Saved by the Hammer

The end of the month rush has grown into a bad habit. It keeps returning like a dark dream one just can’t quite remember. Every cabinet or bookcase that needs leveling, every conceptual sketch of a new project in wood, every website maintenance that procrastination has kept at bay, it all pulls back to break ones resolve, but the goal must be met. All else must be abandoned. The monthly ritual is made all the more pathetic considering my new word count goal is far from significant.

A trellis project just started is on hold at least until tomorrow; August first. Do I buy new pavers? They don’t reach all the way along the raspberry patch. Or do I cannibalize those long concrete border stones from other parts of the yard, replacing the end to end pavers and repositioning them with the side to side pavers? Would they reach the other end even then? I best stay inside lest my mind be distracted, lost in the its virtual simulations of exactly how I am to get it, and the many other adventures an old run down house presents, done.

A week ago I asked myself; Is this it? Is this where I give up on my meager goals? Am I ever going to get another book out? I could blame my birthday, a bad time of year for me, but whatever the case I hadn’t written for days and had but a week to accomplish the near entirety of my new word goal for July.

I have two full books in draft form completed. I had put aside the sequel to Chuck Hammer while I wrote those two until this month. I pulled out the old notebooks on the sequel and set to work.

Yeee Haaa! The words flowed like water. “Loyalty’s Fertile Soil” the next in the Fortunes of Chuck Hammer Series is bulldozing along. I came to this last day of the month with no worries that the goal will be reached and more.

My problem right now is keeping up with the extensive list of characters as I race ahead; their descriptions, positions and place in the storyline. I will have to do some back tracking come tomorrow, to make sure I have all my ducks in a row.

I had a moment of regret this weekend. A gentleman of my acquaintance, a man who enjoyed the first Chuck Hammer asked me where the next one was. Ouch. It has been a long time since the first book. I must take solace however in the fact that over the last year I have completed two books and the sequel is steaming along. My work practices are coming in line with what it will take to be a writer. I have hit a pace that will allow me to put out two, or one very large book, every year. When I get five books published, and have the next books in the two series I am creating underway, it will be time to do some serious marketing.

I also have some more short stories forming in my immense brain. In the Lunar Colony in which the next Chuck Hammer is set, there is a story telling ritual every new moon. One of those stories is in the sequel. I am planning to create a supplemental, to the second Chuck Hammer, of short stories; the supposed results of these communal gatherings.

“Loyalty’s Fertile Soil” may grow to 200,000 words (or even more). I may put the first half out as an e-book before the second half is finished.

I also found a helpful way to keep the writing flowing. Even when the words come easy I get hung up at times. I go off and read for about fifteen minutes, check the refrigerator and sit back down and the blockage is gone.

Of course you need good reading. You read to improve your own writing. The free e-book market doesn’t always provide the highest quality, actually seldom does, of writing. Fortunately I found a source of good writing. Not without imperfections but the writing is quite good and exemplifies what the written word can do that the screen can’t.

E. R Mason is the author. I am on book two of three of the adventures of an Adrian Tarn. The third book is very reasonably priced. There’s a marketing strategy for you. The first two books are free and the third is so reasonably priced that nothing can stop you from purchasing it.