The Confabulator Cafe

Category: NaNoWriMo

  • (Peer) Pressure and (Face) Time.

    What is it that keeps me writing 50,000 words of only slightly mitigated crap through November? Peer pressure, of course [0].

    The Lawrence Wrimo group is amazing. The Lawrence Wrimo group is so amazing that people who have moved away to other parts of the country still participate— on Facebook, by email, through our blog, on IRC [1]. I fully expect that once the first Lawrence Wrimo goes to that Great Thank God It’s Over Party in the ceiling [2], they will still be logging in to talk smack bless us with their presence.

    We have thrice weekly write-ins through the month of November. We have nearly nightly chat-ins [3] which are raucous parties in their own right. We hold monthly Writer’s Nights Out year-round, and if all goes well may start scheduling the occasional Writer’s Movie Night [4].

    What was wholly unexpected when I started doing Nano lo these many mango seasons ago, is that we keep getting together because it turns out we like one another. And through that liking we support one another, suggest ideas, provide escape hatches for those who have written themselves into a corner, cheer on successes, mourn the loss of ideas that seemed good at the time but simply could not be brought to life, and hold one another accountable to our word/page counts.

    For something stereotyped as an introverted, solitary pursuit, writing is surprisingly social.

    [0] True story: I did not volunteer to be a Confabulator. I became one when Sara fixed me with her beady eye and said, “Pick a day to post. Saturday is open.” I was too intimidated to say no. [0.5]

    [0.5] Seriously, Sara, I love you. I just needed the kick in the pants.

    [1] That’s Internet Relay Chat, the great-granddaddy of texting, to you youngins.

    [2] Or basement, depending on how well they’ve studied the scripture according to Strunk and White and followed the tenets of good grammar.

    [3] I’m trying to get an early morning version going for those of us who do our best thinking before 3:00 PM.

    [4] The Hobbit, definitely. Anna Karenina or Les Miserables, possibly. Cheesy musical seventies porn based on fairy tales, there will be plenty of booze. Anything from the Twilight series, oh dear god no. There is such a thing as standards.

  • Dispatches from the Trenches – Week 3

    Although the NaNoWriMo tradition suggests that every day should be filled with writing, it’s Thanksgiving in America. I know this day will be spent with my family. I’m even writing this post in advance, so I won’t be distracted on the big day.

    NaNoWriMo 2012

    For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been posting my correspondence from the front lines of NaNoWriMo. As the battle to finish my story rages on, I’ve shared my triumphs and losses. But not today. Instead, I want to take a break from the war on words and talk about why this holiday really means a lot to me.

    We all have our particular Thanksgiving traditions. When I was a kid, Thanksgiving always meant an extra trip to church, followed by a big family dinner that my mom would prepare — often skipping out on the church service because the turkey needed to be basted or the potatoes needed to be mashed.

    I remember rushing home from church to catch as much as possible of Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. For me, the holiday season couldn’t start until I saw all the balloons and floats — and, of course, the jolly old man himself, Santa Claus — march down New York City’s 34th Street.

    Macy's Believe MeterThese days, Thanksgiving is a time for me to share with my wife and family. My wife and I wake up early on Thanksgiving morning. We have coffee while we watch the parade and slowly get ready for visiting family members.

    She and I still delight to see our favorite childhood characters represented on floats and as gigantic balloons. We love to see the Muppets, and the characters from Sesame Street. She cries when the Radio City Rockettes perform. We still wave to Santa at the end of the parade.

    Why? You might say it’s because we’re still children at heart. We still believe in magic. And when the Believe Meter in front of Macy’s goes from “Imagine” to “Believe,” our hearts swell with happiness and tears come to our eyes because we believe in the promise of hope that comes with this season.

    I think that’s what I’m most thankful for — this year and every year. I’m thankful I have a wife who shares my hopes and dreams about the future. I’m thankful that she is a writer, too, and understands my need to tell stories. I’m thankful she still believes in magic. And I’m thankful that she refuses to grow up, even as we grow older together.

  • Dinosaurs and Sushi Bars

    NaNoWriMo, day 21,537,832.

    Here is a plastic giraffe in a tuxedo. Squids have six arms, but sea monkeys only have two.

    So tired. The overhead lights beat down on my head. The sofa cushion has permanently taken on the shape of my ass.

    The words have dried up. I’m at the climax scene. I have to kill someone I love, and my heart is breaking. I don’t want to go on.

    Thanksgiving is almost here. I don’t have to cook. I made reservations. But I still must clean. They’re coming here afterward. I can’t let my family know that we live like this.

    I write a few words. I hunt down all the moldy things in the fridge. I scrub the crumbs and coffee stains off the counters.

    I need to write the words, but we also need food. The sound of my own voice is sharp, and I cackle maniacally at something the cashier says. She and the bagger exchange worried looks. I hope what she said was funny. I’ve already forgotten what it was.

    I have an idea for another story. I could skip over this monstrosity and work on something new, right?

    I have a new kitten. She’s very sweet and loving. My leg looks like it’s been through a meat grinder. Because she loves me so.

    I’m tired. My white board is almost empty. Only a few index cards left. Maybe it’s not too late to save my beloved character. Why does anyone have to die?

    The ice cream is all gone. I ate it. Sorry.

    Alfalfa sprouts.

  • The Magical Week Three

    Last week I talked about how my word count would have to suffer while I put the rest of my life back in order.

    Well most things are now ordered, so I am pushing hard to get back on track with word count. With Turkey Day being this week, I’ll have both down time and busy time, so I should be able to keep on pace.

    I am a little terrified, however, because I just got my final exam for my grammar class, and it’s due by December 3rd. And it looks HARD.

    Anyways. That’s where I’m at in life and word count. Let’s talk about much more pleasant things. Like where I’m at in my story.

    I just have to say, that regardless of the year, the third week of Nanowrimo always ends up being magical. My story is picking up speed. The words are easy to write. My characters are developing themselves. Unexpected plot twists emerge in each word sprint. This. The things that start to happen in Week Three are what I love about being a writer.

    It just takes two weeks of hammering your head against a wall to get to this magical point.

    (more…)

  • Don’t Lose Sleep Over it: Oh, Wait. You have No Choice.

    All right, so we’re nineteen days in and here’s the biggest takeaway I’ve learned so far: NaNo is a jealous and vengeful god. If you ever want to have a relationship with something that does not give a damn about the way you feel, I encourage you to participate in NaNoWriMo.

    Don’t get me wrong, the people involved are great, and it’s the support and camaraderie that suckers us in year after year and convinces us that we’re having fun in this collective misery. And I think we are having fun, at least most of us are, but I can’t help but wonder if we’re not the best judges of what constitutes a good time.

    You know how when you’re really tired even the lamest joke can sound funny?

    I think that’s where a lot of us are right now. We’re teetering on the brink of exhaustion, but it’s a shared experience, so that makes it somehow better. I, for one, have only hazy memories of the previous eighteen days. But I also get a general sense of warmth when I try to recall this month, so I’m sure I’ll be on board again when next November rolls around.

    (more…)

  • Days Late and Dollars Short

    It has been a stressful, busy month, and I apologize for this post being a day late. I’ve been behind on my NaNoWriMo novel, as I expected might happen. I possibly have one of the lowest word counts of anyone within our region. Still, I haven’t given up, and in the grand scheme of things, I don’t think I am doing too badly.

    As I write this, I am at just over 19,000 words. That isn’t near where I would like to be, but is actually pretty good, considering. This year, I set a sort of unofficial goal for myself of 25,000 words. I should make that pretty easily. Perhaps I can finish the rest of the novel during Winter Break.

    The writing itself is going pretty smooth. Things are starting flesh out, and every time I think I don’t know where I am going next, the book takes a bit of a twist. Right now, I am working on an interaction between my investigator, Mac, and a young hacker named Pin in the vein of William Gibson’s console cowboys. Pin has stumbled upon a way to hack into the spinal chips that provide the residents of Heaven’s Edge with their personalized environmental experiences. Pin has been pushing it farther than anyone else dared dream, hacking into the last sensory moments of executed convicts. Mac has realized what Pin has been up to and is hoping Pin might be able to use his talents to get Mac a lead on the dead man in the penthouse.

    I still think it will be a short novel when it is completed, but I am happy to see the story coming together in ways I hadn’t previously considered. I know how this book will probably end and how Halo’s Slip should begin. First things first. I need to get Heaven’s Edge complete, and then I will worry about the rest of the trilogy.

    Grad school is still the priority. I’ve had plenty to do. Finals are coming up. However, my son leaves for his mom’s house for a week starting tomorrow, and I should have time to make some headway this week. We’ll see how it goes.

    I’m still in this, I am just going a bit slower than I would like. As Thanksgiving approaches, I am thankful for the progress I have made. I will keep plugging away until the book is complete.

  • Forgive me, Padre

    Forgive me, Padres, for I have sinned. And I will continue to sin, throughout the month of November.

    My confession?

    I edit. During NaNoWriMo.

    I edit every single day. Sometimes more than once. I probably spend as much time editing during November as I do writing.

    There. I said it.

    Now, let me explain. (shh, Padre, shh. You can assign me my act of penance later. First, an explanation for my awful behavior. The other parishioners can wait, dammit!)

    I have tried, over the last seven years, to adhere to the mantra (as an aside: there are virtually no rules in NaNoWriMo beyond 50k in 30 days. But there ARE suggestions, and some are more zealously encouraged than others. This is one of those) “DO NOT EDIT.” You will see these sagely words of wisdom repeatedly and with various means of emphasis during NaNoWriMo.

    The reasoning behind this school of thought is that your inner editor is, in almost every case, a man/woman with his/her hand on the brake lever, ready at any moment to pull a Full Stop on your writing progress. And, in the process, scream epithets in your ear about the utter uselessness and awfulness of your writing efforts during November.

    To wit: your inner editor is an asshole.

    So, during NaNo, where the goal is 50k in 30 days, many writers make the conscious effort to lock their inner editors away, in deep vaults under heavy mountains on distant planets, and throw the keys into the fiery furnace of the local star.

    No editing = no brakes, and no internal monologue of self-loathing.

    Does this work? For some/many/most people, yes, absolutely.

    For me? Nope. No way.

    My stopping mechanism is different. It’s not a set of brakes being applied by a hypercritical inner child whose parents never showed any affection or approval. It’s rusty, creaky, near-to-frozen gears of thought that need constant and lavish lubrication to allow the machine to even function, let alone move forward at more than a snail’s pace.

    What’s my manuscript-writing-machine lubricant of choice? My WD-40?

    Editing.

    During November, I write for a few minutes. Then I stop. I ponder. I reconsider. I go backwards. I tweak. I add words. I rearrange paragraphs. I interject conversations.

    I edit. Line by line. And while, on occasion, that results in the deletion of words, the net effect is always, always, an increase in word count.

    Unfortunately, this line-editing process does mean that I move slowly. Sometimes embarrassingly slowly. Last year (much to the perverse delight of my local WriMos) I wrote 67 words during a 15-minute sprint. 67. That’s…not fast. That’s the opposite of fast. Writing 1,667 words a day, words I’m willing to live with, takes me forever. So, when people say they’re busy during November, I tend to roll my eyes. Busy? You have no idea.

    It’s my own fault, but, yeah.

    The next day, when I first open my manuscript?

    I get sadistic.

    I reread my scenes, and then I kick my complacent characters down the stairs. Then I march down the stairs and punch said character in the head, steal their lunch money, and make fun of their hair style. Then I stand back and see how they react to my torture. If it’s boring, I go back in and do it again. With flair and panache. Rinse and repeat, until my re-re-re-read elicits an evil grin.

    Once I’m happy with my new, revised, dastardly scene, I rinse and repeat.

    Write. Line edit. Sleep. Torture.

    The end result has been, historically, a manuscript that’s passable. Not necessarily a first draft, but not exactly a zero draft either. Zero point five. Zero point seven, if I let my ego speak its mind.

    So, yeah. I edit. It’s part of my process, and for me, it works.

    Don’t agree with me? Cool. Have your own process that works? More power to you. And if anyone tells you your approach is wrong?

    Push them down the stairs.

     

    P.S. Two more quick things. 1. Square brackets are your friends! [insert something pithy here]. 2. Retconning during your own story is completely acceptable. There’s no WAY my Chapter Four can happen without completely rewriting Chapter Two. [Change Chapter Two in December] fixes that.

  • Zero Days & Momentum

    Yesterday was my first zero word day of NaNo 2012.

    These days exist. In some years more than others — like in Camp NaNo August, when I would go a week at a time without working on my novel. Sometimes life gets in the way. Sometimes you just need to lay on the ground and scrub your grout with a toothbrush and baking soda — because there’s nothing creative about it, and holy shit, did you know that your grout isn’t black?

    That Grout!
    This grout has been my life for a week.

    But that’s not in the spirit of NaNo. There a lot of goals for NaNoWriMo, and for me the biggest one is that I write every day. For the rest of the year, I write in spurts. I might spend a month on a project, and then write nothing creative for a month or two. I might start something small and silly, then file it away and forget it exists. (John Watson & Donna Noble broship fic, I’m looking at you)

    During NaNo, I shine. I don’t necessarily thrive under pressure, and like I said last week, the words aren’t always good, but they’re all mine. So when I have days like yesterday, when I’m stressed about my real life and wondering what I’m doing with this whole writing thing, it’s easy to just sort of… stop.

    I can’t take yesterday back. What I can do is write today. I can write tomorrow. I can regain my momentum, and remind myself not to take NaNoWriMo as a whole — Who writes 50,000 words in a month‽ Crazy people, that’s who! — but a day at a time.

  • Death Week

    Wrimos or NoWris? Anyone have an opinion?

    Crap. It’s Week 2. Death Week. The Week of flaccid attempts to go somewhere with the brilliantly (and last-minute) conceived ideas that started the month off so well. The Week where WriMos/NoWris drop like flies.

    Hi, I’m Jason.

    This is my fifth NaNoWriMo, I’m familiar with this week. So are you if you’ve participated more than once. I’ve had trouble with it and I’ve overcome it, too. This year, I’m taking a different approach, though.

    I think I’ve mentioned a couple of places that last year’s novel, after some serious editing and revisions, got a RR notice (Revise and Resubmit). I also believe I’ve mentioned here or somewhere (I’m all over the internet, I can’t remember what I’ve said where – whups!) that this year’s novel is a kind of sequel to last year’s. So as I hit the dreaded Week Two, I wanted to be ahead of the curve and I am. A good five days ahead of the curve. Yay, me.

    I wanted to be ahead so that I could split my time revising the first novel while I’m writing the second one.

    So far it’s working pretty well. I’m topping my personal goals every day for word count and making excellent progress on the revision. In addition, they’re informing each other. I can see where foreshadowing in the first novel informs the second and also I’m able to tie the second book more firmly to the first.

    Another bonus is that this year’s novel is better to start with. I’m not head-hopping like I was last year. Still writing too many passive sentences in the effort for sentence variety but that’s easily fixable. I’m also still avoiding a lot of -ly adverbs and that’s a trap in itself.

    But it’s all good. I’m managing to juggle the day job, writing, and editing all at once.

    So far.

    But you know – jeez, three jobs. And family and chores and even some down time.

    I’ll let you know how it’s going next week. ‘Til then, I’ve got writing to do.

  • No Mercy

    Week Two of Nanowrimo is supposed to be the Mighty Mountain of Doom. It is the hump, the long slog, the place where plots go to die. Where the trail is littered with the desicated carcasses of Wrimos who, upon discovering they lack the necessary fortitude, lay down to die.

    I thought I had dodged that particular bullet. Walking into the write-in tonight I blithely announced that my story was going great! The rest of my life was going to hell, what with the laundry and the dirty dishes and library books that have to be finished before I return them and the pot of inedible soup I made this weekend and the small electrical fire and needing time to write this blog post and an employer selfishly wanting me to work on their projects rather then my own, but the story was just fine. I grabbed some junk food, sat down, opened my notebook, and….

    I got nothing.

    Well, that can happen, so to jumpstart myself I began looking at yesterday’s writing to see where I had left off. And then I looked a little further back. And back a little more. And came to the horrifying realization that all I have written in the last four days is a couple of decent scenes glued together with a lot of brainstorming as I looked for a way out of this plot hole — excuse me, plot Grand Canyon.

    It’s a lot of words, but these are not good words. Mind, they count for Nanowrimo! They all add to word count! But they don’t advance the story.

    A farbled along for a few pages tonight, enough to meet my goal for the day, and with a heavy heart left the write-in pretty early. As I was walking home, I suddenly realized that these two characters are going to meet and exchange critical information because one is going to look up the other in the phone book. I had been brainstorming about psychics and hacking into the drivers license database and hiring a private detective, and all I need is a phone book? Seriously?

    So yeah. Week Two. Week Two has no mercy, and really nasty sense of humor.