So 70k words is now a thing. That’s ~270 paperback pages. I can definitely see the finish line for the first draft.

I have 6 partially complete chapters at various stages and 3 intended chapters not yet started. Those 9 chapters will fit within the next 10k words – Only, they won’t. I suspect they will be closer to 15k-20k

Sure this is not an exact science. It’s not about having a direct amount of words or pages per chapter – each chapter does what it needs to do, however long or short that is. If I hit 90k words – so be it, there is still the edits to come. But even if 90k survived, then it means a ~350 page paperback.

The 3 intended chapters might just get deleted, I have an idea of what I want them to be about, but right now, I’m not sure of they still fit to the current story. This is the problem of outlines. So far I have learned, especially in the last few weeks, that I shouldn’t keep rigidly to the outline – it constrains me.

One of the partial chapters is likely to get dropped. The text already written is valuable, but could be move somewhere else without the need to expand it or finish it off.

I’m getting really excited that I might just be able to hit first draft during November – definitely by the end of the year 🙂