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Are you a prolific writer?

SFG75

SFG75

Well-Known Member
I would be curious to learn from our writers how much work they churn out in a given month or year. Advice such as "write often, publish little" that I have heard from others. So, how prolific is too prolific and how prolific are you?;)

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well i blog and I push myself to write at least two a day - its hard but if you don't you wont get your readers will you?
 
I write whenever I find the time to do so which can run from several days in a row a few hours a day to once a week for a half-hour. When the mood is right I can churn out 1000 words in an hour. I have two novels done, several others started and in between I'll write a short story here or there. Prolific? Not by some standards, but I hold my own ;) .
 
I keep my blog updated regularly with short posts; I guess I'm reasonably prolific there. I usually write more formal nonfiction slowly. My prose fiction writing is glacial. My major work in progress is a fantasy epic poem, and to call my pace 'glacial' would be to flatter it: 'geologic' might be more accurate.
 
I began writing newspaper articles and newsletter stories about 10 years ago. Six years ago I began my first novel. I now have four published novels.

At the moment, I am polishing and preparing two more completed novels for submission. I also have three other works in progress.

I like to work on at least two projects at a time. My husband and son blame it on my adult ADD. Heh!
 
I probably write anywhere between 200k and 500k a year. Only about 50k - 100k of that being in "final draft" form.
 
In my head I am incredibly prolific. My problem is getting it from mind to paper (or screen).

As for too prolific I don't really see how you can be. It is one of those personal things: what is right for you is right for you. As art is the most individualistic form of expression then what others do seems a poor way to judge what you should be doing. You can only measure yourself by your own standards and know whether you are slacking off or churning out rubbish by pushing too hard.
 
Between two and three hours a day, when I can - which is probably four days a week. It's not easy to say how many words, as I tend to read through what I wrote the last time and edit, before carrying on, rather like some journalists. At a guess I can write, rewrite and edit one 100,000 page book a year.
 
Prolific? Writer? I am a creeping snail with a busted jet engine atop my heavy shell. That's my speed rate. Now for the writing: Real-world writers tell me that my writing blows. Now I stand alone in the cold blackness. Not a dim gleam of hope anywhere. Only the nightmares of rejection letters, and the pain from the Carpal Tunnel Syndrome I developed in my fruitless efforts to get published. Yeah right!

I shall never be a Nobel Prize laureate in literature, bummer. :whistling:


PS. I am currently going through some serious insomnia, so please excuse my odd sounding reply. Thanks.
 
I've never completed a damb thing, so I definitely not a prolific writer. I have finally started writing a space opera that's been in my head for many years, but the market for space operas in very limited so my chances for seeing it on display at Barnes & Noble are very slim. I will submit it when completed none the less.

I ~wish~ I was a prolific writer. So many things keep getting in the way, mostly my job which requires my presence six days a week now, (I hate goldbrickers!). Wanna know what I found to motivate me to write more? I listen to Paperback Writer by the Beatles.
 
That depends.

My long book, 160,000+ words, took three years.

My Science Fiction, about 80,000 words, took six weeks to write, and several more to edit. Some of the time was in research.

I can usually write a few thousand words per sit-down. The hard part is sitting down and getting started.

I have a free text reader. I have that read my last writing, so I can get back into it. That gets me fired up and started.
 
Far from it! Just the essays and poetry that can be seen up in my blog here, and a number of reviews posted elsewhere. But I am giving NaNoWriMo a shot this year to see if I can kick start the engine for real. 22,000 words so far. Not deathless prose, but mine anyway.
 
Speech Recognition

Getting stuff on to paper (or into type) fast enough is a problem. I am a two-finger typist, so a few years ago I looked for another way. I tried the Dragon speech recognition program. I spent hours reading set pieces of text aloud from the manual so it could recognise my voice. Back then my PC could just about cope - I had to wait for a for the conversion to catch up. The result was generally very good, I marveled at the technology. The problem was that when I started to dictate my own stuff there were so many minor mistakes to correct that I spent more time editing them than I would have spent typing them in the first place. So I gave up, and reverted to two finger typing.

For first drafts I write in pocket size notebooks. It means I can write on buses, planes and trains, almost anywhere. I try to get it into the PC as soon as I can, and because I alter it then, as I type, that version becomes the first edit. When the novel is finished I use a laptop and do a complete rewrite. I then put the novel aside and start another (often it's already started. I get so bored with the editing!). About three months later I edit the novel again (the first novel, of course). Then I edit it again, and again. Finally I send it off and get rejections. And rejections...

I am not saying this is THE way to do it, just that this is the way that I do it. I know there are writers who can sit and write from start to finish without looking back or editing as they go. I can't do that. I write more like a journalist, correcting and editing as I go.
 
I write mostly short stories, so when i sit down to write - usually in spurts - I can churn out 10 pages an jhour when things are clicking. What usually happens i will get sidtracked before i can find the groove, so i may only finish a couple of pages each hour...I try to sit down to write a couple of hors 5 days a week.

I am not very prolific.
 
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