NovelEmber 2025

Table of Contents

The Goal

I want to make as much progress as possible on the initial draft of the first Kingslayer novel.
  As of the beginning of November, it has a total of 5614 words, and I aim to reach 60000 16000 words by the end of the month.

The Mood

The Progress

Week 1 - Preparation

I wrapped up OC-tober 2025 and got some organizational stuff done that might get in the way. So, the challenge started properly on the evening of Saturday, November 8.

Week 2 - Warming Up

I alternated between writing new scenes and translating those from the English draft that I had not yet transferred to the German one. The latter changed slightly as I rewrote them. Also, I spent time preparing for WorldEmber which will focus on the same story. One such preparation was the mood board above. Finally, now that I had a sample of my writing speed, I adapted the word count goal to be more realistic.
 
DayOld CountNew CountProgress
Nov 85614 5872 258
Nov 95872 6833 961
Nov 106833 6833 0
Nov 116833 7728 895
Nov 127728 7728 0
Nov 137728 7846 118
Nov 147846 8308 462

Week 3

I mostly wrote during the weekend and around the middle of the week when we had a holiday over here. Social life took priority during the other days. I got helpful input on this project from my friend, but I also got distracted by the urge to draw a silly meme and by practicing with an art medium that might become a favorite of mine.
 
DayOld CountNew CountProgress
Nov 158308 8878 570
Nov 168878 9929 1051
Nov 179929 9929 0
Nov 189929 10693 764
Nov 1910693 10996 303
Nov 2010996 10996 0
Nov 2110996 10996 0

Week 4

I was fighting the strong urge to rewrite the existing scenes. On some days, the draft felt really off - but I managed to only write down notes for the first editing round and leave the existing scenes in their flawed state.
 
DayOld CountNew CountProgress
Nov 2210996 10996 0
Nov 2310996 11171 175
Nov 2411171 11764 575
Nov 2511764 12136 390
Nov 2612136 12742 606
Nov 2712742 12742 0
Nov 2812742 13495 753

Progress


 

Project

Primer - Flames in the Shadow
Generic article | Nov 12, 2025

Words to live by

"Done" is better than "perfect."
Make it exist first. You can make it good later.
The first draft is MEANT to be messy and flawed. It's a DRAFT, after all.
Every little bit counts.

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