NaNoWriMo 2005

08:05 / 05.11.05

It sort of started out as a spy/thriller by accident - I'm now trying to write my way out of that genre... 6000-odd words - a little behind schedule - will attempt to catch up today....

Jack Fear

13:50 / 05.11.05

Fuck it, I'm out already: I just got a research-intensive writing assignment with a big paycheck and a December 1st deadline. No time for novels this November, I'm afraid.

21:59 / 05.11.05

It's getting painful now - over a thousand more words to go to reach today's target...

23:58 / 05.11.05

... whereas I'm a thousand over. I could lend you some, maybe?

I'd feel a lot better about it all if the story seemed to be going somewhere. Which it isn't.

alejandrodelloco

01:36 / 06.11.05

Hey, any of you crazy cats got tips for BLATANT BOOK PIMPING my book?

Honestly, though, I can't tell if it is any good. I have just been shifting around with my plot like mad and I am a few hundred words behind quota. Eeek.

09:00 / 06.11.05

back on target. Listened to someone who told me that the best way to introduce tension and mystery into a storyline was to have a man with a gun walk in. So I had two different characters with guns arrive and take my protagonists to an alleyway I'd mentioned earlier in the text...

Jack Fear

12:03 / 06.11.05

...the best way to introduce tension and mystery into a storyline was to have a man with a gun walk in.

'Twas Raymond Chandler who said that first, only he said two men with guns. Fact.

NaNoWriMo founder Chris Baty offers similar advice for combatting writer's block: "When in doubt, bring on the ninjas!"

Squirmelia

13:18 / 06.11.05

I am currently a bit behind at 7341 words, but it's looking less impossible than it was earlier in the week. Maybe all that idea-gathering (drinking) wasn't such a bad thing really, except some of my story has now taken the awful turn of becoming a bit auto-biographical.

13:36 / 06.11.05

"When in doubt, bring on the ninjas!" Hmmm are we sure that this man wasn't writing most of marvel's comic output in the 90s?

Still on course, just about - still have to write just under a thousand words to meet today's target. The grim realism strand is the better thought out part of my narrative, but it doesn't compare to the explosions and weirdness that is going on in the other strand...

16:00 / 06.11.05

I'm currently behind target too. I on 7300. I said in an earlier post that this felt like letter-writing... well... I now writing to an aunt I barely know, and have nothing to say. Pah. I've never written fiction before, so this is an interesting experience for me. I'm spent for the day, so perhaps tomorrow will bring forth a revitalised self.

sine

23:32 / 06.11.05

Sitting around a cool 12000, but even though I know I'm not supposta edit, I'm thinking I'm gonna toss about half out. Genre piece: pulp-paperback-espionage-fiction set in WW2 and liberally laced with Biblical myth (it just occured to me that I may be channeling Declare)- I've never written anything this kinetic before...'s'fun, thus far anyhow.

00:31 / 07.11.05

That's totally what my story needs. Ninjas.

No, ninja vampires.

Yeah.

12:27 / 07.11.05

11,000 words - there has been a gun fight and my protagonists have snuck into a basement, only to discover that it is filled with more than a hundred other gunman all dressed exactly the same... I have an idea of how i'm going to explain this, but no idea how i'm going to get my characters out of there... 500 words left to meet today's target...

12:39 / 07.11.05

Blargh! I'm a couple thousand behind quota now because I wasn't able to write for the past two days. Crap. It would help if I wasn't also a compulsive editor. Spending too much time going back over previous writing and tweaking it.

And the story still isn't moving. I'm going to have to kill a character soon just to introduce some drama.

So, who's most interesting to kill: protagonist's best friend, protagonist's mentor, or protagonist's love interest?

13:04 / 07.11.05

Don't pussyfoot about - go for the ultimate shock tactic and kill the protagonist. That will really change the dynamic and kick everyone in the teeth...

13:34 / 07.11.05

You're the second person who's said that, and I'm actually starting to think it's a good idea...

Eloi Tsabaoth

14:04 / 07.11.05

Kill everyone in the whole story! Ahahahahahahah!!!

Ahem.
Keep going, guys! I'm so proud of you all.

alejandrodelloco

17:06 / 08.11.05

Hurr shit I am falling behind.

Quick! ADVENTURE IN NIGERIA!

20:12 / 08.11.05

Oh God, I'm flailing. I am just under 10,000 words. I am starting to lose track of what I have written, and what I am yet to write. I groan at the number of times the same turns of phrase are repeated, a lot. Picking out all the instances of "clearly" will be like picking fleas off a dog's back. Oh, and picking out all the metaphors which refer to dogs will be like picking fleas off something-that-isn't-a-dog's back. Suggestions of something that isn't a dog would be appreciated.

astrojax69

21:17 / 08.11.05

i am just stunned that you all have so much energy left to post!

kill everyone, sekhmet, and recommence the book midway as a mediaeval romance thriller with a talking squirrel and a poisonous butcher on the loose. then, just near the end of that, kill the squirrel and butcher and finish up with a sci-fi polemic where your space captain denounces poverty and slavery on earth and finally flies away into the moonset with a charming young companion called cal...

gridley

03:05 / 09.11.05

"When in doubt, bring on the ninjas!"

The stupid ninja in my book doesn't show up until after about 3/5ths of the way in. Stupid ninja taking his damn time!!!!

13:21 / 09.11.05

Astrojax, I already seem to be mixing up the genres of fantasy and horror, which is odd enough without going all Narnia-Disney-Dune.

However, I am somewhat disturbed, because my protagonist does, in fact, have a charming young companion called Kal.

19:25 / 09.11.05

I'm still behind target, but I pulled it together and wrote 2300 words tonight. So, my total is 12,300. I've got a few ideas in the pot, and I think I'll be able to write a decent amount tomorrow too.

Liger Null

20:23 / 09.11.05

I'm pathetically behind at 6396 words...

astrojax69

01:37 / 10.11.05

However, I am somewhat disturbed, because my protagonist does, in fact, have a charming young companion called Kal.

oh dear, i have come over all psychic, or psycho...

[cue twilight zone theme music... ]

...but see? now my plot idea makes perfect sense and i psychic-ly predict, while my powers linger, that this novel will become a classic of its genre and be studied by children across the globe for centuries to come

14:03 / 10.11.05

If nothing else, I think your plot idea would make a fantastic rock opera.

15:47 / 10.11.05

15,580... Still a bit behind, but caught up considerably today as one character decided she didn't want to remaina mere supporting character and has announced that she will be grabbing the limelight for herself in a couple of chapters time...

18:26 / 10.11.05

I'm still over 5,000 words behind. Gaah. Whatever you do, make sure you write at least a little bit every day, a few days off will kill your flow.

I think I put in too many characters. Soultion: some of them must DIE!!!

astrojax69

19:27 / 10.11.05

can i suggest mebbe a bus crash with all the characters you want killed plunging into a torrent off a bodgy bridge? or a nuclear holocaust could shine a different slant on your current plot and give you lots of opportunities to have kal and friend eek out an existence in a brave new world - or a petrified new one!

hey, good luck & stop reading this and get back to writing!!

19:38 / 10.11.05

Come on... I asked for metaphors which don't involve dogs. Chickens, cats, donkeys. Anything. Like a dog drinking from a rancid pool. Can donkeys, ducks, dinosaurs drink from manky puddles? Like a sick dog retreating to its basket. Do cats retreat to their baskets? Like a dog returning to its bowl for a few crumbs. I could do a Gunter Grass and cleverly pull all these dog references in later in the book. But I suspect the reader won't stay with me that long.

I've only written 550 words today. I am sick of dogs.

20:51 / 10.11.05

Some of my characters have finally found a room full of monkeys at typewriters at the office of a large publishing house... which isn't a metaphor involving animals, but is nevertheless quite fun...

14:24 / 11.11.05

But, neukoln, are you sick as as dog?

14:28 / 11.11.05

He will be in the morining...