Comments on: ISBW 4th Anniversary, Links, and update

By: less than this » Ignorance of professional writing

less than this » Ignorance of professional writing — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 14:03:03 +0000

[...] which … I don’t get, because I never listened to Mur’s book, I guess) there was one that included the following: The fabulous tool�Story Tracker is now available for your [...]

By: V

Sat, 22 Aug 2009 08:10:52 +0000

(Something’s up with the agent-Rachel-Gardner link.)

By: Darren Kelk

Darren Kelk — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 01:16:19 +0000

Thanks Mur you are the best. I write now and one day I will be good. Can I book a interview spot on ISBW ep300 as your interviewee.

Thanks for your greatness.

darren

By: Andrew Nicolle

Andrew Nicolle — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 01:04:26 +0000

Thanks for mentioning Story Tracker, Mur. I hope people find it useful! One thing I wanted to clear up though — my Story Tracker is only available on the iPhone and iPod touch and it has only been out a week! I’m assuming there was a similar tool you used back in the day?

By: Dawn Embers

Dawn Embers — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 16:26:59 +0000

It’s okay Mur. As one of those emailers, I can say we forgive you.

At least you are writing.

By: Jason

Jason — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 16:01:30 +0000

Happy 4th Birthday, ISBW! Thanks for four years of awesome advice and interviews, Mur.

I think this 4-year mark holds a really important lesson, too. And that lesson is: Marathon.

Marathons are all about averages, right? Distance over time. So let’s take a look at some numbers for ISBW. There have been roughly 160 episodes, give or take, including interviews, specials and videos. Yeah, maybe more or less, but 160 is an easy number to work with, and dammit Jim, I’m a writer not a mathematician! So 160 episodes in 4 years. That’s, on average, 40 episodes per year. 40 episodes per year means about 3 1/3 episodes per month.

Or, roughly, just under one episode per week on average over 4 years.

Do I even need to tell you how impressive that is?

In a marathon, it doesn’t matter so much if you sprinted or jogged over a given stretch. It only matters how it averages out in the end. Likewise, in the long view it doesn’t matter quite as much if sometimes we had to wait a little longer or a little shorter time for a podcast.

And don’t forget, the very most important thing about a marathon is that you finish it, regardless of your time. There’s four years worth of finished ISBW content in the archives, not even counting all your other podcasts, writing, published novel, etc. It’ll be likewise with WAR (and the Heaven series overall): pace yourself when you need it, sprint when you can, and in the end you’ll finish it in the best time you’re capable of. But most importantly, in the end you’ll finish it.

You’ve accomplished something really great here, Mur, and you should be darn proud of it. You’re in it for the long haul, and you’ve proven you can be successful over that time frame. So don’t forget to celebrate!

– Jason