P.S. I promise to tell you how the novel is coming along

Tomorrow......









Photo courtesy summervillain

NaNoWriMo -

What?

NaNoWriMo I say. That's National Novel Writing Month and it begins November 1st. The point of NaNoWriMo is to write 50,000 in a month--a mere 30 days.

Why am I telling you now? So you can plan. So you can figure out what you want to write, and how you're going to carve out time to do it.

Why would you want to do that? It's an awesome process. I did it last year and ended the month with 50004 words, just 4 little words pushed me over the threshold. Since then I've deleted those 4 words and added another 8000. So see my point. In one month I wrote 50004 words. In the last 10 1/2 months, I've only written 80000. Actually I've probably written more than that, because while I was writing the 50,000 I completely tuned out my internal editor. I shoved her in a desk drawer and threw in chocolate periodically to shut her up.

But I digress...

What did I learn from NaNoWriMo? Several things.

1. I'm a linear writer. So it's best for me to go from start to finish and not skip around writing scenes as they come to me. It boggles my mind too much to have to go back and try and weave stuff in.

2. I write better from an outline. My first attempt was a sheer pantser (by the seat of my pants.) And while I like the story, I wish I had created an outline to keep me on track.

3. While I'll write from an outline next time, I won't be so rigid as to have to stick to it, if my characters want to veer off in another direction.

4. I learned that characters do veer off. One of my minor characters in this novel refused to be minor, so she's come out of the background and will be a major player in my next novel.

5. I need a strict writing schedule with scheduled down time. I abolished all extra-curricular Internet activities until I reached my writing goal for the day. Once I did that, I'd check email, chat with friends and surf.

6. I used a timer and forced myself to write in one hour intervals. After an hour, I got up and stretched, got a drink and made wee wee. I know you're supposed to get up more often than that, but I have a short attention span and it takes me a while to get back to work. So one hour was my interval with a ten minute break.

7. I allowed myself days off. I know it caused my daily writing schedule to increase, but I'm not eating turkey at my computer and I refuse to give up my day after Thanksgiving shopping madness.

8. Writing is easer than editing.

9. Yes, you can actually take showers. You don't have to be a slob to make the goal.

10. It doesn't count if you write - I can't think of anything to write. I can't think of anything to write. I can't think of anything to write.

Will I do it again this year? Heck yeah. October 1st, I start my outline. And yes, you can have an outline, but DO NOT WRITE one word on the novel until November 1st. That's a big no-no.

Is there a prize? Yes, the satisfaction of writing 50,000 words.

Is this a big deal? Just ask the NaNoWriMoer's who wrote a collective 1,187,931,929 words last November.

Here's the website. Go sign up.

Tell me, did you NaNoWriMo last year? What was your experience? Will you do it again?

Are Your Phrases Redundant?

When I worked for the phone company, redundancies were a good thing. Not in spoken or written communication, but in our central office switching equipment. One goes down, the redundant one kicks in and takes over. Kind of like a battery back-up. Okay, I was a trainer, not a switching guru, but you get the drift.

In writing, redundancies are a no-no. Was that redundant? I just finished editing Chapter 10 of my novel, and I ran into a couple of places where I repeated myself--completely engulfed in flames. Ummmm. If it's engulfed, then it is completely in flames. but I made a note to go back through my previous chapters and look for phrases where I repeated myself.

Then I found this article by Richard Nordquist on About.com . He points out that sometimes it might be okay to be repetitious in order to clarify a point. For the most part, redundant phrases just bog down the story. And the best part--he included a list of common expressions. I love that. Usually you get one or two examples, but he has an alphabetized listing. I printed that sucker and taped it to my credenza.

Edits...ARRRGH

I'm editing. It's a dreaded task, but something I need to do. My critique group is only about 60 pages into my novel, but I keep going back and layering in description, tightening dialog and searching for those terrible words that I have a tendency to sprinkle in my manuscript.

Here's my formula for editing.

The list of words I tend to overuse is posted by my computer. I do a search on those words, highlight them, then go through and tighten the writing by eliminating them. It's a long process, but I love the search feature. It's so much easier than printing the thing out and trying to find them manually.

Once in a while I'll change a character's name after I've started the manuscript, so I'll do a search on any names I may have changed just to make sure John is still John and not Bill or Harry. I've seen names change in novels I've read and it always leaves me scratching my head.

I'll also highlight all my beats and make sure I'm not overusing actions--like always having someone hike their eyebrows. Unless, of course, they are an eyebrow hiker by nature.

Adverbs and adjectives get the hairy eyeball, too. Are they justified? If not, out they go.

How about you? What's your process for editing your manuscript?

Successfully Completing a Novel

The title says it all. I recently finished my first novel and here I will share my attempts at getting said novel published.

I've made several futile attempts at writing a novel, but last year I actually started one and finished it. It's all about passion. I found I had a passion for the subject, so the words just flew out of my head and into the computer. (Not as lovely an image as flowing onto the paper, but you get the drift.)

It's not like I haven't been published. I've had several personal essays and short stories published, but the route to publishing a novel is quite different than publishing something short. With a short work, you still have to get the attention of someone, preferably an editor. But with a novel, not only do you have to get the attention of a publisher, there's usually an agent to deal with.

I know you can publish without an agent, but I've chosen that route. Self-publishing is not for me, so I've not even explored that avenue. I've seen too many horror stories, and I'd prefer not to even go down that road.

So now begins my task of finding an agent.

What's your experience with finding an agent? Good/Bad? (But please if you have a bad experience, don't bash the agent here. There are plenty of forums where you can do that. I'm not into name-calling.)