Author: PirateAba

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Blog #9 – Writing and Suffering – The Wandering Inn

I’ve mentioned I stream while writing. I do it for motivation, because if one person is watching me, I tend to try harder. Not many authors do it; in fact, I’ve only heard of one other person actually writing on stream.

That’s because it’s not very engaging, at least compared to someone playing a game or doing commentary or chilling half-nude in a hot-tub. Well, I’d argue that it’s a lot of staring in the hot tub streams and writing streams, but you get the point.

In this case, I’m flagging 10.03 Y, the fourth chapter of Volume 10, for a blog post and actually linking you to the stream because it’s a good example. Of what, you may ask? It’s not me asking for more people to watch. But it’s the proof I can point to of, well…just check the runtime of the video.

12 hours is apparently the most Youtube will save of a livestream. If memory serves, it was closer to 13 hours when I stopped, and yes, it does include two breaks I had, one for lunch and one for a phone call, I believe.

Aside from that? I worked nonstop on the chapter, which is 37,000 words long, and I believe I wrote it in one sitting. It SHOULD have been a shorter, 1-day chapter. It was not.

You may have questions like ‘why did you do this’, and my answer was that I knew the ending and I wanted to write it. I also had ONE tablespoon of instant coffee that day, having weaned myself off caffeine, so it was super effective.

…I couldn’t sleep even after collapsing from the writing. But the energy the coffee gave me didn’t get the chapter written. There are a few factors why it was so long:

-I had lots of energy from my month-long break.

-I knew the chapter’s details. Not all of them, but I knew the ending, and so it was ready to go.

-I got into the zone thanks to coffee, but mostly, I was on a roll.

If factors like these combine, and I don’t even need to have all the energy in the world, I can get into the mental equivalent of what athletes call a flow state or ‘the zone’. That’s when your mind kicks up and you work harder. You don’t stop, and the writing kicks up a bit in quality.

I honestly don’t think I was purely in flow state for this chapter. This was probably partly that; I can’t imagine working 13 hours in a row normally. It’s usually closer to 6-8 hours, which again, is nonstop. But part of it is just refusing to stop when I’m trying to get to my end spot, which is always the end of a chapter.

This was not a smart move for my personal energy, or tendons, or maybe even the quality of writing. Let’s be clear: this isn’t me raising the bar. I don’t think writing for thirteen hours gets better writing. I would say, rather, this is the bar. It’s indicative of where I am if I push myself to create a single chapter in one day.

I can do better. If I’d given myself time, had a month or even a week to workshop this one chapter, you bet it would be even more gritty and triumphant, have more details, fascinating anatomy, and scene. But I’m also writing as a web serialist, and for my job, putting out regular chapters, this is probably the best example of me going as close to full tilt as you can get.

I don’t know if you actually want to check out the stream, but if you put it on fast forwards you can probably read it at decent speed? I assume a lot of readers who watch do something like that so they can read the current chapter as it’s coming out.

Anyways, the point is that I wish I could see other authors streaming. Not just streaming—I wish Terry Pratchett or authors I admire had webcams, sat down, typed out work, and ran commentary on why they were writing this or talked as they wrote.

I had the idea to do that myself, but I’m not nearly so eloquent speaking, and I don’t want to show my face. But as a young author, I wanted to know…what writing looks like. Each person is different, and you can talk about the craft all day, but seeing someone do it would be great. I’m not there yet, but if other authors stream, I’d love it to be a thing.

We could write in hot tubs. Again, that’s a thing streaming platforms did for a while. Along with gambling and…you know what? Authors don’t need to stream. The world of streaming services is weird and grungy, and I’ve observed it and decided it’s fascinating, but somewhat like mold.

Don’t put it in your mouth. That’s all from me! Chapter will be out shortly.

—pirateaba

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