Progress, excuses, timetables...

Well, the year's almost half over and I've read almost ten books. I did manage to add some non-fiction to the roster but they've been mostly acting books. Speaking of acting, it is the reason I also have not done much writing in the past few months- I have been focusing so much on making ends meet as well as taking things to another level on this path I have chosen, that it has left little time for me to work on my writing. Not that I'm making excuses- I can surely afford to write at least a paragraph a day but I distract myself so easily...the acting pursuit can be quite consuming. And I'm quite addicted to the net. But I can't say "if only I had more time..." because I frequently end up with lots of time on my hands, I just don't use it in the best ways. I could get some reading done, some writing done, some research, some job submitting on days I don't have work and at least two of those things on days when I do have work. So why haven't I been doing that? As far as I can tell, a lot of it has to do with planning- I don't plan to do those things so they don't usually get done. I don't plan to exercise, to walk instead of drive when I can, to sew/mend some rips in clothing, so I don't manage a good estimation of what I can do and when, how much time to allow. I need to think about my days in more specific terms. It's easy to lose sight of how helpful it could be to actually plot things down in shedule form because the field(s) I'm in quite often says: "to hell with your scheduling!" but I should at least try and once again start making my goals more specific, more detailed; the more specific they are, the more likely you are to accomplish them, right? I have been doing a pretty good job of that in one area (what I want to currently accomplish in my acting path) but I need to make room for others.

Mergers

A strange thought occurred to me yesterday (except it wasn't really all that strange since it kind of crossed my mind before with good reason): that I should merge book one (my first, completed novel) and book three (the one I wrote the majority for for NaNoWriMo). I guess I considered it a strange thought because book one is about 95k- almost four-hundred pages- and doesn't need another story added to it. But at the same time, the two stories remind me so much of each other thematically, and with other things here and there regarding the characters and issues, that it seemed quite possible that I could find some way to make them one.

I have merged two ideas before, but that occured in the gestation period. As I was thinking of what to write for my first NaNoWriMo attempt and I realized that the idea I wanted to go with didn't seem to have much in the way of expansion possibilities, I took another idea that resembled it a little and joined the two and it worked out perfectly; I think they were meant to be that way instead of two separate short stories as I originally had them. And still that particular book (book two) is only 65k (about two-hundred and sixty pages). Hell, it looks like it needs another merger; I might have to go fishing through my ideas and see if one of them could be expanded and annexed onto that work.

But as for one and three, as much similarity as they bear to each other, I think I will keep them separate. Perhaps they both won't make it to see the light of day, perhaps book three is an improvement on and ultimate replacer of book one, perhaps neither will go past their teens (three is still a toddler, one is the teen- the parts are all there and developed but it's still not mature), but I don't think I'll merge them. I just decided that while writing this entry; in fact, in writing this, I am now really inspired to find an idea that could work for book two in order to expand it. Perhaps there's still room for it to grow after all. Or maybe it's supposed to be a four foot ten adult.

Reading Goals

Writing and reading go together, so of course I have some reading goals as well. They're not as specific as the 2006 goal (100, then 50 books for the year) but I do want to read at least two per month.
A few days ago I went to the library and picked up some must-reads from my list of "100 books to read" and I'm really excited about reading them. But as I stared at the pile one day, a thought that had come to my mind before some months ago (and every once in a while since) returned: I need some non-fiction in my life. So when I'm done with this pile, the next pile is going to be different. I might have one or two of fiction still in there, but the majority will be non-fiction, and I don't mean autobiographies. Well, okay, maybe one if there is one that strikes my fancy such as Einstein's or Copernicus's, but I'm talking about general knowledge things, books on the universe, how things work, biology, geography, history. I already have two non-fiction books in my possession- one about money, and one about the universe- so I'll probably start on those.
I need to remind myself of what's out there, about the world in general; it can only enrich my writing.

2008 Writing Goals

Quite simply, I plan to get some interest in at least one of my novels this year (particularly novel two)- as in an offer of representation/selling. I've said it before but I really feel like I'm holding on to what I've got for too long. Yes, more work is required but I plan to do it; in fact, on January 3rd of this year, I was hit by inspiration and started writing a missing chapter. I don't know when I'll finish it but I'm going to do it this year. And whatever problem I had with the ending, I'm going to fix that too. I am currently converting it to the proper format, chapter by chapter, simultaneously reviewing the work. I don't want to put a date on this particular goal although it might be best to do so anyway, but I'll say by March I want this book to be ready. I have a query letter written for it already and I'll go over that too, but it's time to stop messing around.

In addition, I am planning on researching the writing markets so I can work on getting published somewhere, somehow. Therefore, I plan to continue creating: poetry, short stories, articles etc.
I plan to keep writing.

NaNoWriMo 2007: Final Words

Let's review:
I wrote a little over 6000 words of a new novel in the last two weeks or so of October before NaNoWriMo began, and over the course of November, wrote an additional 29.3k words for that novel. In addition, I wrote nearly 7000 words for another new novel during the month, and an additional 6000 or so words for the first novel I completed in 2006. In the process of working on the latter, I ripped out whole sections, added new, necessary ones and brought the novel to a close at last. I no longer see it as a trunk novel, in fact, I am eager to go back to it and fix it some more so that I believe in it enough again to send out query letters and work on selling it. So NaNoWriMo gave me my first novel back and the beginnings of two new ones to boot.
Ultimately, I did not write 50, 000 new words for a single new or existing novel between 12:00 a.m. November 1st and 11:59 p.m. November 30th. But I did write approximately 50k of new material as a result of NaNoWriMo, even if it does not all fall under the rules in regards to time, and working on a single story. So I don't get a winner's certificate this time, but did I win? Sure.

NaNoWriMo- Day Nineteen

Well, I reached over 30k as I was supposed to yesterday. I'm right on track, and as a result, it looks like I won't finish early like I did last year when I was not only on track but kept above the requirements pretty much every day and reached 50k on the 24th. So this year it might be a close shave unless I happen to write double the minimum every day henceforth, in which case I would finish this Sunday (25th). But somehow I doubt I will do that although I've had oodles of time on my hands for the past few days, lots of time today and it looks like I'll have a lot of time on my hands tomorrow. I guess I will try to maximize tomorrow's time because there is really no reason for me to be barely hanging on like this.
But another thing that's different from last year is that last year, I had a plan. I knew the story, I knew where I wanted it to go for the most part, and I plotted and outlined it beforehand so every day, I knew what I wanted and needed to write; chapters were planned out. As a result, I ended up writing in a linear fashion.
This year, I had a simple idea for one to begin with, and instead of plotting it out as I had planned to do to see if I would go with one idea or the next, I ended up writing over 6000 words of story for it before NaNoWriMo even started. I wouldn't say I burned myself out before I began, but I certainly took a chunk out of the amount that counts for NNWM. Plus, I still haven't plotted or outlined it- I'm still winging it at this point and jumping all over the place when it comes to scenes and characters. I'm considering actually sitting down and coming up with a plan though, regardless of the fact that I'm still doing just fine without it. I just feel like I want something new and exciting to happen; the twists I came up with weeks ago and integrated have grown stale to me. Something else needs to be thrown in the mix. I might have to interview the characters soon.
I just realized I was speaking as if I am writing for one book! Well, yes, I was referring to book 4 (PN) all this time and that's because it's the one I mostly write for. But yes, I do still write bits and pieces for book 3 (ES) and I'm still counting every new piece I write for any of the books for NNWM. Sometimes I feel a strong urge to abandon new words for 3 & 4 and just work on editing and polishing book 1. But that can wait I guess. Only about a week and a half of this left.

NaNoWriMo- Day Ten

I wrote nearly the amount I was supposed to yesterday (for that day alone), short by about four hundred words, and did not get to catch up on the total amount I was behind before that which was a little over eight-hundred words, so I lagged behind by about twelve-hundred words at the start of today, and added up to the day's usual required count, I had about three thousand words to write total in order to be all caught up and on schedule with the minimum daily word requirement. So I had to write nearly double the usual in order to catch up which I did, thanks to my decision to go to a "write-in." With the write-ins, individuals plan to go to a coffee shop or something and invite others to join them so I went to one today with the intention of giving myself about three hours to write. And it worked! I wrote most that I needed to write (still currently short by two-hundred words), but in addition, I worked out the ending of novel one! Like I said, I had written it down to just about the end but hadn't written out a clear final two or so chapters- just had pieces of what I thought I wanted to be in them. And there were pieces that referenced things that hadn't been written yet. But thankfully, today I finally wrote it straight to the end. About two or so days ago I had written in an important link, and now, it's finally pretty much complete- just have to copy and paste what I've written into the actual draft and clean it up a bit which I suspect I will do soon and voila- I've finally actually fully completed the work (wow, that was a lot of adverbs). It feels great.
It's funny- I thought I'd be writing a section for one book then another in a single day which I think I started to do, but now they've been making me work on them alone at my writing sessions. For example, yesterday, I added only to book four (PN) and today, C grabbed and monopolized me. But I'm still lacking those two-hundred words so I think I'll be writing in a different story to get those in since I can't add anything else to C right now- it shut me down once I reached the end. Or not, because I think I will try to put things together for C once and for all, so there actually is a pretty good chance the last bit of the quota will be met by it- I have to transition the new stuff in.
All in all, I'm proud of today's work.

ETA- Ended the day with 16741 words total, a tiny bit ahead of the minimum. I ended up adding the extra words through scene transitions for C after all.

NaNoWriMo- Day Six

Okay, I ended up reading in most of my spare time today, finishing off a book I've been reading for a while. Finally, at 10:20 p.m., I said to myself- "Oh crap- I have forty minutes to write about two thousand words." See, I was short about five hundred words yesterday, so really, to catch up, I had to write about twenty-two hundred words. I did try- made a noble effort. I could have done it had I more time, but I have to get up very early in the morning. The job I'm going to has a lot of down time though, and it will allow for me to do some writing. And I pledge to do it. Because now I'm eight-hundred and twenty-three words behind. But the good news is, what I wrote today was for book one (C), and I've finally written in the missing link between the last completed chapter and the final chapter(s), finally put in some vital pieces, so that now I can see myself officially finishing it! It's pretty exciting. I just have to go and tie the new pieces in, round out some of the old pieces and I have finally completed book one. Of course the bad news is that I'm 823 words behind the minimal count for Nano. Gah!

NaNoWriMo- Day Four

I seriously don't plan to write a blog post this often for the whole month. It's just that I have to document for myself what's going on right now until things settle.
I am currently two-hundred and fifty-seven words behind where I should be at the end of today as a result of falling behind yesterday (Saturday) which was my travel day. That's no excuse of course, because I had more than enough time in the airport, on the airplane itself, after unpacking etc. to get in the minimum word count but I didn't take advantage of the time. Instead I did other things, and only bothered to write about a thousand words.
In addition, I gained three hours in changing time zones, plus another hour today as a result of daylight savings. So I really have no excuse. Plus, I didn't have a single thing to do this entire day but shower and eat so really, I had more than ample time; I should be at at least ten thousand words right now for all the time I had over this weekend.

Still, what I ended up doing today was editing book one (C) straight to the end (chapter thirty). So now I have to write another chapter, and fix the final chapter. Once I write that second-to last chapter or two- not sure how much it will take- the final chapter should be easier to put together. So I actually did get a lot accomplished today, having spent so much time on this particular work.
I tried to get back down to NNWM business after finally getting spent at the end of book one, but my creative energies were directed to book five. Actually I kind of went back and forth, writing a bit of book three (ES) which is how I got most of my word count in for today, and brainstorming for book five, writing down thoughts and ideas as to the direction I would go with each story. I also did a lot of research for the latter, browsing the most popular (I believe) forum for people from my country, picking out important topics and beliefs I wanted to touch on. That part was tons of fun and also took lots of time.

What I think I'm about to do now, even though it's after midnight and therefore supposedly nearing my bedtime, is jump to book four (PN) because I think I'm spent with the cultural stuff too. So it looks like four out of five of my books are getting some action today (the second one, The PA, is done as far as I'm concerned- only the last chapter needs to be completed and I doubt I will touch it this month- but what do I know, eh? It might surprise me).

In any case, I can write a measly two-hundred and fifty words before going to bed.

ETA- Made it! And then some. I ended up still writing in ES though; didn't touch PN after all.

NaNoWriMo- Day Two

I certainly don't plan to write a blog entry for each day of NaNoWriMo, but I just had to take note of what happened today: again, I worked on book one (C), and spent the entire day procrastinating, waiting once again until about an hour or so before midnight to start putting in words for NNWM, but a strange thing happened- I started getting ideas for book five! I think what happened is that ES (book three) is based in my home country, and so is BC, book five. So when I started brainstorming and thinking about incidents etc. for ES, naturally, I got ideas for BC as well since they're both firmly based in my culture. Still, it was quite unexpected for me, as I didn't know anything about book five beyond its cultural base, and that it would be a collection of short stories. And now I've got ideas, and the tentative short story titles, and I can barely contain myself because I want to work on them and brainstorm and plan for it more.
What the heck is going on? It's like some porthole has opened up in my brain!
I'm loving it, that's for sure. I'm feeling like the writer I always thought I was.

So that's the deal- that's how NNWM is going- I'm all over the place.