A weekly writing review

One possibility beyond a weekly (fiction) writing habit is a weekly writing review. I tried doing one yesterday and it seemed like a good idea. I took stock of the ten or so most recent story drafts I had sitting around and decided, arbitrarily because of time constraints, that I wasn't going to look at anything else I've written. As I noted then, in the future I can always revisit that decision and decide to go back further if for whatever reason it seems to make sense.

It worked great. I identified one specific story to reread and edit and did that. I hesitated but it worked out. I was worried I had overdone the emotion but in rereading it, it felt fine. I actually liked the imagery and narration. And I found a few things worth improving.

Something I like about this is that unlike a writing dashboard, it's default dead. If I don't explicitly decide to include a draft in a weekly review, it doesn't keep popping up. It's dead. Good riddance. Maybe I'll bring it back later — but I don't have to. I am not defaulting to continuing, so I expect things I don't want to continue with would naturally drop off.

We'll see what I think of the weekly writing review next week. Maybe I'll find once a week is too often or that the format is too constraining. Possibilities!