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Today has been a long day, during which I worked two part time jobs on what is supposed to be my day off. In that respect, I’m just like everybody else trying to make my way in the world and pay the bills. The reason that I am writing or actually voice dictating this blog right now is because I just realized I was given break. (And should be thankful for my good fortune.)Several months ago I started listening to the Self Publishing Podcast with Sean Platt, David Wright, and Johnny B. Truant. I think that their ideas on writing are awesome because they center around hard work. That is a concept I can definitely get behind. Their message came at a time when I was struggling and discouraged. I can never thank them enough for the inspiration they provided.Right now I’m standing at a part time job and reading Yesterday’s Gone on my phone. Sure, there are interruptions when I have to put the phone down and watch for trouble, but all in all this story has made the night go by much faster. I suddenly realized that I was almost dreading the end of my shift, because that will mean I have to stop reading and drive home.Bummer.I am at forty percent of Yesterday’s Gone: Season One. Things are getting complicated for the characters in this book and I am growing attached to them.

A writer must write first and do everything else to maintain his or her career as an author after this most important task is complete. Great! I like that! However, this also explains why my emails stack up, my web page goes dormant for weeks or months at a time, and I disappear from social media. (Retweets barely count, much to my dismay.)January and February of 2016 have been full of writing. I finished Weapons of Earth, which means I finished the Chronicles of Kin Roland Trilogy. All that remains is one final revision, editing with Pro Writing Aid software, and sending the manuscript to my professional editor (BZHercules for this project). On a side note, I also paid for an additional round of professional proof reading of Enemy of Man and Son of Orlan by BZ Hercules to complement the excellent edits of Samantha LaFantasie (who did a great job for a great price). In a perfect world, I would again pay for both of these editors, but I only have a budget for one this time around.I am two thirds of the way through my current draft of Dragon Land, which will complete the Lost Dragonslayer trilogy. Along the way, I also worked out story beats for Fight Like A Werewolf, book two in the Police Paranormal series. (Die Like A Man is definitely a stand alone novel, but I really like the characters and feel like they have a few more quests to complete.)The last thing I am doing today before getting back to creating new words is to rework the book description for Die Like A Man. It should be live on Amazon soon. THE NEW BOOK DESCRIPTION
Die Like A Man was written and re-written over the course of ten years. Now I am on a quest for reviews and would like to thank in advance anyone who will consider leaving some honest feedback, not just for me, but for other readers. Thanks, Scott Moon ​Behind the badge is an assassin. Behind the assassin is a monster with scars to hell and back. Alistair Rohan is not a modern day hero, he is a man on a mission — intolerant of bullies, liars, and predatory abusers of the weak. The difference for this hard charging vigilante lies in the reason his father put him in a crucible that should have killed him. No one should have been able to endure the torture, much less survive to become a police officer. It was as though his own father thought he was a demon that needed to be destroyed. In Rohan’s darkest days he was a contract killer and a human being without a conscience. Now he is in a different place with friends he cares about and a lot of questions to be answered.Can he face the truth? Why are the people he killed coming for him? Is there ever a chance for redemption, and if there isn’t, why should he try?Die Like A Man is full of dark action and supernatural thrills. There is a reason that Officer Alistair Rohan runs down his enemies with the grim determination of a preternatural monster.

I hope you read my earlier post today, because when I wrote it, I was basically making an excuse not to make my #3KADAY goal. Yes, all of that business-ish stuff needed to be done. And I had a lot of work to do for my second real job. And there is this strange and mysterious organization called a family that never gives up on me no matter how anoying I become. Life must come before art, but that important fact does not make it easier to keep the dream alive.There were so many things that went wrong today. I knew I was in trouble because I didn’t do the writing first as I had intended. It should have been okay because I found a long block of time that should have been just like writing first thing in the morning. About a half an hour ago I hit my 3k goal. Friday is the first day of my logging week, so it is a relief to get off to a good start. I hope that any goal you are pursuing this week is also going well.Dragon Land, the third and final book of the Lost Dragonslayer Trilogy, now stands at 51,500 words.​ I am having a blast!Just for fun, you might want to check out the free digital copy of Dragon Badge (Book 1 in the Lost Dragonslayer Trilogy.) Maybe, if you’re just crazy enough, you might even consider leaving a review. Only the bravest, most intelligent, and generally awesome readers have what it takes to write a book review!

This week has been good to my hands, more specifically the fingertips that get to feel the immediate satisfaction of generating stories via the keyboard. Wow, you might say, that is a weird way to put it. And you’re not wrong. I am a writer; words do funny things around me. What, you ask, is the point?I wrote an average of 2,644 words a day this week. My goal was #3KaDay, but I will take the 18,511 words that I completed on Dragon Land and be happy. (This total does not count blogs or other social media writing, it is strictly creative fiction I am talking about right now.)I firmly believe that it is impossible to ever become a fulltime writer without being able to produce in sufficient quantity. If I were building houses for a living, I would need to construct as many as possible. Writing is half art and half work ethic, if you ask me.Hard work doesn’t scare me, especially when it is this much fun.

What do you do after you finish the final draft of the final book in a science fiction series? Take a couple of days to work on your Urban Fantasy series, right? That is where I am at and let me tell you it feels great to be in a fresh project. Taking some time off from sci-fi is already paying huge dividends. For example, today I wrote over 4,500 words on Dragon Land.Mornings are for writing new words. Once I hit 3k a day, I start editing and revising finished drafts. Fridays are always my best writing days and today has been no exception. After easily exceeding my “new words” I started reviewing Weapons of Earth from start to finish for consistency of plot and story. When that is done, I will be using Pro Writing Aid and saving money for at least one professional editor.Today was has been a great day so far. I hope you are finding success wherever you are as well.

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Like many writers, I read Stephen King’s nonfiction book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. When I first learned that he wrote 3,000 words a day, everyday it seemed like a lot. Now, many years after reading his advice, it the ideal seems either daunting or totally doable, depending on the day. I work full time, and according to contract, that means forty two and a half hours before I am eligible to put in for overtime. I also work two side jobs.There are days when three thousands newly created words is more of a challenge.And what about editing? How do writers who are attempting to get consistent word counts everyday deal with writing. I don’t know about anyone else, but when I am editing a large project, it isn’t uncommon to go into negative word production (which is another King axiom; cut ten percent during the edit).​We will get to some methods of addressing that particular issue in a moment. For now, there are a few other word count productivity questions I want to throw out, because admit it, this is exciting stuff. #writinggeekShould I count blogging?Email?Social media?It might sound crazy to even worry about these details, but generating three thousand words a day is the same as writing 1,095,000 words a year.Pow!The Words I Track1) New words: these can include story summaries that will be expanded into regular narrative, outlines material, and story beats (for fans of the Self Publishing Podcast crew). Story building can be counted, but it isn’t wrong to forbid yourself from logging this category. I know a very good writer that will probably never finish a novel, but will have an entire universe created to the smallest detail — so writer beware.2) Blogging: I say count it, but set limits. Even though I awoke this mrning with ideas for several different blog articles (a rare occurrence) I am limiting myself to five hundred words. (Because I have a novel to finish, Hello Moon!)3) Email words: no, this is like an Olympic sprinter bragging about how she walked to the mail box every day — not something that will bring home a gold medal.4) Social Media: if the raw number of words spent on social media make a great novelist, then I am in trouble. This should probably be subtracted from the daily goal. (Look at me mom, I wrote eight thousand words on Facebook! Ah, no. There are so many reasons not to do this.)Summary: Today, I start adding the words I blog to my daily log. The reason is simple; I don’t blog consistently and it is something that can help aspiring novelists.Bonus: The best way to meet word count goals is to join, or start, an accountability group. Josh Hayes, Scott McGlasson, and Roy Upton have allowed me to be part of their word count team. So far, 2016 is looking to be a good year.Results: I have not made 3k a day, but I have done better than 1k so far.Here are some good books on writing productivity:2k to 10k (by  Rachel Aaron)5,000 Words Per Hour (by Chris Fox)Writing in Overdrive: Write Faster, Write Freely, Write Brilliantly (by Jim Denney)Also:During the last several months I have been extremely inspired and entertained by the Self Publishing Podcast of Sean Platt, David Wright, and Johnny B. Truant. Writers who are not afraid to work hard might give it a try.

What is happening in Cathy’s Town?Last night, at a ridiculously late hour, I read through my work-in-progress, which began as a largely seat-of-the-pants narrative. After about 6,000 words and some research on Nevada, Smith & Wesson revolvers (.44 caliber Russians…thanks for the idea, Elmore Leonard), and the Aleut people and Alaska) , I wrote a new opening scene that sets the entire story of fire!So far the Characters for Cathy’s Town: Piano Players, Gunslingers, and Widows include:-  a woman and a Russian Orthodox Priest priest fleeing from the Northwest to the East Coast with a major problem in Nevada, during 1880 plus or minus a few years,- her son that must find her, protect her, and admit that his father died in a gun battle with a rival family,- a piano player with a mysterious Civil War and Reconstruction history,- a young woman running a frontier empire with only her intelligence, courage, and desire to be the richest widow west of the Mississippi,- and some bad-ass Cossacks bent on revenge in the American WestI am enjoying the creative process on this project so much that it takes everything I have not to publish the book in blog posts as it is written. Fortunately, I learned the pitfalls of that method once before and will not publish until the story is a great as it can be and I have contracted a professional editor.​Merry Christmas!

Not a lot of time to share thoughts today. Raw Recruit, book one of the Legendary Austin Kirk is underway. I wrote about 6,500 words shortly after devising the concept and premise. That has all been filed for future reference and included as world building material and back story, but probably won’t be used. I am exploring the story and taking my time on this one. What I have written is fun and each draft version gives me new characters and insights into previously conceived characters. 

Last week I began to write a western and loved every inspired second of the process. There was a mixture of seat-of-the-pants writing and pre-planning stuff (beats, or at least that is what Platt, Truant, and Wright call it), and some research (on-the-fly as I went stuff). The project feels both ambitious and natural.So what is the problem?I am in the middle of several projects and awoke with feelings of dread and guilt that I was being irresponsible by constantly starting new things. I set a minimum amount of time that would be spent on the original project, not really expecting to have time for other stories.Happily, I was able to dig back into my western just before midnight. After a day of banging my head against a project that has tortured me for almost a year, the fresh and exciting story premise of Cathy’s Town was like a divine gift. I feel so much better now and happy writers sleep better, I hope. Chances are that in an hour or two I will wake up with some random idea and chew on it until I just get out of bed.My goal is to keep the first draft clean, and by clean I am in no way referring to sexual content. I have a tendency to move writing platforms. Scrivner’s the best! No, move it all into word. Hey, what about Google Docs. All right, let’s reformat for Scrivner.If all goes according to plan, I will write Cathy’s Town: Piano Players, Gunslingers, and Widows in Google Docs, with periodic back-up dumps into Scrivner for the next stage of the process. The first draft should be done without starting over twenty times.Wish me luck.

The Forgotten Prince by Josh HayesThis version of the Neverland stories combines all the things I love in fiction; scifi action with great characters and a bunch of surprises. I like the way Josh Hayes shows the cast of the original story in interesting new ways. Bella is my favorite, but Wendy and Pan have found themselves in roles that promise a lot of fireworks as the mystery of Neverland is explored.The first chapter sets the tone the book. Hayes uses suspense topped with action to begin his sketch of Hook. I knew I was going to be entertained as soon as I started reading the first scene. Without going into the specifics of the plot, I can say the world building is good. The more I learn about the place where Lt. John McNeal finds himself, the more I want to discover who or what created this alternate world.I can’t wait for book three in this series.

​THE BEST PART of starting a new project is running around with a new character having adventures like something out of an action movie. World building just happens this way. By day two of the project, I am waking up with ideas and scrambling to get them all down. There are many ways to do this, although none of them seem to really capture the magic of “morning imagination.” I have paper, a smart phone, and a computer. Still, the ideas come too fast when I wake up.

The middle of the night is a good time for story revelations, apparently. Getting back to sleep can be a chore. Last night I was able to hold a picture of void-centric aliens in my mind long enough that I believed I might remember the idea in the morning. Every science fiction tale needs a FTL (faster-that-light) mode of travel, and in the universe of Austin Kirk, that mode is void-centric aliens.Hint, these benevolent creatures are not our friends. They would have us believe the galaxy is a peace and they exist only to serve us.Yeah, right.I hope that you will find The Legendary Austin Kirk a rich and entertaining series. Writing it is a blast and I can’t wait to share.#TheLegendaryAustinKirkTwitter: @PayneAuthor ​​