I finished Nanowrimo last night. You can see the thing in the sidebar now telling me that I had many days of absolute crap followed by a few days where I just wrote until my fingers were a mess. Actually, this is the best representation of how my writing went this month.
Meanwhile, my story remains incomplete. Wow, you know, one of these days, I would like to plan something out that is relatively short, like 100,000 words or something, and actually finish the damn thing. Furthermore, I would like the story to be readable. In fact, I have been reading some of those 'how to' books, like how to write a novel, and one of them that was actually very interesting and I would highly recommend is Novelist's Boot Camp. You can probably see why I liked it already.
Sometimes, when I write, I like to write merely for writing's sake. I almost always write for myself (unless I'm blogging or writing with others, which I haven't done in years). And what I really found helpful in actually writing for a purpose, like giving my characters a reason for existing, and why their story would be of any interest, is doing something of a foundation builder. And have I got a few!
It starts off with Genre (which I generally nix), Macro Setting, Character, Opposition. I'll save you the time, all of my stories are either Alternate Reality or Fantasy. Or sometimes Alternate Reality IN Fantasy. I guess being that writing is a bit of an escape for me, and often I think, 'gosh, the world really isn't half bad!' after reading some of the crap I put my characters through. But that's how I develop 'em, right?
Last Year's Nano, which I haven't finished and last checked is at 94,031 words (though I've got this sucker planned out where it should come in around 500,000), is as follows.
In a society based heavily on eugenics and the right to progress one's family line, a seemingly ideal product of the society's intent is mistakenly routed in the direction of the non-breeders and finds himself living as the lowest of the low, and eventually finding himself as the voice of the oppressed.
And one might wonder why I find books like 1984 so fascinating? Actually, though the background of the world isn't perfect, I've kind of taken the worst from different sides of society and created this alternate reality where my main character, Alex, basically goes through hell and is treated like an animal through most of his existence.
Why do I do this? I don't know. But what's important is this story does have an ending planned out, and I think if I can ever get there, I'll go back through, do a quick clean up, hold my breath and throw it on the internets for the whole world to see.
But not before.
This year's Nano was written in the same world (IE - alternate timeline) as last year's. I just followed a character that is related to a character that knows a character that knows Alex. Did you get that? that's probably part of my problem as to why I can't finish anything. I'll start following one guy, write background stories in my head of another guy that he meets, and feel like I have to flesh that out a bit so I get to writing and 265,000 words later I've got a story that takes place parallel to the regular storyline and kind of weaves in and out, except it follows four different characters. And that's not even the Nano.
This year's Nano goes as follows.
A young boy is forced to grow up a little to fast through various trials and obstacles as he tries to protect his family from his cruel and malicious step father.
Um, forgot the macro setting. I guess the setting is HIS LIFE, as it follows him from about 6 years old to about 38 years old. I stopped at about 13. It is entirely NOT readable. I made the step father as evil as I could think of and there is an ending where the villain gets his just reward, so there is a happy feeling inside of "Booyah, got what you deserved Bastard!", but what the main character (Rob)has to go through a lot of strife to get there.
What gets me are there are people like this out int he world who would be like this guy if they could get away with it. Unfortunately, in this reality, people are not treated very good unless they are what I dub 'master class'.
But I'm gettin away from myself. See, I tend to get sidetracked, which is why I haven't been able to finish all of my stories and tend to come back to them after a leave of absence. I have one from 2001 that I never finished. NONE of them are finished.
I find though, that my best stories are the ones where I tend to go for humor by getting the main character(s) out of their comfort zone, and usually way out of their comfort zone. The above story(ies) are nto funny, but I have one that sounds hilarious just by by reading the builder.
A spoiled, pampered celebrity socialite and a highly trained elite special ops soldier from two very different worlds somehow find themselves in each other's body, and are forced to live each other's lives until they figure out how to return to their original selves
Hijinx insues. And a lot of raised eyebrows. Actually, I'm surprised by how readable this story actually is. Unfortunately, some guy in the special forces or a ranger would read it and tear it a part while telling me 'that is NOT how we do things.' But seriously, how would you do things if Paris Hilton was controlling your body? (and no, she's fictional, but has the same mentality to begin with).
I hate a poorly done gender bending character swap story which has been done a lot, so I wrote one myself. And no, you can't read it. (It's not finished!)
One I was doing hot on that was based purely on a homework assignment where I built a character from ground up is called "Satyr", has some moments of extreme discomfort (I think I would have to rewrite parts of it to make it work) and yet, probably has the most chance of being something I would consider publishing. Because, well, it amuses me.
A popular jock finds himself 'awakened' to his true self as that of a mythithical beast known as a satyr and is forced to befriend the outcast coven of witches at his school who awakened him to reverse the spell.
For some reason, I like to write jocks. Mostly cocky and arrogant and full of themselves male characters. And then I throw a monkey wrench at them and see how they handle it. The Satyr is like this. Being a mythical beast who forgets how to do certain things gets in the way of his social life.
Of course, I think this story is hilarious, though weird in some parts, and one of these days I would like to post this story somewhere where people can read it and laugh at it with me. Though with my luck, half of the audience would read it, tells me it sucks and stare at me as if everything now makes sense and they finally get why I am so weird. But that will never happen. Why?
Because it isn't finished. And I would only post something on the internets that is finished. Until then, you can ask me, 'so Kami, why are you telling us about your stories when you won't let us read them?'
And I will respond 'because, writing takes up a good deal of my personal time, which is usually reserved for my social life, which explains why I have one, and now you can heed the warnings of why you shouldn't get into writing. It is addictive and it will eat your life.'
Yes, writing is usually a solo activity and not something done with a group of people. And this is the synopsis of Four of my stories. At last count I had about 25 of them. The shortest? Well, I didn't get to far in Nano '2004. I made it to 1,373 words and got bored with it. But the plan is still there to tell the story.
The longest? I'm guessing 555,000 words. Although, to be fair, that particular story is probably five seperate stories combined into one.
And you can't read it.
One of these days, I'm going to write a 'short' story, 'short' being the key word there, actually FINISH it, and publish it.
Maybe next year's Nano it will happen? Yeah, 50,000 words is a short story in my terms.
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