One day to go

I'm still behind on my plot outline for NaNoWriMo. I'll write some more this evening and then it's time to write the real thing.

I'm a little bit nervous and a little bit excited. I have a good feeling about this year. I hope it works out. I'll aim for 5000 words a day, with the 1700 words as a minimum. I'll take most weekends off - probably. I can't ignore the family completely.

With luck and hard work, I'll end up with a reasonable first draft at the end. This time I'm going to work had to write in scenes for the most part and write a lot less of the narrative summary. If I'm not interested in a scene I tend to just summarize it quickly with the intent to go back to it, but somehow that never happens.

This year it will happen. (Maybe if I say/type it enough times I actually will do it.)

A few days off...

Plus some computer troubles, means I haven't posted in a while. So much for trying to post twice a week. I'm behind on my outline for NaNoWriMo, but I will get that done in time. In fact I could use what I have now, but I'd like to add a bit more detail if I can.

Salvaging my computer was good as it meant I didn't have to spend lots of money on a new one. It just took most of my time off to fix, which was not so good. I don't know how stable it will be, but I'm hoping for at least another six months, maybe a year if I'm lucky.

I just hope this year's plot clicks. By that I mean that I can connect with the plot and the characters. I seem to manage one or the other, but not both at the same time. This is annoying and the reason I have never bothered an agent to date. It would be a waste of time for both of us.

Instead I waste my own time trying to find the write novel to send out. If I write enough I'll get there. I know I will. (Don't you just love positive affirmations - well it might work.)

Characters

I love inventing characters. I find that it’s no work at all and it seems to come easily to me. I have no idea why, but it is also the reason that I always start off with characters and let the plot follow in its own good time.

All of my characters – at least I can’t think of an exception at the moment – are a result of many small bits of information and snippets of stories. All this merges together into one distinct character. I don’t use the normal ways of creating a character and background. I don’t write a biography and I don’t answer the 30/50/100 or more questions that some sites give to help produce a well-rounded character.

Instead I write little scenes. These are defining moments for the character. They may show how mean they are or how generous. They help explain what makes that character who they are. I do include some aspects of a biography, such roughly how old they are, but unless there is some need for it, I tend to leave that alone.

I will say that if something becomes important in a story, such as the heroine having red hair, green eyes and is exactly 24 years 3 months and 16 days old, then I do add these facts to the character sheet. And yes, I do have character sheets. They just don’t look like the examples you see on the internet or in books.

I normally outline four to five characters in detail for each story. There are far more than this in one novel, but the others don’t have such a detailed outline as I may only use one or two aspects of their character. But in these cases, they are noted in the minor character section of my notes. I do this because I have a nasty habit of using the same name more than once. I tend to forget these rather quickly.

I have fun creating characters and if I get really stuck I simply fall back to character creation. For some reason this is easier than some other aspects of writing, like sticking to a timeline…

I didn't write much at all over the weekend and yet I know I was busy the whole time. Well most of it anyway. Time seems to fly by at the moment. At this rate I won't even get my outline finished before NaNoWriMo.

That's not entirely true as the main story is outlined, but the subplots and extras have yet to be added. I might try to get the scenes worked out too, but that might be a step too far. I don't want to end up in the same situation as last year. I hope it goes better this time.

Inspiration and writing

I have to admit that I have no problem finding inspiration. Every day there is something that gets my mind whirring. I don't always record it. If I don't think it stands out enough I leave it alone. If I wrote every thing done I wouldn't have room in my bookcases for books.

Some do make it into one of the three places I use to record things. The first is as a file on my computer. The second is my A4 student notepad, from which I can tear the pages so they can be added to a folder and the last is my small, hardback notebook that travels everywhere with me. In fact I have three small notebooks as I have a terrible habit of losing them. It takes a while to rediscover them.

Each of my characters gains something from these snippets. Perhaps not the full character comes from here, but everyone is affected somehow. And from my collection of characters, comes the plot. I write murder mysteries so the victim(s) and the murderer tend to develop naturally from the pool I have created.

Sometimes I find that it isn't working out at all, but if I replace a character or two then things start to go better... I don't delete characters. They go into a sort of hibernation, so that when I need one I take a look at what I have in stock and see if there's a good fit. Some characters seem to stay in my mind more than others and develop more. They tend to end up as either a victim or a killer.

I know that there are those who are all about plot and I did try this for last year's NaNoWriMo. I had a good, complicated plot all mapped out. All the subplots too and then I added the required characters. I hated the whole thing. It never seemed to flow and everything felt wrong. I know there were no plot holes, but to be honest, I would prefer them to the uninspired drivel I produced.

There was nothing wrong with it. There was nothing to make it stand out either. It was a story I've read before so many times. Only those were better written. I did finish NaNoWriMo, but only just and it was hard. This year I'm going back to what I do best - plot holes and the rest.

Now I'm not saying that plotting is wrong. I do now plot a bit more. But I can't plot and then add in characters. It just doesn't work for me. But no matter how you write, inspiration is out there just waiting for you to grab it.

Blog-chain

I've joined the NaNo blog-chain. You can join too. The link is here, then just follow the simple instructions at the bottom of the list of blogs.

In case the above link fails to work, the correct URL is:-

http://ameliajune.net/the-nano-blogchain/

Annoyed

I don't seem to be able to paste text from the clipboard into the blogger editor. If anyone knows how to do this, let me know. It's starting to get annoying as I do quite a bit of writing off-line. In fact my main writing computer never connects to the Internet and I did this deliberately so that I wouldn't get distracted while writing.

blog posts

Instead of thinking about and writing the outline for NaNoWriMo, I've been thinking about and writing outlines for blog posts. Not exactly what I thought would happen, but I am writing a bit more. I'm slowly clearing my evenings and a bit on weekends so that I can write more.

I'll post another short post on Friday.