Days 20-29: It’s over

Hit 40k on the 20th—on track and everything! But then life finally caught up to me, and I fell way, way behind. Writers block hit me badly on day 28 and it took me seven hours to write 1800 words—what happened to 2000 words in forty minutes? =(

But then I wrote a letter to writers’ block and explained my situation, found the solution, and returned to my computer to write the last 2000 words, ignoring the growls of my stomach and resolving to finish before I got out of my chair.

So I’m done.

…

This feels rather anticlimactic.

And for all this thinking that Time for Surrender could stretch to 100,000 words, it sure didn’t. Perhaps if I put a bunch of stuff in. Perhaps if I spend more time on it in the future, I could expand it and add more stuff. But last week ideas for other projects started roaring in my head, and so I suppose I’ll do a revision and then put it on the shelf next to my other completed projects. After all, it’s not like I’ll be publishing this one. Whenever I look at blogs from people in the publishing industry they’re all “:K No more vampires!”

But what if I didn’t even use the word “vampire” throughout the entire novel?

Haha, yeah, right. Maybe in about ten years I’ll dust off the manuscript and polish it. Send a few queries. Whenever the vampire craze dies out. Though I’ve seen at least two people mention that as well.

Eh, whatever. I’m done! Yay!

Days 14-19: The slog, the block, and the breaking of the barrier

I broke the barrier.

I’m not talking about the 35000 point, where everything is magically easier–though I did cross that today (supposed to yesterday, but am a day behind)

I’m talking about the point in NaNoWriMo where you shut off the internal editor and just start writing. Before yesterday the fastest I ever got in my 2000 was an hour and a half. Last night and just now I did that in less than an hour.

I pretty much just shut my brain down and let my fingers fly. It was amazing, and I just added bunch of stuff into my plot that I don’t know how I’ll fix or hint in earlier chapters, but I found out that a somewhat-flat character is actually quite round, as his mother is in a residential care facility for schizophrenia but he doesn’t think she has that type of mental disorder.  Now, this book is about a journalist being stalked by a vampire and his living brother. I don’t know how Martin evolved to that.

But yeah. My fingers flew. I think that “Musify: Block out all sound” playlist is really working.

–

Ended up way behind on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, totaling a day behind that I still haven’t caught up with. So that was the slog–I was so exhausted from everything going on over the weekend that I had nothing for NaNo except a few hundred words.

The block is slightly there. I started writing a letter to writer’s block today during school but it ended up being a pity party of one about how I thought my NaNo novel was stupid and there was no way anyone would read it and still look at me the same way, because OMG I was the freak in all my classes and…yeah. It’s been a stressful week.

But I broke the barrier. I wrote the fastest I have ever done, or hoped to do. Two thousand words in forty-five minutes? Heck, yes.

Day 12: 24000 and my writing playlist

(If I wanted to sacrifice sleep and the grade on my Spanish test tomorrow, I’d stay up until 11 getting in the last 800 words to the 25000 mark. But I have a test tomorrow. I did that last week on Thursday night to reach 10,000, didn’t I? And then I took the SAT two days later and crashed three hours into the test due to lack of sleep. Yeah…not pleasant.)

Anyway, the main focus of this entry is about the music I listen to as I write.

There is a playlist folder on my iPod title “Musify”. Click into it and there are three playlists in there:

• Block out all sound
• Dark scenes
• Sad scenes

I think they’re pretty self-explanatory. I listen to “Block out all sound” the most.

Before I made that playlist I would try to listen to favorite music of the moment, but it often doesn’t work as my brain tries to block out all sound as I write, though when I like the lyrics I lose focus on the writing, so the music in the “Block out all sound” category is comprised of various songs from Bullet for my Valentine, Breaking Benjamin, Eluveitie, Escape the Fate, Linkin Park, Muse, Nickelback, Nightwish, Nine Inch Nails, Sacred Oath, Sirenia, Three Days Grace, The Used, and 30 Seconds to Mars.

This year, my Christmas list is going to be made up of a lot of heavy metal albums so I can add to the collection and take out some bands that are too easy listening for writing.

Days 9-11

So I got to 20000 on the 10th, but it was nine o’clock and I didn’t feel like going to the Coinstar machine at that time so I waited until my mother went to the grocery store and begged her to deposit my saved-up coins so I could get enough iTunes credit to download my preordered Memento Mori. I pay for my music with my discarded change because I’m cool like that.

Today was a bit harder to write. It took me two and a half hours to write 2000 words because I was emailing my friend with philosophical discussions about Twilight, and the topic turned to speech and debate, and…I was distracted.

I think it’s come time to review what I’ve written and write down what needs to be expanded later so that I know what I need to resolve in later parts of the novel.

I haven’t even listened to the entire album yet, but I can tell you that Flyleaf’s Memento Mori is amazing from the half that I’ve listened to. My favorite track is “This Close”…for now.

Days 7-8

I hit the 15000 mark today. Currently: 15610

My goal is to get to 20000 on Tuesday. If I do, I’ll buy myself the new Flyleaf album that just-so-happens to be released that day.

I’m going into denial when it comes to slowing down. I was pleased with the ideas that came out today, but not with how I expressed them. But I have to keep going. I’ve been breaking the rules and going back and adding things here and there–so I’m increasing my word count! I swear!

I think I’ve been going back and editing more this year, but at the same time I’m still flowing. I had so much trouble last year–I locked myself into a weekend house party last year and as a result it yielded very little good ideas.

Still feeling good.

Goal for tomorrow: 17500.

NaNoWriMo: Days 4-6

Day 4: Cross country league finals, got home late. Squeezed in a grand total of somewhere in between 250 and 400 words. This was also the night that I tried the journal entry format and utterly failed, so going back to third-person.

Day 5: Reached the 10000 mark. Pushed myself to stay up late–I was falling asleep as I was writing. But wrote a lot more easily than the night before, proving that I write a lot better in third-person and not journal entries.

Day 6: Went to my first write-in. There was a speaker (a professional ghostwriter) who taught me a lot in the half hour that she lectured. Now I’m looking at what I have and taking stock in where I’m going to go. The group was composed of lots of lovely ladies; I’ll be going back next week. Had to leave early, though, because I’m taking the SAT tomorrow and need to go to bed early. As in…now. So it’s another day where I didn’t get many words in (like 300) but I might push to get 1000 tonight. I’m still ahead.

NaNoWriMo: Day 3

Okay, whenever I have a day off from school, I never get a chance to laze around. Cross country, then home to do homework, off to work, straight to a team dinner, then home to get in a measly 2208 word count. Haha, okay, that’s not measly, but compared to what I did yesterday and my goal of 3000 for today, it could have been higher. I would get the other 873 words to reach my word goal, but I have to finish my homework and then go to bed.

*huff* I might as well have had a regular day of school.

I find myself wanting to write even more Dracula-style by using journal format now. The beauty of NaNo is that I could just start writing in journal format whenever it pleases me and convert the previous 7000 words of prose into a journal in December, so I could if I feel like it. Or if I don’t feel like it, then I could switch back to prose. =D Today I inserted some obituary articles, which required looking some up on the lovely Internet and observing the format of obituaries.

Tomorrow’s a busy day, so I’ll try to get in the 1667 minimum.

NaNoWriMo: Day 2

I found a NaNoWriMo report card through Lit Drift today. Awesome for more procrastination! =D

I’m still bursting with ideas, though being at 4244 words, it’s to be expected. I’m considering reaching 5000 before bed tonight because I can. I don’t have school tomorrow, which also means I’ll be writing more than my 2000-a-day goal, because there’s just no excuse for not catching up or speeding ahead on a day off. Actually, if I hit 5000 tonight and then aim for 3000 more tomorrow…I could get 10000 on Thursday. I’m excited.

This novel looks like it could be a big ‘un. I have so much to say, which is really good, because I think this time around I’m putting in more detail instead of just action, action, action. Characters think more. They deliberate on their actions (I think). It’s more drawn out, and though some people hate that, I love drawn-out action. It makes the read more enjoyable. Hence why I’m able to read The Scarlet Letter and Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre and Dracula and other pre-twentieth century literature and declare I love it.

(Edit: I was looking at the pep talk authors page on the NaNoWriMo website and ROBIN MCKINLEY AND TAMORA PIERCE are listed as pep talk writers. Oh my goodness oh my goodness oh my goodness–Robin McKinley is my favorite author of all time; The Hero and the Crown has been my favorite book since I was ten and I’m heartbroken that I can’t find my copy. Tamora Pierce is the reason for a lot of feminist elements in my stories; I wrote a paper on her for school last year and met her in person at a book signing in May. OH MY GOODNESS. Two writers that I love to pieces are writing pep talks for NaNoWriMo. I’ll be printing those and carrying them around with me wherever I go.)

NaNoWriMo 2009 – muahaha

It’s been quite a while, hasn’t it?

At first I wasn’t going to, but once again I am participating in NaNoWriMo. Wish me luck! I’m already at 2118 words–all written in about an hour and forty-five minutes.

I’ll be using this blog as a musing spot, rambling about plot, etc, if it occurs to me. I might disappear off the face of the earth again, but who knows?

To kick start the event, here’s a meme about NaNo that I did (from here):

When and how did you find out about NaNoWriMo? How did you do?

It was 2006. I was thirteen and found out about it through a blog six days before the event started. I had the day off from school on November 1. I wrote five hundred words and abandoned the whole project. So I don’t really count that day. The next year, I was fourteen and finished with three days to spare (it would have been five days to spare but I was hit with a sudden bout of procrastination and didn’t want to be done, haha).

Where do you write and with what do you write?

My first two years of NaNo I wrote on a laptop first purchased in 1996 which was so ancient that one needed to manually change out the CD and floppy disk drives. It had been stepped on twice and had two big ugly cracks in the top left and right corners of the screen. But it had a word processor, a way to transfer the file to a computer with Internet, and provided me with a chance to write alone in my room. In May of this year I blew two years of saved-up allowance, babysitting, and birthday money on a refurbished laptop that I love and call “Ivan” after the Russian czar. So I write on that now, either in my room or at the kitchen table when I’m eating breakfast and writing at the same time. When I write at school, during class time, I write on loose-leaf paper and then type it later.

How do you find time to write?

I squeeze it in between school and homework and cross country and my job and debate club…well, I haven’t gotten much writing done lately, but I’m hoping to reverse that this month. Cross country ends on Wednesday so I’ll have an extra two hours every day during November. But homework and studying suffer a lot for the sake of writing.

Are your partners, friends and family allies or enemies?

They’re frenemies. My mom shakes her head, my dad asks me why I don’t let anyone read what I write, my sister sniffs and says something about writing and how it’s useless, and my cat sits on my keyboard. I used to shove my stories into my friends’ faces in eighth grade, but when I started high school I stopped showing my writing to people because I realized that there’s a thing called rewrites that makes your writing a lot better.

What are you strengths and what do you use to help you get to the end?

I find writing easier than a lot of people I know. Give me a piece of paper and I can fill it with words in ten minutes, never stopping. My fingers act as the waterway for the flow of words that I type when I have something to say.

What are your weaknesses, obstacles and challenges that hinder you from finishing?

*ahem* Sometimes my mind wanders, or I want to hurry up and get to the end where all the exciting stuff happens that I’ve been thinking about since day one of the draft, so I stall. Or I like to do memes like this.

Do you plot/outline/plan or do you write by the seat of your pants? How much do you plot or how unprepared are you?

I outline in my head and then see what happens as I write. Plotting usually happens a few pages before I write it. This year I know *most* of the characters and a general idea of what will happen, but when it comes to an ending and what happens in the middle I have no clue. I can only write by the seat of my pants when I’m in the zone, but that’s not often. I love the zone, though. It’s awesome.

Do you participate in the real life community, go to write ins and meet ups in your area?

I haven’t before, but this year I got my license and so I’ll be driving myself to the write-ins at the coffee shop near my house every Friday. I’ll also be attempting to frequent the forums, though I’m not a good forum person. I tend to lurk.

What are your writing aids? Special snacks, music, totems, rewards or punishments?

Last year the laptop that I wrote on didn’t have Internet. This year my new computer has Internet, which will probably be a hindrance, or it could help for some quick research. I always listen to music–the more it drowns out the rest of the world, the better. Rewards and punishments don’t usually work, unless it’s someone else doling them out. Though I do have candy from Halloween that will speed my brain up. =D

Wow. I just did half a day’s word count doing this meme instead of writing or studying for the major unit test in AP US History tomorrow. ><

Roommates and Overnight Visitors

After dropping my sister off at college on Tuesday, I’ve been speaking to her more often than when she still lived at home. This might partially be due to her always going out with friends, working, or being holed up in her room watching Scrubs and Grey’s Anatomy on her computer during her last month of waiting for college to start while I was attending high school, but in a way it’s nice that we can talk. Most of the time we tease each other. Though this morning, I woke up to an interesting text from her about one of her new roommates. She has two, and they both moved in yesterday (she moved in early in exchange for helping with official move-in day).

so my roommate already asked if she could have a guy sleep over tonight

I can’t help but ROFL. My sister is not the type to canoodle. However, neither am I. I’ve never even held hands with a boy, and I’m getting on in my years. (Because sixteen is such a ripe old age.)

But it made me start thinking, as so many things do. It seems rather selfish to live in a cramped room with one or two other people and expect them to accommodate you and your nightly activities. I mean, would you like it if you had to spend your nights listening to…two people…frolicking between the sheets? I sure wouldn’t.

It’s comedy gold, yes, but in real life it’s just awkward.