Tag: NaNoWriMo

How to Write While Dealing With Holiday Madness

Photo of a Christmas Tree with eclectic ornaments.
A typical Koster Christmas tree.

This week, my accountability group is writing about “Holiday Plans and Are You Writing?” Last week, we blogged about the topic of “Where do you stand?” in terms of our writer’s journeys. The entries are part of our How I Write series.

Ya know, I’ve always wondered about Chris Baty’s sanity for picking November for NaNoWriMo. Then I think, “Student, not mother!” and nod to myself and keep going. My plans on the NaNo front went well for the first week and then I hit a wall. Having kids home sick from school on a revolving basis this week didn’t help either. I’ve been trying not to catch whatever they’ve had, but my focus and motivation has been completely shot in the whole process.

I enjoy the holiday season, but I’m always looking forward to the restful and relaxing aspects of it more than the hustle and bustle. I was sickened by seeing Christmas decorations up in the stores before Halloween weekend. The idea of Black Friday sends me to the corner to curl up in a whimpering ball. Cyber Monday is more my speed, but I try to spread it out through the month of November and the first week or two of December.

While I was growing up, the Holidays always meant food, family and travel. Thanksgiving has always meant a lot on my dad’s side of the family which traces its roots to the Mayflower and beyond. Turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy stuffing, green bean casserole, sweet potato casserole with the pineapple and marshmallows, fresh yeast rolls, Apple Harvest Cake and pumpkin pie have always had our table groaning. But last November 1st, DH and I gave up grains, legumes, potatoes and most white sugar. Thanksgiving felt kinda funky. Not as funky as the year we went to his uncle’s in NYC and didn’t have turkey, but a huge pork roast. My Puritan roots were shocked, but I survived. Christmas dinner is usually a replay of Thanksgiving as well.

The biggest take away here is that our routine shifted and we survived. I HATE change and new things. But I’m learning lots of new tricks as I work on trying to build up my discipline and continue to improve my craft while balancing it with the bustling life around me. I think I’ve learned that I can’t throw all my hopes and dreams into the single biggest writing month of the year (NaNoWriMo), not and still maintain any resemblance to balance and sanity.

So about those promised tips in the title… They may sound sarcastic in places, they may be a little tongue-in-cheek in others, but they are all things that I’ve found that help me and to me are worth trading money for time and sanity in some cases. Your mileage may vary, but do what you can to keep your creative tanks full.

How I Write While Dealing With Holiday Madness:

  1. Consider an Online Christmas — All your ordering can be done between writing breaks and many offer gift wrapping options. And really, who has time to wrap? We seriously considered saying it was an Amazon themed Christmas one year and the boxes would have been deemed as acceptable. Saves your gas and time and sanity! Ok, maybe not the most carbon conscious option, but it still has appeal. Just don’t hand your kids scotch-taped boxes and tell them to wrap their own presents. I HATED not knowing what was in those boxes until Christmas Day. (*waves* Hi, Mother!)
  2. Add Writing Time to your Wish List — You won’t get it if you don’t ask for it. And if you ask nicely in advance, I’ve found people are more likely to respect your time and space. I also find that just taking it by getting up earlier than everyone else works wonders. They get to feel superior because they slept in so late, and you get a quiet house to yourself — until they get up. At which point, feel free to direct this hapless soul that has wandered into your creative space to dump the ingredients for dinner in the crockpot to let you finish this section.
  3. Decide What Matters Most — Only YOU can answer this one. Plan according to your priorities and don’t feel guilty about it. If you have a family, next summer consider talking about what people enjoy doing most during the winter holidays and adjust your traditions to drop ones that no one likes or try new ones that appeal to your family’s values and tastes. If something doesn’t work for you, make a note of it so you don’t repeat it next year.
  4. Make Ahead Meals — Dump chicken is a staple in my freezer. Buy a bargain tray of boneless skinless chicken breasts or thicker pork chops. Buy a couple bottles of BBQ, Italian Dressing, Ranch Dressing and some quart-sized ziploc freezer bags. For my family of 4, I put 4 breasts or equivalent servings of chops in a ziploc. Then add approximately 3/4 cup of the BBQ, Italian or Ranch Dressing (I also add some minced garlic and some black pepper to this one). Zip and freeze flat. You can bake one of those suckers from frozen at 350˚F for 50-60 minutes and get two solid 25 minute writing sprints in while it cooks. It marinates as it freezes and also more if you let it thaw first, but honestly, who remembers to do that in time?!
  5. Make Sacrifices to the Crockery Gods — I can’t tell you how many times throwing something into the crockpot in the morning has saved my bacon! Look for simple recipes with 5 ingredients or less, dump chicken and pork loins work well for this too. Most of dinner cooks while you’re doing your thing. Husbands and teens CAN be taught to dump the ingredients in. They may claim to have forgotten how the next time, but this is where all that practice at being a persistent writer comes pays off!
  6. Pamper Yourself — De-stress by relaxing. Curl up and read a book. Go see a movie. Go get a mani-pedi if that’s your thing. You’re running around doing everything for everyone else right now, right? Hopefully, they won’t forget you deserve to be pampered and treated like royalty, but… yeah. Trust me on this one. You’ll feel better for giving yourself a treat like this in the middle of the chaos.
  7. Holiday Parties, Concerts, & Get Togethers — Don’t let them get you down. They’re a great opportunity for people watching! If you see or overhear something you’re afraid you’ll forget, slip into the bathroom and pull out your trusty notebook or smart phone or whatever and note it down for later! Same thing goes for that Aha! moment that strikes you in the middle of the concert… don’t lose it!
  8. Say ‘NO!’ When Appropriate — You know your deadlines and obligations. Don’t short-change your own goals just because every family on the block has invited you over for some eggnog and carols. You know the connections you can’t miss, but you’re not lying if you say you have other plans and what you mean is you want to write. Give yourself the gift of time for yourself.
  9. Houseguests — Whether you have them or are one… be sure to schedule downtime for everyone. Some may need more than others.
  10. Remember Why You Celebrate— To me, this is the most important one… if my writing slips, it slips. If my holiday prep slips, it slips. I’d much rather spend time with the people I love having a good time than run around like a chicken with its head cut off, scrambling to get everything done and feel miserable about it.

YOUR TURN: With the holidays’ coming up, what are you holiday plans? What are your favorite holiday food traditions? And how are you plan to balance your creative endeavors with your real life obligations? Or are you taking a break?

And if you’d like to read about how the rest of my group approaches their research, you can find their blogs here:

* Alexia Reed * Angeleque Ford * Danie Ford *
* Emma G. Delaney * Kimberly Farris *

Looking Back to Look Forward

Last week’s post on How We Buckle  Down and Focus on Our Writing, another entry in our How I Write series, really got me thinking since it didn’t seem like I was physcially or mentally able to sit down and focus this past week. The result was the topic that I challenged my accountability group to answer this week: Where are you now? Where is that, in comparison to where you were six months ago? A year? Five years, ten? How have your goals changed? What would you do differently?”

A family portrait.10 Years Ago

We were living two time zones east in Austin, TX. We had two pre-schoolers at that point who kept me busy. Somehow, I was still active with LegendMUD: coding, designing areas, writing quests, descriptions and dialogue for the computer-controlled characters. This was basically a text adventure game that spanned three eras of time and attempted to present “History as it was thought to be at the time.” This meant magic worked according to myth and legends and you could run into virtual versions of many historical figures or even take an active role in those same myths, legends and historical events. I was also doing technical writing as well as doing op-ed and more explanatory pieces surrounding updates and the community. We were well-connected to a diverse group of friends and colleagues in the area.

5 Years Ago

When we moved to San Diego, CA, and basically ripped apart our social fabric once again. We signed the kids up for scouts so they could benefit from the programs and get to know other kids in their school as we didn’t live in the same neighborhood. I was reading up to 2-3books a week while waiting to pick them up from school. I was also no longer involved with LegendMUD but bored as just a player on another game and I was looking for a creative outlet. At this point most of my energy was going into making my son’s Cub Scout experience worthwhile.

4 Years Ago

The next summer, I picked up DH’s copy of Becoming A Writer by Dorothea Brande. I swear, she spoke to me across the decades. She lit a fire under my butt and I couldn’t ignore her. I found the Romance Divas writing forum while looking for information on how to get started and chewed my way through DH’s books on craft, soaking up everything I could. It was at RD that I met Bria Quinlan and Jodi Henley. These two people are still inspirational and influential today. In fall 2007, I started Beneath His Touch, writing for hours in the chat challenges. Thus began my journey of alternating rounds of craft study & bouts of writing.

This cycle continued as a sort of holding pattern as we also dealt with our son’s recurring migraine and sinus issues which led to a quarter of independent study, that stopped my writing dead in its tracks. That was two years ago. I’m slowly recovering and gaining momentum as you’ll see below.

1 Year Ago

Last year, in the week before Thanksgiving, we decided to start house hunting as our lease was up at the end of the year. We found a house, closed on it and were moved in by the second week in February. Silly me, at this point, I was also trying to finish a draft of the full novel I’d started in the fall of 2007 (BHT) and finalizing my goals for 2011. Revealed was stuck at a weird half-way point and the heroine wasn’t very sympathetic. The overall plot was in place, but the hero’s side of the story was mostly missing. And I have a handful of other false starts that I can’t just toss out, because the characters want their stories told. Now, if anyone knows how to keep them quiet while I focus on a particular pair at a time, my life would be so much easier.

6 Months Ago

My oldest promoted from Middle School to High school and I took the plunge to join both RWA National and the local San Diego Chapter. I’ve slowly been pushing myself out of my comfort zone, but I’m still reluctant to push myself. It’s getting easier, especially when I look back like this and see how much I have been able to do. I also finished a round of polish on the full novel I started in 2007 & prepared my first submission to a literary agent. My local RWASD chaptermates are also good about pushing me. I mentioned I needed to start submitting and get my PRO membership. They kept asking if I’d done it yet. Then it was hugs & cheering and “Have you submitted your PRO app yet?” See? They support and propel you along. They’re awesome like that.

Where Am I now?

Many days, I don’t feel like I’ve come that far, but I’m now a recognized PRO member of RWA which means I’ve made a submission and am actively working toward publication. I still haven’t heard back, but their automated receipt was enough! I’m also reworking Revealed and turning it into what it was intended to be instead of taking easy and lazy ways in regard to characters and their reactions and decisions. It’s still the same essential story, but it reads so much better. It’s always a good thing when you can see the strength of the heroine instead of wanting to slap her for being a constant watering pot. I’ve also joined an online chapter of RWA , The Beau Monde Chapter, which specializes in the Regency Era, and boy am I soaking up lots of Town Bronze there! More importantly, instead of feeling like I was spinning my wheels with the same two stories, I started another one to see what I’d learned and to try a slightly different approach. I’ve run into a brick wall, but I think that was just because I called it a NaNo project and got discouraged when I couldn’t hit the numbers. But, I’m not giving up on it!

How have my goals changed?

In the past four years, I’ve moved from writing simply to amuse myself to wanting to see my book on a shelf and treating it more like an actual business. I even have real business cards. My goals are SMARTer. They’re more realistic, more structured, and I’m much more conscious of the longer term goals on a week-by-week basis thanks to my accountability group. My goals are also more public and more ambitious. I’ll be attending the RWA National Conference in Anaheim next summer. You’ll notice my real name is now attached to my writing and social media. I haven’t been laughed at yet for saying I want to write Regency Romance novels. Most people think it’s pretty cool.

What would I do differently?

I definitely would have joined RWA sooner for the support, especially at the local level. I really wish I’d taken both days of Bob Mayer’s Warrior Writer workshop, but I’m glad I decided on the day based on his Who Dares Wins book over the day dedicated to our stories. I needed to hear the bit about stepping out of our comfort zones and that’s where I met Pamela Moran and M. A. Taylor, who cemented my decision to join RWA & RWASD. And yes, I should have listened to them and joined then, not waited two more years. I do wish I’d been more serious about trying to reach a daily or weekly quota that worked with my writing cycle, but that’s something I don’t have to label as a regret, but can take and work toward that in my 2012 goals and beyond.

YOUR TURN: Can you see your growth and progress toward your goals? Are you happy with where you are now? When’s the last time you did something for the first time?

And if you’d like to read about how the rest of my group approaches their research, you can find their blogs here:

* Alexia Reed * Angeleque Ford * Danie Ford *
* Emma G. Delaney * Kimberly Farris *

Creativity Bubbles

This week my accountability group is blogging about how we buckle down and focus on our writing to inspire our creativity as a few of us are participating in this year’s NaNoWriMo challenge. Last week’s post on research strategies and sources is also part of our How I Write series.

The title of this post is a play on words: both in the sense that it rises from within and finding that sphere of focus that lures the muse out into action. I find my creativity bubbles best when I can control my ability to narrow my focus, limit distractions and have something to hold me accountable. This post is a bit of an expansion on the one we did a while back called “Getting Down to Business” which looked at the routines we rely on to settle into writing.

Narrow Focus to improve Creativity

I’ve always been able to hyper-focus on something that interests me or is mind-numbingly tedious. Give me a good book, a puzzle to solve or get me into the zone with a sewing project or organizing data or text and I can tune out the world. I’d probably get in trouble for this, but my husband has the same ability, perhaps more so. It’s not unusual for one of us to walk up behind the other, ask a question and be ignored until we forcibly insert ourselves into the other’s attention bubble.

I know I used to drive my roommate nuts in college. In order to study, I’d turn on music to drown out the noise from the rest of the hall. Unfortunately for her, what worked best for me was loud and obnoxious like Run D.M.C or The Violent Femmes. I knew them well enough that I could tune them out as well and they provided excellent coverage for any noise on the floor.

Lately, for writing, I’ve found that I can’t listen to music with lyrics if I’m trying to write down new words of my own. Does. Not. Work. Doesn’t matter how well I know it or not, it’s distracting. My solution? Instrumental music. Preferably Peter Gabriel’s Passion soundtrack. There’s just something about the building rhythm of the percussion on those tracks that intensifies from the beginning through to the end of the hour simply pulls me along and the words with it.

The song in the video below is a great example of how the music builds throughout. If you have any suggestions for stuff that sounds similar, please let me know! I’ve found Japanese drumming to be VERY close to what I’m looking for, but I’m always looking for new stuff too!

My next album of choice is the soundtrack from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon for similar reasons. I usually get pulled out of my zone when the song “A Love Before Time” comes up. I often skip both the English and the Mandarin versions because of this, but at least they’re at the end. I’ve also listened to some other instrumentals pieces, but nothing works as well for me as the Gabriel soundtrack.

Limit Distractions to Creativity

I’m horrible about distractions. I’ve always needed to take frequent breaks and rest/refocus my eyes as I’m far sighted and hate my glasses. This usually means looking out the window. Hummingbirds are a HUGE distraction. But any movement in my peripheral vision will pull me out. I’d probably do better with blinders than headphones. I used to write with headphones (more as a signal to the other parents waiting) during my kids’ martial arts practices, but I lost that hour of writing time when they gave that up.

A ringing phone drives me nuts. It has to be answered by the second ring or it kills me. I could probably turn it off, but I feel I need to be available in case school calls about one of the kids. With CallerID there’s no excuse other than being unable to stand the sound of it ringing not to ignore calls I don’t need to take. If only the telemarketers were as trainable as everyone else to respect my “office hours”.

Trying to work when the kids are home is just asking to be interrupted. They’re teens, so they should be self-sufficient by now. Honestly, they mostly are… but as any mom knows, as soon as your attention is directed elsewhere, like to a phone call or something you’d like to do for yourself… BAM! There they are, like magic. This is why my writing time usually falls during the day between dropping them off at school and picking them up again. You can imagine the havoc this plays with my ability to focus when my son is home with a migraine, especially when he missed an entire quarter when they knocked him down daily and then we did home-study for a quarter. Luckily, he’s doing much better this year. Although he has missed a few days here and there, it’s not constant. I also find working in the mornings on weekends before anyone else is up to be a good time.

Staying Accountable

So that brings me to the internet. I’m my own worst distraction some days. There was a running joke in college about “Study breaks” which really translated into “I need to take a break from the fun and study”. I always do better knowing someone else is working “with” me. Or at least at the same time. This is also a holdover from college where my now-husband would force me to work and more importantly finish my undergrad thesis by saying “If I have to work, so do you.” So I did.

These last two factors are why chat challenges work so well for me. I find I work best with 20-30 minute “sprints” with a few minutes between to refocus my eyes, check-in with whomever I’m working with and be accountable for how my time was spent. The #1k1hr challenges on twitter are too long and I find myself drifting away from the task to randomly surf. I don’t think I could use one of the internet blocking programs because I frequently look something up for research and go right back to writing. Research like that doesn’t usually pull me away from the project for long, it’s undirected or unspecific research that is dangerous.

Deadlines and I are not good acquaintances yet. This is one of the reasons I keep coming back to NaNoWriMo. Some days are better than others for productivity, but I feel like I need to be doing this on a consistent basis. I’ve tried writing trackers and such, and unless I’m already dialed into the project, it’s not a motivator. But knowing so many others are working toward the same goal? Yeah, that speaks to me and I can’t always ignore the call.

YOUR TURN: How do you shut it all off and just focus? Do you play music to block the world? Do you shut yourself into a room for a few hours? Can you manage it while surrounded by others?

And if you’d like to read about how the rest of my group approaches their research, you can find their blogs here:

* Alexia Reed * Danie Ford * Emma G. Delaney *
* Angeleque Ford * Kimberly Farris *

67 Days

calendarI decided I’m not going to do NaNoWriMo again this year. I’m taking a slower approach and hoping to complete the first full draft of my Regency, Beneath His Touch, by December 31st. This gives me 67 days to write another 56k words to end up with 90k total. When I’ve been able to sit down and focus, I’ve been able to write a bit over 1k words a day. This is lower than the 1667 words a day for NaNoWriMo. To finish this book in November, it would take around 1900 words a day, something I’m not willing to commit to right now.

Unfortunately, I’m not a crazy college student with all the free time in the world on my hands. I have two middle schoolers who are in need of a bit more direction and support to make it through this next quarter while trying to keep up with martial arts and scouts as well. Not to mention all the normal holiday fanfare in the next two months that will fall on my shoulders.

But that’s what the group, Accountability Corner, I belong to is all about: balancing life with writing. Lately, we’ve been trying to think of our writing as starting a small business and what all needs to be done to make it successful. I still feel like I’m very much in the R&D and early product development stages. I know what I want, but I’m not quite sure the prototypes are living up to my expectations. It was surprising to see how many activities we could tie to the ones listed for starting a small business and even more so, how many of them we were already pursuing. Some of us more than others, but we were all headed in the right direction.

Speaking of R&D, I’ve been doing a lot of research lately. Not necessarily Regency specific research, although a lot of people have been visiting my Regency Resource pages, but I’ve been reading voraciously this year. I could only recall about 79 books that I’d read last year, but this year I decided to keep track with GoodReads and set up a shelf for books I read in 2009. I’m surprised that I’ve read 105 books so far and I have another two in progress as well. I tend to keep one book in the car to read while I pick up the kids and I forget to bring it in, so I pick up and start another one in the house. I’m curious to see how far I’ll get on that count in the next 67 days as well.

So, what are YOU going to do in the next 67 days?

I think I can…

uphilltrainSo May is also a month of insanity around here. So why did I jump on the RD May Wri Mo bandwagon? Cause I’m a sucker for wallowing in pain and suffering with as many other people as possible? Maybe. More likely, it’s the fact that I work better knowing others are working at the same time.

Dayna Hart put everyone who signed up on teams this year. Wow, extra motivation and incentives. Dayna rules. Each team had 250,000 words to start with — some have grown with additional members. My personal goal was to add another 30k to what I had so far for Beneath His Touch. I decided I wasn’t going to push my luck and even doing 1k words a day has been a stretch with lack of practice.

However, I’ve already added 6,666 new words to the project! Yay, me! I’m slightly ahead of my goal, but I suspect as end of the school year events start ramping up, I’ll need any cushion I can get!

I still need to go back and work on the first 3 chapters, but knowing I’m working on chapter 8 is a great feeling too. I made the mistake the other day of reading through the material I already had for 4-7 and screeched to a halt. NO EDITING! ONLY NEW WORDS. OR only edits AFTER I make my word count and then some for the day.

So, if you suspect I’ve disappeared, hope I’m in a groove and staying on track!

No NaNoWriMo for Me…

I know. I haven’t been posting lately. Stress levels are high and I tend to shut down during those times.

I’ve been swamped with Cub Scout stuff lately. Not as insane as this time last year when the wildfires tossed everything up in the air, but almost. This is DS’s final year in the pack and he’ll move on to Boy Scouts in February. The problem? I’m ready for it to be February now and they still have no idea who’s going to be filling the three or four jobs I’ve been doing. Between popcorn and membership, September through November are hectic months here and I learned my lesson last year. I CAN do it, but I’m in high stress avoidance mode right now.

That being said, I do have a plan for November to get all my projects organized and laid out with what exactly needs done to complete them. So far, I have a short summary outline roughed out on one of them. Dont’ laugh, that’s actual progress! More than just organizing, what I’m doing could be more accurately called pre-writing. Of course I probably have 100k in pre-writing stacked up at this point if you combined all the projects together. This really shouldn’t surprise me.

A Writer's Guide To Cohesive Story Building" by Karen S. Wiesner
I think I’m going to try to take these one project at a time, do the summary outline followed by a much more detailed checklist and then a detailed scene outline. If you’re curious as to how I came up with this plan it’s from the From First Draft To Finished Novel: A Writer’s Guide To Cohesive Story Building by Karen S. Wiesner.

The book is apparently a companion book to her book First Draft in 30 Days and while she says they can be used in conjunction, sometimes it feels like some of the information to do so slipped through an editing crack. But, since I don’t have that book, and I’m not exactly rushing out to buy it either, I’m going to plod along with the info I do have.

I love the way she presents the idea of layering through an analogy of building a house. You have to have a firm foundation, then a strong framing and then later you get to finish and decorate it. I think I’ve tried to start at the wrong end and haven’t exactly made sure my foundation and framing were the strongest before dashing ahead and picking out curtains and furniture. Basically, I’m still trying to figure out process while layering everything else along the way.

Write Fiction That Grabs Readers at Page One & Never Lets Them Go" by Les Edgerton
I also recently read Les Edgerton’s Hooked: Write Fiction That Grabs Readers at Page One & Never Lets Them Go which focuses on openings and spends a great deal on opening sentences. I’ve been thinking about that a lot too, but still find ideas coming to mind from Nancy Kress’ book Elements of Writing Fiction – Beginnings, Middles & Ends to reinforce the ideas about what makes a strong and successful hook that is integral to the story and can sustain it. I’m still having issues with finding where a given story starts, but I’m slowly being able to distinguish backstory from what makes an interesting beginning for me as a reader. Yes, I need to know all that info, but it doesn’t have to show up on page one of the story.

I know part of it is terminology, but this bit about inciting incident or story spark or turning point is also giving me fits. Start where the main character’s life changes. Ok. Sounds easy, right? But throw in wrenches like, “Oh, if (s)he doesn’t realize he’s life is changing yet, start later” or “Does it matter who’s life is changing because of this decision/action/etc? Who’s POV do you start out in first?”

I know, stop thinking and just do it. Hey, at least we get an extra hour tonight. I’m using mine to sleep!

Thursday Thirteen: NaNo Lessons

 

13 Things I Learned During NaNoWriMo

1. Priorities are important — especially when you have multiple projects all due by Nov 30th.

2. The month of October is for planning, start EARLIER than Oct 31st.

3. I definitely need a road map/game plan. This plan needs to be extremely more detailed. Lord SO_N_SO is not sufficient to get a grasp of his true character. Luckily, this was not the hero, but that little piece of cardboard was whispering that he’d like to apply for the job someday.

4. Progress is progress. Any progress is good.

5. My mornings are usually more productive than evenings, although a couple of my best runs were from 10-midnight after the kids were in bed.

6. I work better when someone else is working too — I knew this, it was just reinforced in Live Chat on Romance Divas. This is especially true when I’m not quite in the mood to be working. Getting 10 words down and knowing someone else is working against the same clock goes along way to finding motivation.

7. I can write 2-3k words a day when I put my mind to it — however my journaling and blogging and real life suffered for it. My kids & homework do not mix well during writing time. I need to teach them the benefits of #6. Martial Arts class time, however, was good for working on notes on paper.

8. It is possible to stuff my internal editor in a box for extended periods of time. I still haven’t really stopped to go back and read what I’ve written, except to ramp up for the next session. I will admit to some fiddling, but I noticed that I was zapping words instead of adding new sentences — not good for NaNo.

9. Peter Gabriel’s Passion CD is great for background noise. The rhythms build throughout and help keep the momentum going. Stomp — the found instrument percussion group — is also good for background music.

10. I need a wider variety of instrumental music in my iTunes. Lyrics distract me much more easily.

11. I’m more comfortable with letting conversation flow and then going back and filling in action beats and internal dialogue later. Long passages of descriptive narrative were often more like torture, especially if it was internal reflection about some deep emotional issue.

12. I was more comfortable in my heroine’s head, especially when she’s reacting to the off-stage hero.

13. I had a lot of fun doing this even though I won’t “win” with only 35,856 words still. It was a lot of work, but it was another form of a puzzle for me. Must. Solve. Puzzle. Having my spreadsheet that took Dunne’s Emotional Structure and Vogler’s Writer’s Journey diagrams and smushed them all together really made it easy to see where the patterns needed to go. Having that based on page numbers also felt like it helped me with pacing. But most importantly, I learned a lot about how my own personal process. I’m going to keep working on this one and then start the process again for the story that comes before this one, only at a much more reasonable pace while I start to unravel the mysteries of the self-editing process.

Links to other Thursday Thirteens!

1 Tempest Knight 2 Ava Rose Johnson 3 Gina 4 Susan Helene Gottfried
5 Heather 6 Carrie Lofty 7 Ember Case 8 Alice Audrey


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The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

Downhill: 35,856

Falling sick last week really knocked a hole in my word count. I have a bit over 14k left to hit the 50k mark, but I’m already into Act III of the story and maybe have 27 pages of material planned until the end. That’s roughly 5,400 words, so that would leave around 8,800 that I’d have to go back and add to and between earlier scenes. Some of that will be needed, but I may not officially “win”. Which is ok.

I am, however, pleased with the progress I’ve made this month. This was a fantastic jump start and without it I would likely still be”thinking” about this story and not have something on the page that can be worked with. Will I do it next year or if the Divas decide to do their own in a different month? I don’t know.

I look back at a couple of my earlier attempts and go “What was I thinking!?” This definitely gave me a much better perspective on the amount of planning, effort and hard work that goes into a project this large. The ones I typically read run around 400 pages. *gulp*

Anyway, wanted to post an update since I forgot on Friday and I don’t know if I’ll get much writing done in the next couple of days because of other obligations.

25,120: Did I Mention, Colds Suck?

Writing progress since Thursday has been practically non-existent. I’ve been largely unable to sit and focus on anything for any significant amount of time. I’m about 5k words short of where I should be by this point. Guess I’m not going to be taking any time off except for cooking on Thanksgiving Day itself.

I did go back and rewrite all my notes so I can read them, they’re in a logical order and basically to revisit with the story line itself. One part of me onders if I’m just freaking out because I’ve gotten this far along and good grief! I’m in uncharted territory while the rest of me cringes and shivers to try to get warm and hopes that my head doesn’t explode from the sinus pressure.

I’ve been living on Afrin and Advil, but they don’t alleviate all of the symptoms completely. The nasal spray does make it so I can breathe, but as you know, breathing in colder dry air brings its own pain.

The good news is the kids are feeling much better. The bad news is that they’re off school this week and DH came back from his trip still feeling miserable and he’s home from work today too.

I’m going to try to write some today, but I’m not going to push it.

24,777: Almost Half-Way!

Photo of a set of stone stairs that was taken by the author.
Halfway up the stairs…

The kids are feeling a bit better. The boy’s likely going to school tomorow. Neither have strep, so that’s a relief.

Not having to stop and run back and forth to school has helped with NaNo productivity. Once I’ve gotten everything out of the way, I can sit down and pretty much write until I’m ready to quit. At this rate, I might get to take Thanksgiving day off so I can cook. 😉
My hero’s been behaving the last couple of days. I didn’t want to write any more last night so I did weird things like figure out how many words I was averaging per page so far and took and colored all the scenes in her POV pink and his in blue… then zoomed out to be able to see 6 pages at once and boy, that was a lot of pink! I can see I’m gonna have to go back and add some insights into his life/story in there.That big, blank, gaping hole at the beginning of ACT II is a great candidate for that kind of filling in. It’s surrounded by an ocean of pink.

Writing today went a little easier as with these scenes, I’m able to work in some of the other material from the original short story. I’m having to rewrite most of it, but there are useful bits. I’m nearing the bottom of the page of notes I have for Act II (probably 22 pages worth) and it’s a strange feeling. I’ve never gotten this far in a story before. I did manage to cram 25k words on another ms this summer, but it’s going to need completely torn apart and redone at this point.

I’ve also decided that having a wonderful, rich, detailed and interconnected world for you characters is great, but man is it a lot of work. You need a REALLY big chunk of time to write down all the relationships and details that you think of as you’re writing. I know, I should write it on an index card and toss it in a box and move on. However, I’m a digital pack rat. The file is getting unwieldy. Sounds like a project for December!