An update...

I'm not doing so good in updating this blog, but here's one.
I've finally found a copy of a short story I wrote about two years ago. I found it on the back-up, stand alone, hard disk we have. Thank the lord for back ups. I'm going to submit this story to magazines etc. and see if anyone wants to publish it. I'm going to start with paying markets first and go down from there. :)

My new, desk-top computer is up and running and it is on this computer that I have put the story. I will put it onto a USB stick just as soon as I have one with some space. I have also re-installed yWriter5 on to this computer.

I have a nasty habit of using my desk top computer for games and I tend to pick playing games over writing. I also own a netbook, which I only use for writing. The idea is that I move the story to the netbook, re-read it, edit as necessary and then submit it for publication.

My work computer is dying, so at the moment the entire contents of its hard drive are on a variety of USB sticks and portable hard drives. Hence I have no space available for the story. (Though having said that and while editing this post, I found a small USB stick, which does have space. So tonight the story gets moved.) I will be getting a new, work laptop in a week or two.

I've started to make a new schedule for writing and I'm actually doing some. Not a lot, but it's a start. I need to get into the habit of writing and that habit needs to be substainable.

I need to move the files around. For NaNoWriMo, I kept the files on a USB stick, but now I want to concentrate on using my netbook and not to write at work if at all possible. Therefore I will copy all the files on to the netbook.

One publication I'm going to check out is 'The New Yorker', because if I'm going to be rejected, I want to be rejected by the best.

And I keep getting sick, which means I'm tired all the time. At the moment a normal day is wake-up, eat, go to work, get home, eat and sleep. Repeat for all working days. I'm starting to feel a bit better - touch wood.

My typing is much worse. I don't seem to be able to 1) put my hands in the right rest positions on the keyboard and 2) hit the right keys when typing. I always seem to be a letter or two off or I press too many of the right key.

Practice make perfect. Now all I need to do is practice.

It's been a while

But I am feeling much better and I have started to write again. At least sometimes.

I'm going to try to start writing a blog. Nothing to do with writing or related subject, so I won't mention it here. It is still in the planning stages. I don't have a title or anything at the moment. Just an idea.

I'm still planning on submitting the short story I wrote a couple of years ago. I need to find it again. I know it's on my home computer, I just have to dig it out.

After I've caught up with that, I'm going to start on my book again. I know it has potential, all I have to do is make it work.

Sounds so simple...

Not so good

So I've not been feeling brilliant lately and have done practically nothing on my writing. I've had great plans and have done very little, including not submitting a short story to a competition. Stupid, but actually not that surprising.

This is because I am apparently suffering from moderate severe anxiety and moderate severe depression. Now there's something to get anxious and depressed about. To be truthful, it's not as bad as it seems. I'm not taking any medication and I won't be taking any.

I will be doing some 'courses' to help me change my way of thinking and reacting to situations. This is CBT - cognitive behavioural therapy and I should see results pretty quickly. It's not a quick fix, but most people see results fairly quickly if they do the work.

So I'm deliberately taking a break from writing and a few other things, while I get this sorted out or at least under control. I'm already feeling better, which may sound odd, but last weekend for the first time in a long time I took a brisk, 9-km walk, which I enjoyed immensely. Exercise does help as long as it's a type of exercise you enjoy.

I used to walk a lot. I lived on the edge of a village and used to walk in the hills frequently. I used to bike in the hills too. Now I live in a village in the middle of farmland. Very flat farm land too. It's now where near as pretty and I feel a bit uncomfortable walking around here. Most of the people who live here don't do that sort of thing. I need to get over this and get out more.

I'll try and keep writing here at least once a week. No promises though.

Christmas break

And it really was a break from everything except my family. I didn't write or read anything. Hopefully this weekend I will print out the entire NaNoWriMo manuscript, then I'll chop it into scenes and rearrange it all over the next few weeks.

As I move stuff around, I'll also rewrite the scenes - add or take away as necessary. I know that not all of them will be used. I put in extra background more for myself than anything else. The ending definitely needs work. I rushed it in November in order to finish on time.

The current version is almost two stories which don't quite come together. I need to make these two sides mesh a little better.

As usual I know what I need to do, I just haven't done it. Anyone noticing a theme here...

I also have a short story I wrote some time ago and as long as I can find it again, I'm going to edit it once more or at least read through it and then I'm going to submit it to magazines for publications. I still need to research this part, so at the moment I have no idea to which ones I will send it, but I will send it. That's my one resolution: to submit this one story for publication.

It would be nice if it is published, but I also want to get some experience in this area.

No more written

I've been busy, just not with writing. I've been catching up on other parts of my life.

Hopefully over Christmas, I will get a chance to work on my writing. I want to go through what I wrote for NaNoWriMo and rearrange the scenes and chapters. To do this I need to write an outline. Well to be fair, I have to do the 2 at the same time so that they match.

If I do get time, I will be able to start the second draft in January. If I don't get round to it, I won't start the second draft until March or later.

Time to get my act together.

Post-NaNoWriMo

I haven't written much at all since the end of November. I did need a break - I will admit to that, but now I need to get back to writing and I'm in two minds.

I had always intended to write some more scenes in December and then edit the scenes into the right order in January, ready to re-write them in February and March. Now I'm wondering if this is the right thing to do. Most of the story is there, but it does need organizing and bringing together.

I'm hald convinced that I should reorganize now and start the re-wrting in January. Trouble I know I don't stick with my descisions, which is exactly what I'm doing. In both cases, some scenes won't make it into the next draft and new scenes will have to be added.

I just feel, right now, that I'm writing stuff that won't be going anywhere and it would be a better use of my time actually fixing the scenes in order and seeing what is missing. As I have never managed to go much beyond the first draft, I think this is a barrier I need to cross.

So it looks like I'm going to start the reorganisation and then write more scenes. If I can do this and end up with a half decent and complete story, I will be happy.

Yesterday

Things went bad at work yesterday, so I got absolutely nothing written.

I'm glad it didn't happen before yesterday, otherwise I would have been much lower on my NaNoWriMo total. So there won't be much happening on the writing front until I get this mess cleared up.

Time to try shifting my writing to evenings and weekends.

It's over

So NaNoWriMo is over for another year. Congratulations if you won! I'm more statisfied with my writing this year than ever before and I seemed to have picked up a writing habit in the process.

I wonder how long it will last. Anyway time to go write another scene.

The end

I just wrote those words. Ywriter says I have written 61080 words in total. I'm about to export and validate.

Here's what NaNoWriMo's validator says 61032 words.

I wrote on 25 days, hence I didn't write on 5 days. On one of the days I was sick, on one I was on a business trip and the other 3 days were pure laziness. This is more active days than any other year to date. I'll analysis the day totals later.

I have to admit I sumarized the last few scenes, so I'll expand on those in the next few weeks. I wrote more than I've ever written in one month. It's also better than anything else I've ever written. I didn't have to pad or use any dirty tricks to reach the total.

I know it's not perfect and I know I still have scenes to write. I also know the whole thing needs to be reorganized and I need to work on the timeline and plot outline. I was originally going to write more scenes in December, but I'm half tempted to go through the plot and write a new outline and rearrange the scenes into the right order.

Well I'm going to take a short break. I might write a little, but no where near on the level I have been. I do want to write every day or most days, just not always on this story.

I won!

Day 30

I'm sick. It's not serious, but I feel really, really bad. I'm tempted to just verify and be damned.

However, I'm going to try to write a bit now and verify at lunchtime or early afternoon. Then I'm going to go to bed and hide from the world for the rest of the day.

So I should still make it to 60k, only about 1500 words to go...

Day 29

It's been quite a good day, though for some reason I found it impossible to produce a capital letter on the first try. I still managed to write 2503 words, bringing my grand total to 58514 words.

Writing was definitely easier today. No idea why. Tomorrow I'm hoping to add about another 2000 words so that my total in the validator reaches above 60k. I know that the validator and word counts from the editor don't exactly match, so if I can be 500 to 1000 words over I should be safe.

I might do a bit more tonight, I will see how things work out. It's going to be a busy evening so there may not be time. Still there's still tomorrow.

Day 28

I have written 2482 words today and my grand total is 56011 words. I'm on track to reach 60k if nothing bad happens. If something does come up, well I'm beyond 50k so I've won anyway. And yes it is backed up.

I will try to write another 500 words today if at all possible. If it is possible, I'll try to update here tonight. I will update NaNoWriMo.

Oh and I'm still not at the end. I was hoping to make it before the 30th, but now I'm not so sure. The ending seems to be getting further away at the moment. Having said that, I'm not sure how much of the scenes I'm writing now will make it into the next draft as the story seems to be shifting direction.

However, maybe this new direction is the right one, and the previous scenes will go. Well I'm making no decisions now, that will have to wait for the new year.

(Updated with the extra words)

Friday and the weekend

Over the last three days I wrote nothing. Not a single word. I didn't even open up the file. I have to admit I enjoyed the break, but it's not exactly what I should be doing.

So I have until midnight on Wednesday to write as much as I can. To be honest I will probably verify sometime on Wednesday afternoon, just to make sure that I do get round to it. It would be a nightmare if I did all this and then I forgot to verify.

So I'm currently at 53529 words. So 60k is not out of the question. Let's hope there's not too much other stuff I have to do in the next few days.

Day 24

I jsut found out that I made a mistake in my spreadsheet and I only had two days when I wrote nothing instead of the three I had been claiming. It may only be a small improvement, but it makes me feel better.

Today I wrote 3027 words, bringing my total to 53529 words.

Tomorrow I am out all day, so I'm not likely to write very much. I will try to write something in the evening, even if it's only 19 words - my minimum above zero word count in one day.

Starting to write the end now. I should hit 60k, I think. Still it's definitely more difficult to write now. I think it's the over-50k-syndrome.

At the end of November I will take a short break, before continuing with writing scenes - some scenes I still have in summary. Hopefully I will still get everything I want written before the end of the year. Then all I have to do is make the scenes into a book...

update

Yesterday I added another 500 words after writing the blog entry. I ended the day with 50502 words.

Today I'm struggling to write anything. I think it's because I've reached the 50k and I know that as far as NaNoWriMo is concerned I've won. When the validator goes live on the 25th, theoretically I can enter my text and seal the deal.

However I haven't finished the draft and I don't want to validate unless it's finished. I now know how it ends and who the murderer is. I've avoided the obvious suspect and made the actions of the killer work with the people involved. I could just write a summary and leave it at that.

But I don't want to. I want to write the scenes. OK maybe not all of them, but enough to make it part of the novel rather than an outline. I'm hoping to add about 10k before the end of November. It would be really cool if I could make it to 70000 words, but that really is pushing it.

In December I'll probably keep writing the first draft scenes as there are some I haven't completed yet. Then in January next year, I'll start cutting and pasting the scenes until a book emerges. I've written quite a bit in a linear time line, but that makes no sense for the storyline. Some will become flashbacks, other scenes will simply not make it into the book, but it was still worth writing them.

Once everything is in the right order, I'll go through each scene and chapter again. This time I'll rewrite them. For some this will only be a tweaking, but for others it will mean a complete rewrite.

After that, and if I get that far, I'll need to send it out to beta readers. Then it's to the last edit run. Of course this is all very far in the future, but this story is the best I've ever written and that may not be saying much, but it means a lot to me.

This one I will finish.

Day 23

So far I've written 2502 words, giving a total of 50045 words. I broke the 50k. I will still be writing and it would be nice to reach at least 60k before the end of November.

What I would like to manage is to write at least 5000 words per day on four of the remaining November days. This is including today. But I don't think I will. I'm leaving in half an hour and I will be busy for the rest of the day. Tomorrow is a possibility as are Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday next week. However nothing can go wrong on those days and somehow I don't see that happening.

Work has been extremely busy and frustrating. Home has just been busy. I will continue writing after the 30th until I have all the scenes written. Then I'll cut and paste them until I have a coherent story. Then it's time for the first rewrite. Hopefully this will be at the beginning of next year. I might take a break in between, but I'm worried I won't be able to get started again.

Please ignore any typing errors if you see them, for some reason things always get worse towards the end of NaNoWriMo. I can't seem to type the simplest word without making a mistake.

Day 22

Yesterday I wrote 5019 words, bring my total to 47543 words. If things go well today, I will break the 50k mark. If that doesn't happen today it will happen tomorrow, but I think today. I'm very happy about this.

I think I will end up with about 60000 words by November 30th. Less than I originally hoped for, but more than I've ever written during NaNoWriMo. The story is interesting as are the characters. This one I'm really going to try to transform into a readable book that can be submitted to agents.

I will probably start with writing some more scenes before I start cutting, rewriting and reorganizing the ones I have. At the end I hope to have a book of about 75000 words.

This year has gone so much better than any other year to date.

Day 21 update

I managed to write a grand total of 19 words yesterday. That is pathetic, but at least I wrote something. I did not update NaNoWriMo.

Let's hope today goes better. Trouble is I know I'm going to be busy again, because of the trip last week. Should be quieter from Wednesday onwards, so my word count should increase dramatically then.

Day 21

So far today I have written 0 words. And there is nothing missing from that previous sentence. Work has been completely crazy and I have not had time to do anything else.

Since last Wednesday I have written 0, 2207, 774, 793, 1210, 0 words up to and including today. Not the best of records, but except for the day I traveled to my business meeting and today, I have written everyday. I'm hoping to write tonight as well.

In my original plan, I should have written 63000 words, or at least to have been above the 50k. I'm at 42505 words, which is not bad. I'll definitely make it to 50k, but I'll have to summarize more scenes than I originally intended, so that I can finish on time.

Not a disaster, just annoying. I didn't always get a chance to update NaNoWriMo, but yWriter's log keeps track of my daily totals. A wonderful tool it is too.

Next few days...

I will be leaving for a business trip in 5 hours time. I will try to at least write the minimum between then and now, but no guarantees as I have to prepare for the trip first. Also I will have much less time to write. I'll be working about 12 hours a day and then there's the 7 hour drive each way (today and Friday).

And yes it's by car, so no chance to write on the way. I am not happy about this, but sometimes you just have to do things you don't like doing and I haven't had to go on a business trip since the summer. I know it's not that bad, but right now I keep thinking 'why me?'

Day 15

I've written 5494 words so far today, bringing my total to 37521 words. I should break 50k in the next three days, if I keep up this rate. I probably won't write any more today. I'm going quite fast, which was never the intention I meant to go at a more steady pace, so that I didn't get lost.

However having said that, the story is going very well and is on track. I'm in the middle section at the moment, which is good and where it should be. I don't think I'll make it to 80000 words. I might make it to 75000 words, which isn't too bad. Anything over 50k is a bonus and I'll be happy.

I think this is my best year yet. I had a rough outline and some subplots, a good storyline, and interesting characters. It's not turning out how I originally thought it would, but it is staying inside the broad lines and the characters are speaking for themselves.

I hope this continues.

Yesterday

I ended up writing 5271 words, giving me a total of 32027 words. It was the first time I'd written over 5000 words in one day. I'm not particularly keen to continue with such a large amount, however I still need to catch up if I want to reach the 80 000 word goal.

Let's hope today goes as well.

Day 14

Today was a good day. So far, I've added 4765 words, bringing my grand total to 31521 words. I'm hoping to write some more later, but I wanted to put an update here first. So I have less that 20000 words to go to make the 50k. In that respect, I'm ahead of the game.

I'm slightly behind my optimistic goal, which called for 3000 words per day. I'm currently on a 2251 words per day average. I did know I wouldn't write everyday, but this is still lower than I was hoping for at this stage. I would like to write another 500 words today and then write a similar amount tomorrow.

I have to go on a business trip on Wednesday, so I am unlikely to be able to keep up the word count. I'll try to compensate the following weekend, but if last weekend is any indication that won't happen. Still it might...

The weekend

went badly. I wrote 240 words on Saturday and 19 0 on Sunday (apparently I didn't save my 19 words). I didn't bother to update NaNoWriMo. I knew I would have off days. Still my total is now 26756 words, which means I'm still on target to reach 50k before the end of the month.

I am, of course, behind on my goal of 80k by the end of November, but that was wishful thinking. There are just too many things on my plate for me to keep up with writing 3000 words every day. Still I'm hoping I'll do better today.

The worst is that from Wednesday I will be away on a business trip. I should be able to get something written, but it's unlikely I will be anywhere near my target for those 3 days. I'll try to catch up over the weekend, but if this weekend was anything to go by, that just won't happen.

Day 10

Well the day isn't not over yet, but before I forget to write an update, here it is. Today I have written 3150 words, bringing my total to 25509 words.

I had originally hoped to reach 30000 words today, but due to illness I didn't. I don't consider this a failure for two reasons. The first is that I have written more consistently this year than ever before. I have written every day even if it was just a few words.

The second is that I'm enjoying writing. This year is a joy. I'm enjoying the characters, the plot, the setting, the everything. This is in complete contrast to last year when I hated the whole thing.

I know I can write to a deadline, but I know I'm lousy at writing without one. Without a deadline, everything else seems suddenly so much more appealing. This year's NaNoWriMo is changing that, because I'm changing the way I write.

I write in smaller chunks - just 500 words at a time. These can quickly add up and I don't need to set aside a large chunk of time to write thousands of words in one sitting.

I write every day. In previous years, I wrote 5k a day for ten days, normally the last ten days. This year I want to write almost every day.

I keep back ups on all my available computers, but my main file is on my USB stick. This means that I can use any computer to write on. I also have a netbook, which allows me to write almost anywhere. I used to keep my main file on my work laptop and a back up on the USB. This made it difficult to write at weekends as I didn't always take the laptop home with me.

What I've done, in essence, is to make it easier to write and it's having an effect.

Day 9

Spent  most of the day asleep. However I did get to write this afternoon. I added 2167 words, bringing my total to 22359 words.

I'm still behind my perfect target of 3000 words per day, but still on target to finish 50k well in time. I'm hoping to catch up a bit over the next few days, but I'll have to see how ill I am.

Day 8

I'm really not very well, but I did add 669 words to my total. I might add a little more later, but maybe not. I can barely keep my eyes open. So my total is 20192 words. A little behind my perfect total, but still way ahead of my expectations.

At home tomorrow and I'll take my netbook upstairs tonight, so I should be able to add some more tomorrow.

Sick

I'm definitely sick and will go home soon. I still hope to do some writing today, but I don't think it will be as much as other days.

Day 7

Due to a rush at the end of the day, I never updated my blog. So yesterday I wrote 2314 words. Bringing my total word count to 19523 words. If I was writing 3000 words per day I should be at 21000 words at this time. I am instead averaging 2789 words per day, which is not bad.

So far I have written every single day, which is also a record. I don't think I will manage every day in November, but I'm hoping to get close. I know I won't write on either the 18th or the 25th as I have a trip that will happen on one of those two days. Date is yet to be fixed.

Happy. Happy. Joy. Joy.

NaNoWriMo update

So for the first time ever, I believe, I actually wrote on the weekend. Not a huge amount, but more than ever before. Beating zero words isn't exactly hard, but still it's an improvement.

On Saturday I added 1635 words and on Sunday 2051 words. Bring the grand total to 17209 words. This is slightly under my target of 18000 words by Sunday, an average of 3000 words per day. But I'm happy with it and that's all that matters.

Now for today's writing...

Day 3

I didn't blog yesterday simply because I didn't have time. I added about 2500 words to my total, which ended up at 10007 words. Not bad for three days or writing. I wrote less because it was a busy day and I had less time to write. The writing is still going well and is not slowing down at all.

Let's see how long that continues for. Today I'm hoping for at least 3000 words. It would be nice to do more, but I have a busy afternoon/evening so I don't think that's going to happen. And for the first time ever, I'm going to write at the weekend too.

In previous years I have only ever written on weekdays, during quiet periods at work. This year I'm trying to be a bit more structured and write less per day, but for more days in the month. I normally write the 50000 words in ten days randomly spread out through the month.

This year I'd like to reach 80000 words or there about. I'm using a new editor, yWriter, which allows me to write in scenes. These I'll rearrange later on into the correct order. I find I write better if I write the first draft using a linear time line, however the story works better with flashbacks. I find I can lose consistency if write a later flashback before and earlier one.

If I don't use some of the scenes, that easy and I can still add in new ones. But seeing them laid out in the correct time line means I don't have the reaction happening before the action.

Day 2

And I'm currently at a total of 7246 words. So I've written 3213 words so far today.

I have changed my goals again. I still of course want to write the minimum. That is the basic goal, which won't change. However my daily goal is now 3000 words. If I do this every day then I will write 90000 words in November.

To be honest I don't think I will reach 90000 words, but I hope to get close to this total. I know I won't be able to write everyday, but I should manage to write most days. And some days I will write more than others.

I'm still finding it astonishingly easy to write at the moment and I still have lots of scenes lined up. I actually know what is going to happen next.

I will admit to only writing the backstory at the moment. It will be placed at appropriate points in the story to illustrate some points. But I'm writing the whole thing in chronological order at the moment and I'll move the scenes around later on. I'm also trying to write more than I actually need. I think this will help too.

So currently I'm very happy with my progress and excited by the project. Can this last?

Day 1

And it's a good one. I have written 4033 words. I'm not going to add to it again today. I think 4000 words a day is a good total to aim for. I would like to have a grand total of about 80000 words or more by the end of November, which might even be possible.

Of course I am having a good day and I'm pretty sure there will be bad ones too. Not to mention days off too. But if I make it to 50000 words, I'll be happy. If I make to 80000 words, I'll be ecstatic.

The whole thing just flowed today. I almost can't believe it.

Not starting off too well...

After being so tired last night that I forgot all about writing to being woken up twice in the night by a power failure and a mouse, I'm not getting off to a good start for NaNoWriMo.

I completely forgot my files as well. I'll start without them and hope that what I write now matches what I wrote then. It's mostly names that I forget and sometimes I transpose characters.

Still here's hoping I make it to 1700 words. Making it to 5000 words would be fantastic, but I'm not betting on that.

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.

Plot of character? How is your writing driven?

I actually started off writing about inspiration, but I got sidetracked, so I decided to leave that for another day and write about plot versus character instead. Below is what I wrote...

I have thousands of ideas floating around in my head, some of which I write down. These are plots or people by prototypes, which can be expanded as needed. Part of this is due to how I write. I always start off with characters and the plot develops from there.

I find if I have interesting characters, I never have to make things happen, they will occur on their own. In fact, if I get stuck at all I put some or all of my characters in a room and see what happens.

For example, in my NaNoWriMo outline for this year, I started off with a character similar to one I had read about in a news story. It was about a man who's dead body had been lying for months in his flat. Not an unusual story except that the man had not been a recluse. He was in fact an obnoxious weirdo, who was disliked by everyone including he own family.

Most of the neighbours assumed he had been rehoused by the council, His family weren't talking to him and didn't really make a huge effort to contact him. It was only when a workman needed access to the flat to fix a leak that his body was discovered.

This started me thinking about all the horrible people I know and the victim of my NaNoWriMo was born, well died. She, in fact, starts off dead. But her nastiness leads to all sorts of possibilities and without her needing to go over the top in any of her actions. This gives me a large pool of suspects. It's a murder mystery in case you were wondering.

Everything I've written has always started with one or more characters. It's the only way I seem to be able to write. Last year I tried starting with a plot. I did write the 50 000 words, but it was a slog and not one I want to repeat. The result is incredibly bland. There aren't any plot holes, as in my other attempts, but it will send you to sleep quickly.

Not much...

has happened. I haven't written that much more on the plot. I need to, I don't have all the sub-plots yet, I just didn't do much this weekend. Instead I enjoyed a beautiful autumn day with my family. And did some housework.

Now back to writing...

Posting

I don't want to tempt fate or anything, but I'm hoping to start posting twice a week starting next week. The first post will be as is, an update on what if anything I have written towards a book or NaNoWriMo. The second post will be different and on a writing subject, such as inspiration or character vs. plot.

I'm not sure how long this will last, but it's worth a try.

Plot

I've got the plot sort of worked out. No details yet, but a time line and a storyline. I have to work out the sub-plots and other details. I need to also do some research into dead bodies, time of death and that sort of thing. It's a murder mystery by the way. I mention this just in case you haven't worked it out yet.

I haven't got an updated word count, because it's all plot, time line or storyline. Still there is progress and it's not even October yet. And of course I've remembered to post again :)

Eek

I just realized it's almost 3 months since I posted. That's terrible. I just added a note to every Monday's to-do-list from now until November to write a post. In it I will say what I have or haven't done and I'll include a word count no matter what.

Today's word count is 259. That's how many I wrote yesterday. Today I hope to at least double that number.

It's been a very long time...

since I last posted. I went on holiday and did all the usual stuff, but the one thing I didn't do was write. Yesterday that changed.

For some weird and wonderful reason I thought NaNoWriMo was October - stupid I know. Of course it's November. However I had a slight panic attack when I thought it was only a couple of weeks away and I hadn't even thought about what to write.

My exact thought was 'I have no plot or even a single character...maybe that will work...damn complicated though...might work...let's see' and I started to write. OK not a huge amount, just a few hundred words, but it's more than I written in months.

I don't know why I stopped writing. Probably it was because it just seemed like too much trouble. By the end of the last school year I was getting very tired and stressed. Not a real excuse, but I think the break has done me some good.

What it all amounts to is a very complicated plot for NaNoWriMo, which will span 80 years, with five or six separate stories that will weave in and out of each other. Did I mention it's complicated. I have no idea if it'll work, but if it does it could be the best thing I've ever written.

Should be fun to find out. So back to writing the plot summary, which will be in the form of a time line spanning the eighty odd years that the book will span. The actual book will not follow the time line, but the stories will be revealed in flashbacks. Maybe flashbacks is not the right word, still the actual story line will move back and forth through the time line.

Hi, ho, hi, ho, it's off to write we go...

long time, no blog

I've been writing scenes. Quite a few and new ones at that. I've also planned out a timeline, which means it is now easier to write some parts. I'm about halfway through and I am slightly stuck. I'm not sure which scenes should come next. I've been thinking about it for over a week now and I still can't get them in order.

I've decided to start writing the scenes from the first half and see if it all fits together, perhaps then I will see the second half more clearly. Of course the fact that I keep changing the climax of the story isn't helping. A little distance is needed.

update

I added approximately 1500 words last week. Not a huge amount, but not bad either. Currently, I write for just one hour a week. I know I need to write more. I just have trouble getting motivated. I'm so tired in the evenings that all I want to do is sit down and vegetate.

I worked out that if I continue at this rate, I will finish after one year. Better than never, but could be improved.

writing

When I first started this blog, I was worried that I would write here more than anywhere else. In fact it's turning out to be the opposite. I'm actually writing my novel and I hardly ever write here. I never really think about it to be honest.

I suppose that's a good thing, though the purpose of this blog was to give me more accountability. Still my writing has improved no end and even though I'm still not writing as much as I like, I am writing.

Chapter 4 is currently being written. I won't say re-written as I am changing almost everything except the broad out line. Not much is left from the original version. I'm not allowing myself to write anything in narrative summary, which is about all my previous drafts have ever amounted to. OK, so there was dialogue, but not much else.

This version is in scenes with action, dialogue and descriptions - totally different from any previous version. At times I have to force myself to write, but it is working.

I'm bad.....

at writing blog posts. I can't believe it's been so long since I updated. I have done some writing and I can honestly say that the quality of my writing is much improved.

OK, I'm not going to win any awards, but I am writing scenes and not just narrative summaries, which was my favorite way of getting out of the bits I wasn't enjoying.

I am now up to 6000 words of a novel. Here's to many more.

Yesterday

I had a good day writing. Wrote for just under an hour, but got a lot done. I am very happy with what I wrote and how much I wrote. Feeling much better because of it.

An update

I haven't been here for a while. A death followed by a health scare meant I just didn't have the energy to update the blog. Sorry.

Now all of that is over and I'm sort of catching up at work, so it is time to get back to writing or at least writing about not writing. I have my story. I know what's wrong with what I have written. Now all I need to do is make it right....

This should be interesting. I am attempting to get into the habit of writing every day, even if it is only for 5 minutes or so. I would love to write for an hour a day, but I'm not going to run before I can walk.

So time to finish the urgent stuff for work and then I will write. At least one sentence...

Tuesday's report

I forgot to write in my diary yesterday. I think I need to have it with me so I can write in it when I have the time or the inclination, rather than leaving it at home to write in it at 6pm.

However, I did write. I wrote a piece, which is part of my "novel" and I am using as a writing exercise. I'm trying a new way to create scenes. Hopefully it will work, but only time will tell. This method fits in well with my current writing style, so it's not like I have to make big changes. I will however have to go through my current draft and split it up differently and work on the individual parts. This is not a bad thing.

If I can get the individual parts to work, then I can put them back together and make the whole thing work. Well that's the plan anyway.

Yesterday

I didn't write. Well that's not entirely true. I wrote in my diary, but I didn't add to my novel.

What I did do is read about scenes. I found that I keep summarizing scenes and not actually writing them. If that makes any sense.

I summarise what the scene is about, maybe add in some dialogue, and that's it. I'm not describing the scene or moving people, not even allowing them to fidget or breathe. In fact some of my scenes are just talking heads, nothing more and I seem to be having trouble adding action or surroundings.

So I'm going to start some writing exercises in order to help with describing place and time and adding in actions. I start today. I have an hour free in which I will start.

Re-reading NaNoWriMo, I noticed that almost the entire thing is written in summary form. That is sad.

Bad end to the year

I did no writing in December 2010 due to personal reasons. Also, I was sick. Nothing went right.

Christmas was good when it finally happened as was old and new, which means New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

Slowly I'm getting back into writing. Very slowly. I've been reading about writing at the moment. Today I need to start writing and I mean more than this post.

I'm thinking about writing a diary. That's something I've never done, but I know several writers who find it very useful. They begin with writing their diary entry and then find it easier to move to their work. I'm going to try this, starting tonight.

NaNoWriMo aftermath

I am so glad the NaNoWriMo is over. I will freely admit that I didn't enjoy it much this year, which came as a surprise to me. I thought I would. However I hated my story, which I think is the reason. The story was easy to write as I had a wonderful, detailed outline, but the story was boring and obvious. I chose it for that reason, so that I could finish a story from start to finish, where the plot didn't morph on the way. It's boring.

The characters, on the other hand, are interesting. They just didn't get to do anything interesting. So what I'm going to try to do is blend this year's characters with last year's plot. It may not work, but it also helps me get round a plot hole or two that I was having problems with.

And I start this weekend. Hopefully. A new outline, then new scenes, and finally a new novel.

Watch this space...

NaNoWriMo

So I finished with 51992 words according to the offical word counter. I din't blog much, because I was writing.

I wonder if next year I will take part and if I do, if I can do this without having to write so much during the last couple of days....

No progress

I'm still at just over 33000 words, which means I need to write just under 17000 words before midnight tomorrow. Definitely doable. OK, I might not finish until late tomorrow, but I will finish. I'll aim for 40000 words today and leave the last 10000 until tomorrow.

33000 words

Not too bad, not the 35000 words I was hoping for, but a lot better than I feared. And tomorrow is another day.

writing

I ended yesterday with just over 30000words. Today I've added about a thousand more and I can't think of a single thing more to write. I'm not feeling very well, but that's just an excuse. I really don't feel like writing. I was hoping to end the week with 40000 words, I'll be lucky to hit 35000 words.

Of course, this doesn't mean I won't reach the magic 50000 words. It just means I have more to do in the last remaining days. That is what I'm good at. I just wish I could be more consistent.

My spelling is improving, but I get the feeling my grammar is getting worse.

Today

Yesterday I ended up with a touch over 26000 words. I'm hoping to get to just over 30000 words today. It should be possible. In theory. Trouble is I was never very good at theory.

I have added 500 words so far today, which is progress. Let's hope it continues.

25000 words!

So I am now over the halfway mark. Less than 25000 words to write to win NaNoWriMo. I will write enough to win, but I won't be anywhere near my original target.

However I will have a good first draft, that needs expanding, re-writing and editing. In the end I will end up with a good manuscript. I have no idea if it will attract an agent, but I should get to that stage this time.

After NaNoWriMo, I will work on one chapter a week. I will, however, not start until next year, before that I'll work on the outline to another book. I need a break from this one. But this is, by far, the most advanced story I have to date. It is consistent.

The weekend

I reached 23000 words over the weekend. Not exactly brilliant, only an extra 500 words. But we are now into the home straight, so I know I'll start writing more.

Only 8 days to go and 27000 words, that should be no problem. It should take 6 days, so time to spare. Now it is time to write.

yesterday, Tuesday 16th

I wrote 1400 words, bring my total to 21700 words. So I'm still behind the NaNoWriMo average total for the given date. I'm not feeling well today, but I'll see how I do.

Some how I see myself writing the last 25000 words in the last weekend, and making it just in time. Sigh.

Writing

I'm finding it increasing difficult to write each day. I keep trying and I fail miserably. That doesn't mean I don't want to write or that I have nothing to write, but I just don't want it to become routine.

I don't know if that makes any sense. It makes sense in my head. I know I'll win NaNoWriMo - barring accidents of course - but it won't be until the final week. Then the deadline will be looming and the adrenalin will be flowing and I will end up writing 10000 words a day. It's the way I always win.

What worries me is will I be able to write away from NaNoWriMo. I didn't do so well last year, but part of that was a lack of an outline, meaning I got lost in an ever changing story. I've started the outline for that and I do intend to do the re-writing. I'm just worried I won't have the discipline to write consistently. Maybe I was never meant to do that.

Having the outline definitely helps. It's the best thing I ever did. This years NaNoWriMo is much more consistent than previous years. However it is nowhere near ready to submit. I'm skipping over chunks of the story by putting in a "telling" section. These need to be changed into "showing" scenes. I may even go back and start writing these before the end of November, as long as I've reached the end of course.

I may even need to do that to reach the 50000 words.....

Update

I wrote a total of 1100 words over the weekend. Not good, but at least I wrote something. This week I'm hoping to write 20000 words, with a target of writing 5000 words a day for 4 days out of the 7. I should be able to do this because I have done it before. It simply means I have to write. That means not writing here, or surfing the web or wasting time.

I'm very good at wasting time. Time to start writing.

no more words

OK, so that's not strictly true, but...

I didn't write a single word for NaNoWriMo yesterday and only 200 the day before. That is not good. I would love to use the weekend to catch up, but I somehow get the feeling that it won't happen. Life continues as does NaNoWriMo.

I'm not worried because I know I will make it to 50000 words before the deadline. Even if I have to write the remaining 33000 words in the last couple of days. I know this because this is how I normally write and win NaNoWriMo.

The trouble with that is that NaNoWriMo only happens once a year and so I have no push to write the rest of the time. There are so many other things to do. I do write, but only a little and very infrequently. I need to change my priorities. But will I?

10th November

I wrote a grand total of 200 words. Pathetic, but never mind maybe I'll do better today.

yesterday's progress

I wrote 3200 words yesterday. Bringing my total up to 16700 words. I even remembered to put the total in on the NaNoWriMo website. It went very well yesterday. I wrote until the battery in my netbook died. That's the first time this year that I've found it so easy to write.

Let's hope today goes as well.

Today's tally

I've just reached a total of 13500 words, so I am back on track to hit 50000 words on 30th November at 1667 words per day. I've added 2750 words so far today and I'm not done yet, but I probably won't update again this evening. That's a pretty good total and I did it easily, though I did have fewer interruptions today.

Tomorrow will definitely be different and I will have to make an effort to update at least NaNoWriMo in the evening, so that the graph looks reasonable. I can always write a new blog entry the following day.

Things are looking up.

The weekend

I wrote a grand total of 250 words over the weekend. I didn't bother to update NaNoWriMo or here. I'll add those to today's total. Assuming, of course, that I actually add to my total today.

OK, I know I will add to my total. I'm not quite that bad yet, but I definitely write better when the deadline is looming. I should say I write more. There's no proof that it is better.

Progress today

Do far I'm at 10500 words. By far the most I've written in one day in this year's NaNoWriMo. OK so it is only day five, but still it is much better than some of the other days.

My biggest challenge over the weekend will be keeping the NaNoWriMo website updated with my word count. I rarely go online at the weekends, but I have to make a special effort this month.

Yesterday

I managed to the total to 7800 words yesterday and update NaNoWriMo. I'm hoping to reach close to 10000 words today. I should be able to do that. It's just a little over 2000 words, which is close to my average so far.

This is a very boring entry, but there isn't any thing else to say.

Today!

So far my total is 7000 words. Not bad. Not brilliant either, but it's better than I feared. I'm hoping to make it to 8000 words by the end of the day. I should be over 10000 words if I want to write 80000 words before the 30th.

Still maybe I'll write more at the weekend. I probably won't, but perhaps I'll be disciplined enough to do it. If I keep up my current rate, I should end up with about 54000 words. I will win, I just won't be anywhere near what I was hoping for. Of course, I will only have myself to blame.

yesterday seems so far away......

OK so it's a dreadful title. I ended the day with 5500 words written. I managed to update NaNoWriMo, but forgot to add an entry here....

I wrote much less than I hoped, but work got in the way. I spent too many hours struggling to instal a program on my computer. Failed miserably and ended having to go another route, which basically meant working out how to make two other programs talk to each other. Still I finally got something working.

The result is that I never finished chapter three - the idea was to write a chapter a day - but I did stay roughly on track. Time to go and post my 5k shoutout.

Yesterday

I ended the day with 4400 words. I forgot to update NaNoWriMo as I had intended to do. Never mind, the extra words count towards today's total instead.

I'm still finding it difficult to get into the flow, but I think that's just the lack of urgency. If it was November 25th, then it would be a completely different story...

Trouble

I'm having trouble writing today. I have in fact managed just 250 words all morning. I wouldn't call it writer's block. I'm not sure what to call it, but I just can't seem to get into it. But on the bright side, at least I don't need to go an pick up any extra notes. I'll have plenty still to write during the music lesson. There should be time to add about 1000 words, then I'll continue once I get home. I'll also try to update NaNoWriMo website too.

A mistake

I just realised I only brought the notes for chapter two with me. I should have picked up the notes for chapter three as well. The reason for this is that this afternoon I have to take my children to their music lesson. This will give about one hour to write while I wait for them. It's highly likely that I will finish chapter two before then. I might swing by home to pick up the other notes, but it depends on the time. I normally have a pretty tight schedule.

word count update

I finished yesterday on 2200 words. Not bad for the first day. Chapter one is written. It's not ready for publishing, but the first draft is there.

On to chapter two. I'm hoping for roughly the same word count. A little higher would be nice, but not necessary. However I do think that this first draft is going to be a lot less than 90000 words. It will probably end up 70000 to 80000 words. At worst it will be 54000 words and that's if I write 2000 words per chapter.

1500 words plus

I have now written 1541 words. Far more than I thought I would write when I started about one and a half hours ago. So I should definitely make the 1700 words. I'll see how much more than that I manage.

1000 words written

So the fire alarm went off and we all had to leave the building. But despite this I just hit 1000 words. Another 700 to go for the minimum and 2000 more for the average. I think I'll end up somewhere between these two values.

And I'll stop posting so frequently too. I'll probably end up posting twice a day. Once in the morning and once in the late afternoon.

It's going pretty well so far...

Hit 500 words

I finally started to write and I have now reach 525 words. Just under 1200 words to reach today's minimum and just under 2500 words to reach my average daily goal.

Somehow, it doesn't feel real yet. I think I work better with deadlines. If today was the 20th November, I would be more motivated to write.

Well I still have lots of time to go. However I won't update here or NaNoWriMo after about 5pm CET (Central European Time). I'll update first thing in the morning if I write after that time. This of course only holds until the 29th November. On the 30th, I'll update as I need to, if I haven't already finished that is.

By the way, I'm writing in UK English.

NaNoWriMo blog chain

Rebecca Enzor has started a blog chain for NaNoWriMo. Click here to go to her post and add your blog to the chain.

My NaNoWriMo total is still at zero.

Not yet started.

So it's now 12:15pm and I haven't even started writing this years NaNoWriMo. I will start to day and hopefully complete the minimum (1700 words). I might even make it to 3000 words, which I hope will end up being my average for the month.

My excuse is that I was on holiday last week, from work at least. So now I have to catch up on all the missed emails and work I should have done.

Though I been waiting for NaNoWriMo to start, it feels more like an anticlimax than anything else. But then again, I normally do most of my writing in the last ten days when there's a greater sense of urgency. Maybe that's the problem.....

More outlining

I'm now up to chapter 8 on the outline re-write and only 18 days until NaNoWriMo begins. Time to pick up the pace and really get these outlines ready. There are 28 chapters in total and if I can write 3000 words per chapter, I'll end up with a book with 84000 words.

I'm really looking forward to the start of NaNoWriMo and I'm getting a little nervous.I just want November 1st to be here.

And welcome to all the new people following my blog. I wish you all good luck in your NaNoWriMo attempts.

Update on NaNoWriMo outline

Instead of continuing with the outline of the previous NaNoWriMo story, I picked up the new outline again. I wrote a character list and a quick synopsis, which misses a few points. I did it out of my head and not referring to the chapter outlines I had already written.

I did that so I could see how much of the story I could remember. It's amazing how many little changes crept in. After writing the half page synopsis, I started on Chapter 1 outline. Very little changed, but names were added and a couple of minor points were clarified.

Now I'm up to Chapter 3 and it's taking longer than I thought it would. I guess I shouldn't be surprised really. As in this round I'm making sure that there is consistency in everything, through names to places etc. I know in the first outline some characters changed sex to make them fit better in that particular scene, now they are fixed and hence some scenes need to be redone.

Consistency...I'm not very good at that.

Update on outline

So the second outline is now at chapter nine. I wrote five more yesterday. I'm hoping to reach thirty in total as with the previous outline. This is for the simple reason that then I need to write about 3000 words per chapter in order to produce a 90000 word novel.

It doesn't actually mean the finished book will have 30 chapters, but it might do. I'll make that decision when I have actually written it. I'll work on the current outline until Sunday, then I'll switch back to me NaNoWriMo outline. Once that is smartened up and correct, and if there is time, I'll switch back to this outline.

I actually think working on more than one project is helping me. That might sound a bit weird, but I seem to be able to concentrate better on one after I've completely taken a break from it for a while. I came up with some pretty good subplots for the old novel in a very short time once I restarted. I'd had real problems before.

I hope to reach about the halfway mark, before I have to switch back to the NaNoWriMo story. And I hope to have the outline finished before NaNoWriMo starts.

New outline

I finished the outline for NaNoWriMo as I said and I have started on the detailed outline for the draft I wrote for last year's NaNoWriMo. I am just starting on Chapter 5. Chapters 1-4 went quicker than I thought they would.

I only really had Chapter 1 in the first draft. The others are new to the story and provide some background and show some of the relationships between the characters rather than just telling the reader what those relationships were. I think it's an improvement.

Having said that I don't think the draft could be any worse. The new chapters provide some red herrings and clear up some things that were obscure in the previous draft. They also set up the killer, which was missing from the previous version. That, however, was due to a switch very late on in the first draft.

The killer switched identity, which made far more sense in the story, but caused some problems with the draft. Hopefully writing the outline will eliminate those conflicts completely.

I'll continue to write this outline until October, when I will stop and go back to the outline for this year's NaNoWriMo. I need to do some changes to that outline - some characters keep switching gender and some switch names - so that it is ready for November 1st. If that's ready before November, I'll switch back to this new outline.

Currently it is all going well. I wonder how long it's going to last...

Outline finished!

The first draft of the outline is complete. I ended up with 27 chapters. If, during NaNoWriMo, I write about 3300 words per chapter per day, then at the end I have a finished novel of about 90000 words. Sounds easy.

I will now ignore the outline for a couple of weeks, and work on another outline instead. Then in October I'll come back to it and add/change what I need. The whole thing should be ready by November 1st.

Feels good to have finished the outline. Something is actually complete.

Another update

I really have to start thinking of some titles. I can't use "update" all the time.

Anyway to the update - I have now outlined 15 chapters. That means I am halfway through the outline. It does need some revision and character/place names, but the plot is coming together. This also means that I should be finished before the end of September. If I am, then I shall start the outline of the previous NaNoWriMo and leave the this outline for a week or two.

I will review it in October, before NaNoWriMo starts. I'll edit it and make sure all the details are there and then come 1st November I'll use it as a guide. I'm hoping to write 3000-5000 words a day. If each chapter is 3000 words and I have 30 chapters, thats 90 000 words in total. A real book. If I run out of time, I'll skip or skimp on parts so that I finish in time, but it will be much easier to go back and fill those parts in.

What all this means is this year I am going to write a full length book for NaNoWriMo. In previous years I have written a first draft, but I've never had much luck going back and making a real book of it. Hence the change in approach for this year. I don't know if it will work, but I think it's worth a shot.

For the last year or so I've been trying to get more serious about really writing a book, but with little success. I keep changing my mind and the story ends up so confused it's impossible to work out what was supposed to be going on. So now is the time to outline.

I'll add one other thing, in the past I've always finished NaNoWriMo in about 10 days or so, by writing 5000 words each day. So theoretically I should be able to extend this and write every day, instead of just the last 10 days of November. Of course, life will get in the way so I won't actually be able to write every day, hence the lower target of 3000 words a day. Some days I'll write more, and some days I won't write at all. But I will write.

Update

I have now outlined 12 chapters. Not bad. I expect to end up with about 30, so I'm over one third done. I do need to go back and edit a little, plus I still have to name some of the characters.

Time wise, I'm doing well. I should have the complete outline finished and revised before Novemeber 1st and NaNoWriMo. I don't think I'll have time for the second outline I was hoping to write. It would have been nice to have written that too, but it's taking me longer than I thought to write the first one. However, it should save me a lot of time later on as all the kinks should be ironed out now rather than later.

I still haven't worked out how to change the spell checker language, so the posts are still not checked. It's a little bizar, because I do have English selected as the language, but the spell checker seems to be ignoring that.

more writing

So now I'm halfway through writing chapter seven outline. I'm trying to do at least one chapter outline per evening and so far it's working out. It would be wonderful to manage ten a week, but that might be pushing it. I get quite tired from just doing a little over one chapter outline as it is.

Still at one a night and six completed, it should take me another 24 nights. That is assuming I end up with thirty chapters. Which means I will be finished before NaNoWriMo starts. Hopefully I'll be able to write about 3000 words per chapter, so the final draft will be about 90000 words.

Also by writing this detailed outline, I should only have to correct for spelling and grammar with perhaps the occasional re-write of a scene or two. But there won't be any problems with changing storylines or characters changing sex at random. At least that's the idea...

More writing!

Yes, I have actually been writing. I now have four chapters outlined and I've noticed something. I keep changing things. Even now in outline and even though I'm only at chapter four. One of my side characters started off female, became male and has just reverted to female.

Not very consistant, but that is the problem. I'm going to make her female and keep her that way. If something in the plot/story doesn't work unless she becomes a he, then it's the plot/story that will change not the sex of the character.

I'm writing very slowly at the moment. Much slower than I would like, but I only have myself to blame. Time to pick up the pace. If I don't I won't be ready for November and NaNoWriMo. I'm only outlined four chapters and there looks like there'll be about thirty in total. At this rate I need thirteen weeks and there is only nine weeks left.

And I need to create a character list. I don't have names yet, just things like MC, sister, client etc. That will help fix the characters and stop them from morphing at will. Time to find a binder.

And this post has not gone through the spellchecket. For some reason the language for the spellchecker has been set to Dutch and I can't find out how to change it. The language setting, that I did find, was set to English, so I have no idea at the moment how to change it back again. Very annoying.

Outlining

Well I've been away for a while. First on vacation and then ill (again). However during this time I have been experimenting with different ways of outlining and I think I've found a way that will work for me.

OK, so I still have to test it fully, but so far it's looking good. I've tried several methods, but none have lasted more than a week at most. This one's been going much longer and I'm much further.

I've got an idea for a story. I've got a more detailed breakdown and currently, I am writing a very detailed outline. I'm going chapter by chapter, through the story and working out what happens in each one.

I know I'll probably move things or even break up or combine chapters, but it is much more detailed than before. I've started a new story, which is a bit naughty, but I need a break from the old one. I think this new story will become this years NaNoWriMo.

If this turns out as well as I think it will, I'll go back to the original story and start planning it out in the same way. OK so the devils in the actual writing, but strangely enough I've never had a real problem with that part.

It's the plotting - well keeping a coherent plot - that I find hard. I change my mind and think I can just go back and change it later, but that never works. At least for me. I get too lost and just can't find my way back again.

So short term goal - for the next month or so - is to finish the detailed outline for NaNoWriMo 2010. Then if I get that finished before 1st November, I will start trying to plot out my failed novel from last year. With luck, both will be complete before NaNoWriMo.

Not much

Well I wrote for a couple of weeks, then became ill and lost it. I haven't written since then. I've got ideas and scenes floating around in my head. I just haven't written a word of it.

I have no excuse. Time to try again...

Writing habits

For the last 10 days or so, I have been writing. Each session has produced 500-750 words, which is pretty good. Last week I managed 2900 words in total and so far this week the total has increased to 4500 words.

I did start off with the goal of 100 words a day, or 700 words for the entire first week, so I blew that goal completely out of the water. As I completed almost 3000 words last week, my new goal for this week is 3500 words to give a total of 6500 over the two weeks. Only 2000 words to go...

In terms of progress on the novel, I would like to get to 5000 words a week. This is eminently doable, but as always it is me that is holding it back. So far this week, I'm not doing too badly. Last night I was ill so I didn't write, I slept instead. However I have no excuse for tonight.

I should add that I was seriously ill at the end of last week due to a viral infection. The doctor was worried it was even worse than it turned out to be, but I was still very sick. I'm still feeling the effects now and that is why I slept for so long yesterday.

I will admit that this is a new story I'm writing. I decided to take some time away from the other one as I was getting more and more confused where it was headed. I haven't completely abandoned it and I will go back to it when I've finished writing the first draft of this story. At that point I will then make a decision as to either continue with it or abandon it for good.

Of course I could be a serial first drafter, never getting any further with anything, but somehow I doubt it.

So slow

Not doing so well. No surprise there. I just don't seem to have the energy, but that's just an excuse. I also forgot to recharge my mini laptop. That's an excuse too. Not to mention that not plugging it in is probably an unconscious way of avoiding writing.

Maybe I'm reading too much into this. Trouble is I know myself very well and I know I'm doing my best to avoid writing. I do similar things to avoid housework too. I am lazy.

Tonight, as soon as I get home, I will plug in the mini laptop. I will. And I will write using pen and paper while it's recharging.

Habits

I no longer write every day. I've managed to drop the habit and I am having some trouble trying to get it back. So yesterday I decided that I would not go to bed until I had written at least 100 words, with a goal to write a minimum of 100 words a day for the whole week.

The idea is to increase that to 200 words a day for the following week. And each week, up the daily total by a hundred, stopping at either 500 or 1000 words a day. I like the idea of 1000 words a day, but I need to see how practical it is to do.

And being practical, I have to allow for some days with no writing. Sometimes it won't be possible. But I could write extra on the days that follow, which I think is probably the best idea so that the week total remains unchanged.

This is, of course, more difficult if I go for 7000 words a week, but not impossible. I manage much more than that during NaNoWriMo. I'm just not sure it's realistic over such a long period. For 3500 words a week, it would be much easier.

So last night I sat down and wrote. In the end I had 1073 words, which is not bad. Tonight I still have my goal of a minimum of 100 words, but hopefully I will again write more. I'm going to force myself to write everyday until I have finished a draft.

Let's see what happens this time.