NaNoWrimo ends but not so Whirlpool

'Tis the end of the month, and I've reached the end of the 2006 NaNoWrimo road. Does that mean the journey is at an end? Not at all. The work continues. I have 71 pages to play with and a new subplot to weave into the storyline. I feel confident that I will have my goal of 100 pages by the end of the year, albeit in rough format. But that's okay. I'll be 100 pages further along than I was On November 1st of this year.

The past week had its own issues so I didn't push along as far as I'd planned--but that happens. I'm okay with it. Participating in this year's romp caused the usual compression and tension and out popped the potential subplot. Don't know if I would have come to that had I not been pushing the story down the birth canal. In addition I made some huge decisions about the character of the partner that will have some major ramifications in the development of the story. The best of it results in added tension between the two partners on multiple levels. Again, not sure I would have gone there had I not been on the Wrimo trail.

So, for me this year has been a success. I have 18K words and 71 pages, and I'm well on my way to reaching my personal goal by the end of the year. Now I have to wonder...will Whirlpool be the subject of NaNoWriMo 2007?

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.

Keeping up during the holidays

Haven't posted much but there has been some life at the computer. I'll be posting a wordcount update sometime tomorrow that will reflect the work done in the last week.

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.

Alas, I'm behind

Behind posting the wordcount and a tad behind the writing. I'm going to have to buckle down this week and really forge through things.

More to come.

Problems with sidebar

Last night I tried playing around with the sidebar and now some of the items, such as the links, are at the bottom. I'm trying to find out how to fix it; I'm not good with code. In the meantime, you can see that I've done a few more words and the draft is continuing, however rough.

Update: Happy to report, as you probably can see, the problem is solved. Thanks to group support's timely help.

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.

NaNoWriMo's Saggy Middle

Just like any first draft of a novel, my NaNoWriMo pursuit is having a saggy middle. I know I need to step it up if I want to reach the 50K goal, but. . . . Right now I'm probably at a 30-35K pace and while that's pretty good, it's clearly not enough to be haloed. If you haven't noticed, there's a new countdown clock on the righthand sidebar. Sixteen days, it says, so I'm going to have to up my wordcount to average 2300 a day to make it.

The beauty of NaNoWriMo is that it urges you on and encourages you to try harder. Instead of 1200 or 1500 a day, why not do those extra pages and make it 2400? Time compresses, expectations are heightened, creativity muscles are squeezed. At the end of the month a first draft is delivered--okay, make that a rough first draft.

How are you doing?

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.

NaNoWriMo train keeps chugging

Well, I'm still here, still working on the story and scraping the bottom of the 10K level. I guess I could have pushed on but I came to a natural stopping point and it's been a long day, so...although my wordcount is steady it's clear from the graph that I'm going to have to pick it up some if I want to make the 50K wordcount. I think I've found a way to easily work in the second murder case and let it come forward for a while, then as it winds down the main murder case picks up steam. I actually feel pretty good about it, too, because I think it will provide a realistic feel for the life of the homicide detectives.

More tomorrow.

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.

Chugging along on the NaNoWriMo train

Okay, racked up another 1K words or so to push me over the 5K top. It's like running a marathan. I guess my strategy is to conserve energy in the beginning while I build momentum for a major sprint at the end.

Right now I'm trying to find a way to smooth in the entrance of another murder case so that it appears more seamless. Homicide detectives do work on more than one case at a time. (Note to self: Check out a few Ed McBain's novels to see how he handled this.) And I have a few passages where the POV needs some work. I'm not actually rewriting, more like making notes as I go. (I love Microsoft Word's comment feature and use it all the time to tab reminders for me to do later.)

Well, it's been a long day and last night I was working on another project until about 4am so I better start winding down.

G'night, all.

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.

All caught up

Okay, yesterday I managed to get caught up and have entered my full tally of 3,610 words. I also had an online brainstorming session with one of my writer-friends and have a few more elements that I can quickly bring into the story. WHIRLPOOL is the first novel in what is basically a tryptech structure of three novels featuring the same Houston homicide detective. I had sketched out a change in partners for the second novel that introduces a lot of conflict and now realize I might as well do it in the first book. Why save my gunpowder, right? I also have a bridging story that is another case that I had structured into the second novel that I now think I'm going to bring up front. With these additions I have plenty of ammunition to fuel my day's writing.

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.

Nanowrimo 2006

Well, I'm off to a great start. Forgot I was going to do this so I'm a little late signing up but I will be writing. My intention is to write as much as I can this month and my goal is 100 pages in very rough draft. One reason for that goal being so primary is that I have a goal of 100 pages for the Donald Maass Breakout Novel Workshop that I'm attending in March. NaNoWrimo is a good way to kick-start these pages and get the first draft going.

If you've been to this blog before you know I've participated in the 2004 and 2005 NaNoWriMos but didn't really push through to the end, although I did manage to get quite a few pages written. Those pages have been scrapped. Over the last year I've made some major changes to the story including changing the main POV character so I'm really starting from square one.

One of my longtime writing friends is also participating this year and is going by the name of Wolverina. She's listed as my buddy. It'll be fun going through the process with a good friend.

Check back for more info during the month.

Drop by my blog at Down the Writer's Path and read my reviews on Blogcritics.org.