writing, revising, & FINISHING a short story entirely on streams | I ALMOST QUIT
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- Опубліковано 7 жов 2023
- The plan was simple: brainstorm, draft, revise, and edit a short story entirely on stream. My silly self thought it would take only two.......................(who knows why). Five streams later and I finally have a completed short story and a BOAT LOAD of lessons learned.
☟↓ QUESTIONS FOR YOU BELOOOOOW! ↓☟
D I S C U S S I O N Q U E S T I O N S :
Would you ever attempt something like this?
Have you ever started writing a story and then realized the idea itself needed way more contemplation??
If you're someone who enjoys using prompts, how often do you start/stop before you find the right pathway to take? Do you brainstorm a couple options and then choose? Try one story, dislike it, start brainstorming again? LET ME KNOW.
L I N K S M E N T I O N E D :
Check out the completed short AND a link to the Google Doc where I drafted everything (including the ridiculous brain dump poem) here: readwriteroam.blog/2023/10/08...
F I N D M E O N L I N E :
❤️ Instagram: / katecavanaughwrites
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🎥 E Q U I P M E N T U S E D & W H A T I W R I T E W I T H :
*My bullet journal / writing & travel notebook: amzn.to/2UkrF0r
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Scrivener for my word processing needs: www.literatureandlatte.com/sc...
*My "rainbow pens": amzn.to/2ZAiWIw
*My tiny camera with a gimbal for on-the-go and motion-lapse: amzn.to/2ZtQzzF
Aeon Timeline to create visual timelines for my stories: www.aeontimeline.com/
*these are affiliate links, where I receive a small commission that helps the channel! Feel free to ignore. :)
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Barrett Laurie and I do romance writing prompt streams on Fridays. Everyone in chat and on screen writes to the same prompts and we read them aloud. Super fun to see where everyone went with their stories and how varied our writing styles are.
OMG LAURA. This sounds so fun, I love it!! You and Barrett always have great ideas so it totally makes sense. I’ll try and join in on one when I get back.
Pinning so other people can find this!
These streams are fantastic. And OMG there is so much talent in our community! I highly recommend these streams.
The whole "writing a story and realizing the idea needs to simmer/be different" scenario is literally me almost every time I write!😂 In fact, the story I'm working on right now was a story that ran into that very issue this spring! I'd written a first draft I wasn't happy with, took some time away during Christmas, and by the time I was a third of the way through the next draft, I realized...this idea needed to be something else. And I wasn't in the right headspace to figure out what it needed to be. Several months passed, the story came back to the forefront of my mind, its central idea got better/stronger, and now, in about a week, I'll be drafting again! As frustrating as it can be, spending time away is sometimes the best thing you can do for stories that feel like they're not quite right. In that time away, I worked on short stories, and I think the work I did with those helped me get to this point with the bigger story where I could see more possibilities (as well as improve my craft).
Yes absolutely!! I love hearing that. It’s (usually) why I like working on multiple projects at once, so that the ones that need extra percolating can take their time bahaha. But sometimes we need a more official break to let our subconscious figure it out. So glad you were able to come back to your story and start drafting again so soon, ahhhhh!!
Back in the late 90s I had the idea, wrote a couple of pages, and then gave it up as a fail. A few years ago, I overplotted my NaNoWriMo idea and lost all interest, and then decided that I was just going to give it a miss this year. Then, on day 20, while I was driving to work, I remembered that old idea.
I got 50K in eleven days. It didn't even feel hard in the way that NaNo usually does. It was like my subconscious had been working on it, figuring it out, and then when it had the chance it just flowed out.
(I still need to go back and revise, so I'm not sure how coherent it actually turned out being. But at least it was fun.)
Honestly, I read the story and loved it! There were a couple of lines that REALLY hit for me, with great description and consistent tone. I know this was a struggle and I know it’s not your favorite currently, but wanted to say that I see your skill shining here regardless!
I am cackling at your video editing skills with the clown snippets! I love your writing experiment videos. To come up with all these ambitious ideas and then execute them...I could never! Hats off to you!
This may be my favorite of your experiments yet! Thank you for being so transparent about the process and the outcome! Very cool. And I would LOVE to do the experiment you mentioned where a number of writers work off the same cards and see how similar the themes might be while the plots could differ widely. What a fun idea! Please make it a reality!!! 🙏
Ahhh, thank you! It was a really great journey.
I'm not sure if you saw LauraNettles comment, but I'd recommend checking out her channel!! She and Barrett Laurie do something like that every week. I'm pumped to join next time. :) (And maybe I'll do my own, one-off version of it randomly!)
Not me thinking she had three hands in the left side of the thumbnail 😂😂😂
LOOOOOL. Gonna start adding hands just for you now bahaha
See if I can get four.
I loved your story! I’m really impressed you did it all on streams. Yes, I’ve definitely come up with ideas and then realized they needed to simmer a little bit more before writing them! It depends on the idea, but I like to sit with my ideas for awhile.
Doing a writing prompt and having everyone on the stream do it sounds like so much fun! I can really resonate with this video. Last year for Nano I had an idea and because of only having a month to get ready I felt real pressure to get it developed and outlined before November. The more I worked on it though the worse the idea seemed to get. I struggled and of course the pressure to have it done by a “deadline” made it worse. Finally about a week and a half before Nano I sat down and outlined another idea and that one came easily. So I abandoned the first idea completely. This year I sat down towards the end of September and looked back over that original idea and all the notes I made and was like “Huh….this isn’t nearly as awful as I remember!” So I’m trying it again this year 😅. So far it’s been easier. I do have another fully outlined story ready to go if I need it, and that is helping take the pressure off. That’s what always gets me. If I feel pressured to write something….even if it’s something I like….my brain goes into self sabotage mode and refuses to give the creative ideas I need!
Just got home from night duty. I'm looking forward to going on your website and studying your writing process. Since I'm a perfectionist who questions every word (and hardly ever gets anywhere with my stories), I'm sure I can learn from you! 😺
Completely unrelated to the experiment, but that red dress looks *Brilliant* on you!
My partner will often walk in on me grinning or crying or raging to a completely empty room. If I'm happy then I'm "plotting" if I'm deep in the feels then I'm "marinating". Either way, it's so important to give yourself the emotional space needed to develop a story. Epiphanies can come overnight or over the course of years. It's a hard lesson to learn that sometimes you just need time to sit in it.
You arrived to a perfect conclusion: The idea has to matter to you. And most ideas that matter stick around our mind and continue reminding us they exist until we write them. It's much easier to write an idea like this than pick something at random. Next time you do a livestream event like this please announce it more because I've love to join. :)
Absolutely I will! And YES. The sticky quality of an idea is SO important.
Dying that after that intro, the Nine of Cups jumped out in reverse position which represents reconsidering how to reach your goals and not pushing too hard 😂😂
Lololol clearly the message was NOT received. 😂😂😂
It usually takes me at least two spins on a prompt to get the idea where I like it, and I've definitely needed to back up on an idea and let it sit for a while to actually be able to do it justice. This seemed so fun! I can't wait to read the piece.
hey kate you are a huge inspiration to me
Your vlog is inspiring and edifying to the level I’m at now. I’ve wanted to integrate this type of video with my writing experience, but I’ve battled those demeaning internal voices that weaken my resolve. After watching this episode, I actually quieted the noise and got some work done. Thanks!
I love when you share your brainstorming process like this! Sometimes I get it in my head that I'm somehow "doing it wrong", but your early notes look so much like mine do. It really helps to demystify a big part of writing that we don't usually get to see because, you know, spoilers lol
I'm so glad!!!
I've been doing a monthly short story challenge - my friends gave me 12 x 3 categories in December (story, object, character) then at the start of each month I pick one of each category blind to write the story. My target is 1500 words within the month, but I've not been too harsh on myself if I roll into the next month a little. One month I had the picks horror story in a terraforming biodome, garden gnome, and a hammer. So the hammer and the horror went well together, but fitting a garden gnome on a planet was a little more challenging. I've had a lot of fun with them though, and will definitely repeat the challenge next year too
What a lovely Sunday surprise! Can't wait to see your vlogs of the writers' retreat. Jessica dropped some hints in her live stream, cast a few crumbs on the water. LOL It sounds like you have a fantastic time!!! Now give yourself time to unwind. Are you in Tennessee now? or home? Just nosy. Love you!
I’m in Kentucky, headed to Nashville in a few hours!! :) it was SO MUCH fun. I have tooons of footage to sort through and can’t wait to relive it bahaha. LOVE!!
I will forever envy your ability to have fantastic looking nails. They are always on point!
Omg thank you. The beauty of picking them off and then instantly reapplying 😂
Hey Kate, thanks for sharing your unique writing experiment. I think it's important for writers to remember that not all ideas come fully formed and sometimes they do need to simmer in our minds before they're ready to be put on paper. I definitely agree with your observation on the importance of giving an idea enough time to develop and mature before jumping into the writing process. Still, you ended up with a compelling short story by pushing through the frustration. I'm excited to read your story on your website, and I appreciate your transparency in the writing process. ^_^
Awww thanks so much!! Yes, a super important lesson to learn (and relearn, lolol). 💙
Kate, That color blouse/dress is gorgeous on you! 💜☺️
Thank youuuu, I love a good red!
I use WordTune to edit my pages. It does the same thing as what you were using Grammerly for and it also has a rewrite option that gives me options to change sentences. I have had the same idea for a book since 2019 and it finally came together as a full book idea last month and I am so excited. However, I am also getting overwhelmed even though I have a partial outline. Why do I do this to myself! 😭
I love writing but I highly doubt that I will ever get into it. Regardless, I find your videos soothing in some way. ˆˆ
I started writing a short script that I got the idea for it from a discarded script from an NYC Shorts because it wouldn't fit into page count. I outlined it, which never works for NY screenplays, and when I got to the actual writing I got stuck. I think I really need to take a writing session and just focus on that and really find where my issue is and fix it.
I remember trying a write a story every single day for the whole of '17. There were days the same prompt made me end up with nearly a dozen story ideas, and there were days I stretched one prompt over several days as I got stuck on it. :}
Oooooh that sounds like such a fun year-long experiment!! Thanks for sharing your experience, it makes sense that some days would be easier or more fruitful than others!! Just have to remind ourselves of that when we’re experiencing a day (or week or month) when the opposite is true bahahah.
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I need to know what oracle cards you use!
I miss the drink & write videos. Maybe we can do one during a community stream?
Yes definitely!! I’ve thought about doing them and maybe Preptober & NaNo is the perfect time to bring them back. :)
You look so good in red
Aww thank you!!
Check out " The Last Draft: A Novelist's Guide to Revision" by Sandra Schofield, it will answer most would -be writers' questions on re-drafts. One example is: it's better to use index cards then a computer program etc... it's much easier using scene cards etc....Many other great ideas in this book, like: Scene title tag lines on a beat sheet etc.... Story Grid by Shawn Coyne and Steve Pressfield is very good too, works well with Scofields ideas on it. .etc..
Ahhh, thank you John for the recommendations!! Those sound like exactly what I'm looking for. I've put Schofield's book on hold at my library and it should be in soon! :)
@@KateCavanaugh Your Welcome - When your finished reading it, make cards of each method she has in there to remember everything its packed with info. She got a lot of ideas from other sources I recognized - very practical craft book.
Fun experiment. Will read the story :)
Edit: It clearly isn't refined, but it's nice. I'm sure it's going to be great with some reworking.
Ahhh, thanks for reading!! :) Maybe I'll revisit some day after some more percolating (and without forcing it all on stream bahaha).
@@KateCavanaugh You're welcome. See you ❤️
On which platform do you do the writing sprints?
I'll be on Twitch regularly starting tomorrow! :) Usually I save UA-cam writing sprints for random events and more special occasions.
That’s amazing! looking forward !
Where does Kate stream? I can't find it?
I’ll be over on Twitch when I get back home! Should be on katecavanaughwrites :)
It’s on Twitch or privately with people through Patreon (any tier including the $1 one).
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