Usually I write posts on writing on Mondays, but I have a couple things to address so the post on writing will be swapped with personal musings this week.
Onto the things…
No. 1 – My apologies for the random hiatus! I had an ovarian cyst burst followed by a massive head cold/sinus infection thing. No worries! I’m fine. 🙂 Still got a couple sniffles, but I’m feeling good and am excited to return to y’all!
No. 2 – NaNoWriMo Update!
Despite my body not working with me, I still managed to crank out words for the WIP each day. You can thank the meds I was on… insomnia was a side effect. Then yesterday happened.
Yesterday, I sat down at Starbucks for the first time since November 1st and fell into the zone. I came out a few hours later having met 20k words (started the day at 13k). Returned to the MS after dinner and knocked out another few thousand. I guess my brain had stockpiled all the words while I was sick, so when I felt better, it just sling shot them onto the page. *shrug* I am okay with this.
But coming up on the “midpoint” of the NaNo word count goal, I had the horrifying realization that I’ve [barely] dug into the story. Don’t get me wrong I’ve written a lot of scenes that are pivotal to plot and character development, but I’m looking at my outline, seeing everything that has YET to be written along with my notes of additional things that need to happen and I’m feeling like Frankenstein.
I’VE CREATED A MONSTER!
You see, I’m currently working on book 3 of a 5-book series for this year’s NaNoWriMo. It is the midpoint of the overarching plot, which means there’s a lot of things to tie up as well as groundwork that needs to be laid. Also, because I’m a glutton for punishment, I’ve structured the series similar to the Avengers’ movie franchise. (Book 1 is Ironman, Book 2 is Captain America, etc.) Each book has its own protagonist who goes through her own character development, but pieces from each book advances the overarching plot until the big hoopla in book 5.
For those of you who’ve read the Lunar Chronicles, it’s structured like that, but with singular, first-person POV’s and without the fairy tale retelling bits.
Anyhoo, on top of the challenges of writing the middle book of a series, I’m dealing with a snarky character who can manipulate time and space. In order to properly develop the characters and attend to the plot and story necessities, I had to cut the book into three portions: Part One, Part Two, and The Fall Out.
Part One is all the character development and relationship building fun and games for Meredith. She gets into some serious trouble, but most of it is “real world” problems. Part One ends with worlds colliding and character deaths (Cue maniacal laughter), which paves the way for “fantastical” problems in Part Two. But because I’m introducing a whole new protagonist, certain scenes with her abilities have to take place in Part One in order for y’all to accept her competency in Part Two.
Also, Time and Space manipulation is really difficult to make tangible. Water in book 1 was so much easier because it has a molecular structure to use as a jumping off point. Time and Space? I feel like I’m in limbo between awesome and cliché. All the time. Now I know why The Doctor has the TARDIS.
My saving grace is one of my other characters is a descendent of Sif (Nordic Earth God, sometimes depicted as Thor’s wife, all around mythical badass), so many jokes to be had.
For more info on my NaNo WIP, read the intro post here. If you’re doing NaNo, add me as a writing buddy, here.
Happy Writing!