D-Day is coming!

Okay, so a couple weeks ago I signed up for D-Day, an event sponsored by my friends at the Chicago Writers Association. The "D" is for deadline, and the concept behind the event is that you, as a writer, set a goal to complete a writing project that you've either been thinking about doing or have already started but have stalled out on and need a jump start.

This, I thought, is just the kick in the ass that I needed. For too long I'd been dragging my feet on that next novel. Always, it seemed, there was something else more pressing. So there were stops and starts and the stops were always longer than the starts.

If I couldn't get my own rear in gear, perhaps a little peer pressure would do the trick.

And it would be cool to tell you that it has worked, that the keyboard is steaming from all the activity. But that would be fiction, which is what I'm supposed to be writing instead of this, which is non-fiction. 

Since I signed up for D-day, I haven't so much as opened the Word document that one day is supposed to be that next novel.

Today this reality hit extra hard because it is June 12, which is two short months before August 12, the day designated as D-Day, the day on which I am supposed to stand with my fellow writers and celebrate in the glory of having accomplished what I set out to do.

So what does that mean? It means that in the next 60 days, the novel that is in my head has to start coming out. My D-Day goal was 20,000 words. That's 10,000 words for each of the next two months. Or 333 words for each of the next 60 days.

I can do it. No, scratch that.

I've got to do it. No, scratch that.

I'll do it. There, that's it.

And this blog entry is 333 words exactly to this period. That's my daily measuring stick.

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By the way, today I posted to ChicagoWrites my interview with Alice Maggio, who wears hats as librarian, online columnist, book club moderator and blogger. Please do take a look at Alice's many adventures in Chicagoland. And then if you haven't done so already, check out my interviews with thriller writer J.A. Konrath and with Sharon Woodhouse, founder of Chicago's own Lake Claremont Press.