Milestone

I've reached 70,000 words!!! This was always the personal milestone for me. My book is no where near finished yet, but I will come on to that in a minute and before you say it, now that I am writing the book, I am not concerned with the word count, the book will be as long as it needs to be. When I was considering writing this book, I also did a ton of research, because I really didn't know what was involved in the process i.e. once I had written the story, what was the next step.

The key thing that stuck in my mind was that generally, a publisher would not consider any manuscript from a first time author that was less than 70,000 words or over 120,000 words in length. There are obviously exceptions (if your story is good enough, it is good enough), but this is what really stuck with me. I thought to myself, "If I could just get over that 70,000 word limit I will be a happy man." Today I did just that.

This book might never see the light of day, it might be considered the worst bit of literature of all time but at least it will not be dismissed because it is too short.

Having said that, I am now experiencing my own dilema, or Meerenese knot as Mr Martin what say. I have reached a point in the story where a big event has happened, the majority of the major characters are dealing with this and it will build towards a conclusion. However, there is also a another strong thread that culminates in a battle. I had planned to include it in this book as part of a thrilling conclusion and tying up all the loose ends, however, the more I think about it, the more I am inclined to push it into book 2 (yes there will be a sequel). I could then concentrate on developing one of the characters involved in the battle. The only problem that this presents is how the battle will take place in book 2 given the ending I have planned with the other thread. I guess I will just carry on writing and see how the story fares. Maybe that will give me a better idea and I can ascertain from the pace of the story whether it needs the massive battle at the end.