Counting Sherds

Writing is both an artistic and a technical effort. Today's work was mostly the latter.

My outline isn't detailed down to chapter and scene. Instead it captures the "beats," places where the plot moves. Thus the more text I have written, the better I can estimate how that outline is going to fill out.

And I've reached that point. I can now say my chapters are averaging 2.5K words, and I'm getting an average of 6 of them per "book"; first book is 6 chapters, second is 5 with 3 more projected, and the third is currently 5 projected. 32 chapters would bring me to 80K and with 5 books it would break nicely into three acts at 1/5, 2/5, and 2/5.

Problem is I have four books, with 27 chapters planned, and that projects to 65K.

So I have options. First is to accept the current outline. 65K is short for SF&F (they tend to want 80K) but acceptable outside.

I don't feel simply expanding is right. Still, I have decompression to do, and the later chapters will run a longer average, and there may be fun stuff I think of that I really want to put it.

Still, the option that is most attractive is to basically add a book. Instead of a straight climb from the final confrontation with the dragon, drop into a third low point. Combine this with how München is getting a bigger and bigger role in my planning, and I basically turn it into a stack plot. Each problem "solved" uncovers a bigger problem. And each is different in character in useful ways, each coming at the core questions of ownership of history and the meaning (and abuse) of the Indiana Jones archetype.

In a somewhat less mechanical aspect, I'm still having a heck of a lot of trouble coming up with stunts. Things that are dangerous, cool-looking, and in the real world would usually end with someone getting hurt. What's even tougher is figuring out how to stunt around, especially in a densely-populated place and around national landmarks, without all sorts of unwanted attention.