NaNoWriMo 2014 (Week 3): Kite-flying weather.

NaNoWriMo 2014:

WEEK THREE

3 weeks done, done, and DONE!

It’s strange how I can sit here now and wonder at how the last three weeks blurred by…but honestly I remember every day. I remember just being super happy to be writing that first week (I didn’t care I hadn’t broken the 10K mark like I should have). And I remember how the 2^nd week had me calculating like mad to see how much of a daily word count I would need to hit 50K on the 30^th.

And then I remember how all of this week I was like “Eff that! I am not going to rob myself of my accomplishments regardless of whether I hit the NaNo goal or not”.

Back when I hadn’t ever completed something, I remember trying to create what it would feel like if I finished a story for the first time.

2014 gave me that feeling 3 times…and despite the state of those MSs (well, one was a fanfic), I felt Great. Fantastic. Really the same….in a totally good way.

What I’m babbling about is I felt the same despite the different paths I took to get to The End. I kinda figure it doesn’t matter how much you’re writing, or where or in what context (i.e. maybe November is a super busy month for you?): writing consistently will get you to the end.

To close off, grad intern Emily S. from SwoonReads says* this WAY better:

As for this year, according to my stats page, at my current rate I will finish this book on January 18. Maybe it doesn’t say November 30, but you know what it also doesn’t say?

Never.

Okie-dokie. Enough of this memory lane stuff—my great excuse: all of these blogs are unscripted—and let’s get on with the rest!

No Plot? No Problem! Week 3:

So I’ve been doing a loose/sparse chapter-by-chapter review of the second half Chris Baty’s No Plot? No Problem! That’s the section of the book where readers/writers get a week-by-week breakdown of pep talks, advice, tips and motivational spiels.

Week 3 is the kite-sailing week, or the week after the previous Storm Week. At the NaNo HQ week two is to be feared. My week two didn’t have doubts…at this point I kinda know what my problem is in finishing stuff. I mean I still get stuck—hence why I jumped ship from my contemp romance idea to a fanfic. Ahh….

Still week two wasn’t full of doubting, or hating the story thus far, and/or self-loathing. I just had to make the decision to adjust my goals…or my viewpoint with my goals. It had me stepping back and looking at the bigger picture. If I want to finish this current project, shouldn’t the finishing be the important part? Chris Baty does say 50K is an arbitrary number—it started as a guesstimate for the length of a short novel…(of course that was a great guess because 50K is considered to be the cut-off for full-length material in the industry nowadays, or so I read).

I want to write everyday. And I want to write to finish this fanfic for me. And, although I hate to say this—and I would love to totally look back at this post on the 30^th having proved myself wrong—but I had to face a reality this week: I accepted I wouldn’t reach 50K. Like the only chance equals a lot of craziness I personally feel I can’t handle. It took about 2 weeks for me to really just embrace a more reasonable >50K word count.

But for those of you who want to hit the 50K, that’s cool too! I’m not writing this to harp on you. And chapter 3 in No Plot? No Problem offers more great tips to nudge you towards the winner’s circle.

1) Stay ahead, get ahead is the goal for Week 3, NaNo-ing friends and fiends. If you’re already got 2 50K novels, then keep writing—or share your word count with a friend! (Maybe as an innovative and early Christmas gift…?) But if you’re behind—like me!—make this week the catch-up week. How?

Make the 49,999^th and 50,000^th word “The End”—other areas of fair word count game are: the table of contents, chapter titles, HECK! Write a purple prosed ode to your love interest’s speedo for another 2000 words. At this point anything and everything goes.

2) Feeling adventurous? Want to try a semi-warrior weekend?

6000-word days are your answer. What Baty calls the 3/30/10 rule: slotting off a morning hour and a half, and another 1 ½ in the afternoon and evening, write in blocks of 3 30-minutes for every session reward yourself with a 10-min stretch/snack break.

Make this Sunday count—although if you’re living in Japan or something you’re already heading into Monday, but maybe you’ll block of company time for a little writing time? (Be super sneaky about it though! Or honest…you could just let your boss know, particularly if you’re having a slow day/week.)

Be kind to yourself—and don’t let that Internal Editor move back in!

I don’t entirely agree with Baty when he mentions the difficulty of writing beyond November. Remember, a 50,000 word novel could be written in a month, but it could also be written in 100 days at 500/day.

Crazy number-crunching, right?

Which brings me to the motivational quote of the week. This comes from a five-time NaNo winner Michelle Breckon from Stow, Ohio: "The best part of the middle stretch is realizing that you do have enough ideas to write an entire novel."
Even if some of those ideas should have you locked up...
:)

So last week I talked the talk, and now I’ll let you know whether I’ve been walking the walk…

I promised an excerpt, and I’m giving as good as my word. Scroll down** for the short snippet. (REMEMBER: this fanfic is based off a visual novel game, so it might not make sense. But if you’re going to read it, do it for the sake of humoring yourself at my expense.

I also set myself up for a 10K run this week…err, that didn’t happen. In fact, I wrote even less this week than last. I broke the 50% mark today, but tbh story-wise I’m no where near that 50%. It’s funny because NaNo is designed to get 50,000 words out, not to actually get you to finish the story—some people start and end up finishing at 40ishK. Sucks, right?

So it got super cold this week! Also it snowed. Yeah, right around my last posting last Sunday. I completely forgot about the peppermint tea, but I’m drinking it now. As I post this…so you’re getting the review as I’m experiencing it (the other way I could have done this was to vlog my drinking the peppermint—too lazy for that).

It's tastes peppermint-y. Lol. It's got that springy minty~ness to it. I can't say it's good for a cold, because thankfully I don't have one. But it feels like it's opening my chest cavity. Like I have so much more air to suck in.
I still prefer my black tea--Orange Pekoe thank you very much--but I'm glad I tried it. And it isn't like the other 19 bags will go to waste.

Of course I would rather try these forms of peppermint treats...

Yum!

Week Four Goals:

1) Go to my first, official local write-in. I actually didn’t really enjoy the plan-in sessions with the local WriMos, not because I hated my companions but that I hated the atmosphere. It was difficult to write around other people. All those fingers on keyboards, coughing and sneezing, etc. = Annoying. But I’m going to be a trooper and go for the experience.

2) Try at least one 6000-word day...this one is a HUGE maybe. If I do this it will be probably on Thursday or Saturday. We'll see how crazy I'm feeling.

3) Try to wrap up the NaNo event with 30K. So that I can at least say I wrote 1000 words on average. Haha. Yeah...

So here's to the final 7 days of crazy.
May we all come out of this in a kite-flying mood.

*

*NOTE: Here’s the rest of Emily S.’s blog on SwoonReads! Check out this inspirational post HERE.

**Excerpt from Addicted to Sunlight, a DBL fanfic:

Or four as Subaru scoffed and stood abruptly, and then as if he didn’t want the attention he made a face. “What? I have better things to do then stick around with vermin.” No sooner had he insulted them, he clutched the banister and vaulted over the side. His boots made no noise when they should have given the racket he was making before; more so, it defied the law of gravity and any other physics.

Yui was almost curious enough to see if he was still there.

Ayato wasn’t. “Good riddance! Man, that guy bugs me.”

“Subaru has a long way to go before he learns how to treat a woman. If only he’d let me show him just what to do. Ne, Bitch-chan, you’d help me demonstrate?”

This set Ayato off again on his threats. Yui was almost relieved, save for the occasional namedropping and possessive insinuations in their conversation concerning her.

Maybe their fighting wouldn’t be a bad thing after all. Shuu thought differently and he made it known. “Ah! So loud. I’m off to a quiet place better suited for music.”

(End.)

NaNoWriMo 2014 (Week 2): A hurricane called NOVEL.

NaNoWriMo 2014:

WEEK TWO

Week Two is officially gone, and we’re past that halfway mark! (And NO, I'm not talking about my word count. xD)

I say this all the time for the Update Day posts, but where has the time seriously gone?

All I have is the results of the few things I’d had wanted to do by this 2nd post of this series.

1) Fashion a summary for the fanfic (SCROLL DOWN*). Though a bit of background. The fanfic I’m writing is for Japanese visual novel game which stars sadistic, teenage male vampires. So think: the whips in FSoG—the game even has a torture chamber in lieu of Fifty’s Red Room of Pain—meets the teenage vampire drama in Twilight.

2) Hit 25K or w/e the word count is currently for Day 16: 26,672. Yeah, well this hasn’t happened. But I also mentioned how my goal for this month and beyond is to write daily. So I’m happy where I’m sitting so as long as I make progress every day. J

3) Also Week Two’s final promise was to keep sane. And I think I managed that pretty well. I never really went into the writing feeling like it was “do or die”. I would sit and aim to write at least 100 words. Maybe it’s also because I’m writing a fanfic…but truthfully I remember I felt the same with my other completed works. Low stress and more like a “wow, what’s going to happen next?” And at least with each successive writing task I’m approaching it more like the world is sitting on my shoulders in the writing session. Week Two was also supposed to be Storm Week in NaNo land.

No Plot? No Problem! Week 2:

Yes. In the words of author and NaNoWriMo founder Chris Baty, Week Two is “a black howler of a tempest” (pg. 124).

All the advice packed in Chapter 6, or the Week 2 prep, tips and advice chapter focuses on gearing for the downhill part following the so-called sunny start of Week One.

I find that writing is more of uphill very quickly before it tapers off to a downhill roll once those first few thousand words are filling the pages.

But the book offers great tips and advice on how to weather out the storm that Week 2 could be. It talks keeping yourself healthy. Getting sleep and eating properly. There are tips to keep yourself afloat should your powerhouse of confidence from Week One should collapse in on itself from the winds of self-discovery…in particular the sort of self-discovery that blows your Internal Editor away from his/her island vacation back onto your front porch.

1) Picking away at your novel is hard at this point. And I agree. But for me it was on-and-off days that included Week One doubts.

2) Word count obsession is a big way to stifle your progress. Think of it this way, the more you start at the word count/page count bar on your word processor, the more you get little done.

For this I find using my phone’s Google Doc app is really great to avoid the word count bust, and get more “ka-boom!” when I surprise myself at how much I accomplished word-wise after copying my work over onto a word document to save.

Not a stickler for the sticky note idea?

Wordpad is great for this, too. And it saves you a sticky note!

Other tips include:

3) Involving family, friends and/or co-workers to brainstorm ideas for plot direction—of course you’d play host at your plotting party! Just make sure you don’t steal ideas by vaguely insinuating your plot. (Personally I think this idea works well with one-sentence pitch examples. Like “a literature student and a young entrepreneur enter into an erotic relationship”. This sentence blurb for FSoG is extremely vague and therefore perfect to work with!)

4) Tricks on padding your word count! Of the list of tricks, I liked the longer character names idea. For instance, rather than naming your heroine Jane, call her Jane Marie. Suddenly a find-and-replace feature will double from a couple hundred to four hundred instances of the name. Now rinse and repeat with all characters! Haha.

5) Unlike the unpleasantness associated with hot flashes, “plot flashes” are a great way to plot during down time. They can be planned or unexpected--though the idea here is to plan to use your time better. Eating, taking a shower, and lying in bed are times that could be used for plotting. Hash out what happens next during these times to bypass those brain farts during the actual writing. (i.e. “Well of course Character A should do this—even though that completely defies the rest of my set-up!”)

Also tons of motivational quotes. Here's some really sweet advice from five-time winner, Melanie Macek: "Week Two: chocolate."

Chocolate is good this whole month. (Unless it's expired. Then throw that crap out.)
Though on a serious note, leave the storm outside this year. Don't let winning bog you down. Write, write, write, but write what you can. 50K is a goal to aim for, but 5K and 500 words can be goals too.

Because weather-wise it has been getting colder and this time of year for those of us who actually are affected by winter and darker skies: SAD can be a problem. Seasonal affective disorder is a mild form of depression associated with change in season, and specifically winter.

I like to keep busy and distracted from pre-winter/end-of-semester blues. So Week Three will hold these goals, and by next post I’ll update just how busy I’ve been.

Week Three Goals:

1) An excerpt from the fanfic. Yeah. Not going to be as exciting as something “original”, but whatever. Deal. :P

2) I’m hoping to add another 10K to what I have, and hit 30K because I’ve never hit 30K for a NaNo comp. I attempted it first in April 2013 and my last attempt was this April’s Camp NaNo. More details on my ‘nanoing’ history next time.

3) Maybe a review of peppermint herbal tea? –shrugs-

I’ve heard it’s good for colds, and ‘tis the common cold season. So why not? I have a box of 20 bags to spare.

All this (and probably only this) next week! Until then, stay warm, healthy and happy.

EDIT (11/18/14): Forget to post up the summary. Doh! That was entirely intentional. Haha.
*Here it is now:

Retrieved from the desk of Karl Heinz--the Vampire King and a hunter's biggest game. What could these names mean...

SUBJECT: YUI KOMORI

Taken and dropped into this world of darkness, contine to watch this ningen carefully. It took a lot of time and money to find her. To bring her to this point. And already she's losing the battle against the vampires...she's losing her head and heart to them. I expect everything to come together soon.

SUBJECT: KIRIA HANASAKI

Unfortunately naive, despite all my efforts... She goes to school with vampires and continues to ignore the rumours of attacks. Nothing special about her despite what her lineage has to offer. The wolves have a purpose for her as well. Perhaps 18 years of monitoring and research have gone to waste. Details of project termination TBD.

Karl Heinz has left these documents behind in his hurry to evade us. Any clue as to where he might be headed must lie with these two young woman. Verify their statuses.

NaNoWriMo 2014 (Week 1): We Meet Again.

NaNoWriMo 2014:

WEEK ONE

So here we are.
Week One of NaNo down, and about 3 weeks left to go.

Let me re-cap my week first:

Despite actually having been awake past midnight, I didn't start writing until Nov 3rd. Why? I wasn't sure what to write, and I didn't know how to go about it.

This surprised me...only because I completed two unofficial nowrimos this year. I wrote both versions of Bad-Blooded Billionaire in two separate months. So I already proved that I could write a, as Stephenie Meyer put it, "book-length thing" and in a month.

So I kinda started NaNo a couple days late with the decision that word count-wise I'm aiming for anything past 0.

If anything I want the excuse to write every day. And if that means continuing past November until I'm done I'm cool with that.

No Plot? No Problem! Week 1:

Part of these weekly posts will include short reviews/summaries of Chris Baty's part how-to, part, IMHO, every writer's biography. 
No Plot? No Problem! gives advice and tips/tricks on how to survive each week of NaNo.

It isn't a foolproof plan to reach the intended 50K for this month, as in for instance I didn't agree that Week One is the easiest week. I've learned that once I got a book going and I'm well into the word count AND the story--it's harder to stop. But the start or the starting has always, and will probably always be, the most difficult part of the first draft journey.
Nevertheless I find that most of the contents in No Plot? No Problem! could be taken away from NaNo.

So as per Baty's warning at the start of the second part I waited until Week One commenced before searching through Chapter 5 of this text.

What I found was:
1) a button to ship Inner Editors to a kennel vacation (Bad Editor, Bad! Don't chew up my manuscript!)

2) a push past finding the perfect first sentence

3) Golden Hours: those pieces of time that are just meant for us to write--Sorta Fun Fact: my Golden Hours are from 4am-8am, and then at 5pm-9pm; I also find I write better in certain places...surprisingly the dining table surrounded by family works really well when I don't want to be alone...but I want to be in my head.

4)  peppermint and spices: tricks to work against the fatigue and push toward meeting writing goals

5) "name drifting": a verb for accidentally mixing up character names that sound alike during your monthly mad dash.

6) sharing might be caring, but it also cause scaring...so don't share parts of your MS with anyone! It opens the chance for that Inner Editor to saunter his/her way back into your writing life this month!

Motivational quotes I enjoyed from past NaNo winners were shared at the back...and I'll share one--picked at random! because I really enjoyed all of them--with you:

"One of the biggest thrills of Week One comes when you first start to see the words slowly piling up, and it hits you--this could really happen. You could actually write a book in a month!"
-Lauren Coffin, an eight-time winner

AND what to expect for Week Two's check-in:

1) I will whip up a summary.
2) And maybe...maybe--and tbh I'm not really aiming for the 50K anymore--have 25K by next Saturday.
3) I'll hopefully still be breathing and therefore will actually have a weekly post up.

What COULD she be thinking? (Big Dreams Blog Update #13)

Happy All Hallow’s Eve!

And since it’s Hallowe’en and all scary things love this season, I’ll share a scary confession: loooooong before I started this blog the idea of journal-ing for a potential public scared the crap out of me!

Anything that exposed me in a creative way was a no-no.

I would hand in art projects back in high school and never pick them up because I wanted to avoid the teacher’s comments.

So this extends WAY past the blogsphere.

Sit me in front of SAW (with a barf bag…and maybe a blindfold) and I could probably weather off the fear. But there’s something about sharing a piece of you that is so much scarier, especially when it’s 50/50 between positive and negative reaction.

I’ve even had dreams where I’ve had some of my favourite authors—I won’t mention names!—all gathered in one signing and reading my debut book aloud…and ripping it to shreds.

I don’t have a debut. Yet. And I don’t imagine this will ever happen…at least in the context of a signing.

Of course this is also an Update Day post and as being a part of the Big Dreams/Do You Have a Goal? blog hop I post a monthly summary update on my own crazy dream to hit one million words of completed writing projects.

Dreamed up by Misha Gericke and Beth Fred the Do You Have a Goal? blog hop features 18 of us crazy people each with a big dream to reach, so make sure to check out and cheer on the wackiness!

I started this blog because I stumbled on Misha and Beth’s blog hop. I thought the idea was nuts and frightening considering the levels of embarrassment if I joined the group and then totally failed at reaching my goal. And…it seemed scary sharing my dream. Throwing myself out there to complete strangers and expecting some sort of understanding and camaraderie from them—just a little too much for me at the time.

And then I actually read the goals—I think there were 6 bloggers on the list then.
As I read through the goals I kept shaking my head, screwing my eyes and calculating the fraction of a possibility that any of these people would reach their goals.

So I did the sanest thing:

I joined.

And I haven’t looked back yet. Sure at times I post and I have no clue if I’m going to commit to the writing and/or reading I’ve set myself up for—but it’s fun. Fun to reach inside my head and share and let consequences go to the wind…

I mean I know it’s Hallowe’en and we strictly save all scares for this day—but I did A LOT of scary things this year.

I joined a writing contest and finished my first synopsis from that.

I shared my work with two authors and got critiques.

And I posted my work right here and there.

Also I’m learning that it gets less and less scary as time goes on and I share more and more. Like I do more of these posts and it feels like second nature.

For this Hallowe’en I’m going to have to find a scary movie…

*sigh*

Why not?

Now to the actual updating!

 I haven’t written in 66 days—ugh. It kinda just hit me earlier today. I started school and slipped into the black hole of readings and coursework.

I’ve not re-surfaced just yet…but I decided that this non-writing thing has to stop.

I’m starting to realize writing should be happening every day.

100 words is very realistic. I should be hitting at least 100 words.

Still to engage in some self-butt kicking I’ve joined NaNoWriMo. And I want to hit the 50K mark. And because I’m waffling on an idea I am going to publish my idea here so I can be held to it, and I’ll do this by blogging weekly on my progress.
(I also give you permission to stalk check on my progress here!)

To organize said weekly post I will frame them around Chris Baty’s No Plot?No Problem! The second part of his book is structured to follow along the four week of NaNo with tips, advice and rah-rah pep talks from past NaNo winners. (Here's one today from NYT-bestseller Kami Garcia.)

Stay tuned for those and hopefully my November Update will detail my “winning”! (What could I be thinking, you say? I know. I'm thinking the same thing.)

Not writing? I find you can still put your creative energies elsewhere.

Creative as heck.

 Moustaches are also game.

Movember lovin'.

See you at the mental/emotional finish line folks.

BOOK REVIEW (35): Ghost House (Ghost House Saga #1)

BOOK REVIEW:
Ghost House

All right! Was not expecting to do a review this month actually because I’m still hovering over my non-existent plot for NaNo…and the last thing I want is the distraction of a book.

A good book.

Said good book is Ghost House by Alexandra Adornetto. It is the first of a trilogy YA paranormal romance—actually described more to be a “gothic romance”, but I wouldn’t call it that really. (But I’ll get to that.)

First I felt this book is perfect given the season—what with Halloween two days away. AND I don’t believe I’ve read a ghost romance before. I mean I know I actually liked Just Like Heaven and I’m seriously a stickler about my rom-coms.

Besides the Halloween spirit—haha! Get it, cuz we’re reading about ghosts—Adornetto managed to draw me in and tbh I sometimes felt like Chloe. Sometimes. Like there was a movie reel going on in my head. She definitely captured the setting and mood for her ghostly tale.

And since I’m kinda heading there let’s jump back to why I don’t think this should be categorized as a gothic romance. This will also explain what I liked and disliked about the book.

(WARNING: There might be spoilers. I tend to avoid spoilers, and I believe that I’ve generally done a good job with my other reviews. But just in case, here’s your warning.)

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*****

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*****

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1. Virginal maiden heroine: our heroine is…well, tbh I don’t know if she’s a virgin. But she isn’t “pure” or “naïve”. In fact I loved that Adornetto played at a bit of a role reversal where the hero Alexander, or “Alex” is trapped in his own language bubble/speech bubble. A lot of 21^st century speech goes over his head and he often doesn’t understand Chloe’s 21^st mannerism. So if anything he’s innocent.

Case in point à (Alex looks at a picture on Chloe’s cell with her help. And it’s not the new-fangled technology that fascinates him…or disturbs him. You pick.)

“Good God.” His eyes widened. “Why do you carry images of harlots on your person?” I was glad Sam and Natalie weren’t around to hear that—they’d kick his ghostly butt.

(Sam and Natalie are her friends.)

“They’re my friends,” I told him. “That’s what girls look like in the twenty-first century.”

“But why would you choose to associate with such people?” he persisted.

I didn’t think my message was getting through. “They’re not prostitutes,” I said emphatically. “They’re ordinary middle-class girls living on the West Coast.”

Alex averted his eyes. ‘In that case, I do not approve.”

(Tough.)

2. There is no corrupt clergy, stupid servant—or any of the other archetypes listed in the Wikipedia search for Gothic romance elements. (Yup. I did use Wikipedia, but I also have studied a bit of gothic literature in a horror lit. class. So yeah…more like a brush up really.) For instance, we are led to believe Alex has made a sacrifice for Chloe when he disappears from her for good…but I couldn’t help but ask myself while reading from that point on: is it really a sacrifice? At the point where he made this first decision I don’t believe it was; nevertheless, keep reading and I do feel there’s a point where Alex does make a sacrifice. One that is left open-ended BTW because of a—WARNING!!!!—cliffy ending to this first installment.

3. The setting is off a bit. I know I said Adornetto created a hauntingly beautiful image with her foggy, rainy landscape, or book scape. But the thing with gothic romance is that the setting becomes a character of its own. I think the only way I can explain this is to point you all to Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. There is beautiful description of the house, and there is evocative narrative of the goings-on—present and past—in the house, yet it didn’t feel like the Grange Hall could stand all on its own.

So I enjoyed Chloe’s snark, I loved Joe, I loved the story with our antagonist Isobel and Alex, and I especially liked the dialogue…sometimes. Sometimes it got super cheesy. And sometimes people did over-the-top, crazy things—like *ahem*jumpinthewayoffallingchandeliers*ahem*. There was also a little bit more male presence than young females, and I guess it’s understandable given the remoteness of the setting. But when Chloe does meet girls her age she isn’t exactly open to them, or caring of their presence. She’s very nonchalant and one-tracked mind when it comes to Alex, and freakishly, freakishly obsessed with him and their oddball love.

I mean the author finds a way to work around the whole ghost thing when intimacy came a callin’ and there’s even a teasing erotic lilt to one scene between Chloe and Alex.

Chloe is also super weak in the beginning—classic damsel in distress. She even calls out for Alex.

But read on. The story actually redeems itself in surprising ways, so don’t let the whole “eff-ghost-romances” thing get in your way.

OR the unappealing cover stop you from picking this one up. Here is an alternative cover--maybe the UK version? Lucky Brits.--to tantalize you.

And at least read it for the ending and the potential book 2, Ghost Hour, holds.

Hint: Alex is back. And the location is sunny California. Not exactly the grey, damp world of Grange Hall.

My verdict:

✮✮✮.5

(3.5 stars)

BOOK REVIEW (34): No Plot? No Problem!

BOOK REVIEW:

No Plot? No Problem!
(PART ONE)

So I may have decided to enter the NaNo run this year.

Okay, I did. I decided to enter. I’ve even created a novel right here.

So of course this wasn’t a whimsical decision. Nooooo way. I learned my lesson back in 2012 after jumping in on NaNo thinking I could write.

Maybe I could have actually completed my novel that month two years ago, but then maybe I wouldn’t be sitting here having had any reason to start this blog. These posts are might to document my writing journey off-and-on, but this last year I only recently realized it’s just probably something I need to do. It’s become a great place to publically announce goals and then fiercely do everything to reach them and avoid THE INTERNET SHAME. (‘Cuz real life isn’t that shaming apparently.)

But I decided to enter NaNo and before I made my decision I hashed out some hard questions and then hashed out some even harder answers. Like, why did I fail in 2012? And what motivated me to avoid attempting it in 2013?

Well I didn’t like the answers because they presented realities, such as it was plain cowardice that drove me to quit that first day in 2012 and never try in 2013. Also plotting!

Ah-ha! I’ve already mentioned—or hinted at—my dislike for plotting. Actually it’s not even mere liking or disliking, it’s a problem of fearing to plot. As if I might completely destroy my passion for the story when I find gaping holes of plot, bitter clichés and deus-ex machina prancing through my idea.

And that’s how I ‘pantsed’ both versions of Bad-Blooded Billionaire.

I don’t want to do this for NaNo. I need to plot. Lest I risk being driven insane by my internal editor…because she has a knack to do things like that…

So I did what any sane writer would do, I got myself some outside resource to help approach plotting. Because, hello!, how does one plot?

Should I write pages and pages—almost a novel worth of outlining, or should I just…well, just what?

Enter NaNoWriMo founder Chris Baty’s No Plot? No Problem!

And I can say with total confidence that this book is a really great resource tool. Albeit designed specifically for NaNo, the tips he gives can be used by any writer at the start of the first draft.

And although I really loved reading it—at least the first part (the second part is on lockdown for now because Baty set it up for readers to use the book to follow along with each week of actual NaNoing)…still I found I disagreed with some points based off of my own writing style/preferences. Style and preferences I found only after finishing two MSS.

No Plot? No Problem! has a lot of point form notes that are placed alongside advice and experiences noted from NaNo winners interviewed by Baty. Here’s a sample of this advice, and by on opinions on it:

Don’t wait for inspiration to strike at a particular day. Don’t set deadlines to publish, set a deadline to write—a reasonable one. If you decide to use NaNo to kick start a novel then great! So as long as your plan is to stick it through to the end, it could take several years. But also understand that the perfect novel doesn’t = a certain amount of time. Some stories will probably seem to write themselves, where as other require you to edit/revise until you’re sure you killed the story.

Writing trajectory after two novels does not agree with Chris Baty’s perspective. And since both of these two finished MSS of mine were novel months, I think I can safely presume I’ll have an uphill journey. The first week (particularly those first few days) will be the hardest. Why? Because I tend to wig out over words—I’m also unused to the addition of responsibility. Like an extra ball has been thrown into the loop and I have to make sure the other—very few!—balls I’m juggling don’t fall.

Plot WILL come. It will. Unlike the Second Coming which is…well, still on hold, plot is sure to come. Something will happen as you write, even if you have no clue what you’re doing in the start. If you keep at it you’ll find your characters’ separate motivations/goals will conflict with each other = BOOM! You have internal/emotional conflict. But perhaps external conflict if that character actually is a body of judges in a kyriarchy government and they’re all targeting you, trying to flush your Robin Hood organization out.

I wouldn’t call writing a “low-stress” hobby or career—anyone who has written a book, regardless of its being a month-long adventure or not would probably tell you that they had at least one point of really high levels of stress. I would amend this to calling writing a ‘high-stress, but higher reward’ hobby/career.

One of those rewards is writing for the sake of writing—that the writing will…take over. Even if you choose never to write a novel again after a NaNo run…or a NaNo jump start to a novel that might take you a more time to finish, as Baty puts it writing your “own manuscript, [he] also found [himself[ able to appreciate [his] favorite books on a different level”.

The first part of the two parts in the how-to text is split into four chapters covering topics like snacking/meals during the month-long writing retreat, generating music lists for your WIP, brief researching tips, plotting and pre-writing that doesn’t overwhelm the story, writing in groups and the use of negative and positive reinforcement—I really like the idea of betting with others over word sprints—and all in order to avoid being the “one day” novelist for…well, one day more.

Setting back your dreams until they never happen for a tomorrow that will never come not only drains you of energy, but I believe one of the things writers all share in common is the need to want to write a story? Whether that story comes fully to us, or in separate chunks that gather like pieces of a Frankenstein monster: write now and not tomorrow.

Okay, maybe not now, but if you already started the novel use NaNo to finish! Use the community, donate to the site and always above all, have fun.

I'll be going in-depth with PART TWO of the post for this review. And, yes, I'm planning another writing series during the 30-day fiasco. I'll be doing weekly write-ins because I went to take away the experience of community and I'll do a chapter-by-chapter of the second part. I haven't touched the chapters for each week, and I'm taking Baty's word that the advice in there will get me through the hump...

I'll share what I can and hopefully we'll all cross whatever finish line we set out to cross, whether that's 50K in a month or 100K or maybe just adding and finishing up a novel you've already started.

It's all about quantity in November, not necessarily quality.

EDIT: I just realized that I didn't give this a rating. Given that this is one-half of the review--i didn't finish reading the book--I'll leave it for an overall rating once I'm done NaNoWriMo. (You know, if I actually compete.)

BOOK REVIEW (33): Changing Constantinou's Game

BOOK REVIEW:

Changing Constantinou's Game

Changing Constantinou’s Game—a title with a name I actually can spell! I was surprised, although I don’t think I’m pronouncing the hero’s Grecian last name correctly. Well it can’t always go both ways, right?

So this is the fourth novel of Jennifer Hayward. (In other words I caught up to her releases! Yay me! I’ve always wanted to follow an author I like and be able to have read all of their published titles. Right now Ms. Hayward is that only author. :D)

Okay, now really to the review.

We have yet another sexy couple who work…really well together. (Double yay for chemistry!)

Isabel “Izzie” and Alexios “Alex” are not exactly like fire and ice though. They’re way more alike than most couples I’ve read. The only big difference is that Alex is supa-rich and Izzie isn’t. Oh and I guess Alex is a tall, cool drink of Greek on a hot summer Manhattan day and Izzie…isn’t.

The body issues touched briefly on in this book are really concentrated all in the beginning…like that first chapter because unlike most books I’ve read Izzie and Alex are not drawn together by a sham of a convenient relationship to do a slew of things, usually the most common character motivation being a quick need for money, protection of some sort and/or throwing a lifejacket for a floundering reputation.

I repeat: there is NO contractual obligation binding these two people together. The glue is all sexual tension.

Do I hear a triple ‘yay!’???

I also liked that not ever dropped thread from the past was neatly wound up. I already mentioned Izzie and Alex are WAY more alike, and one of those similarities they share is an insecurity that stems from a crap relationship with one of their parents which then prompts the theme of trust-building issues that riddle their relationship.

Neither of these pasts is fully, neatly tucked in at the end. For instance I don’t imagine Alex’s father is going to get an invite to a wedding anytime soon.

And that’s realistic.

Or as realistic as it gets during some points—which brings me to why I’m not going to give this a full-star rating.

I didn’t really like how Alex handled Izzie. I get that he went through so much, and there was this huge plausible reasoning that was entirely rational for his behaviour…yet at the same time it felt rehashed.

His anger at the media no longer seemed like a genuine concern. And Izzie kinda just took his bullshit reactions. Like so many times he yells at her, totally freaks out on her and she’s not in the wrong. And, okay, Alex acknowledges that…but as he says in the book and which I totally was hoping Izzie might throw back at hime: “fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me”.

She kept running back to him and in any other situation where she didn’t’ have a really cool boss and a great work environment, she’d probably have been fired.

Essentially when this couple gets hot—welllllll *ahem* they get hot. But sometimes it felt rushed.

I should also probably forewarn about pacing. This book moves like Kat Cantrell’s Marriage with Benefits. The timeline I think works out over 8 months, and it makes sense because the book really captures the early relationship of Izzie and Alex and its ups and downs—totally normal given Alex’s billionaire status and Izzie’s larger-than-life experiences.

And although they weren’t my favourite book couple of the year, I would still rank Izzie and Alexios as part of my top…well, actually I don’t know how many romances I’ve read but they’re up there. Trust me…actually don’t trust me. Go read the book for yourself and if you have time to spare a comment, let me know what you think of Changing Constantinou’s Game.

My verdict:

✮✮✮✮.5

(4.5 stars)