In From Lambton to Longbourn, Darcy and Elizabeth banter about practicing the virtues of self-control and charity. When it comes to each other, they’re both better at charity than self-control. That passage keeps coming back to me lately because I’ve been thinking a lot about self-discipline – specifically how to make myself sit down and write. I feel better when I write, but I’m having trouble finding the motivation and perseverence to actually do it. I think I’d better go back to setting concrete public goals, which has sometimes worked in the past.

So I’m going to commit here to a conservative 250 words a day minimum for the next week, with a holiday on Saturday when I go to Milwaukee for the annual Jane Austen’s birthday luncheon with my friends Stacy (Affairs of the Heart, EBB) and Marilyn (According to Jane, coming out next fall). I’m hoping they’ll motivate me, too.

I’d really like to get this book done and get onto something new! New stories are so much easier to write than the end of old ones. My experience is that it takes me five times as long to write the last third of a book than it does to write the first two thirds. I call it Chapter 8 syndrome – everything flows easily until about Chapter 8, and after that it’s pulling teeth. It’s no surprise to me that so many stories are abandoned at that point. But I’m too stubborn for that.