In a comment on an earlier post, Jeff Meyerson reminded me that I haven't posted any writing updates for a while, so the first day of the month seems like a good time to resume. Unfortunately, today was my first day off from writing in a couple of weeks, so I have no pages to report. I can mention, though, that June was my most productive month ever, with 707 pages written. That's the first time I've hit the 700 mark after coming close a couple of times in the past. Then I followed that up with exactly 500 pages in July. For the year I'm 12 pages off a 6000-page pace, so I've got a good shot at achieving that. I've hit 6000 twice before and would like to again. Mainly, though, I just want to get a million words done again. If I do that this year and next year, that'll make 10 years in a row. Has anybody ever written a million words a year for 10 straight years? I don't know, but it seems likely Walter B. Gibson did when he was writing two Shadow novels a month and a bunch of other stuff besides. Frederick Faust might have. It can't have been done too many times, though.
Of course, all this talk about pages and words doesn't mean anything unless the work is good. I think I'm doing a pretty good job most of the time, but the final decision on that is up to somebody other than me.
Tomorrow it's back to work.
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6 comments:
James you are the last of the pulp writers and it's a shame that the pulp era ended around the middle 1950's and I mean that in a good way.
I would agree about Walter Gibson and Faust writing a million words for 10 years. Maybe H.Bedford Jones also. But in addition you do a daily blog and run the WesternPulps discussion group. Amazing.
Impressive. Most impressive. You are a marvel.
Walker,
Yeah, HB-J is a good candidate to have written that much. I forgot about him. Good company to be in, if I can do it.
Thanks, Scott.
Wow. I can't even imagine the discipline it takes to write a million words once, let alone year after year, especially at the level of quality you achieve.
Thanks for the update.
Jeff M.
I did much better this summer than usual but nearly this good.
Good grief, James, I had no idea.
I added up my total yesterday, because I knew I had taken too much time off for publishing, and the YTD total was a pathetic 47,500 words. A handful of short stories and a slow slog on a couple of novels.
I used to be in awe of August Dereleth, who as a regional/horror writer produced about a quarter-million words a year. No longer.
Keep it up!
John
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