23,552

My word count is sailing along! I seriously thought about writing another 1500 words tonight just to say I'd reached the halfway point, but decided that doing that wasn't going to make the book any better in the end, and since I'm probably well ahead of most of the other people doing this (today's pace goal would be 13,336 words), I figured it was best to take some time off and not necessarily dry up every idea I had.

Pretty exciting weekend since over the past two days I wrote most of the ending. There's still one more scene left, one kind of character reveal, one bit of emotional tenor, before I'm at what I think is THE END, but I'm close. And knowing how it's all going to end will hopefully make the rest of the stuff in between easier to figure out.

I'm starting to narrow down songs from my writing playlist as I write, picking out the ones that are really working the best for what I need them to do so I can ultimately put together a soundtrack album to go with the book. This is usually a collection of 10-15 songs that had the biggest impact on the writing, and sometimes I'll share the list with anyone curious enough to hear the music that helped me put the book together, particularly while they read it. I think that would be kind of cool, but not many people ever take me up on it. My first REAL book, the first one I count as an actual book, was written to nothing but Bruce Hornsby. My cancer memoir was written to a mix of songs that fit the tone, which is also what's happened with this one. My book from this past summer, a ghost story, was written to Iron Maiden, and creepy Iron Maiden songs specifically. The book I did for last November? Didn't have a playlist. Maybe that's why it turned out so half-baked.