passed 40,000 words the other night.) On the other hand, 84 days from start to finish is pretty impressive. I’ve been working on this book for more than a year now — beginning in October 2008, when I first sat down and wrote the three paragraphs that now open what’s currently the book’s third chapter.

In the year and two months since I started working on this project, I’ve seen a lot of changes. I climbed out of unemployment and got myself a real job. My wife and I moved apartments into the heart of the city. I took up bicycling. I started volunteering at a literacy center. The story I’m writing has changed, too. I’ve fleshed out the background of the characters more, figured out how to better control pacing, and discovered what the story is really about.

In a way I’m jealous of how fast Robin Sloan went from start to finish. At the same time, though, I’ve so thoroughly enjoyed writing the first 40,000 words of my book that I’m very much looking forward to finding out what happens in the next 40,000. And if current trends continue, the next 40,000 after that as well.