So, how is everyone doing? Besides having spent an inordinate time pondering whether or not it’s reasonable for a limbo-like afterlife to have trees if only sentient mammals go there (no, I haven’t decided yet), I’m doing pretty well myself.
My main character has decided that it would be fun to help the police investigate a serial killer, which wasn’t anything I had in mind on November 1st. Stories are like that though, as we all know.
I’m a few thousand behind, because I’m having real problems with the current part.
I hit the 50K mark Friday- now at about 52000. My characters have done some surprising things and I really need to bone up on my research for some additional characters. I’m thinking I have about another 20k of story, backward and forward, but not sure if I can wrap it up properly. I have not been writing much this weekend-but am thinking things out a little before I pick it up again Monday.
In case anyone gets jealous- I’m only this far because I have no job and this is my way to avoid working on that particular problem :).
I’m currently at 31,621 and am actually pretty happy with the story so far. I like the plot, the construction, I could use a heapin’ helpin’ of good dialogue and some better character development, but that’ll get remedied in December.
The one nice thing about living in the Twin Cities has been the sheer number of available write-ins. In fact, I ran into another doper at one at the 28 hour write-in marathon this weekend. What are the odds? (Well, probably pretty good).
We’re on the final week! How’s everyone doing?
I’m at 43501 and feeling confident about finishing it up. I like the way I have constructed the story and have been able to keep the action “up”.
The one thing I know will have to be edited this year and I will have to do next year is a list of character names. I’ve been trying to follow the guidelines and not read anything I’ve written as I would be prone to editing, but I have to talk about a character and I have to call them by their occupation as I have no idea what I named them.
I’ve been fighting to stay on track, but have yet to actually fall behind…I was at 37K as of last night. I also don’t think the book will end at exactly 50K, which is fine, I’m guessing more like 60 or 65K
All that said, it’s been a lot of fun!
I’m at 36k. Which isn’t too bad, considering I lost nearly a whole week to:
Thank god I’d built up a sizeable safety cushion of word the first couple of weeks.
I’m at a little over 62K, I think I will do some supplemental/experimental scenes and probably end up around 70k, hopefully. I have a TON of historical research to do, have three books on the Great Basin frontier that will take up most of my December. Then I believe I will start again from the beginning, using what I have more as an outline than rough draft. I liked what I did last year, but I think this one has a chance ;).
This is the first year I’ve participated in the social aspect of Nano and I’ve enjoyed it, although almost everyone else is doing fantasy and I’m the oddball doing historical fiction. We had a fun Turkey Write In this weekend, complete with turkey, pie and fixin’s.
One thing I’ve noticed, in my group there is alot of “let’s try to have a character do this” or “fit this into your novel” and I find it a little odd. I realize people are just having fun with their writing but although I do no work on paper before I start, I really have a strong string of scenes in mind- maybe not plot, but I know generally know what my story is about. It just seems like some are just writing to pound out words on the page- which is great, but that would just drive me crazy to not have an idea where things were going or to let my story be influenced by random, quirky suggestions.
Damn. I need something like that for drawing.
I am an official winner! Woohoo!
Sigh. I’m still exactly on track. I tell you it’s stressful, people, living on the edge like this!
Given that I reached 50K late Tuesday, I know for sure mine’s not done at that length. It’ll probably take another 30-40K before it’s really done. I’m aiming for completing everything by Ground Hog’s Day.
I have a question for people as they finish: what did you include from reality in your story? Since mine is set in NH, the ice storm got mentioned, and the generally terrible conditions of the roads since are griped about. There are also small things about the economy and stimulus money too. Oh, and considering my heroine has a teenage foster kid, Twilight got a couple of lines as well.
I’m trying to ground the story in reality as much as possible, despite being fantasy. Being only a quarter I’m not Latina enough to credibly write magical realism (relax, it’s a joke, Son), but it’s not exactly urban fantasy either. The only differences from real life is that the afterlife is a place, and as a sentient being Big Foot(s) go there too. No elves, vampires, werewolves, fairies, witches, or ghosts.
Final day for everyone!
I was a winner on the 24th and wrapped it up on the 25th which was perfect as this weekend threw me way too many curveballs. Tomorrow, I’m going to go through and correct the grammar, spelling, and editing issues (I kept forgetting characters names and just put in their occupation). And frankly, the “bad guys” are just too bad.
I visited the town where my story took place just prior to writing it and got a good sense of the layout. It was one of two towns in a couple hundred mile radius which had what I was looking for: a small town feel and a nearby monastery.
I also used a bit of an NPR story/bookregarding the search for science in spirituality and with some other sources, I learned a bit regarding how a brain functions on religion. This, coupled with the fact that there has been a study correlating the same brain functions with those on hallucinogenics, really intrigued me.
So I took that idea and expanded it like a cheesy Michael Crichton novel and decided that those who became religious had their brains function in a certain way. The more religious they became at the moment, the more the temporal lobe would emit a chemical. The monks at the nearby Abbey discovered this and began “harvesting” this chemical from the religious folks in town. They thought that God had created this chemical in the brains and that by taking it, they would become God themselves.
Congrats on your win- the idea sounds very interesting :)! I’m at a coffee shop now doing my final push. I already hit my 50K but I am going to try to get as close to 75k today as I can (I may not make it, I did not get around to it yesterday at all!).
The location I chose for my novel is a Great Basin valley that I’m familiar with, it has great history to work with (military fort, Indians, renegade Mormons) and as an added bonus, my best friend works for the BLM in the area and built me a fantastic map, complete with archeological sites, old stock trails, etc. Plus she has a ton of field experience, it’s a very remote area so that has been very helpful.