Melonade

Last night at approximately 11:30 p.m., I was given one of these:


I passed the 50,000-word mark and the good robots at NaNoWriMo officially declared me a winner.

Whew.


That's pretty much how I felt about it. I was thrilled to have made it a day early and to have a draft with a beginning, middle, and (most challenging of all) an end. But after 30 days of madness, I'm really just glad the pressure's finally gone. The story's good (I think) but the current state of the manuscript is definitely not.

Well, after the holidays are over, it will be back to editing my other novel. In a few months, I'll dust off Novel #2 for editing.

I have a feeling there won't be any more writing today. Yesterday was rough, as I have surmised all Sunday writing will be. My brain just doesn't work as well on Sundays. At least we had gorgeous weather and I could sit outside Panera after they closed. Everything was going well until the elastic band on my Moleskine notebook caught the N key on my laptop and popped it off! For a few seconds, I just stared at the overturned key on the concrete and wondered if I would have to bow out of writing my story. C'mon, my main characters are Jane and Andrew. Definitely need the N if I'm going to stay in nanowrimo.

Luckily, the key wasn't broken and I snapped it back into place. Whew. Everything was great until this pregnant lady started smoking. That's right. Pregnant. Smoking. Uncool. That's when I retreated to Starbucks and got next to nothing accomplished.

Since my story deals with time travel both forward and backward, I've been thinking a lot about the Back to the Future movies lately. It didn't help that two of them were on TV the other day, or that the box set is sitting mere inches away from me and can be viewed at my leisure. But I've decided that rather than fight it, I'm just going to embrace the fact that there may be similarities. Not intentional, mind you, but similarities nonetheless. And that's true of just about everything I've ever written; halfway through I will inevitably think of some book I've read that shares elements with what I'm working on. That frustrates me, because I don't ever want to think that I'm a copycat writer.

Good things about today:
1. Met my word count plus a little extra.
2. Figured out my main character's last name.
3. Wrote a scene I was thinking about but couldn't write yesterday.
4. Managed to do this all before 11 p.m.

Bad things about today:
1. Beginnings of a sore throat. I always get some kind of throat/ear/sinus problem this time of year, so I'm just hoping this will be something mild that won't fight me while I'm writing.
2. Still struggling with the beginning of the story. I know there is a conflict between the main character and her best friend, but I have no idea what that is. Also, best friend's brother has the possibility to be an interesting character, and I didn't see this coming. Perhaps he is a catalyst in the confrontation? I can't tell yet.

It's almost midnight, so as I look out my the window of my apartment (and see a cat looking back at me!), I'll examine today's writing accomplishments.

At 9 a.m. I started writing. The sun was pouring in my open window, and the late night revelers were still quiet. I didn't mean to start so late, but it was past 3 a.m. when I finally got to sleep, so an adjustment was necessary. The novel started pretty much like I expected. Churned out about 1600-ish words in the first couple of hours, followed by several mini-sessions throughout the day. The last couple of hours has been spent helping my sister rearrange her furniture, 'cause I'm a sucker for that kind of stuff.

My other novel has several iTunes playlists. Each of the main characters has a personal playlist (save one) of songs that either have some connection to their part of the story or is music that they would actually listen to. These lists were honed over months after many more months of becoming acquainted with them. I've tried to replicate that for the new book, but it's impossible when I don't even know the main character well enough to know what music she'd listen to. So instead, I made a quick-n-dirty playlist of 52 songs that's been on repeat all day long. Not sure where I was going with that...I'm sure that sentence will make several appearances this month. Jane's voice is still foreign, so I guess until I grasp it I'll just have to write her words in mine.

As of now, I've got 2692 words under my belt. I could, and probably should, try to get in one more session before I call it a night. Or before all the neighbors start being noisy and I can't get to sleep.

Here's a copy of the challenge email I sent out announcing my involvement in nano. If you didn't get the email but want to participate, leave me a message.


Friends,

As most of you know, I have devoted much of the last few years to writing a novel, Gifted. At times, this has meant losing sleep and sanity, declining invitations, and generally being a nuisance to those in the real world. Many of you have encouraged me. Some of you ask if I am "still writing" with a spark of doubt that I will ever finish, but to me, this still counts as motivation. After all, the whole thing started as a bit of a dare.

Now here's where it gets interesting: I'm about to do it again, and I need some help.

While for some people November 1st means throwing out shriveled jack o' lanterns and counting the days until Thanksgiving, for others it is something else entirely. For the last 10 years it has been National Novel Writing Month (aka NaNoWriMo or NaNo), and crazy people all over the world will once again choose to write a first draft of at least 50,000 words (roughly 200 pages), or 1,667 words per day.

You may ask, "What's this got to do with me?" Here are some answers:

1. Place your bets. One of the NaNo motivational tools is making bets with friends/family to nudge you toward your word count goal. For example, you might propose that if I don't make my word count, I buy dinner for you. Or clean out your garage. Or walk your dog. As long as it's a) legal, and b) not against my morals, I'll probably agree.
2. Make it more interesting. If you want to go beyond standard betting, you can propose something more extreme/expensive/ridiculous and also provide me with a minor character that must be used in the story. I'll ask you for a few simple details (name, age, and a couple of other things), and fill in the rest. Of course this probably means that I will have to provide actual proof of your character's presence in the story.
   
3. Send out good thoughts. NaNo requires seclusion, but I know the only way for me to succeed is to have support. There will be days when meeting the word count is a breeze. Other times I will be tempted to type, "This was the dumbest idea ever!" 278 times. Even if you don't want to participate in the first two options, you can check up on my progress and/or harass me when there isn't any via posts to Facebook or Twitter, or check out my NaNo page if you want to delve a little deeper. Share this message with other potential supporters.
4. Come celebrate with me. I fully intend to finish by midnight on November 30th, and I want to make a big deal about it. I hope you'll join me in December for a celebration.
   

Now you're thinking, "That's great and all, but what about that other book that's still not finished? Why stop now when you're so close?" While my first story began by the guidelines of NaNo, I wrote the draft in April because I couldn't wait for November. I've let three other Novembers pass without participating, but this year a lot of new stories have been stirring around in my head, and it's time to put at least one on paper. I'm not finished with the first story, and it's not finished with me, either. It's been pretty patient so far and is willing to wait until I get back.

One more thing, and I'll be done: NaNo is sponsored by the nonprofit Office of Letters and Light. If you're a fan of reading, writing, or people who read or write, and you've got some spare change, please consider donating to the cause. $10 will keep those servers serving for 3 hours. $25 sponsors one classroom in the Young Writers Program...you can click the nano link above and go to donations to see more.

All right, you made it to the end! Thanks for reading. Happy November!

Mel

This November will be the 10th NaNoWriMo, and they've designed a nifty tee to commemorate the occasion. Being a lover of NaNo and t-shirts, I naturally want one now.