Beyond A to Z

For most of us the A to Z Blogging Challenge is now over, or the last few entries are being polished and posted. A time for reflection. How did it go here?

In terms of numbers, not too badly. As far as I can recall without checking, 22 of the 26 were posted on the intended day, and of the four that were not, two were around a day late, one half a day or so, and one just a few minutes. Close enough. I'll take that.

In terms of content, I'm relatively happy. It began as planned, as one side of a dialogue dealing each day with an aspect of the ravelling yarns setting, whether an aspect seen previously or one entirely new. Then things got a little out of hand, and the narrator was killed and resurrected, running the narrative off onto another set of rails.

The midsection was a real challenge for this reason, and I found I was bumping up against the limits of communication, having trouble conveying the nature of events in the format chosen. If you stuck with it, very well done, and thank you. The posts for the last week to ten days almost wrote themselves, and there's a much greater clarity.

Despite the unexpected route taken, the themes are consistent across the run, and true to the mood of the earlier non-Challenge posts, and the whole closes with a summary I feel fits the development of the character and setting. It's given me a lot to work from.

I'm not sure any certain conclusions can be drawn from the experience, but it did reinforce for me what I already suspected, that it helps to follow the path inspiration takes, to use the passion roused by a particular subject or writing session; and that it really is possible to sit before a blank screen or sheet of paper and create, with rough draft and rounds of edits feasible in a short space of time. Management of the different levels of the narrative is perhaps the greatest issue with this seat-of-the-pants approach.

While I'm sure many would argue that a step back and repeat reviewing could add to the work, I'd say that the idiosyncracy of the moment is more likely to be lost by doing so, that subjectivity and spark of deep comprehension of character and situation. I often did return before posting, but can't honestly say I was able to improve the text by doing so.

I plan to follow up with a trio of things in the next day or two. One is to republish the whole series in a single post, editor software permitting, to avoid the problem of having to read it in reverse order. Another is to rework the block of images at the top right of the blog to take into account the change in focus. A third is to take part in new challenges, whether my own or others of the wider community.

Finally, I would suggest to anyone who took part that you repost in the same way - if the entries are short - or create an index page - if longer - assuming you haven't already. This will help us all in returning to the work you've created in the future.

If you're thinking about those new projects, I can offer a trio of options I've seen.

• Story A Day - A complete story of any length per day. If I joined in, I'd likely try a reasonably short 31 words - about double Jennie's Expansion Joints - for the 31 days of the month. It could also be tied in with an existing project.

• D30 blogging challenge - A post themed around one number per day, for 30 days of the month. It looks like mikemonaco at Swords & Dorkery has set this up spontaneously and is following it alone for now, but he might well like a little company. Again, this could easily be tied into an existing project.

• The Heroes of Armageddon Charity Project - The guest post by Ron Saikowski and the discussion below it are my thinking here. Although not a formal blogging project, we could easily make it one. I've put out a post a week for the past two weeks, one on ash wastes and one on hive interiors, but if others wanted to join in, collectively we could get that higher.

If anyone knows of any other options, feel free to leave names and links.

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