chronicled & illustrated

Well, NaNoWriMo is done for another year. It was a month of steady-steady-steady writing. I think I had three days when I didn’t get my quota (1667) done and one of those was Day 1 when I’d just returned from being out of town for three weeks. Even in that steadiness, however, I felt many ups and downs.

The bottom line is that I didn’t end up with a cohesive novel. I spent time the last day, after reaching 50,000 words, just writing notes to myself about what seems good about the writing and what doesn’t. One of the things I did was to list all the subplots I had going on. No wonder it never gelled! There were about ten separate things, some of them introduced once and never revisited!

I also wrote what I thought the plot should be. After spending a month immersed in that world and those characters, of course I know better what directions I should gone. I think the notes helped and will help in the future. I have more of a overview of what I wrote rather than being left with the impression of the last few days of writing which was less than inspiring. I also feel that the notes will serve me well later when I want to go back to it. It will give me a way into the story.

So that’s a wrap on Nano 2007.

On the other writing front: I finished the first draft of the short story on Saturday.

Ahhh, such a simple sentence.

Finishing a short story was once close to impossible for me. I had a writing teacher early on who was in the habit of spending 6 months to a year on a short story. She was a very bad influence on me!!! I have since joined a writing group with some wonderful role models who are much more practical. They have been a very good influence on me!!!

This story was a personal challenge to see if I could come up with an idea, write it, edit it, polish it, and send it off to the Nova Scotia Writer’s Federation contest all within 3 weeks. Oh, one other thing: it had to come in under 3,000 words, a feat I’ve never managed before.

So you see… it’s a simple sentence with much import for me. Yesterday I edited and rewrote the ending. Last night I read it out loud and felt it was choppy so I worked on transitions today and did line editing. This afternoon I gave to two trusted readers. While handing it over is always nerve-wracking, I did feel proud that I’ve gotten it to this point with four days to go before it has to be postmarked. The verdict is in from one of my readers; it got a thumbs up!

Now, finally, I have time to clean the bathroom.
What a reward, eh?
Oh the glamourous life of a writer!

This entry was posted on Monday, December 3rd, 2007 at 5:26 pm and is filed under self-evolution, NaNoWriMo, emotions, processing, writing, fiction, daily life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.