Day 4 Review 11/05/2010
 
Day 4 was a major disappointment. Up to 6,402 words now. Sorta.

I only wrote 77 actual words, but I did a major overhaul on the summary so I counted that in my word count. I know that's a bit of cheating but I'll make up for it at the end, I promise.
 
Day 3 Review 11/04/2010
 
Today I got to 5,158 words, 58 more words than were my target for the day. I think the actually number of words a day we're supposed to do is 1,667 to get to 50,000 in 30 days. I rounded that up to 1,700 so I am always getting a smidge more than I need and that may come in handy as the days move on.

Today I broke one of the rules I set for myself: no editing. I was only a few hundred away from today's total so I went back over the stuff I'd written already and fleshed it out a bit. I didn't make any drastic changes, just a few hudred words of tweaks.

I still have a few things I need to work out, like the race of the main character and his family. The way I have been writing it, he doesn't sound like a heavyset white kid from southwest New Hampshire. When I read the actions and speech I picture a skinny African American in my head, which just will not work for southwest  New Hampshire.

Another issue, which will be worked out in editing but is annoying me, is that the first nearly 5,200 words take place over about 18 hours, though most of that takes place in the first 6 1/2-7 hours. Just seems like a lot of words for such a short period of time, though there is a lot of character creation and development. As much as I just want to get the story written, I also want to have to do as little editing as possible when I'm done so I'd like to do it right the first time or at least really close.

I still have to decide whom the egg was given to. Was it David's grandparents or his grandmother's parents? It seemes to be a bit more sensible to have missionaries going to Madagascar in the late 1930s than the 1960s.

I think after I do my homework tomorrow morning I'm going to revisit the character list and add all the new people in and plug the new story information in, including David and Cally deciding to have sex before he ships off on this dangerous trip because they know they want to have each other be their first. It won't be explicit as that is not needed but I think it is important to the story.

Well, that's the plan Stan. Happy writing to my fellow NaNoWriMos!
 
Day 2 Review 11/03/2010
 
I wasn't as happy with today's total as I could be. I worked on the novel off and on all day but only managed to get to 3495 before midnight. Ach well. I did get to answer some interview questions about my NaNo time for a local NaNoWriMo'er who is also writing about it on her blog. She seemed to be happy with my answers.

I went to a free NaNoWriMo writing workshop tonight at the public library. I was one of three participants. It was very odd to be so much older than the others there but it wasn't horrible. I was literally twice their age. But the grad student running the workshop taught us about outlining with the sea of life, catalysts and wave as well as dénouement (wrapping the story up after the climax). I am not sure why but my method of writing is to spend very little time in the 'sea of life' and going right for the catalyst, then having the sea of life be explained through the reaction to the catalyst. He was disappointed that two of us had outlines already as that was one of his focuses today but he still managed to teach us all new things about the process.

The next workshop is on Saturday at 1. I commited to being there. I also said I would see if I could scrounge up another local working on NaNo novels. He is trying to have this be his teacher practicum (sp?) but he needs at least five people for it. I like being able to help out students. I am going to need the help when it is my turn so I hope the karma hangs around for that.

I have to do some school stuff tomorrow then I should be able to get some writing in. Maybe I'll go hang out at the lake tomorrow afternoon if it isn't too cold. With the turtles gone and the foliage on its way out there is so much less there to be distracted by. I also got some books on Madagascar that I need to at least skim for research for the latter parts of the book.

Time to get a few more words in before I hit the hay. Maybe I can get a good start towards tomorrow's total. Happy writing!
 
Day 1 Review 11/02/2010
 
After writing off and on all day, I ended up with 2,394 words just before midnight. Not too bad. I am reasonably happy with the way the story is setting up. I am definitely going to have to go back in after it is done and flesh it out so that it is more 'rich'. We've now met David's girlfriend Cally, her sister and her parents. We get to see the closeness between David and Cally and just how devastated David is by his grandmother's death.

My friend Lia posted a word cloud of her first day's work so I thought I would too. Maybe every Monday until it is over I'll post a word clould of that day's work. I'm not sure if the program can handle a 50,000 word story but if it can, I'll do one of my entire novel on the last day. I used the one at Wordle to create my word cloud, then made it an image. Check it out and make your own, there's a slew of different options.
Picture
I am quite tired tonight so I am going to head to bed. I got a start on tomorrow's writing with 126 words. Woohoo. Tomorrow early evening I am going to try to go to a write-in at the public library. It is supposed to be for 1 1/2 hours. Hopefully it will be a lot more typing than it will be talking. I've never actually gone to one before so it should be interesting. It will be the first challenge to my social anxiety in awhile. I hope I don't chicken out.
 
And I'm Off! 11/01/2010
 
At just after midnight I wrote my first two words (really, the last two): The End. Then I took a bit of time to play City of Heroes to calm my nerves before I really started to write. I am so happy that Owen was able to help me get MS Office sorted out for me so I will have no problems with that while I'm attempting to write the book.

I erased those two words then started writing in earnest.

Is the first chapter too early for a death? I hope not as it really sets the rest of the book up. We get to know several of the characters, especially David, who is the main character in the book.

I stopped writing at about 3:05 a.m. with 1,218 words written. I'm going to head to bed as soon as I upload this post to the blog. I want to get a good night's sleep (hopefully!) and keep writing after I get my morning coffee.

Good luck to everyone! May the pen be mightier than your need to sleep
3 Comments
 
Ack! 10/31/2010
 
NaNo starts in 21 hours and I'm having a rethink about the story idea. Maybe I should do something else, something that doesn't require so much research. Maybe I'll have another brilliant idea a few minutes before midnight.

What would you do?
 
 
Well, I gave Scrivener a shot and it is not working out well. I keep losing text when I copy/paste stuff and the formatting is not working either. I'm not sure if there are limits on how much text you can have in the beta or what, but it is too frustrating to deal with right now. I just want to get my profiles written so I'm ready to go at 12:01 a.m. I am so happy I don't have to get up on Monday so I can work for a few hours before going to bed and not have it be a disruption to my life.

Right now, however, I have a major headache. I think I need to go soak in the whirlpool and relax. I can keep working on the profiles, thanks to my wonderful handheld. My HP Ipaq is the best invention ever.
 
Scrivener 10/29/2010
 
Through Lia Keyes and the NaNoWriMo Warriors group on Facebook, I discovered Scrivener. It is a "word processor and project management tool created specifcally for writers of long texts such as novels and research papers." It was writtern for use on Macs, but there is a beta version for those of you like me who are using Windoze. I don't think the beta version is as feature rich as the Mac version, from what I've seen, but has two things going for it: free (until Dec. 12, 2010) and less to learn to be able to use it. 

I have never used writing software like this before so it will be interesting to see how it goes. As a college student, I like the idea of being able to collect all my research in one place and being able to easily switch between files without having to click away from the program I'm using. I also like that it allows you to export to a number of different file formats, including PDF and HTML--both are useful for when you're done and you're ready, if you choose, to self-publish as an e-book.

I have plugged in my plot summary and added my character sketches. I am in the process of rewriting them so that I am using the same format for each character. I figure if I do that it will be easier to remember the factual details about the people and can go from there -- things like date of birth, age at the time of the novel, what they look like, job/school stuff, partners, etc. I'll leave the personality development for when I'm writing the story.

I'll let you know how it goes as I move through NaNoWriMo. If I like it, I'll probably buy it when it comes out sometime in 2011. For $45, it may well be worth it.
 
 
I have to admit, I am a bit excited about this year's NaNo. I really love the story idea and can't wait to get started.

Is it cheating to be thinking about how I want to start the story? Should I start the story before his grandmother dies? After the funeral? After the reading of the will? Should the story be in first person? Third person? I only have about a dozen "main characters," is that too many? Not enough? How much of a back story should I create?

Mom! Is it time to start yet?
 
 
There are just a few days to go before NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) starts. This year I vowed to have a story idea chosen a bit earlier than five minutes before go time like last year. Though, I did get a story started that had 17,000 words before my life (once again) fell apart around the third week. So I have been very busy getting ready for 12:01 a.m. on November 1.

On Wednesday, while my daughter was getting her teeth clean and I was waiting for the bad news (for my wallet!) I wrote down the basic plot summary for "The Egg Mystery." It is a little over 1,000 words. I have a beginning, middle, and end as well as some plot twists and danger built in. My friend says it sounds like an interesting story, my daugher says it sounds interesting but wouldn't be something she would pick up to read and her boyfriend said it sounds kinda cool but he wouldn't choose to read that kind of book. At least they're honest! Right?
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