As you may or may not know, November is National Novel Writing Month, more commonly known as NaNoWriMo. The goal is to write 50,000 words in 30 days. It sounds like a daunting task, but thousands of people "win" every year, and I have twice myself.
This year's story is going pretty well. I've had this week off, so I've tried to make the most of it, knowing that things will get harder once I go back to work on Monday. It's been my goal to write 25,000 words by bedtime tomorrow, and given I'm up to 23,084 words, I'd say that's probably going to happen. This will leave me needing to only write 1100 words a day for the rest of the month instead of the usual 1667 people shoot for, and with some luck I might not need to worry about writing at all Thanksgiving Day or the day after (I'm one of those brave souls who "does" Black Friday with a friend every year) which has been a problem in the past.
I think things are going so well because I really like my story this year; hopefully I won't immediately jinx myself by saying that. I haven't won since 2006, because in 2007 I got the flu and then pneumonia in November so I didn't even try, and last year I scrambled for ideas and picked two that didn't have any real mileage to them. (my complete score since 2003 is 2 wins, 2 loses, and two years sitting out. come on lucky number 7!) This year I'm doing what I said back in June that I some day should - write a story about someone who can cross between life and death. The current story has little in common with the fragment I wrote down then, and somehow involves our heroine helping the police look for a serial killer, by crossing over to talk to his victims. Who knew that was going to happen?
Anyway, I'm having fun crafting an urban fantasy story that completely lacks vampires, werewolves, ghosts, fairies, and elves. Instead Caitlin is dealing with a teenage foster kid with the same ability as she has, the first person she saved who grew up to be her neurotic ex-boyfriend, and a guy who'd be perfect for her if only he'd ever been born. Oh, and of course the female detective who is trying to solve a string of murders with Caitlin's reluctant help. Not too complicated, right?
"Oh my God, I'm sitting on a time bomb. It's just a matter of time. I can't wait forever. Nothing lasts forever." - Educated Animals, Time Bomb
This year's story is going pretty well. I've had this week off, so I've tried to make the most of it, knowing that things will get harder once I go back to work on Monday. It's been my goal to write 25,000 words by bedtime tomorrow, and given I'm up to 23,084 words, I'd say that's probably going to happen. This will leave me needing to only write 1100 words a day for the rest of the month instead of the usual 1667 people shoot for, and with some luck I might not need to worry about writing at all Thanksgiving Day or the day after (I'm one of those brave souls who "does" Black Friday with a friend every year) which has been a problem in the past.
I think things are going so well because I really like my story this year; hopefully I won't immediately jinx myself by saying that. I haven't won since 2006, because in 2007 I got the flu and then pneumonia in November so I didn't even try, and last year I scrambled for ideas and picked two that didn't have any real mileage to them. (my complete score since 2003 is 2 wins, 2 loses, and two years sitting out. come on lucky number 7!) This year I'm doing what I said back in June that I some day should - write a story about someone who can cross between life and death. The current story has little in common with the fragment I wrote down then, and somehow involves our heroine helping the police look for a serial killer, by crossing over to talk to his victims. Who knew that was going to happen?
Anyway, I'm having fun crafting an urban fantasy story that completely lacks vampires, werewolves, ghosts, fairies, and elves. Instead Caitlin is dealing with a teenage foster kid with the same ability as she has, the first person she saved who grew up to be her neurotic ex-boyfriend, and a guy who'd be perfect for her if only he'd ever been born. Oh, and of course the female detective who is trying to solve a string of murders with Caitlin's reluctant help. Not too complicated, right?
"Oh my God, I'm sitting on a time bomb. It's just a matter of time. I can't wait forever. Nothing lasts forever." - Educated Animals, Time Bomb
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