Goal: Six stories or story-length novel snippets.

Accomplishment:

One 8,000 word story based on a premise that I've been kicking around for years. I thought it was going to be a novel, and it just wasn't. Now I'm not sure it's even a short story. Paul tells me it's good but I'm afraid it's kind of boring.

One 6,000 word story that came from a premise that hit me while having drinks and super-garlicky shrimp on the porch at Duke's, on the evening after the Locus Awards. A couple of weeks later, on July 4, the story was begging, pleading, demanding to be written. So I spent much of the fourth and fifth of July being antisocial while other people blew stuff up. This is the story that I think is the best in terms of pacing and emotional effect.

One 3,000 word story where I went out for a walk until I had a premise and then came back and started writing. Once I finished writing, I actually knew what the story was. So I think I have to go back and redo it from the beginning before I have a real first draft.

One 1,000 word story that I deliberately wanted to be a flash piece. I started writing without even a premise and kind of liked where it ended up, but I think it needs more sensory detail to really pop.

One 5,000 word story based on a premise that I have been kicking around forever. I think it's not a bad start, but the ending is really abrupt and it needs to be more rigorously thought-out in science fictional terms.

One bunch of words, notes, names, concepts, and associated other things that are closely related to being a story, but are not, in fact, a story. This is another idea that I've been kicking around for a long time, and each week of weeks 2-6 I would start out the week intending to write this story, and then at some point I would realize it just wasn't happening and I would write something else instead.

So, chief lesson learned: if the story isn't happening, it isn't happening. If a story isn't happening, but it might happen in the future, a week is probably not long enough to let it ferment before checking to see if it is ready to happen now. It's like making pickles. It'll never work if you keep opening the crock to check on its progress!

Other lesson learned: the constant attempt to write a short story, any short story, results in more short stories being written. Which seems kind of blindingly obvious, but there it is.

Thanks everyone for your support in this write-a-thon.