NaNoWriMo Day 28

After such an amazing writing day yesterday (10,000 words!), I wrote a mere 500 words today. But, I'm still on track. Actually, until tomorrow, I'm ahead in my word count.

I have no doubt in my mind that I'm going to win NaNoWriMo for the third year in a row -- woot! I can't wait to pass the finish line in the next couple of days.

Yay for a summer camp that lasts a month, doesn't cost a penny, and provides hours of entertainment :)

NaNoWriMo Day 27

The most productive writing day I have ever had. My eyes are about to pop out of my head and my fingers are exhausted, but I wrote a total of 10,026 words today. That's one-fifth of my novel. I know... intense. And if that's not a nuclear explosion, I don't know what is.

Word count minimum for today to be on track: 43,333 (total)

What I wanted to write today: 44, 028 (total), 9,000 (today)

Final word count at  the end of today: 45,054 (total), 10,026 (today)

Cups of caffeinated drinks today: At least 8 -- I lost count

A wonderful day as far as getting words written! I wrote six normal NaNoWriMo day's worth of word counts in a mere day and now instead of being behind in NaNoWriMo, I am ahead a whole day. 

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go glue my thumb back on. 

NaNoWriMo Day 26

I hit 35,000 words today!

Other than that victory, however, the past two days have kind of been lazy. I wrote about one day's quota yesterday and about one day's quota today. Normally, that's great! But when I'm thousands of words behind and need to write two word quotas per day, one day's quota doesn't cut it. But, I am off work tomorrow and (at this moment) cannot think of any obligations keeping me from doing anything tomorrow besides NaNoWriMo. That means it is time for a Nuclear Weekend! (Yes, I am aware that tomorrow is Wednesday.)

What is a Nuclear Weekend? (Don't worry -- it's not as painful as it sounds.)
Usually done on a Saturday or Sunday, a Nuclear Weekend is basically an exercise for building tons of wordcount in one day. The goal is to have three writing segments during the day (morning, afternoon, evening) where you write 40 minutes on, 20 minutes off until reaching 3,000 words per segment. After three segments throughout the day, the work in progress is 9,000 words longer!

If I don't get myself in the chair (futon, couch, lazy boy, or whatever) tomorrow and do this, I might not win NaNoWriMo this year. Although it wouldn't be the end of the world if I lost, it would be kinda sad considering the fact that I'm pretty close.

Wish me luck!

NaNoWriMo Day 25

I made my goal yesterday! Actually, I wrote 3,500 words -- woot! I still haven't written anything today, though, and I need to write at least 3,000 words before I go to sleep. We'll see...

As far as the story goes, I'm feeling pretty good. I know this draft is going to be rough -- really rough. But, there's some action, some mystery, some romance, and some drama. I think it will be a decent story when I work out the kinks.

Gotta write now... Bye!

NaNoWriMo Days 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, & 24

Don't look at me like that! I know I haven't blogged in 10 days. And the reason? Well, I've been behind almost every one of those days. I caught up back on Day 14 and kept on track for a day or two and then I fell behind again on Day 17. It's already 3pm today and I'm only at 29,000 words total and I should be at at least 38,300 words. I'm just a little behind (Ha!). I would really like to write at least two days worth of word quotas this afternoon (3,333 words). I'll blog tomorrow and let y'all know if I make that goal.

I only have seven and a half days to write 21,000 words.

Piece of cake. . .right?

Pray for me. My fingers are going to fall off this time.

NaNoWriMo Day 14

I got to my daily word quota today (I am now at 21,667 words)! Things are starting to unravel in my story so that's making me excited to write. It's also the end of week 2. I've read many times in NaNoWriMo emails that the second week of NaNo can be the hardest week because it's slow, you start to doubt yourself, you're behind on sleep, etc. but that things usually pick up in weeks 3 and 4. I can see how true this is! This past week I have had a difficult time writing but now I feel that I'm on my way with the story.

 It also kinda helps that The Office of Letters and Lights came out with campnanowrimo.org. It's a site just like nanowrimo.org that lets you do NaNoWriMo in July or August instead of November. Yeah, it's pretty legit.

I hope everyone is having a great summer no matter what "camp" they may be attending :)

NaNoWriMo Day 13

I finally hit 20,000 words!

My character is now sitting in jail and is trying to get out without a ruined record (and without her parents finding out if at all possible). She's always been a "good girl" and so being in jail is probably the worst thing that could ever happen to her. She made a mistake and now she's in trouble. Thankfully, when I write tomorrow, she's going to get out of jail without much harm happening...at least much harm happening that night. But the crazy adventures have really only just begun. You see, it's hard to live a normal life when your next-door neighbors are criminals and the neighbor who lives across the street is trying to catch them. Oh, and you're caught in the middle of it all with little information about what's going on. And even though I know that what I have written so far is a bit cheesy, unorganized, and perhaps even boring, I'm excited about what's going to happen in the story tomorrow.

NaNoWriMo Day 12

I am finally caught up! I hit the 18,333 word mark just moments ago!

It's been hard (as I said in my last post) to get myself to sit down and write for the past few days. However, Neighborhood Watch is beginning to pick up in pace. Actually, my main character, Adriana, is about to get herself into some big trouble. And when I say big trouble, I mean the you're-going-to-jail-for-this kind of trouble. Because I am on the brink of that scene, I'm actually looking forward to writing tomorrow. If all goes well, I will have at least 20,000 words by tomorrow night and a main character in deep need of assistance.

NaNoWriMo Days 8, 9, 10, & 11

I haven't blogged the past few days because... I'm still behind. I did pass the 15,000 word mark -- woot! -- but I still need to write another 1,400 words today to be at the bare minimum. I'm having trouble forcing myself to write. I think part of the reason is that I'm writing this novel "organically" (no outline) so I don't exactly know where I'm going. Since I don't know where I'm going, I don't want to get there. Does that make sense? I'm worried I'll make a mess on my journey. I'm hoping that my first draft of Neighborhood Watch won't be a totally crazy disaster. But it probably will. And if it does end up that way, it's only the first draft, right? I can always edit it later. At least, that's what I keep telling myself.

I wrote my first "novel" (in retrospect, it's really just a long short story) almost two years ago. Neighborhood Watch will hopefully be my third 50,000-words-or-longer-novel. But, I have yet to even go through the second draft of a novel since I started writing novels. So, I keep telling myself that I can "edit later" but that's a lot easier to say than to follow through with. I told my family, though, that once I am done with Neighborhood Watch that I would not write another novel until I edit a novel. That should force me to get to work in editing because I want to do NaNoWriMo again next year plus I have tons (ok, maybe just a dozen) novel ideas I would love to work on.

How do you get yourself to edit something you've written?

NaNoWriMo Day 7

Day 7 is finally over! It was pretty tough getting myself to write today. At one point I actually forced myself to write 200 more words before taking a bathroom break. Yeah, it was that bad. But I finally caught up on my word count by passing the much-loved 10,000 word mark. Yay! Now I just have to do that 4 more times and I'll be good, right? If I write 1,667 words a day from tomorrow on I'll finish on time. But, I'd still like to be one day ahead in word count. I've never done NaNoWriMo in a 31 day period (rather than 30). I must say, I love having that extra day as a cushion. But, I hate to use that cushion at the beginning of the month. Hopefully I'll get that cushion back in the next few days. Does this make any sense? Sorry if it doesn't; it's a bit late and I'm rather tired...

Now if you'll excuse me, my fingers are about to fall off, so... catch ya on the flip side.

NaNoWriMo Days 2, 3, 4, 5, & 6

My family and I went out of town for the weekend which has caused me to get a little behind in NaNoWriMo. If I don't get to writing I'll be 2,500 words behind tomorrow (not including my daily 1,667 words...). And it's almost 10 PM so I don't see how I can make much progress before I go to bed. Oh dear. But I guess this wouldn't be exciting if I didn't get a little behind... right?

I started reading a book a few days ago called "How Not to Write a Novel" which consist of about 200 mistakes that new (and even published) authors tend to make. The first chapter of this book pointed out a huge mistake I made in Shiloh's Children. "And what was that mistake?" you ask... I'll tell you! Introducing the main character, introducing his/her family members, showing how they interact together, etc. with no actual story line in sight for 50, 100, or even 200 pages. I kinda, sorta did that in Shiloh's Children. But guess what? I know better now! I know now that I need to start with a little more action and leave off all the history and background. I can still use all that history for my personal use but I don't need to put my reader through all that yapping about Shiloh's childhood. I'll have lots of editing to do come August.

NaNoWriMo Day 1

Day 1 down and I'm 2,500 words into my novel. Today's goal (and every day's goal) is 1,667 words. I woke up early this morning and wrote about 1,000 words before I babysat for my neighbor. While babysitting I wrote another 1,000 words. And finally I added 500 more words this afternoon when I got home. My first chapter is a bit cliche/boring but I hope things will pick up once the story gets going. As someone (an author, I'm not sure who...) once said, "You can't edit a blank page." So at least I'm putting something on the page -- I'll edit it later.

Fourth of July is coming up! My blog's new look seems quite fit for the occasion.