Still rewriting The Novel. I've upped the estimated word count to 80,000 but who knows where it will end up? I just want to FINISH it. I'm also debating the wisdom of reading a great deal while heavily rewriting - I tend to adapt my style to match other authors' voices on occasion, and the lovely lyrical prose of Ann Patchett isn't quite right for a YA alt-history novel. Plus, I read The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay and thought it was near-perfect - that made working on my own quasi-WWII novel quite difficult.
Ah, well. Come November, I can start a brand-new novel, for which I am crazy excited. I've been delaying writing this novel since June, around when I started rewriting The Novel...I'm mildly worried that trying to write a "good" novel for NaNoWriMo will result in failure, but since I'm interning for the Office of Letters and Light, failure would not be tolerated.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Monday, September 13, 2010
Update day
At some point, I vowed that I was going to post weekly. Ha. Not likely. I will try to be better about it, though.
I'm currently at war with the hordes of spiders that keep invading my bedroom (technically, there are some daddy longlegs too, which aren't spiders). This war interests no one but myself, so I'll just say that we're in a lull at the moment - i.e. the last spider to invade my shower was vanquished this morning, and they haven't renewed their attack.
As often happens, I have, while in the process of a major rewrite, discovered some giant flaws in my novel. I think this is because I'm what Brandon Sanderson of Writing Excuses (and author of a bunch of huge books) calls a 'discovery writer' - that is, I write without an outline, discovering the story as I go. That means many, many drafts of a novel before it's worthwhile. In my case, it means I discovered at about 75 pages into the new draft that a) I needed another major character to play a pivotal role, b) I needed to raise the stakes throughout the whole thing, and c) I'm really good at avoiding writing.
I'm on my eighth major revision of this novel. Sometimes I hate it. Sometimes I love it. I spend a lot of time swearing at it. I have 48 days to finish this draft before NaNoWriMo begins, but I'm applying certain principles of NaNoWriMo right now - for example, it doesn't matter how good the writing is if no one ever reads it. Finish it first, fix the writing later. If this book is ever published, I will tell people that I wrote the first draft in 24 hours - which is true, 140 pages of meandering, implausible plot and ridiculous characters - and then I'll explain that I paid for that by spending over four years revising it.
Speaking of NaNoWriMo, I'm looking for sponsors - my sponsorship page is up and running, and I'm offering all kinds of sweet incentives. Check them out, and be sure to email me if you donate.
I'm currently at war with the hordes of spiders that keep invading my bedroom (technically, there are some daddy longlegs too, which aren't spiders). This war interests no one but myself, so I'll just say that we're in a lull at the moment - i.e. the last spider to invade my shower was vanquished this morning, and they haven't renewed their attack.
As often happens, I have, while in the process of a major rewrite, discovered some giant flaws in my novel. I think this is because I'm what Brandon Sanderson of Writing Excuses (and author of a bunch of huge books) calls a 'discovery writer' - that is, I write without an outline, discovering the story as I go. That means many, many drafts of a novel before it's worthwhile. In my case, it means I discovered at about 75 pages into the new draft that a) I needed another major character to play a pivotal role, b) I needed to raise the stakes throughout the whole thing, and c) I'm really good at avoiding writing.
I'm on my eighth major revision of this novel. Sometimes I hate it. Sometimes I love it. I spend a lot of time swearing at it. I have 48 days to finish this draft before NaNoWriMo begins, but I'm applying certain principles of NaNoWriMo right now - for example, it doesn't matter how good the writing is if no one ever reads it. Finish it first, fix the writing later. If this book is ever published, I will tell people that I wrote the first draft in 24 hours - which is true, 140 pages of meandering, implausible plot and ridiculous characters - and then I'll explain that I paid for that by spending over four years revising it.
Speaking of NaNoWriMo, I'm looking for sponsors - my sponsorship page is up and running, and I'm offering all kinds of sweet incentives. Check them out, and be sure to email me if you donate.
Friday, September 3, 2010
New batch of library books
Okay, one can only place twelve holds at a time in the Berkeley Public Library system. That's all right; I can survive. This week, I've already read the following:
- Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins
- The Last Chinese Chef, Nicole Mones
- The Yiddish Policemen's Union, Michael Chabon
Shadow Magic, the sequel to Havemercy, is in at the library; once I've picked it up along with a few more cookbooks, I'll be putting more books on hold.
I'm off to some performance art tonight, and then I'll be spending the weekend baking and cooking. Check out the results over at See Girl Cook.
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