Last time I talked about word-counts, I mentioned that I would only now post on important milestones.

Does 100k count as a milestone?

I think so!

So, yeah me, I wrote 100 000 words!

Just to recap : on december 2nd (2009), I started this novel, setting myself an objective that was writing a novel of 100k words in a year (6 months for writing, 6 months for revision).

Almost 4 months later, I reached the 100k barrier and I’ve still have some way to go before I got to write “the end”.

In order to attain 100k in the final version, I have to write like 10% more for each revision. At the present time, I expect the novel to be around 120k at the end of the first draft, so I have enough meat to do do 2 full revisions and still end up over 100k.

If you want an idea of what 100k feels like :

• New Spring by R. Jordan was 120k long, 330 pages in hardback.
• The Gathering Storm (last WOT) was a little over 300k, 780 pages in hardback.
• Harry potter 1 to 3 : 77k, 85k, 107k
• Young Adults (YA) books are usually 50k

So, if I can get out something that weights like “New Spring”, that’s long enough to be interesting, while being readable.

Right now, I have no idea about when the first draft will be finished, as I still haven’t found out how I’m going to connect where I am now with the ending I have in my head. Hopefully, the chapter I’m currently writing (Chapter 35) will start to build that bridge. What worries me though, is that normally, in act 3, the protagonist takes the fight to the antagonist. The way things are going right now, the protagonist is learning how to fight and the antagonist is the one bringing the fight to her. I’ll see if that works this way.

Now, my next milestone (where I’m allowed to talk about numbers) will be “the end”, since I don’t plan to go to 200 or even 100. So, I’ll use the current post to say it once more : I’m at 100k, yeah me!