Tag: Mama’s Little Boy

November has come and gone, and with it, I say goodbye to the last NaNoWriMo of my Master’s Degree. The last two have been tough for me. I’m the sort of guy that harbors some professional jealousy. Don’t worry. It is perfectly healthy. In fact, it drives me to write more and write better. The last two years have not been good for my professional jealousy. It’s hard to watch everyone else winning NaNoWriMo and not be able to do it yourself. It’s hard to watch them write thousands of words more than you.

That being said, I’ve been fairly happy with the writing that I’ve done the last two years. This year’s project Mama’s Little Boy seems promising, aid I am hoping that Heaven’s Edge, last year’s project, will eventually become a dystopian noir trilogy.

It’s going to be awhile before I can get around to editing. January, I have another literature class, “Classics in Detective Fiction” and my thesis as soon as I determine what it is going to entail. Hopefully, I will have some time this summer to edit and maybe finish the first draft of Heaven’s Edge. By the time all of that is done, it will be November again, and next November will be full of magic and possibilities. I am already considering the novel I will be writing, The Dreamcatcher.

I won’t go in to the plot, right now. I don’t want to spoil it for you or for myself. That’s just not the way I work. But rest assured, it is all percolating somewhere deep in my subconscious. But next November, I will know where I am going, and I will have November to take me there.

By the way, I would like to throw out a cheap plug for the anniversary double issue, lucky number 13, of Bete Noire Magazine. If you go buy it, you can read my story “Flute of the Dead.”

You can find it here, and thanks for reading! https://www.createspace.com/4546097

It’s November 25th, the last week of National Novel Writing Month. Are you panicking, yet? Actually, I think the last week of NaNoWriMo is one of the easiest. A lot of people are winning, which pushes you to finish, and if you have stuck with it this long, then you are probably going to make it. As for my rebellious NaNovella, it is about where it should be. I’m only 4,500 words away from my planned 25,000.

I’ve always been pretty good at the pacing aspect of writing. I generally have a set word count for stories, and I rarely miss it by more than a few words either way. All of the pieces have fallen into place, and we have come to the climax of my story. All the right people are dead, all the pieces, save the final one has fallen, and my protagonist has just settled down into a groove. He has made a grasp for that has handhold over the abyss his life has become, and he thinks he might be able to hold on. Now, I get to take his handhold and beat him over the head with it.

I’m still very busy. I have a lot of projects coming due at once, but it looks like I am going to make my 25,000 words. More importantly, I think I will have something good to work with during the rewrites. I also have a little bit of pent up jealousy against the people who are doing 50,000 this year, and a bit of disappointment that I won’t “officially” win NaNoWriMo and get my winner’s badge. That being said, this was a good project, and a good learning experience for me as writer.

But next year, I’m coming after that winner’s badge.

NaNoWriMo Word Count: 20,500

I am a panster. I say that often, and I say it with pride. Most of my literary heroes, such as Bradbury and King, are pantsers. I write from the seat of my pants, and often I have no idea where it will take me. This year breaks with my past process because my NaNoWriMo novella is inspired by a short story that I had already written. I withdrew it from an anthology short-list in order to take a chance expanding the narrative into a longer work.

I have a short outline, created from the sequence of the story, with a few bullet points added in for scenes I felt I would need to write in. In reality, I have yet to use it. I’ve discovered new things about my character and the things that happened to them. I have yet to feel lost or confused or frustrated. The writing is going well, yet in large bursting chunks. I don’t think I have written a word outside of the sanctioned write-ins.

There are just too many things to do. Last week I read The Turn of the Screw, analyzed Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, read the 1818 text of Frankenstein, and began a unit on Bram Stoker’s Dracula. This week will involve an essay on ambiguity in The Turn of the Screw, reading Dracula, and various discussions involving both. If your eyes have glazed over, trust me, I am with you. I also worked three evenings this week, in addition to my normal day-job schedule, and submitted a third-person bio for a short story titled “Flute of the Dead,” which will be appearing in Bete Noire Magazine very soon. Yet, the hardest part has been shutting off my narrative for Mama’s Little Boy while working on my literary criticism. When I am working on a piece, it sneaks into my head at weird, random times, which can be distracting when trying to closely read other works of Gothic fiction.

That being said, I’m not too far behind the 50,000 pace, and am in good shape for my targeted 25,000. Most importantly, I am enjoying the writing, and have never gone to the keyboard with any sense of dread, outside of the normal dread that comes with being a working horror writer, anyway. I’ve been having a lot of fun. It’s been good to see so many friends and so much interest from the Lawrence community. A special thanks should be made to the Lawrence Public Library and the Lawrence Journal World, both of which have brought us a lot of good exposure this year.

It’s been a good month so far. I can’t want to see what the next week brings.

NaNoWriMo Progress: 12,608 words.

November is a pretty special time in our household. November means NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). This month, I will see a lot of friends, and spend a lot of time working on the first draft of a new novel.

This year will be a little interesting. I am a dedicated pantser. I don’t go into most projects with any sort of plan. I have a concept and generally an opening line, but that is about it. This year, I’ve decided to expand a previous short story.

I wrote “Mama’s Little Boy” based on a news report I read about a guy who kept his dead mother in the attic. He didn’t tell anyone she died because he wanted to keep collecting her social security check. It was one of those cases where real life was just as twisted anything I could come up with on my own.

I was pretty happy with the short story, overall, but several people mentioned in a writing workshop that they wanted to know more about the story. I decided to expand the original short story into a novella. The interesting part about this is that by using my original short story as source material, I am basically using an outline, which is a first for me outside of screenwriting, and makes me more than a little nervous.

I’ve expanded the story significantly, and changed toe structure of the story. So far, I am a little over 6,000 words in, and I am relatively happy with it. By the end of the month, hopefully I will have a serviceable first draft that will amount to something after the re-writes. Given that I am still working on my Master’s degree this November, my plan is to end with a novella of around 25,000 words.

After graduation, I am going to get some of these novels re-written and see what happens. First, however, I need to finish this draft of Mama’s Little Boy, and make it through this November with both an original novella and an A in my classes.

NaNoWriMo Progress: 6338 words and counting.