My writing buddy

NaNoWriMo is over for this year and on November 30th, 2007 at midnight I had 25,100 words. A bit over half-way and that's OK. (hey, that rhymes!) I thought I would share with you one of my major helpers in writing the novel and he continues to be a great support as we move into December and our continued work at increasing the word count. (Perhaps I should say that I"m a support to him!)

Ansel has been a great help all month and he continues to keep close watch on my progress. Stay tuned as December continues, the story is just starting to get exciting and I promise, promise I'll put up a nice long blurb soon! In the meantime, thanks to all of you for giving me such encouragement! Please - keep it comin'!

Sorry, But I Won't Reach 50K

Hi all,
I thought I'd better get on this and finally write that I am not going to finish 50,000 words by midnight November 30th. The month of November just went to pieces for me and I haven't been able to keep up with writing every day.

I hope to actually get to 25K by Friday night, but won't be anywhere near 50K. Shall I list the reasons? It doesn't really matter, other than to say the between my headaches and my partner's unexpected appendectomy (these things are never expected, are they?) I just didn't get it done.

Yes, I'm feeling "not so great" about it, but what can I say. I did get a great start on my novel and I won't be putting it away and not continuing. I am sorry not to finish what I set out to do, but I think this is a lesson in not being hard on myself. This is a lesson I've been working on for some time and it comes back up again this month.

Anyway, thanks for staying tuned and for being so supportive. I"ll keep this blog up and move into regular mode as I keep going on my novel. Stay tuned if you care too and I'll be posting updates as I go.

Thanks again for all your support and encouragement. Cheers and Happy Writing, jill

New Goal for the end of the Weekend

Hi everyone: My new goal is to reach 30,000 words by the end of the day Sunday. I'm at around 18,000 right now, so I'm a bit behind on the overall word count (I'm not going to do the math to see exactly how far behind I am). Life got in the way over the past two days and I haven't written since Thursday morning!

AAaaagggghhhh!

But I will persevere! I can do this! I can make my goal for the weekend! Sunday I will spend my whole day writing (although Sarah says we have to get outside for a hike and she's right).

So, I'll be back at it and will let you all know how it goes.

2119 Words Tonight - Wow, this is really working!

I am having so much fun writing this novel! WOW - it continues to flow and it's awesome! These characters are incredible! I promised to post another excerpt, so I'm going too tonight, but first I need to warn you --- it's hard for me to know just how much this excerpt might spoil anything that happens in the novel. I mean, it's hard not to post something from the novel without it giving away at least some small part, but what I'm saying is that since I don't know where this is headed, I don't know how much of what I post will give away anything plot-wise that might happen. Just covering my bases, I guess. So anyway, here it is. Enjoy. Oh, and please don't pay too much attention to the grammar, spelling, etc, 'cuz it's about getting the words out, not editing those words (I'll do that in December).

This passage is between the main character, Elum, who has returned to Cadreya, the colony where he trained as a guardian and Galagia, a young guardian trainee. The first speaker is Galagia.

“When I was twelve, I had my first remembrance. As you can imagine, it was quite intense and at the time I thought it was a nightmare. I woke screaming in my bed, sweating and shaking, and unable to remember where I was. Nothing around me looked familiar and when my father rushed into the room I jumped out of bed and attempted to escape, not recognizing him and expecting him to attack me. He grabbed my shoulders and held me firmly talking quickly in a language I did not recognize. Then within seconds, my body shook violently and I fell to the floor, my father’s grip loosening under the intensity of the seizure. I lay on the floor for several seconds fully conscious of what was happening to my body, but unable to speak. After the seizure ended, I remembered where I was and more importantly, I recognized my father.”

Galagia’s voice was low and steady as she told her remembrance, not wavering in the least with emotion. The veil she described as having fallen over her conscious as a result of her dream seemed to have descended again and removed her from the present while she recited the event. As I listened, I noticed she had shifted her left arm so her sleeve was inadvertently shifted up to reveal a tattoo around her wrist. The tattoo was of a serpent eating its tail, the traditional tattoo from the colony of Nebili on the third planet from the moon of eleven. The symbol of the serpent eating its tail was an ancient design and the motif used by the artist to create Galagia’s tattoo was obviously familiar with the ancient images. As I looked closer I realized that each of the serpent’s scales were unique and had at their center another symbol, this one a character from an alphabet I did not recognize.

“Guardian,” said Galagia and I looked up at her face with embarrassment.

“My apologies, Galagia,” I said, smiling. “I was distracted by your serpent,” I continued, gesturing to her arm. “The work is quite beautiful and accurate to the ancient symbols, but I do not recognize the characters in the scales.”

“Most people do not see the runea, my liege,” Galagia said, lifting up her arm and pushing up the sleeve of her tunic even more. In so doing she revealed an additional tattoo, this one made up of just the characters themselves, laid out in long vertical lines like text. Looking down at her arm she recited, “Light is essence. Breath is beauty. Go in balance.”

“The ancient message,” I say with understanding, “you were Guardian before,” I state looking up at her face.

15,380 Words and Counting

I passed my goal of 15,000 words by the end of the weekend tonight. Originally I had thought I would hit 15K by the end of Sunday, but instead, I find that it's Monday night but I made my goal all the same (I can count today as the weekend, since it's Veteran's Day and I didn't have to go in to work).

This story is so much fun to write. I am constantly surprised by the directions it takes, by what the characters do, by what they learn. Where does this stuff come from? Last week I was fretting because I couldn't get Elum to leave home. He was back after a pretty traumatic event, one in which afterwards he didn't know what to do, so he found himself at home and he was just hanging out, doing nothing much at all... learning more about his younger brother having not seen him in several years, seeing his Uncle and cousin and generally working in the colony orchards without much thought of the past. By Friday on my drive back to Flagstaff after taking Sarah to the airport for an early morning flight, I was thinking, "what the heck are you doing Elum? You need to get the heck out of there! The readers are going to want some action, you know, not just a bunch of scenes in the orchard or the kitchen or the wherever!"

Can you see my frustration? Well, it finally happened on Saturday. I was writing away and all of a sudden, someone shows up with a message for Elum (sorry, no spoilers, okay?) and he has to quick leave the colony and head on out to make this story happen.

Now, I'm not saying that those first days of writing are not any good --- although the whole grammar thing is kind of a struggle --- what those days show are background for who our main character is, they set up the story, they flesh out the "drama and trauma" that are affecting him and his true goals in life, etc.... so they are not a waste, but I gotta tell ya, I was getting tired of him hanging out at home; out of the limelight so to speak.

Sarah said tonight that I just needed to tell Elum to get the heck out of there and after I did it, he did! Wow, that's an amazing thought --- on many levels.

As I move forward with this story things happen that I don't expect, connections get made with what I'm writing now and something I wrote days ago, pieces seem to fall in place or go in directions I was never expecting. And all of this happens in the conversations between the characters. They just start talking and I kind of know what they are going to talk about (I mean, I need to know since I'm writing it, right?) but all of a sudden some new thread comes up or some leap to the past gets made and lights go on, bells ring, and chocolate falls from the heavens! Well, not really, but you get the idea. It's amazing! AND really fun!

So, I made my goal and am feeling good. It looks like I need to do just under 2000 words a day for the rest of the month to make 50K and I know I can do it. This is just fun! They say there is a wall out there and that I'm bound to hit it. Who cares! I'm staying in the moment and right now the moment is FUN!

10,000 Words!

I hit 10,000 words today! Yippee! I'm so excited and I had such a fun time writing today too! Elum is finally leaving home after visiting for the first time in years to go back to training and his mission as a guardian. I thought he would hang around forever, sleeping in, eating home-cooked food, generally acting as if he didn't have a care in the world, but finally, today, he gets the message and heads back to his real life!

Whew --- I was wondering what was up with him. It's as if he was lolly gagging around as much as I feel like I've been lolly gagging around getting words down.

He's off and now the story will really get going! I'll add another excerpt (a bigger one, I promise) soon. I promise!

Early Mornings

I've been getting up early to write every morning, maybe not so early for some, but an hour earlier for me every day. I can say that the writing is going really well, my characters continue to surprise me and I very much look forward to what they are going to do next. Here's a very brief taste of the tail end of a conversation my main character, Elum (yes, I changed his name or should I say he changed it for me?) and his mother:

“Elum?”

I look up to see her a hundred marks away, waiting patiently for me to catch up with her.

“Coming,” I call and trot down the path. “Thank you, Mother. Your words are always a comfort to me and I bless you for giving me life.”

“You give me too much power, my son,” she says smiling. “You’re father was also involved!” and with that she turns laughing and continues through the forest.

I know it's a brief taste and doesn't really show you what's happening, but I wanted to share that Elum is very close to his family even though they don't know he is a guardian or the danger he is in. (Please don't worry too much about the grammar, sentence structure, etc....just a reminder to anyone reading this blog and to myself "this is about quantity people, not quality. Editing comes in December."

Before I get back to Elum, I just wanted to put in a word about why I linked "The Golden Compass" movie trailer to my blog. New Line Cinema certainly doesn't need me advertising their movie (although they are obviously encouraging it by providing the code to pop it into your blog) but I wanted to add it because Philip Pullman's books known as "His Dark Materials" were a true literary shift for me. (Thank you Deb E. for introducing me to this amazing trilogy!) I'd never before read anything like them and to date that has not changed. If you haven't picked up "The Golden Compass," "The Subtle Knife," or "The Amber Spyglass" you've just got too! You also have to read them in order (follow the sequence I listed). Go, run lads, get ye to your nearest seller or lender of manuscripts and expand your literary experience. You won't regret it!

On another note: Congratulations to Deb E. for moving forward to swiftly with writing 100 words for 100 days! You go girl!

OK, Elum, here I come.