My 70-Day Writing Challenge to Finish My Book
Hello, fellow book lovers, and welcome back to the MsBrowns family blog! It’s NotesOnDawn here, and today’s post is a little different. It’s not a review, or a list of my favourite fantasy reads. Instead, it’s something more personal. It’s about the other side of our "AllAboutBooks" world: the creation of them.
I’m embarking on what feels like a monumental task, and I’ve decided to document it, partly to share the journey with this wonderful community and partly (if I’m being completely honest) to hold myself accountable.
I’m officially starting a 70-day writing challenge.
The goal? To finally, finally, finish the draft of my short story collection before the end of 2025.
I’m very excited, and more than a little terrified. This challenge feels so important because it marries together two goals I’ve been struggling with for a while. The first is the writing project itself, a magical realism collection I’ve been chipping away at, and mostly avoiding, since 2022. The second is my desire to create more content for all of you, something I have found incredibly hard to balance since starting a full-time, 9-to-5 job.
This is my line in the sand. This is where I try to reclaim the 'writer' part of 'writer's-ofinstagram'. Let's go.
The Great Unfinished Project
Let’s talk about "The Project." We all have one, don’t we? That one story, that one collection, that one novel that lives in a folder on our desktop, glaring at us. Mine is a collection of magical realism short stories. I adore the genre, that beautiful, delicate space between the real and the fantastical. It’s what I love to read, and it’s what I’ve always wanted to write.
I started it in 2022 with a burst of inspiration. The first few stories came easily, worlds and characters appearing almost fully formed. I was in a flow state, lost in the magic. And then… life. A new job, new responsibilities, and the energy-sapping reality of a five-day-a-week commute.
My 9-to-5 isn’t terrible, but it's demanding. It claims the best of my brain. By the time I get home, make dinner, and sort out life admin, the creative well is often dry. The idea of opening that document, of trying to spin magic from thin air when I can barely form a coherent sentence, feels impossible.
And so, my collection has sat there. Growing, but painfully slowly. A paragraph here, a few hundred words there. It’s become a source of guilt. As people who are "AllAboutBooks," we know how much work goes into them. But knowing it and doing it are two very different things. This challenge is my attempt to finally bridge that gap.
Day 1: The Archaeological Dig
So, what does Day 1 of a 70-day challenge look like?
It’s not as glamorous as you might think. There was no lightning strike of inspiration, no thousand-word sprint. The first day was quiet, practical, and a little bit messy.
I sat down and just… refamiliarised myself.
For the last few months, my writing (when it has happened) has been split. I’ll have an idea on the bus and scribble it in my notebook. I’ll type a few lines into the notes app on my phone. Other parts live on my laptop. It’s a chaotic, fragmented system that mirrors how chaotic my creative brain has felt.
So, Day 1 was an archaeological dig. I had to transcribe scrawled, half-legible passages from my notebook, trying to decipher my own handwriting. I had to consolidate files, create a new "master draft" document, and read back what I’d written months ago.
The strangest part was trying to follow the thread of a story I’d abandoned mid-sentence. It’s a bizarre feeling, like trying to remember a dream you had last year. You know the feeling of it, the colour of it, but the details are lost in fog. Day 1 was about sitting in that fog and patiently waiting for the shapes to reappear. It was an act of translation, of reminding myself what I was even trying to say.
It wasn't 'writing' in the romantic sense, but I’ve realised it's perhaps the most crucial part of the process. You can’t build the house until you’ve gathered all the materials in one place.
Breaking the "Word Vomit" Habit
In the past, I’ve been a binge-and-bust writer. I’ve done NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and loved the adrenaline of it. Because of that intense time crunch, I’m the kind of person who can bang out 2,000 words easily in one evening. It’s a frantic, thrilling process.
I used to think this was my "process." I was a sprinter.
But I’m trying to break that habit. The problem with those sprints, for me, is the aftermath. I’d spend a short, intense period basically vomiting words onto the page, messy, unfiltered, and fast. And then, burned out and overwhelmed by the sheer volume of mess I’d created, I would write absolutely nothing. For months.
That’s how my collection ended up in this state. It’s a series of brilliant, messy sprints, with no connective tissue, no endurance, and no follow-through.
The "word vomit" method is great for getting a first draft down, but it’s not sustainable for a long-term relationship with creativity, especially when balanced with a 9-to-5. It relies on huge, finite bursts of energy. What I need now is something that runs on a smaller, more reliable battery.
The New Goal: "Measured and Honest" Writing
This 70-day challenge is my antidote. My goal for the next couple of months is to completely redefine my process. I want to move away from the frantic sprint and embrace the steady walk. I’m aiming for a routine that is measured and honest.
What does that mean to me?
Measured: It means forgetting the word count. A successful day is not 2,000 words. A successful day is simply showing up. It might be 200 words. It might be 20 minutes of editing. It might be just thinking about a plot hole while I wash the dishes, and making a single note. It’s about small, consistent, cumulative effort. It’s about proving to myself that I can integrate this into my weekly routine without burning out. Maybe it's 30 minutes before work, or my lunch break, or one protected evening a week. The amount is less important than the regularity.
Honest: This is the harder one. "Honest" writing means resisting the urge to write what I think is trendy or what might perform well on "Booktok." It means tuning out the pressure and listening to the stories themselves. It means not forcing a scene just to "win" the day. If the words aren’t there, the "honest" thing to do is to edit, or to read, or to research. It’s about respecting the work and being truthful in the process, even when it’s slow.
I am hoping this new approach will be more sustainable. It feels more mature. It feels like the only way I can be a "writer" and also a "person with a full-time job" at the same time.
The Accountability Part (This is where you come in!)
As I said, the other goal of this challenge is to create more content. I’ve found it so difficult to "perform" creativity when I’m feeling drained. It’s easy to post a photo of a book I’ve read; it’s incredibly vulnerable to post about a book I’m failing to write.
But this challenge marries the two. The process becomes the content.
So, I’ll be sharing my progress, the good, the bad, and the ugly. The days I write 500 words, and the days I just stare at the cursor. I’ll be posting updates here on MsBrowns and over on my Instagram.
I’m hoping that by sharing this, I’m not just holding myself accountable. I’m also opening up a conversation. I know I am not the only one in our #writingcommunity who feels this way. I see you, fellow #writersofinstagram. I see you with your 9-to-5s, your unfinished drafts, your creative guilt.
This is my journey, but I would love for it to be a community one.
So, let’s see how it goes. 70 days. A 2022 short story collection. A 2025 deadline. Hopefully 🤞🏻 I do not give up halfway!
Thank you for being here, for reading, and for being the best "AllAboutBooks" family a person could ask for. Let the writing begin.
NotesOnDawn