by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
In general, things are going well with my first novel. The biggest thing I’m worried about at the moment is word count. That is really at the forefront of my mind. I’m really worried that instead of about 100,000 words, I could be somewhere in the 140,000 to 160,000 range.
I’m worried that I’m going to suffer from the worst elements of Stieg Larsson’s writing where, specifically, in the case of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo the first about 135 pages are dull as hell because it’s all exposition and not a lot goes on.
But if you do a direct comparison between those first 135 pages of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and my novel’s first act, things are not one-to-one because I have a lot sex going on that should — hopefully — cause people to at least be willing to read until the murder that sets off the second act.
In that respect, my novel is structured a lot like The Girl Who Played With Fire. That book sold a lot of copies, so it’s at least possible I might follow suit.
Meanwhile, I have three or four “backup” stories I want to buckle down and start to develop. I just really struggle to implement the type of personal structure necessary to get such things done.
And that doesn’t begin to address how I need to actually consume media sometimes instead of just always only produce it.
I hope to start to do just that sooner rather than later because I know I’m not going to live forever and I need to have some balance in my life.
