Cats are the best writing pals

 My cat is a creative genius and a comedian. 

In case you didn't know, now you do.

She's also 100% certain that if it's warm and I'm looking at it, it's where she belongs. Which, of course means she thinks my laptop is her bed. Add that it's a touch screen, and this means interesting editorial changes, compliments of Angel.

It also means all I have to do if I want to summon her is get involved in a scene. Then she's full on ready for snuggle time.

So here is to all the feline writing companions, keeping their worshiping would-be writers on their toes and full of cuddles.  

New Projects

 Early, on the first day of 2021, I embarked on a new project.

Now, it isn't entirely new, as I've been heading in this direction for quite a while. I never would have had this blog were it not for my interest in noveling. You see, I came to blogging through twitter, and I found twitter through NaNoWriMo many years ago. I think it might have been 2005 or 2006. 

Well, this year, on January first, I finally hit the publish button on KDP (Amazon's direct publishing service). I had long thought I'd try the traditional route. You know the drill. Query an agent, get rejected, lather, rinse, repeat until maybe one picked me up and found a publisher for one of my novels. 

This winter, I realized something about myself. I hated dating. When I met my husband, it was one of the first things we confessed to each other. The process of trying people on to see if they were a good fit exhausted both of us. So we spent the first few dates in a mad rush to tell one another every reason it wouldn't work out, just to cut to the chase. Like I said, we both hated dating. Well, the query thing felt a lot like dating to me. It felt like something that sucked the joy out of creating.

So here I am, publishing my books on my own. Is it scary? Only when my mom threatens to read the sexy parts. 

So this? Right here? Is my first ever published book. Exciting, right? 

/Okay, for me it's a big deal. 

Come back by over the next couple weeks and I'll let you know more about what I've been up to, because, hooooooo, Nelly, have I been busy. 

Goals and Accountability: Where did NaNo Go?

I have a gorgeous calendar by my computer. Okay, that's misleading. It typically sit under my netbook and is more than many moons outdated. Anyway, it's open to November and has word counts penciled in on it, a relic from a year I almost didn't finish NaNoWriMo, and yes, before you say anything, I do need to clean my desk more often. I know that it is January and NaNo is long over, but let's face it, I'm not done. Sure, I, like you, hit my goal of fifty thousand words, and then some, but that doesn't mean I'm done. Fifty thousand is a good starting point, but for my emotionally-fragile family drama, but before I start shopping it out to agents, it really needs to put on about thirty thousand meaningful words. 

Let's have a moment of math, shall we? 

80,000 - 54,376 = 25,624 words to go. 

Time to get writing!

That's not so bad, really. If I hit they keyboard like it's November, I'm looking at another two weeks of writing. Six weeks of writing? No big. However, that's when the real work starts. The editing. 

Have you already hit the word count zone for the novel you're writing? Yes, there really are word count guidelines for different genres. Then you still need to be editing with the rest of us, and so it's time to set some goals.

It is not November. Try however I might, I can't make it be November now. I can't summon the collective energy of millions of writers struggling to hit their daily word counts, and I can't convince myself I'm racing against a friend's growing word count chart, especially when editing isn't as simply quantifiable as a word count. As a result, it is time to be honest about what kinds of measurable progress I can aim for. 

Word Count

Goal 1: 500 words a day. I'm not going to finish this as quickly as I started it, so the imaginary six weeks is right out. At 500 words a day I have another month and a half ahead of me, and that's manageable. 

Accountability tool: I'm replacing the outdated calendar with a new one to pencil in my word counts. If it's a number I can see with my eyes even when I' not touching a device, I'm far more apt to keep up with it. I keep it simple by updating word counts at bedtime so I don't have a string of numbers confusing me later.

Editing

Goal 1: Read through and correct all glaring errors. There's always a lot more to editing than correcting errors, but it's somewhere to start.

As I get back into the process of writing every day, I'll write about more of my little goals on the way to actually finishing my novel. With any luck, all of us will be finished before November rolls back around.

NaNoWriMo, Day 8

I have terrifying news.

It is the eighth day of National Novel Writing Month, and not only have I switched stories entirely (on the 3rd) I am egregiously behind on word count. I really should have over 12k by now, but my word count is languishing at just over 6k.  Did changing story lines hinder my chances of success this year? Is writing this blog post going to keep me from my goal? When all is said and done, this will be some three hundred words or so which could have better been applied to my epic fantasy novel, right?
Of course not. When three days in I had only managed to write a meager 287 words, I knew it was time to say goodbye to that particularly uninspired plot line. I may pick it up when time is not of the essence, but for now, I need something with more fire under it's proverbial posterior. Since then I have vastly improved my word counts daily, and I think this story may just have the momentum I need.
I think part of this momentum comes from my having an idea where I'm going. I can see who the characters are and why they are intertwined. I can see a destination towards which their combined fates seem to be charting a course. I can visualize a story and a backstory for each of them.
In short, I'm taking the easy route. I'm writing something that isn't going to surprise me much, rather than something more serious where every decision is as painstaking as a real world choice.
Sure, when writing epic fantasy I have to make myriad little decisions. How many moons, what's the weather like, any beasts that aren't part of our zoological schema here on Earth? But these are easier choices than whether or not my main character is a vegetarian and how that might affect her interactions with other people Is she computer savvy, or is she a bit of a ludite. Do these things matter? Yes. Everything matters in fiction, but it seems to me that serious fiction, set in the modern day, has more constraints because the author has to address all of the ways in which the characters do or do not fit into the world around the reader, a world on which the reader is somewhat of an expert, having lived their all his or her life.
"What reader? It's NaNoWriMo, I'm not showing this to anyone," you say. Well, good for you, but I can't get beyond the notion of writing as though someone, someday, just may read what I'm writing. Why do we tell stories if not to share them?  No, not every story needs to be shared. But if I were to write every story as though it never were going to be read by anyone at all, then I'd be wasting my time, and I'd be aware of it.
So yes, I'm behind, but I'm going to keep writing as though someone out there may eventually be looking, and I'm going to summon all my whimsy and complicated feelings in order to keep this story moving fast enough to catch up. By this weekend, I shall be ahead.

So say we all.

NaNo No Go?

So yes, I'm still doing NaNoWriMo, and today I worked up the real world people skills to go to my first NaNoWriMo write in.

It was great. I got my parents to babysit the JabberWalky and set out in the evening for an hour and a half of like minded writerly geekdom. Hosted at an indie local coffee shop, I got about 2k words down and advanced my plot substantially, all while supporting local business.

But here's the thing. I was the only NaNo-er in the building.  The ersatz organizers didn't even show. Sure, I know, these things are kind of informal, and yes, life happens, but it was a bit awkward looking around for anyone else who even knew what NaNoWriMo was and didn't actively have their homework in front of them.

Like I said though, it was great.  I probably got more done in that hour and a half than I would at home. There, I felt like some sort of real author, taking in a quiet nook of humanity and writing amidst the hipsters and the goths.

It was great.
While the write-in was pretty much a no go, I got a lot out of it and I'm glad I went.

So if you're nervous about going to that first write in, afraid you won't know anyone there, afraid you'll be the only one who shows, take it from me- it's okay to be the only one who shows. Who knows, maybe a private-public-write-in is just what your novel needed.

Word count: 37,219

NaNoWriMo - Full In.

I did NaNoWriMo in 2006 and 2007.  In 2007 I didn't start until after November 20th, and still managed somehow to finish.  Then in 2008 something happened. The economy soured, we couldn't afford to stay in our home anymore, and we moved in with my husband's mother.

It turns out, she's not a big fan of watching people sit a computer if it isn't "work" related.  She kind of has this notion that if you're not outside of the home with a typical job, then you're not doing anything worthwhile.  So I said "this year, I think I'll skip NaNo." Besides, I argued, my computer had died shortly before moving and it was all just too complicated. I was pregnant and depressed, and it was easy not to do it.

A year later, 2009, I was busily nursing a baby, changing diapers, and dealing with life coming far too fast for me to handle. Good reason to skip it, right?

2010. Baby is walking. Baby is talking. Baby is hard to keep up with. Delightful new computer, but still, not a good year for me.

2011. This is it. I do it this year or forget that I used to write. So I'm going all in.  This is me, doing NaNo this year.  These fingers learned to type so that they can write, and write I'm going to do.  Sure we're sort-of moving that month, but no more excuses.

Want to join me? Sign up at NaNoWriMo for a thirty day whirlwind of writing and fun starting November 1st, and GET WRITING.