We're back! Want to track your weekly progress with me again?

[dollyt8]

NaNoWriMo as an organization is no more. Whether you just found that out or you wanted to participate apart from the organization anyway, I'm back to give progress updates, share badges at the end of the month, and encourage anyone who wants to come along for the ride!

Join the Trackbear leaderboard here: TrackBear

Find my blog on how to write faster for NaNo here: Nine Ways to Write Faster for NaNoWriMo

Join a challenge to write 100K in three months for a prize instead of 50K in one month for no prize here: Koala Quill - Let's write your success story. Together. (disclaimer: this is a referral link!)

If you want to participate, start by talking about your WIP if you already know what you're writing. I'll start!

1. Title - Obsidian Blood
2. Genre - Fantasy
3. Blurb - Not written yet (clearly I'm not as prepared as last year) but baically it's a cross between Jurassic Park and How to Train Your Dragon, which is as weird as it sounds.
4. Status - Outlined and planned but not a single word written yet

And feel free to share any more details about your stories, especially where we can find them if you plan to post them when you're done!

 

[dollyt8]

And there's also this website I just found, but I haven't tested it out yet, so use with caution! https://novel-november.com

 

[Diana Silver]

Hi Dolly,

Great to see you back here! Thanks for opening the thread, I'm in.

I'm currently writing the final bit of my novel's full-text draft. It's a stand-alone so this is really the end of the story... It's a tough time for setting and sticking to goals because every other week I get stranded into long stretches of plotting and having to reorganize the puzzle pieces. So I'm joining, but it's not going to be a word count report. Still, I'll find a way to track progress somehow!

Title - Azalie's Heart
Genre - Modern-day fantasy
Blurb - A bunch of teenage witches have to save the witching world from itself fueled by pizza take-away, energy drinks and hard-won friendship.
Status - Passed the 100k mark, started work on the final (25k word) arc last week. It's roughly plotted out, just need to bring it home now.

 

[AlexS]

Title: The Fractured North - Book II of the Mistress of the Wastes trilogy
Genre: YA Fantasy
Blurb: In the aftermath of a continent-shaking cataclysm, multiple factions, be they a king, queen, witch, noble or traitor, embark a perilous race for an artifact of great power. The story directly follows Book I: Kings and Witches.
Status: 3,750 words in 2 days. The entire story is planned for ~90K words, so probably won't be finished in November.

 

[Prince of Spires]

I happen to be starting my next project, so I might as well join in on the fun. I doubt I'll get to 50k, but even getting 25k down in a month is a great way to jumpstart the novel.

Title: Vali's Knight
Genre: Epic Sword & Sorcery
Blurb (provisionally):
Randal joins the Knights of Vali, where he gains some training in Garford about the Knights and about being Gifted (though there are no Gifted Knights to help him). As he familiarizes himself with the Knights, he learns that not all is well.

Meanwhile, Bryn is chased across the empire by a band of Hashin-shin, aiming to take her out after she managed to escape Halmuq. She needs to learn to work together with the remaining towns-folk from Jadar to lead them to safety, even as the city council opposes her.

Across the country, violence is increasing, and there are increased signs of chaos activity. Tales of border raids increase. Then the High Priest shows up, and announces that one of the dread gods has returned.

Status: First half is plotted. 0 words written so far.

 

[dollyt8]

Hi Dolly,

Great to see you back here! Thanks for opening the thread, I'm in.

I'm currently writing the final bit of my novel's full-text draft. It's a stand-alone so this is really the end of the story... It's a tough time for setting and sticking to goals because every other week I get stranded into long stretches of plotting and having to reorganize the puzzle pieces. So I'm joining, but it's not going to be a word count report. Still, I'll find a way to track progress somehow!

Title - Azalie's Heart
Genre - Modern-day fantasy
Blurb - A bunch of teenage witches have to save the witching world from itself fueled by pizza take-away, energy drinks and hard-won friendship.
Status - Passed the 100k mark, started work on the final (25k word) arc last week. It's roughly plotted out, just need to bring it home now.

Very cool; I'm excited to see how much progress you make!

 

[dollyt8]

Title: The Fractured North - Book II of the Mistress of the Wastes trilogy
Genre: YA Fantasy
Blurb: In the aftermath of a continent-shaking cataclysm, multiple factions, be they a king, queen, witch, noble or traitor, embark a perilous race for an artifact of great power. The story directly follows Book I: Kings and Witches.
Status: 3,750 words in 2 days. The entire story is planned for ~90K words, so probably won't be finished in November.

Awesome! Good luck reaching your goals

 

[dollyt8]

I happen to be starting my next project, so I might as well join in on the fun. I doubt I'll get to 50k, but even getting 25k down in a month is a great way to jumpstart the novel.

Title: Vali's Knight
Genre: Epic Sword & Sorcery
Blurb (provisionally):
Randal joins the Knights of Vali, where he gains some training in Garford about the Knights and about being Gifted (though there are no Gifted Knights to help him). As he familiarizes himself with the Knights, he learns that not all is well.

Meanwhile, Bryn is chased across the empire by a band of Hashin-shin, aiming to take her out after she managed to escape Halmuq. She needs to learn to work together with the remaining towns-folk from Jadar to lead them to safety, even as the city council opposes her.

Across the country, violence is increasing, and there are increased signs of chaos activity. Tales of border raids increase. Then the High Priest shows up, and announces that one of the dread gods has returned.

Status: First half is plotted. 0 words written so far.

Nice! That's the way I look at it as well. It's a useful challenge as long as you make progress!

 

[A. E. Lowan]

dollyt8 Thank you! I'm so glad someone's taking point this year. I'm skipping it, but good luck to all y'all. Now, get back to work!

 

[JBCrowson]

My WIP is running at a way slower rate, I made a major structural change in the summer to split it into two books, and have a non-linear chronology for the first one. I'm really happy with how it's shaping up. I'm 90k in, probably looking at 100-110 by the end, with book 2 needing more work and likely looking at another 30-40k words to bring out certain plot and character arcs more.
Book 1
Title: Isle of Echoes: Navernum
Currently 90k words, second draft
Genre: Epic fantasy
Blurb (working draft): When Arlechs' girlfriend is chosen as the annual sacrifice for the festival of spring, he is convinced her choice was not divinely inspired. Aided by his mentor, the mysterious Arbouretor, he has two weeks to uncover enough evidence to persuade the king to overturn the choice. To find it means re-involving himself in the competing factions he paid a high price to leave two years ago. As the festival approaches, the gods take an unhealthy interest in mortal affairs, throwing everyone's plans up in the air, but where will they fall?

 

[Prince of Spires]

I'm at about 750 words so far. Glacial progress really (for NaNo at least).

The main issues are that starting a new project is always hard. And that I think I'm probably starting the chapter wrong / in the wrong place. Which means I'm not yet in the flow of the story, which slows stuff down. Also, I'll probably cut most of the words I've already written, though that's a problem for future me...

 

[Diana Silver]

Oof, can I write out a bit of frustration here?

Writing a final arc to a story is hard. I keep second-guessing my overarching plot-choices of this last part, so I end up writing out some very close-to-my-heart scenes I don't know if they'll even fit in the whole. I wonder if I should backtrack and re-plot now (cause I already know some aspects of it don't work) but I can't quite get myself to let go of the things I like about the current order of events...

The rest of the story was not this hard. I could always leave things for later, tell myself there were future scenes where the good ideas would find their right place. But now there is no future plot anymore. It either goes in here, or goes into the bin for all eternity. (I know, there's going to be so much rewriting, and old ideas can always find their right place then, but that makes it even harder to commit to what I'm writing now >.<)

I'm struggling.

 

[A. E. Lowan]

Oof, can I write out a bit of frustration here?

I'm struggling.

First, you're in good company. Our first swing at our current book turned into a 45k word dinner party. I went full Tolkien - except we have bad ass babes in the cast and not so many dwarves this time - and it was fun. It wasn't the story we were trying to tell and it turns out we have a Dragon King who's a scene stealer, so the whole thing got scrapped.

Lesson the First: Never delete anything. Make sure to have a file or a OneNote page or however you roll and put anything extraneous into it. I use scraps all the time, and I also get scenelets and vignettes rattling around in my head that I keep until I find where they're supposed to go, and then plug them in.

If the writing is this hard, you've lost the track somehow. I do this all the time. I find that, in my process, when I start slowing or am just wandering around the scene and stalled out, that going back to the last time the writing was flowing and not so stiff and difficult makes it easier to figure out what happened. For me, I've usually forgotten to bring the conflict. Conflict = Story. It doesn't have to be world-shattering, but it does need to be there.

It also helps me to play "What If?" Take a look at how the plot is evolving, and then throw out alternative paths. Make sure to get the characters involved, if you can. I get that sounds a bit weird to some people, but it does work and I find it very helpful. Note; I'm also batshit crazy and I have had characters start that conversation out of the blue. During the writing of the dinner party, deep in a writing trance, one of our MMC's actually turned around in his chair and directly addressed me to give me a few details that I'd missed.

Crazy. But it works. lol

TLDR: If anyone gets here and takes the Too Long Didn't Read seriously, we need to talk about a writer's relationship with piles of words.

Good writing and godspeed!

 

[JBCrowson]

Oof, can I write out a bit of frustration here?

Writing a final arc to a story is hard. I keep second-guessing my overarching plot-choices of this last part, so I end up writing out some very close-to-my-heart scenes I don't know if they'll even fit in the whole. I wonder if I should backtrack and re-plot now (cause I already know some aspects of it don't work) but I can't quite get myself to let go of the things I like about the current order of events...

The rest of the story was not this hard. I could always leave things for later, tell myself there were future scenes where the good ideas would find their right place. But now there is no future plot anymore. It either goes in here, or goes into the bin for all eternity. (I know, there's going to be so much rewriting, and old ideas can always find their right place then, but that makes it even harder to commit to what I'm writing now >.<)

I'm struggling.

I think writing a plot can be like solving a puzzle, where you think you are just about to solve it, then the last piece doesn't fit. Don't panic, take a few pieces out then re-order them, turn one or two upside down and rejig them, and see if they now fit. Also remember that sometimes your fave scene is just the wrong shape, and you have to either cull it or pull one of its' legs off to make it fit.
My first effort at plotting my WIP had all the tension of a bar of wet soap as the MC wandered around like a reality TV cameraman, seeing people doing stuff around them, but with little stake in any of it. Now, by the end of chapter one there's a clock ticking down to death of the love interest, and a whodunnit situation to solve stop the clock. The two versions have 90% of the same scenes, the order is different and the presentation of emotional impact is dialed up to 11.

 

[JBCrowson]

turns out we have a Dragon King who's a scene stealer,
Our beloved dragon on here excepted, its just the way with dragons that they stomp in and take over everything. Couple of millennia on the naughty step should sort them out.

 

[JBCrowson]

Re-worked a scene, cut out some navel fluff last night, added the biggest missing piece, now at 100k.

 

[Prince of Spires]

Got another 175 words written. At this speed, I'll reach 50k words by end of November next year...

It's actually good news though (except for possibly winning NaNo, no hope of that at all anymore). Thing is, the first bit felt like me wandering around the story world, looking for the actual plot. Just putting words on the page for stuff happening, but not actually feeling the story. With these past few, it actually feels like I know what I should be writing. I'll think on it a bit more, but this should make things easier.

Of course, it probably also means I can scrap everything I've written so far (all 750-ish words, whoop whoop!) and start over. But it still feels like I made a lot more progress than the numbers actually suggests.

And yes, in case anyone was curious, it was a case of needing more conflict. The main character simply walking in the door and starting a conversation doesn't do it. So, I'll go blow up stuff and escalate things first before I let him walk in...

A. E. Lowan the dinner party sounds amazing. I'd read that Though I do feel the need to point out that most women in Tolkien's stories were pretty bad ass babes as well. They just tended to get less screen time. But some of the biggest deeds in his legendarium were performed by female characters.

 

[Prince of Spires]

Diana Silver One thing I always tell myself is that deleted scene's are never wasted. Their primary use is just sharing them as bonus material with fans (in my case, newsletter subscribers). They always want to know more and I have to come up with something new to say every month, so deleted scenes are gold.

Also, they're a learning opportunity. The more you write, the better you get. And especially with close to your heart scenes, you can put a lot of emotion in there. Giving yourself permission to not include it in your finished novel might actually free you to write all those emotions.

Lastly, know that plenty of writers delete scenes. For my most recent novel, there are chapters I rewrote 3 or 4 times. They're unrecognizable in their current form. Nothing wrong with that. Sometimes you just have to try a few things before you land on the right thing. Though I agree with Lowan that often when the writing is hard it's because something's off and I'm not completely sure what to write.

 

[Diana Silver]

I think writing a plot can be like solving a puzzle, where you think you are just about to solve it, then the last piece doesn't fit. Don't panic, take a few pieces out then re-order them, turn one or two upside down and rejig them, and see if they now fit. Also remember that sometimes your fave scene is just the wrong shape, and you have to either cull it or pull one of its' legs off to make it fit.
My first effort at plotting my WIP had all the tension of a bar of wet soap as the MC wandered around like a reality TV cameraman, seeing people doing stuff around them, but with little stake in any of it. Now, by the end of chapter one there's a clock ticking down to death of the love interest, and a whodunnit situation to solve stop the clock. The two versions have 90% of the same scenes, the order is different and the presentation of emotional impact is dialed up to 11.

You turned out to be right. By now I've found a change in angle, a relatively small shift in motivation, and the rest of the plot is falling into place around it

 

[dollyt8]

I haven't been able to keep on top of this thread much because I've been so sick, but in the past week I managed to get to 8,789 words. Not anywhere close to where I hoped, but better than expected given my illness. I'm pretty sure I had Covid, and the sore throat was so unbearable I ended up going to the doctor. Tested negative for strep and thankfully got meds that have finally started helping a bit. Now I can eat a little and drink water (I managed to stay hydrated with hot tea, but it was very difficult). I'm happy to see others participating and making progress, and even if some of you may not have gotten as much done as you hoped, you're moving forward! Cheering you all on from where I'm attempting to recover from my couch