Friday, November 12, 2010

NaNoWriMo Day 12: An Update

It was day 11.

I had 22, 673 words written.

That's 80+ pages.

And I hated my NaNo novel.

That was last night.

I was tired of writing it and I wanted to start all over.

On the 11th day of NaNoWriMo (someone should make up a 30 days of NaNoWriMo song).

Here's the problem: I was bored. I was writing probably what should have been a thrilling scene. Bones were being unearthed. Boys were being sneaked into bedrooms. It was incredible.

Not.

So this is what I was thinking about as I drove into work today: How do I salvage these 20,000+ words? (If you remember, driving in the car and taking a shower are the times when I get my inspiration.)

And *bing* I realized what I needed to do.

I need to take out an entire sub-plot of my novel. I'm still really fascinated by it, but it just isn't working. I'll put it in the back of my head for another time.

I'm changing it from part first-person narrative/part third-person limited to entirely first-person, although I'll have first-person coming from two different people.

I'm cutting out a character sooner than I'd planned (she was going to be kicked out of the school anyway; I just hastened her departure).

I'm changing a character who was a Ms. to a Mr.

And I'm doing it right in the middle of my 50,000 word goal. Crazy? Perhaps. But it was the only way I could see to get through the rest of November.

So, essentially, what I am doing is taking this square peg, see? And see this round hole over here? I'm JAMMING this square peg into that round hole! And I'm excited about what I'm writing again.

But I'm going to have a huge mess to clean up from all of this square-peg jamming at the end of the month.

So, how is your November going? If you're doing NaNoWriMo, tell me how you're managing so far. If you're not, I'd still like to know how you're doing. :)

4 comments:

Liza said...

Good for you for doing it at all...and now, with ambitions changes, you really impress me. Good luck!

amanda jolley said...

Haha, you and my son need to hang out and talk novel writing. He changed his from 1st person to 3rd.
I need to let him know about NaNoWriMo. It would be a great challenge for him.

You amaze me, friend.

Teri Anne Stanley said...

ha! My dead husband changed into a comatose brother at about word 15000, and the blackmailing city councilman is now a white slaver. The plot thickens, it might be getting kind of custardy.

Nicole said...

I chickened out of NaNoWriMo, mostly because that's just terribly difficult to type. :)

Actually, I miss writing and need to start again but I have so many hypothetical balls in the air right now that I couldn't fathom taking on one more thing.

January, in my head, is going to be the perfect month to start all these things I've been putting off. VT workshop over. Holidays over. Disneyland trip over. In a better routine with Adam's school. January pretty much seems like paradise to me right now. Although, knowing me I'll find something else to stress about. Hopefully not. ;)

I still have that children's book started that I wrote for our very short lived writing group that I keep thinking about finishing. I even asked Richard to illustrate it. So maybe I'll pull that out before January. It's a little more manageable in my head then a novel.