So, I made it through the Voretober challenge of 31 days of stories. Big thanks to everyone who read my stories and is still reading them. I learned a lot about pacing myself and getting work done on time doing this, and if anyone else wants to try something like this (we are in Nano-November after all) here's how I managed to write a story each day of the month.


1) Started each story with a character.


Character > Plot, meaning that a story with compelling characters and interactions between them can often compensate for cheesy or corny plot. That isn't to say good plotting and description isn't important, but it's usually the character that hooks the reader. I've found that to also be true for writing--even when doing a story I didn't feel particularly strong for, I was able to focus on the characters and what I wanted to see them do.

2) Budget time

I tried to follow a schedule best as I could. Everyone has their own creative process and there's no one right way to work, but I spent two hours after work each day eating and relaxing, and then worked until bedtime. Knowing how much time I had to write gave me an idea how long my stories needed to be. I also didn't play any video games except on certain days and at certain times (Sunday night was my designated Destiny time).

3) Set a deadline.

I had a rule: get a story finished and uploaded before bed. Undoubtedly, this led to my stories being lower quality than they could have been and in sore need of revision (more on that later) but it did serve the purpose of focusing my work and ensuring I would always get something done so I could move onto the next day.

4) Don't look back

After finishing each day and uploading my story, I stopped thinking about it beyond recycling the setting and characters for other prompts. While I did check comments/favs for feedback, I used it for the next story I was writing instead of going back to an older one.

5) Do what works now

I didn't do a lot of outlining, but I did think ahead about what I was writing. However, because of points 2) and 3) I didn't have a lot of time to debate whether or not what I was writing was "good" or would get a lot of comments and favs. My priority was getting a story, any story down, and I told myself that, no matter how my current story did, I would be writing another one immediately afterwards.

I do have to admit that I did plan out the multi-part story that ended on the 31st to an extent by picking the relevant prompts and writing the sections around them, so I guess the advice would be better served as: do what works now, the way you know it will work.

Now onto the future

So, as mentioned above, my fast-paced writing schedule left little time for revision and editing, so I'll be working on putting together the Sam/Danny segments into a proper story which may or may not contain some of the other shorts. It's a setting and cast I've done a lot of fleshing out over the last month and I'd like to use it some more.