2008 NaNoWriMo Is a Wrap.

On Thanksgiving Day I completed the 2008 NaNoWriMo Challenge! Thanksgiving was special for me this year. We had my grandmother down, who just turned 90 in September, I just got a new job, my son’s high school football team made it to State, and I completed (and this is the real biggie) National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). “Wooooohhhhooooo!”

As you can see from below, completing NaNoWriMo was one of my 2008 writing goals and I am pretty stoked about pulling it off. NaNoWriMo is a big deal. The objective is to basically write a book in 30 days (50,000 words are required to win) – and November of all months too! It doesn’t cost anything, there is no big prize at the end, and no one calls you, but the reward is in knowing you did it – you wrote an entire novel in a month. My novel was 52, 201 words.

My novel is called ‘The Ring’. I really don’t like that title and if I actually do submit it to a publisher, I’ll probably rename it. When you hear the title, you think of the spooking Japanese/American movie by the same name – I’d like to get away from this connotation. My novel is nothing like the movie. My novel is about a young man who inherits a ring from his grandfather, benign as anything, right? Well, the ring comes with baggage; the ring comes with a memory. This memory is shared with my main character, Aubrey, in the form of extremely vivid and powerful nightmares. It takes him little over half the book to figure it all out, but let’s just say the ring plays back what his beloved grandfather did long before he was the sweet, dedicated, caring, family patriarch, and Aubrey’s grandfather. Aubrey with the never ending moral support of his longtime girlfriend, Dawn, eventually figures it all out. By confronting the past, Aubrey atones for his grandfather’s actions and ultimately is rewarded and the savior at the same time. I liked the story line and had it cooking in my brain for sometime.

Getting back to Thanksgiving and finishing my novel….I was trying to wrap up my novel for the November 30 submittal date and had been cranking away on Thursday. Through the entire month, I had been ahead on my word count and never felt pressured, but knew my climax and end were going to be tricky and required flawless timing. So, there I was hunched down in the Ikea ‘writing chair’ with my trusty Dell Latitude hammering away and really quite caught up in the scene I was writing when my wife, who completely oblivious to the challenge or emotion at hand says…”Hurry up! We have to go, come get the turkey and put it in the jeep!”. We had to drive ten miles to my sister-in-law’s house for the big Family dinner…and we had the turkey, which cooked all day. So I continued typing, telling my story, creating my scene and tears were rolling down my cheeks. It was the strangest thing….I was totally into my story/novel/scene (thank God for iPods and classical music!) – completely emotionally committed, I couldn’t help it, the tear came. My son actually came to me to enforce my wife’s command and said…”Dad! Come on let’s….are you crying? What’s wrong with you?” I also ignored him. So, there they were: my daughter, son, wife, and grandmother all with their coats on and everyone except my grandmother carrying something staring at me……I just kept on typing – I had to finish or I would loose the mood and flavor of my scene and ultimately the climax. Yes, I was rushed. Yes, I need to revisit the climax. No, I didn’t yell at anyone.

I couldn’t have done NaNoWriMo by myself without all the motivation from other NaNos, friends, and the various writing Podcasts I follow. Thanks to those digital writers out there that kept me motivated – kept me engaged…Mur Lafferty, JR Murdock, Holly Lisle, and Jordan Castillo Price. ”Thanks guys!”

Next projects? I am continuing work on ‘My Private Idaho’, a letter to Prez elect Obama on National Service, and one other story that is “speaking to me” but not yet defined.

I'm Ahead in My Word Count!

My word count is 31,582 right now. This puts me 1,582 ahead of schedule. Math is not one of my strong suits...just like spelling and grammar! And I want to be a writer? "WTFO?" Anyway, the way I figure it....NaNoWriMo's objective is 50,000 words in the formulation of a 'novel' by November 30, right? OK, so, if you divide that out, 50,000/30 - you get

1666.6666666666666666666666666667

If you take that and multiply it by 18, which is where we are today, you get 30,000. So, I am ahead!!! Yeah!

Keeping my word count up shouldn't be much of a problem because my plot is evolving and my characters are starting to drive the story - all I am doing is tapping on my keyboard. My daugter keeps asking me what the prize is for completing NaNoWriMo and I tell her I get a certificate. She makes a face and wonders whatelse I'm supposed to get. It is difficult to rationalize a monumental word count of 50,000 for a chintzy certificate. I explain to her that it is a matter of pride and achievement. I told her it's like working on her science project. You do more than you're supposed to and you get an "A". You feel good because you got an "A", but you also feel good because you did more than you were supposed to because you felt that was important and because of that, you have been rewarded and told "good job!".

Getting Closer

Well, my word count is up to 26,199. I wonder what 26,199 looks like in book format? How many pages is that? How thick of a book is that? Is it like a tech manual that cam with your new computer...that most people never read...just like my novel? YIKES!

Anyway, like I said before, I am not writing this novel to be published (but it'd be nice if it were), I am writing it to finish NaNoWriMo. I just gave them $25 donation so they can reach out to educate young adults....oh, and, uh, I get a postcard and two stickers - check out the Viking helment on the left - I love Viking shit. I love Viking shit because I am a sailor and have Viking ancestors! Ever hear Immigrant Song by Led Zepplin? That's them, my ancestors.

The only crappy thing about participating in NaNoWriMo is it's so easy to give in to the ADD and check email, check facebook, look at CNN, or Yachtworld. Heck I just emailed my friends a link for a boat I'd like to get...someday....Here, check it out:

http://www.yachtworld.com/core/listing/boatFullDetails.jsp?access=Public&currency=USD&listing_id=1761&units=Feet&boat_id=1933083

I hate sailboats! And email....and CNN....and Facebook....and my iSnod.

Still Writing....and Writing

24,454 is my offical word count today. It isn't that hard. The only problem is that I am getting a little bored with my novel and have diviated a bit from my outline...remember "word vomit"? Well, I do sort of have an outline - actually wrote it out...otherwise I'd be all over the place - worse than I am not.

I will finish my novel and I will sucessfully complete NaNoWriMo. Unfortunately, I dont' hold much promise for my novel to go any farther than my first NaNoWriMo triumph. God only knows how shitty it it!! But, who the hell knows? After November 30, I am going to actually read it and see what I have created. If I like it and it engages me, then maybe I'll send it to someone or maybe just do an internet release. I just don't like it that much and it just doesnt' seem very 'deep'. The content and literary promise of my novel is secondary, right now, to the role it plays in my life objective of writing a novel. So, I am good with that.

Writing Continues...

My word count is up to 22,445 - an new all time high for me. I have never written ANYTHING this long in my life. Very exciting stuff!

The novel is progressing nicely. Most of my characters are slices and small bits of people I have known throughout my life. The setting is places I know well and can describe in detail. Since this is my first novel, something I've always wanted to do, I wanna stick with things I know...."write what you know". Of course my grammer and punctuation sux, but that's OK. I am following a rough outline, yet letting my characters and the situations dictate the direction of the novel. I am always there looking over them from above and bring them back if they start going astray.

Over the last several days, I cranked out some serious word count. To complete NaNoWriMo, you need to write at least 1,666 words each day. At first, this sounded insurmountable, but not any more. My average since begining has been about 2,500 words a day.

Looking forward to leaving work so I can write....oh, yeah, there is my "lunch break", right?

Thanks NaNoWriMo!

Without the motivation of the folks at the National Novel Writing Month, I'd never be able to say this and mean it....

20,141 Words!!!.....only 29,859 to go!....Yikes!

"No sweat".

I am taking the "word vomit" approach to my novel. There is no outline, no rough draft; only a notion of a plot. My fingers translate even the smallest notions of plot from my mind and allow the plot to develop. I admit that often my characters drive the story and I mearly write what they are doing. They have been behaving and the "arrangement" has been working well.

When I sit down to write, I like to listen to classical, instrumental, or earth sounds.
My story is sort of dark and deals with transferance. Some of the characters in my novel are drawn from my persoal past and the notion for the story comes from a strong desire to write "Dark Fiction". It is easier for me to write dark....in my next novel, I want to write something happy, something uplifting where no one dies.

One of the things I like to do is get writing prompts from friends and family....do you have a writing propmt for me? "What's a writing prompt, you say?" That's where you give me a little push....for example. 'The car just stopped right there in front of the Burger King....or 'Just as Katie turned around she was confronted by.....'

Send me a note.

Vacation

Wow, that was quite a long vacation....at least from the Blog. Whew! I am exhausted! Well, I really have not been doing a lot of writing up until now and have not really felt like updating my blog because I've been on Facebook lately.

Anyway, I missed most of my 2008 writing goals, sort of. This month, I joined National Novel Writing Month aka: NaNoWriMo (http://www.nanowrimo.org/). Basically, the goal is to write your first, or second, or third novel in a month - of at least 50,000 words by November 30. Yikes! Scary! Well, we are just past the first week in November and I am up to 17,000 words on my novel.