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Reading Rampage

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Anyone who knows me well knows that I love to read. For the past 3 years, I’ve been keeping track of how much I’ve been reading and here are the results:

2011: 10,551 pages

2012: 12,213 pages

2013: 10,000 pages

Total: 32,764 pages

Overall, not bad. I haven’t always been this obsessive about reading, I’ve mostly been a sporadic reader but a few things contributed to what I called my Reading Rampage.

One factor was that I was buying a lot of books and meaning to read them at some point but never seemed to get around to it. I figured, I bought all these books, I might as well read them.

Another thing was that I was working at an elementary school as a teaching assistant and the teacher I was working with would set aside about 10-15 minutes a day for the students to do silent reading and I joined in with them.

There was also the fact that I like to write. Some of you might be wondering how reading got me into writing so I’ll tell you that happened. When I was going to UVic, I took a creative writing class and one of my instructors said the following: the best writers are often the best readers. That’s something that really stuck with me and I’d always meant to read more but, again, never really seemed to get around to doing it.

The last contributing factor happened when my father passed away in 2007. He went through books like nobody I’d ever seen before. The day after he died, I started reading a book series that I knew he liked: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. That was my way of dealing with his death; I didn’t mourn his passing, I celebrated his love of reading. I never realized how much his reading influenced me until I started really making it a priority in my life.

One problem was, though, I didn’t really have any structure in my reading. I was still reading sporadically but I was doing it more often. As I went through a few books I was still buying more and it started to look like I was never going to catch up at the pace I was going.

How was I going to do it? It took me a couple of years to figure it out, but in the middle of November 2010, I started keeping a running total of the number of pages I was reading. Then I figured I should probably set a quota on the number of pages I should read.

The problem was, how much should I read a day? 10 pages? 100? I couldn’t really decide on a number so I set a monthly quote of 1000 pages per month. It seemed like a lofty goal but I was confident I could do it.

I managed to do it. From November 10, 2010 to November 10, 2011 I read exactly 12,000 pages.

I kept the same goal for 2012 and again managed to average 1,000 per month.

This year, however, I decided to dial it down and set a daily quota of at least 25 pages per day. Overall, I wanted to hit the 10,000 page mark for the year and while I fell behind last month, I managed to reach that goal.

As 2014 approaches, I think it’s time to stop the Reading Rampage. Not entirely, but just pulling back and not forcing myself to try and read every day. The problem with daily, monthly or yearly quotas is that if you miss 1 day, it sets you back significantly and you’re left scrambling to try and catch up. It usually happens toward the end of the year and I find myself trying to read 300 pages in the last 2 or 3 days. It can be done, but it’s stressful.

While I love to read, the biggest drawback is that it’s very time-consuming. I’m a busy man and I find it really difficult to dedicate 2-3 hours a day to reading so I’m no longer going to try and do it every day. I’ll still keep track of how much I’m reading but I’m not going to set any goals to reach.

So ends the Reading Rampage, I’m sure my dad would be proud. I’m not sure if I put up anywhere near the numbers he did but I’m pretty proud of myself.

Untitled Dragon Story: Chapter 1

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(Note: this story does have a title, I’m not willing to reveal it just yet)

A long time ago, in a cave just outside of a village known as Ofa, a soon-to-be mother dragon named Gladys tended to her egg.

Her husband, Thadeus, came home and checked on his wife and their soon-to-be offspring. As the expected parents looked down into the nest, the egg started to move ever so slightly.

“It’s starting, Gladys!” Thadeus exclaimed.

This was their first child, which made it all the more exciting for the couple. They watched as cracks started to appear near the top of the egg and it wasn’t long before a tiny set of claws poked their way through the opening.

“Come on! Come on out, baby!” Gladys said to the egg, encouragingly.

Another set of claws appeared as the youngster worked its way out of its shell. This was followed by the nose and soon the whole head was out.

The dragon couple watched breathlessly as more of their newborn appeared. After a short time of clawing and biting, the dragon child emerged fully from its egg. The mother and father caressed the newborn with their noses.

“It’s a boy!” Gladys exclaimed.

“Everything seems normal,” said Thaddy, as he was commonly known.

Everything was normal. At least until the newborn dragon sneezed and a small stream of fire shot out of its tiny body.

“Where,” Gladys began to ask, “did that fire come from, exactly?”

“Well Gladdy, my dear” Thaddy replied, “I may be mistaken, but I believe it came from his rear end!”

NaNoWriMo 2013

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Last year I took part in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) but didn’t finish the story that I started. There were many reasons for me not reaching the 50,000 word target; a big part of it is deadlines. We don’t get along, deadlines and I. Especially when it comes to creative projects.

Another thing was that I was basing my story on an already existing one by a different author. Not only that, but it was an extremely long one. The story was Varney the Vampire and if you’ve ever read the entire thing, congratulate yourself on finishing what it possibly the longest book ever written. Reading the whole 3,000 page story and trying to write 50,000 words in a month proved to be a little too much for me.

The daily quota of writing 1,600 words was okay at first, but after about a week of that I found myself struggling to create content. I had no idea where the story was going and I need a clearer sense of direction when I’m writing. As a result of this lack of direction, I was changing story elements constantly. I changed character names 3 or 4 times and it became difficult to keep track of all the changes I was making. I also wasn’t satisfied with the story that I was coming up with. Most of it was filler; stuff that I was throwing in just to try and meet the daily quote. That’s not my kind of writing at all. Not only in terms of the structure, but the style. This story really didn’t feel like me.

I can write 1,600 words a day but it’s not going to make a lot of sense. The mandate of the NaNoWriMo project is just to write, it doesn’t have to be a finished piece at the end but that’s not the way I write. Once I write something, I generally don’t make a lot of changes to it later. I write sequentially and when I’m writing part of a story, it’s nearly fully finished soon after I start it. That doesn’t really work for the type of writing required to complete a 50,000 word draft in a month.

There was also the fact that it needed to be an original story, not one that I had already worked on. I have dozens of story ideas, many of which I’ve already started on and some that I’m almost finished. I’d much rather try and finish a project that I started than try to come up with another new idea that ultimately goes nowhere.

It has literally gone nowhere. When December 1st came around, I stopped working on the story and haven’t touched it since. Someday I plan on re-writing and trying to salvage it, but for the time being I have my eye on other writing projects. Maybe I’ll finish it someday, maybe I won’t.

For these reasons, I’ll be participating in NaNoWriMo again this year… sort of. I’m going to do it on my terms.

First: it’s going to be a story that I started brainstorming a couple of years ago and actually did start writing. Not much was completed, basically half a page or so already existed.

Second: I started re-writing it a couple of weeks ago. I didn’t wait until November 1st to start. Right now I’m about 3 chapters and 800 words into it.

Third: I’m not going to set any word total or daily quota. Whatever I end up with is whatever I end up with. Basically, I’m starting it off as a short story. If it gets to be longer, it’ll become a novella. If I do get up to the 50,000 word range then it will become a novel.

Fourth: I’m not giving myself until the end of November. If I’m still writing it into the new year, so be it. It’ll get done when it gets done.

I really think this is the way to go for me. Do it on my own terms and at my own pace. If I go a few days or weeks without writing anything, that’s fine by me. I’m busy with work and other things in my life, I really don’t have a lot of time to spare and I’m not going to go out of my way to make time for this. Whenever I feel like writing, I’ll write. I have no expectations right now and I’ll wait to see where it takes me.

In my next post I’ll present the first chapter as a sneak preview. This is going to be much more my style of writing and I’m looking forward to finishing it, whenever that may be.