Writing Report November 21, 2025

Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New year’s will be a bit less stressful for me this year since I finished my first draft of my latest project this week, technically a Western since it occurs in Nevada in the 1890s but actually more of a historical novel since there are few horses, no cowboys, and only one Native American in it.

Actually, my files says it’s the second draft but it’s more like draft 1.5.  I started out telling the story in straight, linear chronological fashion but out of necessity the tale requires my protagonist to require a HUGE information dump right at the beginning while introducing ten other characters at the same time, two of whom are only needed at the very beginning of the story.

That draft stalled out at about 15,000 words.  I was deep into the book before my plot even kicked into gear and the sheer avalanche of needed details would put most readers to sleep.

So I set the book aside for several months until I figured out the correct angle of attack:  A court case in which my protagonist is the defendant, through which I could tell the story in disjointed flashback ala pulp fiction, allowing me to jump straight to the good stuff and fill in the info dump in small driblets.

That draft clocked in at 63,000 words which is an enormous relief to me; most of my other first drafts hit 100-120,000 words and it’s like pulling teeth to try to trim them down to under 90,000 (which is long for a mainstream novel but not excessively long).

The other novels I’ve written tend to be large, sprawling stories with dozens of characters and multiple points of view.

This one is tightly focused on my protagonist and offers a far smaller supporting cast than my other stories.

I’ve got a few minor details to attend to before I can put the project aside, minor stuff like correcting a few earlier passages so they align with later plot developments, change character names, etc.

Happy Holidays, y’all!

© Buzz Dixon