subscribeWriting on the anniversary
Sunday March 7, 2010
I started a new short story (or novella? Ah!) set in one of my worlds last weekend. I’m a few thousand words in and I’m absolutely loving the feel of the world again. I set it in a familiar world to get excited about the idea of going back to revise one of the drafts set in the same world (at a different time, in a different place). Writing this is doing everything for my enthusiasm I hoped it would. Not only that, but I thought I’d had all of my big, necessary worldbuilding questions answered in regards to this world’s history and system(s) of magic, but apparently I don’t. Writing this story, with its vociferous narrator and her particular mindset, helped me to see that. I love when one story and its characters helps me with another.
The other fun and really exciting thing about this story is my narrator herself. She’s much edgier than the last main character I spent a significant amount of time with and the contrast is really thrilling. She’s so vastly different from me it’s both an excitement and a challenge to dig into her brain and look out from her eyes. (It may sound pretty gross, but I definitely do imagine myself as something of a leech in these characters’ heads when I’m writing first person. I’m weird but we knew that.)
In other news, it’s also my first wedding anniversary, the week of my sixth anniversary of being together, and it’s Oscar night. The anniversary(ies?) we celebrated with a lot of sushi on Friday and an obnoxiously huge steak to share last night. That steak made my life complete. (Who needs gluten when there’s steak? Carnivorous GF folks of the world, rejoice!) I should have photographed it, but considering the husband and I were starving, there wasn’t really any time to waste. (Also, my iPhone has no flash and you know restaurants with mood lighting that equates to shadowy darkness…) Both anniversaries sort of shocked us. I’m surprised it’s been a year since the wedding, and even more surprised that it’s been six years of us together. In a good way. But because we celebrated both Friday and Saturday, I’ve spent a lot of today writing and working. I’m also very excited about the Oscars (but less excited than I could be because I haven’t managed to see all of the nominated movies — though 10 is a lot to try to tackle before Oscar night!) and the whole shebang. The husband is less thrilled with my taking over the remote for a whole evening (as well as my decision to sit there and write between awards with the netbook on my lap) but then, Oscar night comes but once a year! As does our anniversary… but I think the steak counts as time well spent to celebrate each other. Right? Steak makes up for tonight being about Oscar… yes.
Finished?!
Tuesday January 26, 2010
It’s a term that’s always relative, isn’t it? Being “finished” with something — especially for writers. How finished is finished? Even now, a week after I hacked, slashed, and rewrote the final chapter in my Work in Progress, I’m reluctant to say I’m finished. In one definitional sense I am (the edited, cleaned-up, polished rewrite is DONE!), but in others, I’m still working.
Since I “finished” the rewrite, I’ve been looking to cut scenes, unnecessary words and phrases, and redundancy. Thankfully, the slicing has been going well and mercilessly. I will miss a lot but I’m not too concerned about that at this point. After my betas read it, I’ll go through again (hastily! Speedily! Remarkably quickly!) and… well. At that point Things Will Happen. Yes, indeed.
It’s been hard to want to tear myself away from working to even think about blogging. (I apologize for the gap here!) I’ve tried to supplement with occasional Twitter comments, but I even forget to update (and check) Twitter — and Twitter is Twitter. Even when I stare at the WiP (which is still “in progress” as far as I’m concerned for now) and I don’t want to work on/in it, I still do something else involving writing. I write notes for future projects, I fiddle around with reference documents, I read or re-read something else. I’m no longer in the habit to blog. (Bad Erin!) Then, when I’m not working, I’m catching up on all of the other life essentials I consistently neglect, which is hardly different from anyone else who gets sucked into their work.
(One of said life essentials is now appeasing my husband by watching one episode of Battlestar Galactica a night. His preference would probably be a non-stop marathon, but we’ve compromised. Neither of us has seen BSG and considering I regularly quote Star Wars and we are both unrepentant geeks, watching BSG is one of those “It’s about darned time!” experiences we can no longer avoid. We’re still early in Season One [be dears and don't spoil anything!] and already Starbuck has filled a bit more of the complex, ass-kicking female character void in my soul. That, and where has Tricia Helfer been all of my life?! I am straight and married — but damn.)
The next steps are to finish my last scan of the document, pass it on to the next sets of eyes, then start the business end of things. This isn’t my first novel by any stretch, but it’s the first one I’m going to query. I’m both excited and terrified about that. Now that I have the entirety of the story written in a final form I love (…and tentative sequels mapped? AH!) I am looking forward to 2010 with a bit more enthusiasm and fervor than I did a month ago.
Good things are going to happen. My cheeky optimism says so.
And NaNoWriMo is over.
Tuesday December 1, 2009
I won NaNoWriMo 2009! Now all I need to do is get my winner’s t-shirt (or another, at least) and sit back, giggling over the ludicrousness of my accomplishment. Right?
Well, not really. I’ll explain.
The breakneck pace of my NaNoWriMo project this year was due in part to a lot of factors. It was a story I first wrote, in a version absurdly different from the way I see it now, back in 2000/2001. I’ve rewritten it top-to-bottom at least three times now, and in each version markedly different things happen but it’s the same world, same basic story. The three main characters are always the same three folks. I know them absurdly well. I even transposed their odd story onto a screenplay I wrote in college, for no other reason than I couldn’t think of what else to write for my assignment and these characters are old friends. But back in 2007 I imagined a vastly different background for the characters which gives a different gravity, a weight to the story that was never there. But I never wrote more than a vague scene and some notes on this new direction. I realized that this change was so big I had to delete certain characters I’d known for a draft or two, create entirely new ones, re-imagine old ones, and utterly alter the nature of the plot’s movement. (And that was scary and a huge thing to just… start one day!) My ideas for this draft were the same but the events leading to them were different, things like that. I was afraid to actually write it at last, I think. But I needed a project for NaNo and I think NaNo is the perfect opportunity for a writer to just take something off of their already large to-do list and just do it (as opposed to the way a non-writer approaches NaNo).
So I approached this year’s NaNoWriMo as my excuse to finally write this idea down, as I said a few weeks ago here. That helped my ability to punch this story out in 20 days, certainly, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t pretty much flying by the seat of my pants every day all the same. I also devoted a good 8, sometimes 10 hours a day to the endeavor, and had a lot of output as a result of the time I put into it. (And no, my fingers can’t fly over keys for all of those hours straight. I am easily distracted.) Some fascinating things happened. I was confident in my point of view and its changes. (Point of view is usually my hardest single choice in a draft! I agonize! Not so in this one.) I seamlessly slid into the persona of these old, beloved characters, even though I threw things at them I didn’t even know I’d hidden up my subconscious sleeve. It was glorious fun.
But now that I’ve done all of that, finally written down the meat of the story (and I’ve outlined what the rest of the story will be) I am looking at December quite differently than I looked at October and November. I’m realizing that while I can probably sit and finish my NaNo novel and make it what I know it will be now, I also have an obligation to myself to finish my 2009 WiP, the very same one I started during my self-imposed JaNoWriMo last January, the one I’ve been working on in earnest rewriting and polishing since the summer. I’ve made the [rash?] promise to myself that by 2010, I will finish it. Which means… 31 days from now. It’s only about 20 or 25,000 words away from completion. That’s half of NaNoWriMo’s sheer output demand. Theoretically as I wrote 50,000 words in 20 days, this 20,000 word chunk should be… well. Shouldn’t be too onerous for a 31 day task.
Now that is a hell of a lot scarier to me than NaNoWriMo. My WiP is a rewrite. Granted, I’ve diverged [at times majorly] from my first draft in this rewrite, but I still know where I’m going and [pretty much] how I’ll get there. (Rather, I know the major things I need to hit and where it will end, but the details are foggy. I am a write-to-know details person.) But finishing denotes… finality. I think I need to do it to prove to myself that I can wrap this thing up tight. Then, once I’m content with that, I’ll go back to this year’s NaNo, revisit my other drafts set in that same world… oh, the many things I must do. Oh, yes, and begin the query process. For the first time ever. The funny thing is I’m not nervous about querying so much as nervous about what happens when (“when” because, recall, I am cheekily optimistic) it all happens. When this amorphous agent wants me as a client, when they sell my book to a publisher…. I’m nervous about being a real grown up. Not about being a writer — I’ve been a writer since I was twelve, for goodness’ sake; I have a degree in writing! — but about being a real freaking grown up. I am too old to be nervous about that! But… still. Part of me wants to go tell my story to my Barbies and call it a day, like I did when I was twelve. But I’m too old for that, too.
Oh, December… how exciting you shall be…
It’s That Time of Year Again!
Thursday November 5, 2009
NaNoWriMo time, of course!
(I did see Christmas decorations at Duane Reade, though, so I do suppose it’s also that time of year, but the NaNo time of year is far more important.)
This morning I am at 18,955 words. I sprinted through the first few days and now I am in the midst of a tough scene, which has me stalled. Must push through! Several factors have helped me with my word count thus far: the first is that I conceived this story in its current form in 2007 and haven’t had the excuse, chance, or energy to do more than outline it in all that time. I’m working off of an outline but I’ve also held scenes in all of their vivid, visual clarity in my head for far longer than I really ought to have. I have a strangely visual memory when it comes to imaginary things. (Like, when I recount the plot of a novel to someone, I actually imagine the strings of images my brain put together and rebuild the story from those images.) I’m a weird duck.
The next factor is I was diagnosed with a case of bronchitis last Friday, October 30th, so by the time midnight between October 31st and November 1st rolled around, I was at home coughing up a lung and bored. So I started writing. (Getting two thousand words before bed was… exhilarating.) I spent all of Sunday writing (my friend and I even attempted to squeeze in at the Manhattan Write-in but it was stuffed full of people, so we went to an adorable little tea shop instead with the laptops.) Monday I took off from work and sat around, hacking and writing in tandem. Tuesday I was in the midst of an incredible scene. Then another, then another. Thus… 18,955 words. I had told myself I’d hit 20,000 yesterday but the Yankees decided they were going to absolutely kill the Phillies and I was torn the whole time between writing and rooting for the Phillies — yes I am a New Yorker but sometimes it’s no fun to root for the winning team! — and so I sort of stalled. That and I found I was prematurely digging into the meat of the story that I really need to wait on, so I actually need to backtrack and rewrite a little, then resume the forward momentum. That can be the hardest part of NaNoWriMo for me: I write fastest and best when I write compelling, exciting, integral scenes, and while I try to always write that way, it doesn’t happen like that in a first draft. No matter how well I outline there are still boring little bits (to me) that I slog through. I’m also a perfectionist, so first drafts drive me a little crazy there, too. I hesitate over a sentence if it’s not, well, good enough. But NaNo at least gives me the freedom to say, “Yes, it’s not good enough, just keep going and get it all out!” There’s really literary abandon in that, and I love it.
It’s exciting times, November. Can’t wait to get back to it.
National Novel Writing Month 2009
Tuesday September 15, 2009
Otherwise known as NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month, sponsored by the non-profit The Office of Letters and Light, takes place every November. Originally started in 1999, it now involves thousands of novelists every year striving toward a minimum goal of writing 50,000 words in a single month. It’s mayhem and absurdly fun to do. I won it last year (meaning I wrote at least the minimum 50,000 words required) and I’m planning to do it again this year.
Last year was tough because I hadn’t really sat down with the discipline of writing an entire novel that quickly before (I’d done a chapter here and a chapter there for ages). It was crucial, though, because it taught me the limits of my discipline in a very organized, documented way. I understood under which circumstances the words flowed for me, and under which I struggled. (Knowing that now helps me with my current project. When I get stuck, I use the tricks I taught myself during last NaNo.)
Strangely enough, this last January was more or less JaNoWriMo for me (ha). I started a project vaguely between January 6-10 and had more than 50,000 words by January’s end. That furious pace continued until I had to set aside it for wedding stuff by March. Since then, I’d say I’ve also been writing a lot more in 2009 than I did in both 2008 and 2007 — it’s amazing, really, what I’ve actually written this year — so I’m eager to see what kind of pace I can maintain this November. Past success doesn’t guarantee anything, though. I still need an idea (starting with nothing on November 1st isn’t going to go over well!) and I’d had one by this time last year. If I don’t have one by October 1st, I’ll start worrying. By November 1st, though, it’s kamikaze novel writing time.
The other problem is this — what if I’m still up to my eyeballs in my current draft? Could there be any way for me to work on more than one that month? Probably not. If Things of Importance start happening with my current project, NaNo may have to fall by the wayside. In which case… gah. It’d be both a good and sad thing. Primarily good, though, because Things of Importance are really more important to me.
I tried NaNo first in 2002 and then again in 2007. Both times I gave up by the first week. The two unchangeable problems of November for me are my birthday and Thanksgiving; both occasions usually drag me away from my computer for some time. Ideally in NaNoWriMo you need to stay on pace (“pace” is at least 1,667 words a day — which isn’t asking too much, to be honest) in order to comfortably hit 50,000 words. Last year I had some days of 600 words then days of 6,000 words, which was somewhat absurd, but then again, I have days like that as a regular writer, even when I’m not trying to go for a goal as pointed as 50,000 in a month. I’m also an admitted procrastinator. That also influenced the way my month went. (For the image I posted: Red indicates “under pace”; green indicates “over pace”; and gray indicates “on pace”. Note: It says “30 days left” because it’s not yet November 2009 and the images I snagged from last year are a bit wonky, as they’re half updated; I snagged a bunch last year but I forgot where I saved them. Brilliant…)
I’m a writer but not everyone who participates in NaNoWriMo is, or at least is for their day-job. Anyone can do it. Anyone who reads has a good idea of how to start writing. A bunch of people I know personally are planning to attempt NaNoWriMo this year. Kamikaze novel writing with a collective group of people who’ve chosen to do this — there’s nothing like it. If you’ve never done it before, you really ought to consider signing up on the website (you can do that today!) and getting ready for the insanity to begin at 12am November 1st. Or 9am, or 5pm, really — the whole idea of NaNoWriMo is to set the goal for yourself, monitor yourself, and report your own word count on the honor system. So it’s entirely up to you.
Are you planning to do it? (Say yes!) Have you already been thinking about it, or are you considering it now? I bet you’ll have fun if you do it… Shameless non-profit promotion? Who, me?
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