NaNoWriMo 2011

This past weekend I attended the Colorado Romance Writers annual Fall Retreat, this year held in the Galena Street Mountain Inn in Frisco, Colorado. What a lovely place! If you get a chance, do stay there.

The retreat was wonderful, full of helpful presentations by Those In The Know and informal chit-chat by fellow CRWers who want to help. Also, there was wine (LOTS of wine) and all around good times!

One thing that really got me going (apart of the scheduled two-hour writing sessions) was the wonderful talk by Margie Lawson. There were several wonderful bits of advice, but one of the exercises is a way to set up attainable goals by setting up a list of items sorted into two categories: "WINNER" (which can be achieved within two hours or so) and "SUPERSTAR" (which is all the next in line stuff). I applied it to my plans for Saturday and it worked! The Winner list included "Write down possible storylines for NaNoWriMo 2011" and I got not one but TWO skeletal outlines for stories from start to finish.

I am going to FINISH NANO this year!

Wish me luck!

NaNo-What-Oh?

I'm a winner... of sorts. I participated in National Novel Writing Month, intending to get fifty thousand words committed to a document, intending to make a good start to writing another Romance novel set in contemporary Colorado, some sort of adventure to take place in some part of this great state where very few people venture. Last year I did it. I'm a seasoned vet. It shouldn't be that hard, right?

When last year's effort seemed to breeze into and out of my life, I marveled at how few people were in the winner's circle with me. Dis wuz E-Z! Why didn't everyone come through with 50K?

Well, I know now why. To write a novel is very hard work, made harder by lack of planning and lack of commitment. Last year, I spent the last two weeks of October writing out note cards, doing character sketches, playing with outlines - everything allowed in the "rules". This year, I didn't even settle on a story until November 3rd, and it took me two weeks to convince myself that it was the right story. Hell, I'm still not convinced it's a full novel, and those thoughts in the back of my mind are making me question every word, every scene, every character I create. I'm struggling in a way I don't remember ever struggling to write before.

And this makes me a winner. You know why? Because now I truly appreciate how hard the act of creation can be, and I cherish every angst about my craft because it is a growing pain. I'm a better writer for it, and I will keep writing no matter the pain it causes.

I'm a winner.

National Novel Writing Month

Well, well, well...NaNoWriMo in just under four days...

Last year at this time I had a stack of notecards, all sorted by the colors that indicated their information (green for character info, blue of potential quotes/interactions, red for scene details, etc). There was a sense of "Will November First ever arrive??" I contemplated cheating by starting early and just counting that which I'd written as of the official start date.

This year - as veteran of a NaNo 09 win - I'm both cocky and distracted. Back then I knew I'd have no problem. Right now I'm worried that there won't be enough novelty to keep me inspired or that I won't find the going as easy as last year because of my commitment to other projects taking up my available time.

I have the excuses lined up, of course. "Whirlwind trip to Illinois" coming up. "Too many stories in my head" for me to decide upon. "Committed to my volunteer work" which is more necessary that my personal goals.

Fortunately I recognize these as excuses. They are - in reality - no different from the challenges of other WriMo's (or is it NaNo-ers?) and like the other participants, I simply have to organize my plate to fit all my victuals.

Or I can treat NaNoWriMo like a dessert; it will be on a separate plate, waiting for me to finish my main plate so I can enjoy it like a reward.

Seven Month Itch

November is National Novel Writing Month (a.k.a. NaNoWriMo). For those who participate, I think it's a kick in the butt for people to get The Great American Novel out of their brains and onto paper or into the computer.

I was successful in 2009. By November 22, I had a 69,000 word first draft done and immediately began editing. I was so glad to have completed something, especially since I suffered such despair over my previous manuscript Destiny of Honor that was five years old and 247K long. Having The High Bridge done in record time and of a reasonable length sent me into the throes of ecstasy!

Then I sent it out for friends and/or crit partners (beta readers?) and got my butt kicked. It was in a good way and well-intentioned, but a beating is a beating. Sometimes you're too involved in a relationship to see what's wrong with the object of your affection and a friend has to come along and tell you "He's flawed. You can do better!" I found out that my love was a pretty good story but covered with warts.

I've spent the last five months working with this love of my life but have decided to send 'him' off to the big bad world to test if anyone else can grow to love 'him' as I have. Dressed 'him' up and sent 'him' out.

Unfortunately, I've grown lonely. I'm grabbing my notecard pile (my fertility potion) and plan to make an exciting new love, without the kick in the pants provided by NaNoWriMo.

Wish me luck.

NaNoWriMo and "The High Bridge"

Well, I’m back to the blog after a very hectic NaNoWriMo whirlwind project.

As I mentioned before, I’ve never written a novel in a month before. I’ve spent a month (many, actually) doing straight writing, but to have a set goal within a specific timeframe is an entirely new subject to me.

I’m happy to say that I was successful! On November 20^th, I hit the 50,000 wordcount required to “win” the National Novel Writing Month ‘contest’, and on November 25^th, I wrote my last line of the project bringing it to a count of 61,000+. There are drafts and then there are ROUGH drafts, and anything coming out of a NaNoWriMo wordrace is going to be very rough indeed. It should be. The point is to write, write, write and write some more, right? Well, since writing that last line, I’ve been doing a lot of editing and at the moment, the manuscript is up to ~ 68,000. Unless I come up with some genius idea, I don’t think I’ll get far beyond 70K.

And that’s fine.

In the past thirty-some-odd years, I've written a lot of things, from FanFict to Sci-Fi to Historic Romance, but this is the first time I've written anything that I feel might be publishable. Now is when writing gets scary. Now is when I have to learn how to sell myself. It's like a job interview for your dream job, only ten times as important. If you don't do well in a regular job interview, you can somewhat write it off as "you weren't exactly the right candidate for the job". If your manuscript is rejected, it's like being told that your baby is so ugly, they're willing to put it to death for you.

And here I thought I never wanted kids...