Cooper West ponderings

The truth hurts

Mar 13, 2011 | Writing Process

In the interest of being more accountable to myself about my writing, I’ve started keeping track of my daily word count. I had to go back and estimate for January and February, although I’m fairly sure I came close to accurate for those months: 53,221 words written.

Now, that looks mighty impressive. I’m not ashamed by that number. But you do a rough divide by the number of days (59) and it comes out to a measly 902 words a day.

THIS WILL NOT DO.

I need to hit at least 2,000 words a day; but what I’m doing, I think, is writing 3,000 words one day and taking two or three days off, or writing 2,000 one day and writing >1000 for the next few days.

So, hello spreadsheet! I am going to track my daily totals in the interest of figuring out where/when I’m slacking (maybe there is a legit reason, like class days or days I spend doing mostly editing) and to know where I am, numbers-wise.

Let’s face facts: 1,000/day is 365,000 words a year, which is several mid-length novels and a ton of short stories. At 600,000+ words a year, I will soon have a good number of stories in my stable, which is my goal.

Which means: 2,000/day, period, every day. More is bonus; less is self-sabotage.

~

Sign up for the Cooper West Newsletter!

Sign up for the Cooper West Newsletter!

Add your name in order to receive irregular updates on releases!

You have Successfully Subscribed!