Category Archives: NaNoWriMo
Another NaNo Bites the Dust!
NaNoWriMo is officially over and I’m happy to say I managed to crank out 67,154 words of fanfic last month! I have to say it was nice getting all the instant feedback from my readers and their waiting for updates kept me going when I wanted to take a break. That translated into 71,440 hits from 20,715 readers on fanfiction.net! That just blows away the numbers from the previous month completely and I’m floored that so many people are regularly reading my stories. I mean it feels like a lot, is that a lot?
New episode this week on Vampire Diaries, yay! I can’t wait to watch it, the promo looks amazing! It’ll be good to get back to those episode recaps here too.
I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving holiday for those of you who celebrate it. We had a nice day with family and food and I’m say to say the turkey leftovers are all gone now. Gearing up for Christmas now, the tree is up and presents all wrapped.
In other news, I was just contacted by an editor of a local publishing house who wants to work with me on editing Pretty Witches All in a Row! No guarantee of a book deal as of yet, but I’m glad of the interest and his generous offer to work with me. Fingers crossed this ends up with a publishing deal!
Winner for NaNoWriMo 2010!
So I’ve been so busy lately that I forgot to update that I hit the 50k mark for NaNo a few days back. I’m currently at 59,403 words for the month and still going strong. I might take a day or two off for the long weekend, but we’ll see.
I’ve been watching a lot of Firefly lately and I’ve been feeling a powerful need to write me a one-shot that takes place between the series and the movie I’m thinking. Yeah yeah, I know I need another story idea like I need a bullet in the brainpan, but I’m still toying with it. My three fanfics are still going strong with no sign of any of them wrapping up just yet, so I’ll have plenty of writing to keep me busy in the near future.
I have to admit that my fingers have been itching to start on some original work too, but I haven’t even gotten to a synopsis for Angel of Mercy yet, so I’m leery of taking on another novel just yet. I think instead I’ll just enjoy the holidays (Already got the tree up! I know, I’m one of those…) and see what happens when I come to the other side of them.
FanFics for NaNoWriMo!
I’m having a blast writing fanfic for NaNo this year! It’s been easier than I would have thought to juggle the three stories at once and I’m averaging a day off a week. So far I’m up to 25,405 words which puts me on track to get to about 75k words by the end of the month if I maintain this pace. Of course I might slow down a bit to try and get some other projects done. I still need to write a synopsis for Angel of Mercy and get some query letters out, and I’m almost done editing down Moonsong to a much leaner wordcount.
Of course the holidays are almost upon us, which means a busier time at work as the weather turns worse, but I’m hopeful I can still get plenty of time to write in. Is it weird that I’ve already got all of my holiday shopping done for the immediate family? What can I say, I’m a planner, I like to be prepared. 
Will be turkey shopping this weekend, I have a killer recipe with lemons, herbs and dijon mustard that I’ve made for the past… wow fifteen years now? Boy how time flies… What are some of your favorite holiday recipes?
So Far So Good for NaNoWriMo!
At the end of day 3 I’m up to 8099 in words written, not too shabby I think. It’s definitely a different vibe writing fanfic for NaNo rather than an original novel. I don’t have the freedom of writing complete unpolished crap because it’s a first draft and won’t be seen in this incarnation since I’m posting updates as I go and I’ve got to make sure they’re up to snuff before they get posted. And I also don’t have the benefit of having the fairly detailed outline I had for the other 3 novels I’ve written during the month long writing challenges since I just didn’t have time to get anything down this time.
But on the plus side, it’s gratifying to have people see the results right away. And I’m normally a pretty ‘fly by the seat of my pants’ kind of writer when it comes to fanfic, so that’s okay. And there’s less pressure to come up with something super awesome that I have to then figure out a way to market because my fanfic is just for fun and for the fans. With things so stressful at work, I’m glad I went this route even if I won’t end up with a book to publish at the end of the month.
I wanted to give a heartfelt thanks to everyone for all the support and feedback on fanfic.net! I had over 55,000 hits for my fics last month alone, that is amazing! You guys are the reason I write there, and I’m so touched to have so many people reading.
In other news, I heard back from a publisher today who’s about halfway through reading Pretty Witches All in a Row. He emailed me to let me know that he’s really enjoying it so far and with a little editing he thinks I’ve got the makings of a great book. How cool is that?
NaNoWriMo Fast Approaches…
And I am having some serious waffling issues. So far I think I’ve chosen and discarded easily a half dozen ideas on what to write about. I had started with the sequel to Angel of Mercy, No Mercy for the Wicked. But then I decided to go with something fresh and something my eleven year old might enjoy reading. I even sat down with her and did some brainstorming, which was a lot of fun. I helped her decide what she’s gonna write for NaNo!
Only the thing is… we can’t seem to agree on anything for me to write on that she wants to read! She’ll like part of my idea, but not others, or we’ll have a serious disagreement on what the characters should be like. So I’m thinking… writing kids books is not my forte. Which is fine, and I thought I’d still try and tackle a young adult book since it’d be smaller overall and I’m so pressed for time.
But then I started editing down Moonsong and felt like writing a sequel to that one… and ugh there are too many choices! And I’m still trying to refine my three completed books and pitch them to agents and publishers. To top things off, work continues to consume more of my time than I would like and I’ve started to entertain the notion of not writing anything for Nano.
I know. Sacriligious! It pains me to even think of not doing it.
Then I thought about having one of my new fanfics count as a NaNo entry. After all, I could start it in the month of November and then I could kill two birds with one stone. But somehow that seems like cheating. It’s national NOVEL writing month, does fanfic count?
So now here I am, 4 ish days from the start and I have no idea if I’ll be doing it, or what I’ll be writing about. Yikes!
What do you guys think? Any ideas? Comments? Does Fanfic count as writing towards Nano?
NaNoWriMo – To Sequel or Not To Sequel?
Okay I know I posted that I’d be writing the sequel to Angel of Mercy for the NaNoWriMo challenge in November, but the more I think about it the more I think I’ll be going with something new. I’ve been going back and forth as to what makes more sense, since my writing time is limited between the books/editing/queries/fanfics/RP, so I want to get the most bang for my buck so to speak when I pick up a new challenge. I’ve been worried about writing a sequel to a book that hasn’t sold in case there are any major edits suggested by an agent or publisher that might eventually make an already written sequel need to be overhauled later. Or whether or not sequels make you more attractive or less attractive to an agent or publisher.
I’ve decided that I’m definitely overthinking this.
NaNoWriMo is just about writing. Period. Not marketing, or selling, just writing. So I’ll simply go with whatever characters are screaming the loudest to get their story told. Simple as that. So stay tuned to see what it ends up being. I’ve got at least 8 ideas simmering in the back of my mind right now and a new one could get queued up to the front of the line at any moment. Or inspiration might strike for a new one (got one driving the other day, inspired by a cover of the Aerosmith song “Dream On” by Kelly Sweet. Still might write that one, it’s about a teen girl that moves to a new town with her mother who has something to hide…)
In the meantime new ideas for fanfics keep rolling in too. In addition to the two I’ve got going now for Vampire Diaries and True Blood. I’ve got an idea for one that combines the movie Unknown with Tabula Rasa from Buffy with the cast of Vampire Diaries – essentially they’re trapped in a warehouse with amnesia, don’t even know that some of them are vampires! Also I wanted to write the sequel to Road Trip with Damon and Elena on a European Roadtrip. And then I have an idea for one with Eric and Sookie from True Blood, only this time she’s got amnesia and Eric convinces her that she is His and always has been. (I know, I’m on an amnesia kick lately, I don’t know what that’s about!)
So much to write and so little time!
