Are You Ready to Write Your Novel?

It's almost that time again. National Novel Writing Month is a mere 16 days away.  

The gauntlet has been thrown down, and I've picked it up again. Every year the good folks at NaNoWriMo invite novelists and wannabe novelists all over the world to write that novel they've been ‘gonna write some day'.

Not only do they challenge you to write the novel, but write it now or at least 50,000 words of it within the 30 days of November.  I've never had a problem with writing the 50,000 word first draft - Whether any of them qualify as a 'Novel' is another question entirely.  I have a few in a drawer somewhere that I edited from time to time.  The best of the lot was my 2012 novel written in early 2001 or 02, which I procrastinated into obsolescence. Yep I was still editing and rewriting when 2012 didn't happen

Ever the optimist, I'm taking a few of my characters from that 2012 novel and my Murder

is a Primary Color novel from last year and involving them in a mystery.  I’m bringing a lot of the backstory forward as it informs the characters. 

I’ve got a working title (Witch on a Witch Hunt); designed a quick cover on PowerPoint; and I’m clipping pix from magazines for my storyboard for different characters, rooms, locations, etc.  I need pictures in my storyline. 

A shout out to Nathan Bransford's for Blog post on the One Sentence, One Paragraph... Pitch.  I managed to construct one of my own and here it is.

Here is my one-liner: A real bewitched teams up with a Sam Spade wannabe to solve a series of anomalous murders in the year 2025.

NaNoWriMo - Can I Write a Novel in 30 days?

November is National Novel Writing Month, and this year I'm determined not only to finish, which I always do, but to follow through to publication.  I've been participating in NaNoWriMo and writing my 50,000 plus words every year since 2004, but most of what I've written languishes variously in dark drawers or an old back up file or most recently my skydrive.

So here goes. Novel Title:   The Yanks of Wadenhoe House
Begin:

---We arrived late by cab.  I felt like we were in a scary movie.  This huge castle loomed in the night and the fog rolled along the ground all around us as we got out of the cab.  Daddy, ever the practical joker, pointed at the carving above the entrance and said, “That is the ghost of Wadenhoe.”  Mother told him to cut it out, but I had to pee too bad to be scared.

A maid opened the door and welcomed us; showed us to our flat (English for apartment); told us what time breakfast was served in the kitchen and left. 

There were some white bread sandwiches on the coffee table.  They were butter with cucumber and butter with ham; cut into fours with the crusts neatly trimmed away; and neatly stacked on a beautiful old plate. 

We devoured them all, and Mom put us too bed.  I could hardly sleep, and when she left the room, I crept to the window to look out.  As I look back, I know now why I liked that shot in the first Harry Potter film so much. The one where he sits looking out the frosted window of his new home high in the castle.

The next morning I was ready to go before anyone and waiting impatiently at the door.  We went down the rickety stairs to the better stairs and found our way to the kitchen, where the maids were scurrying around the long table delivering breakfast to our house mates.

At that time Wadenhoe House was managed by Mrs. Boothroyd (Mrs. B) and with two exceptions, all the rooms and suites were let out to Air Force families.  The exceptions were a two men, one from Scotland, one from Poland. They were always referred to as Scot and the Pole – I never knew their names.  The Scot, when in his cups, would change into kilts and serenade the whole house with his bagpipes whether they liked it or not. The Pole was quiet and always had a book in his hand.

Mrs. B introduced us around the table, and asked how we liked our eggs.  I watched as the cook cracked these huge eggs into a bowl, added milk and beat them with a fork.  She put them into the large iron pan on the old wood stove that occupied half the wall at then end of the kitchen. 

Later when Mom found out they were goose eggs, she never ate them again...

I'm walking again

9 days to NaNoWriMo.

"Why are there trees I never walk under, but large and melodious thoughts descend upon me?"
     -Walt Whitman - Song of the Open Road

Today is Monday and I'm grateful to be off on Mondays.  I'll have four 3-day weekends in November to write fast and furious to make up for the days I know I might fall short.  I've no doubt I can make it to 50,00 words, but it's hard to keep up momentum after a draining day at work.

That's why I mostly write in the morning after my walk.  Walk - Yes I'm finally back to walking in the mornings.  Not the 5 miles that was my habit, but first 1 then 2 now 3.  I didn't think my knee would ever recover it's previous strength after the meniscus surgery, but I'm back.

That fresh air fix on these newly brisk mornings of early Fall do amazing things for me and my writing.  I carry a small pad and pen in my pocket, because Walt was right - ideas seem to fall from the trees.

NanoWriMo Looms

ready or not, 'tis here
that 10-day panicked home stretch
to NaNoWriMo


Yes, I'm in again.  November is National Novel Writing Month, and I've given it my best shot since 2004. The objective is to finish a decent draft of a novel - 50,000 words in 30 days, 1667 words a day.

I've done it before, I can do it again.  Granted the first 6 years I spent literally rewriting 3 novels from scratch: 1) "The Fall", a 2012 story leading up to and through the prophesied cataclysm of 2012 and how we survive thanks to the the planning of the wiccan community; 2) "Seti's Chronicles", the matriarch of a wiccan family's history of the the aftermath of 2012 and our survival; and 3) "Murder is a Primary Color", fast forward to a future world and witches in the main stream - sort of a 'bewitched meets Sam Spade wanna be police detective and solve supernatural and other crimes.

The temptation is there to pull one of the old faithfuls out again, but not this time.  I'm going to upload those to Amazon and put them on sale for $2.99 - NY didn't want them, but who knows, someone might.

Meantime, I'm racking my brain for new ideas.  A few come to mind, but I'll probably decide at the 11th hour.

I write my first drafts by hand, so I'm loading up on my 5x8 Cambridge Limited  black spiral notebooks, and refills for my favorite PC pen.  Transcribing late at night to word, I find adds several hundred extra words and produces a second draft.

I need a title, a topic, something - I'm putting that to my subconscious for the next couple of nights.