Monday, October 8, 2012

To NaNo or Not to NaNo?

Hello fellow people interested in words,

Part of me wondered, do I dare participate in NaNoWriMo again?

For those who are unaware, NaNoWriMo is the National Novel Writing Month that occurs in November, see http://www.nanowrimo.org.  They encourage everyone to write - goal is 50,000 words from Nov 1st to Nov 30th. See the http://www.nanowrimo.org/en/about for more info. Best part, it costs nothing and everyone can win.

Last year I was healing from carpel tunnel surgery in October for both hands, and this year I'm finally recovering from a 4 month disc rupture in my back - was putting pressure on my left leg making it very weak and impossible to use going up/down stairs. Now that I'm healed enough to function with daily activities, I've had to ask myself if I shall NaNo or not.

Today I decided; I shall NaNo.  Even if I don't feel good enough, the plotting I'm doing now will help me for when I am able to get the writing done. Plus you don't know you can do it unless you try. Feel free to add me as a friend or check out my NaNo profile at laurathejane78. You can find the synopsis of the next book here.

Best tip I ever read about NaNo was to Never Edit.  That's right.....it's time to write it and get it all out of your system.  Editing is for December.

Happy Writing,

Laura the Jane

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Reworking the Rework of the Rework of the Original


Let’s face it, we have great ideas as writers. I find my issue is that my mind doesn’t stop thinking. I have written one book several times already (two complete times and one more time halfway ~50k into), and now I’m thinking ‘What if…’ and thus is born the 4th attempt at this story. While each attempt is great, I’m finding I grow as a writer with each version. Do I view this as a waste in my earlier times for the discarded files? Nope, not one bit.

I’m attempting this time to step out of the 1st person POV. I know, most people don’t write in 1st but 3rd, though I’ve just naturally gravitated to the 1. Now that I have my realistic playlist of 41 songs, I’m ready for the challenge and, most importantly, I’m excited! I know my characters, I know their quirks, and it’s time to step it up! To my alpha readers my heartfelt apology but a writer has to do what she feels – plus your gonna love it!

Friday, February 17, 2012

A Playlist Makes the Experience


I’m sitting here, four months post dual carpel tunnel surgery, and I think I bounced back nicely completing my nanowrimo.org goal of 50k in the month of November. Since then, I’ve kind of dropped off the face of the writing world.   Where am I, what have I been doing?  Well, um, not much. I’ve piddled around with some stories I have, thinking of new ideas for new books, though I quickly create a .doc file with the basic thoughts before saving it and moving back to my main story.  Yet, the word count is not growing. I think I came up with what my issue was. My playlist isn’t what it was. 

I’ve got a few playlists and the song counts are 83, 154, 200, 356, and 412.  The 412 is the newest playlist I’ve complied that I’ll listen to when my Netflix and Hulu are turned off. In the past, I would watch my TV shows online, and then force myself to hit the red X and listen to my playlist. It got me to writing 1000+ words a night, and the bonus of anytime I heard the song in the car or at my work desk, I would think about the book. But now, I’m still getting nothing done. A paragraph has been an accomplishment.

Last night I realized what I was doing. Previous book playlists consisted of 10-30 songs. It would be a mixture of some old favorites with new songs, all of which I knew the words to and could sing in my sleep. How can I, while listening to 412 songs and taking the time to skip songs that I’m not in the mood to hear, be able to write?
Tonight’s mission is to go home, and create a 20 or less playlist to get me in the story writing mood. I’ll still keep the 412 playlist for the car rides to work, but time to get back to writing and blogging. Anyone else use music as a gateway to writing?