Saturday, October 30, 2010

NaNo madness!

It's only days away, and I start having doubts as to what I want to write for NaNo! I keep jumping from idea to idea. But right now it sounds like I'll be writing The Shadow, book 2, which is for now titled The Swan. I have my own reasons for suddenly pushing it to the front. I won't be writing Winter of Wishes for NaNo, after all. I've decided to wait until Autumn of Secrets gets somewhere on inkpop before I write the second installment. Somewhere such as, perhaps, the top 5. I uploaded the third person version, which is more edited and polished. I don't really know what's happening in Winter of Wishes, either. And if you know me well, you know I can't write without planning.

The Swan wants to be written. I just know. You know the story won't wait anymore when it's sending scene after scene to your head, distracting you, willing you to type it into the word document...it won't leave me alone! And I've learned from experience that the only way to get a story to leave me alone is by writing it. It's time to write it. I'll be drawing up a rough outline in the next two days, and will be ready to go for NaNo, because now I know for sure what I'm doing.

I admit that I already wrote 20k of it before sort of trailing off. *hangs head in shame* So I'm somewhat cheating. But I'm pretty sure The Swan would reach an additional 100k, or even 150k. I just sense that it's going to be so long. So much is going on in it. If it reaches 150k I'll probably have to divide it. But yeah, I can think of about 4 major plots that are going on in that novel. I divided The Shadow into five parts, each one focusing a little on one major idea I was writing, and sorting things out--POV changes, other bits that might be confusing. I also like it divided up. It just seems more poetic that way, writing the PART I and PART II, etc., at the beginning of each new one. (The parts are the reason I don't believe I'm completely cheating. It's like a series of different stories coming together to build a novel, the way the books are constructed. I'd be starting Part III for NaNo, and writing on from there.) The Swan could be 8-10 parts. It's going to be epic!

But if it doesn't reach 100k, I'll start work on...something random. I've realized I simply can't write well if things aren't planned and flashing before my very eyes, like for The Swan.

I came up with an idea for another historical fiction novel called The Garden of Black Roses. It's not THE BIG PROJECT. It might be a part of THE BIG PROJECT, but since there might be fantasy elements in it, I can't decide if it really counts. It's also set in WWII. I simply can't write historical fiction without planning, period.

Thank goodness The Swan is going to be really long. It has to get me far. Or else, I'll be tempted to write The Garden of Black Roses to fill in the rest of the 100k. :/ Not good.

*runs away screaming*

1 comment:

Amaranthine said...

Ha! I thought I was the only one with 20k of my Nano novel already finished. Since it's my first one, I have an excuse. :)

Trailer for The Wishing Well

(The trailer still has the title Autumn of Secrets, but that's the only thing that changed--the plot is the same!)


Thanks to Nickname for making this trailer!