TL;DR: I've gotten through over a month of writing posted here. I thought it might be worth reflecting and recapping again.

I've been working on this writing habit for just over a month. It seems to be a thing, now. I'm starting to think about what I want to do next. These exercises are like marathon training—and at some point, I want to try a proper marathon.

It's also occurred to me that doing fresh characters & settings every day—even if they're just over 300 words—might be harder than building momentum with an established story.

I'm thinking about sustainability. Over a decade ago, I did the 4am wake-up and butt-in-chair thing. That let me crank out a few thousand words before the day job on a regular basis. But, while I did finish a few books that way, I feel like I've fully burnt out that mechanism. The notion of writing a book that way again just seems like a nonstarter.

This drumbeat of a small habit feels more reliable than expecting to browbeat myself into a writing flow by sheer willpower.

Apropos of that, I'm finding it rewarding to review what I've managed to write lately:

  • "Koga's Cauldron" - the lemurs are back, but this time they cross over with the demigod AI setting that I've been toying with.

  • "Avery's Deployment" - another scene in the demigod AI setting, which I want to expand into at least a short story

  • "Yasir's Getaway" - I was thinking, what if a space ship is just a nicer place to live and not necessarily a means of travel?

  • "Ivo's Act" - the prompt summoned up an on stage performance for me, so I ran with it

  • "Vincent's Voyage" - the prompt suggested a misguided hoarder of needed wisdom, not sure I got there though

  • "Familiar Strangers" - the prompt got me thinking about someone shying away from asking someone on a date, but pandemic times got to me.

  • "Megachurch of the Shattered" - this one was about a religion I dreamed about a few weeks ago, which I might build into a longer story

  • "Roxy's Faceroll" - the prompt made me think about being productive despite burnout because they paycheck still needs to roll in

  • "Left on Read" - I want to work on writing more imperfect characters and their relationships, so this one kinda does that.

  • "Unheeded" - the prompt brought to mind a smug elder unwilling to hear new perspectives, which often leads to a disaster trope, so I went with it