Post-dated to keep this on top:

6,181 / 50,000 (12.4%)

Seven Tears

New Words: 3,057
Total Words: 6,181 / 50,000
Pages: 20
Reason for stopping: Goal reached!
Stimulants: Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper, too much of it.
Darling du jour: One of the clearest things that her interviews taught Natalie was that the gossip of today becomes the oral history of tomorrow--at least in a small town like Harper.
Mean things: Family strife.
Other writing-related work: Nothing, just writing and writing and writing
Mammalian assistance: Rumpus has started standing sentinel (okay, lying sentinel) near my desk while I work. He did the same thing when I was writing the first draft of The Exile's Daughter.
Far too amused by: Not much today.

Today was a little more of a slog than before, mostly because of the Exposition Scene from Hell, which had to be written even if it does get cut later, because it's stuff I need to know about this godforsaken town. The slog paid off, though. I'm now only 3,800 words off schedule, and that should be easy to catch up.

Arrrrrrgh. I am slogging through a gigantic bloated scene of suck, and I know there's nothing for it but to write my way out of it, but arrrrrrgh. Endless exposition and town history that could be much more interesting than it is. Maybe it IS more interesting than I think, but it just belongs somewhere other than the first time we meet the character doing the expositing. All I know is that I'm tired of it at the moment.

Ooh hey. That's the good point of writing out of order. I can just go pick another scene to start, can't I?

Seven Tears

New Words: 2002
Total Words: 3124 / 50,000
Pages: 11
Reason for stopping: Goal reached, and brain dying.
Stimulants: Lots of ice water, Vanilla Coke, hummus with itty bitty baby pitas
Darling du jour: Still, the part [of his face] Amanda could see was remarkably handsome, particularly in a town so Hicksville that the Homecoming Queen was probably the only girl in school not missing a tooth or two.
Mean things: Unrequited love, aw.
Other writing-related work: So many notecards. It's threatening to become a full-fledged outline.
Mammalian assistance: Added this, because today I had lots. Pooka kept coming by and trying to help me type, and Rumpus spent most of the afternoon perched on the back of my chair, overseeing my work.
Far too amused by: Amanda

Oh yeah. This writing thing IS fun, isn't it. I'd almost forgotten. I'm still behind, but I'm less behind than I was yesterday! Go me! I'm shooting for more than 2000 tomorrow, because I won't have housework to deal with. Of course, it's all very very rough, and what I don't know about small-town police work would fill a small library, but that can all be fixed later, if needed.

( Excerpt, because this was just too fun to write. )

Still a little rough, but so much fun. I'm enjoying my characters.

Okay brain, when did you decide I was writing a police procedural and why didn't I get any say in the matter?

Okay okay. Supernatural mystery police procedural chick lit. Without the shoes and the boyfriends. Or much of the humor, come to think of it.

Back to the notecards. Whee!

The housework is done. The grocery shopping is done. The cats have been throughly waxed. It's time to get to work.

It's the fifth of November, I'm 7,000 words behind schedule, and I have a brain full of plot. I'm not worried, because I was more behind than this on 11-21-01, and I still managed to win NaNo that year. Of course, this year I won't have a four-day weekend to work through, but...

I'm setting my sights kind of low today--aiming for at least 2,000 words. Tomorrow I might aim higher. Here I go.

Seven Tears

New Words: 0 (no, no, come back. Keep reading.)
Total Words: 1122 / 50,000
Pages: 4
Reason for stopping: Running out of steam, must get sleep.
Stimulants: Lots and lots of water, cough drops, little bit of Halloween candy
Darling du jour: I don't have one, but I HAVE A PLOT.
Mean things: While notecarding tonight, I introduced a minor character whom I already love although I've not written a word about them. A few notecards later, I killed them off.
Other writing-related work: About half this sucker is outlined on notecards as of right now. I have a title. I HAVE A PLOT. I know where I'm going! Whee!
Far too amused by: ORT ORT ORT

In my own defense, I have to say that I did not, strictly speaking, miss today. I've been brainstorming like a mofo all day, even while in meetings at work. I have a working outline well underway and have a list of scenes to tackle tomorrow. This is good. I can do this. I may not have gotten any draft-work done today, but I laid some serious groundwork. I am SO excited about this now.

"ORT ORT ORT" possibly not fear-inducing.

That enormous CLICK that you just heard? Yeah. That was my major plot falling into place. Or perhaps I should say, "appearing from OUT OF NOWHERE and falling into place". I now know why these three women wind up working together. I now know what they're working towards. Hell. I now know for sure that there's three of them and not four.

I have a plot! I even have a prospective title! (Maybe not quite as amusing as the working title, but hey.)

IT'S ONLY NOVEMBER 4 AND I HAVE A PLOT ALREADY! I AM INVINCIBLE!

Untitled OH MY GOD WHAT AM I THINKING NaNoWriMo 2005 Project

New Words: 0
Total Words: 1122 / 50,000
Pages: 4
Reason for stopping: Never actually started--see yesterday's virii.
Stimulants: None
Darling du jour: n/a
Mean things: My characters are off the hook until I can breathe again.
Other writing-related work: Lots of pen and paper brainstorming. At this point, this entire enterprise is a big amorphous mass in my head. It has a shape, but I can't see it clearly yet.
Far too amused by: Not so much.

Yes, it's true. Three days in and I've already missed a day. It's not for lack of trying. I'm planning to spend the weekend cocooned at home, so here's hoping I get some serious catching up done. I've never been so far behind in a NaNo and still interested in going on, but I am, I am.

Untitled OH MY GOD WHAT AM I THINKING NaNoWriMo 2005 Project

New Words: 403
Total Words: 1122 / 50,000
Pages: 4
Reason for stopping: The virii in my brain are merciless.
Stimulants: Halloween candy
Darling du jour: All cities and towns have secrets, regardless of size or location. It's an old known fact, old enough that it's become a cliché for lazy writers. (hee, that's so getting cut)
Mean things: I was all historical today, so I wasn't mean.
Other writing-related work: Lots of long overdue North Carolina research, wherein I (re)learned that Roanoke is not in North Carolina.
Far too amused by: the Roanoke thing

I shouldn't even post this excerpt, because it's SO very rough and sucky, and contains what is quite possibly the most awkward sentence I have ever tried to formulate. But you can get what I'm going for here, I hope. And I have to say, as slowgoing as this is, this is the most forward motion I've had while writing in a long, long time.

( Pirates! )

It would help if I LOOKED at a map of North Carolina before getting all excited about putting Harper near Roanoke, because 1) Hello, Lisa, Roanoke's in VIRGINIA, and 2) Roanoke's nowhere near the ocean. For some reason I thought it was. Simple enough. I invent my own missing colony that got overlooked in favor of Roanoke. But still. Grr.

I blame the viruses in my brain.

(File under: stupid writer mistakes)

Wow. This book really is going to have everything. Selkies, muses, pirates! Ghosts! Lost colonies! Oh yeah. We're definitely back in North Carolina, and whatever makes Harper the oh-so-special place that it is was also behind Roanoke. I have no idea if that belongs in the book anywhere, but I just know it. I also get to play around with another favorite 'what if' of mine: what really happened to Anne Bonny? She vanished from history after escaping the noose because of her pregnancy (which may or may not have been real). Again, I dunno if she has a place in this book, but it's in the back of my mind.

The writing is still going veeeeeeery slowly, but I think it'll pick up once I'm not coughing and sneezing my head off, or having other medical emergencies.

(format shamelessly stolen from matociquala)

Untitled OH MY GOD WHAT AM I THINKING NaNoWriMo 2005 Project

New Words: 719
Total Words: 719 / 50,000
Pages: 3
Reason for stopping: Headache and coughing are slowly killing me
Stimulants: Two giant mugs of Lemon Lift tea with honey, and some Halloween candy
Darling du jour: Kate looked at the alarm clock on her side of the bed--her side, the whole thing was her side now
Mean things: I've killed off five people before page 1. Also, survivor guilt.
Other writing-related work: Character notecards, long overdue. Some extra notes in the note file, some serious thought about where the hell this is going.
Far too amused by: my working title

I'm already wondering if taking a scattershot approach to this might not make the editing easier for me, because I doubt very much I'll have a clear picture of the entire story by the time I'm through. And without that clear picture, necessary changes might make themselves more apparent--and I might be more willing to make said changes. And speaking of changes, Harper is trying to move north on me, goddamn it. What I've always envisioned as a Southern coastal town is trying to turn New England. Maybe that'll shift again once I start writing about Natalie...

( Excerpt from today's work. This might not become a regular thing, I haven't decided yet. )

I know I'm already behind by nearly 1,000 words, but I figure doing any writing and/or plotting with a low-grade fever is good enough. I can always catch up, right? :)

I have to wonder why I am so obsessed with the notion of the woman left behind when the man down to the sea in a ship and drowns, but obsessed I am. Similar themes show up over and over again in my writing, second only to the mother who leaves her children for the sea. (Which also figures in this novel, with another character.) I blame brand_of_amber, but then, I blame him for all of the angst in my writing.

520 words of grieving so far. I'm really trying not to think about how Freudian this is threatening to become. But at least the playlist I came up with for the last story I attempted is terribly appropriate for this character (Kate).

You know, there was supposed to be some happy stuff in this book somewhere.

I have:

• Eaten lunch
• Taken a nap
• Found my MP3 player
• Started a scene
• Given myself full permission to write rambling, out-of-order, probably unnecessary crap
• Sworn to embrace the cliche and not question my ideas until they fall over and die
• Sworn to let this suck as much as it needs to, as long as it's suck that I enjoy writing
• Gotten myself a cup of very hot Lemon Lift tea with honey--debated adding whiskey, assuming we have any, to complete the lemon-honey-whiskey triumverate that was always my mom's favored cold remedy when I was a kid. Decided against it.
• Made as random LJ posts and comments as I can feasibly get away with.

Diving in now. For reals, yo.

(I also managed to dip my sleeve in my tea, but that's another story altogether.)

Well, it's the day before the insanity starts, and I have not so much done. I have my desk cleared off and reasonably ready to work. I have some vague character notions. Tonight I plan to get down more concrete character stuff, like conflicts and fears and all that good stuff. I had hoped to have a rough outline on notecards, but it hasn't happened yet. I still don't know how my four (three?) protagonists wind up interacting together, I don't have a common goal for them yet. That's the most worrying thing for me right now.

I'm prepared to do a scary thing: write this sucker out of order. This is either going to be absolutely brilliant, or it's going to be an enormous mess. Of course, it could be a brilliant mess. Which, come to think of it, sums up the trunked Harper story, "Girl Behind the Counter". I reread it today, and there's a lot about it I really love--although it really is too flawed to save. Am I going to cannibalize the good parts for this as-yet-untitled novel? What do you think? :)

I get it now. I totally get it. After a major A-HA moment in the shower this morning, I realized what this novel is. It's a Harper novel! I've already done some research (with some help), and I have a solid sense of place. Plus, I've already written two short stories about it already, one published and one unpublishable.

I am now officially psyched. I have three of my four main characters firmly in mind (and in fact, one of them is probably going to be Natalie from "Midsummer", but I haven't decided for sure yet--she might be a little too involved in the more fantastical elements of the town). I have a town, which is just brimming with background and plot and interesting minor characters. I might really be able to pull this off.

Best of all? I have a real involvement in telling a story about Harper, but at the same time, if it fails miserably, I haven't "ruined" the idea, because there's always going to be more stories about Harper. :)

I was thinking that in order for me to do this successfully, I needed to start with an idea that I wasn't overwhelmingly invested in. That might sound strange, but I'll explain. I have several novel ideas (and notebooks and worldbuilding and character sketches and... so on). I'm so invested in those ideas that I don't think I'd be able to write with the right level of "who cares if I fail!" So I'm whipping up something out of the blue, based loosely on characters I am quite familiar with, throwing them into a potentially preposterous situation. Will there be cliche? Oh yes. Will there be forced motivations and weak plot points? Oh probably. But will I write? I hope so.

Of course, the only time I actually won NaNoWriMo was when I finally tackled my very first novel idea, the one I'd been mulling over for years... so my logic might still be off. But I do, already, have four characters that I think I can be very much invested in. That might prove the difference.

Let's see. I do have a few plot goals, or rules, I guess:

• None of my characters may have romance as a main motivation. Getting over a romance, sure. Finding a new one? No.
• These women will avoid talking about men whenever possible. (With one possible exception, see the first rule.)
• Accept the cliche. Love it, use it, twist it whenever possible.
• Just write, damn it. WRITE WRITE WRITE. Even if it sucks. Especially if it sucks.
• If there is to be a supernatural element, shove it in a cage and keep it there. And torture it as early as possible until it reveals all its logic and ground rules to you.
• Whenever possible, make the situation worse.
• Overcaffeinate whenever you can, and have fun.

Yup, I should definitely start asking for that time off in November now...

I have amused myself tremendously by coming up with a description of the idea blossoming in my head: The Jane Austen Book Club meets The Craft.