Something New for NaNo

It’s NaNo Time! (Nearly)

Yup, coming up on that time of year where a lot of people around the world go mildly insane trying to write 50,000 words during November. Other people sit back and watch, cheer, and jeer.

Where will I be? Historically, I write the 50,000 words by Thanksgiving and cheer everyone on. I’ve been debating the value of my continued participating in this annual event for years. In my mind, NaNoWriMo has value, but it’s to those who struggle with it. I don’t struggle with it, so why do it? I know I can write 50k in 30 days. If I push it, I can write 80k, although my family hates me for it. Does that mean I should modify my goal? Should I step aside and cheer on everyone else?

For me it comes down to the reason for doing it. I see NaNoWriMo as being for those who struggle. Namely, for the new writers. I want to encourage those who have an idea for a book, but haven’t set aside the time to get that first draft down on paper. (Figuratively speaking.) NaNo is for those writers still fighting with that first draft. Maybe it’s their first book, maybe it’s their third. It doesn’t matter. The point is, they’re struggling with it.

Critics argue Nano puts quantity of words over quality of words. Yes, it does. Sort of. Maybe. Here’s the thing on that: the goal is the word count, not the quality of the words themselves, so that criticism is true. However, experienced writers know a couple of things that those critics clearly aren’t considering:

1.   Increasing your words/hour doesn’t mean you’re writing crap. Authoress RJ Blain looked at three of her mindsets while writing, the words/hour that corresponded with each, and the quality of writing at each. Just because she writes faster sometimes doesn’t mean she writes worse. The blog post is worth a peek. I concur fully.
2.  When you’re inspired, your words/hour increases as does the quality of your writing. The experienced writers know the trick is to stay excited and/or inspired about your work. If the author is excited/inspired it shows in the writing and the reader picks up on it. A byproduct is that it gets that book written faster. At least the first draft, which is what NaNo is all about.

Don’t be concerned about quality anyway. First drafts are rough, they’re meant to be, and that’s what revisions are for. You’re supposed to put that quality concern aside for NaNoWriMo. Too many aspiring authors get caught in the editing trap: they write a first chapter, then edit it. Write a second chapter, then edit it. Then they decide the first chapter doesn’t work anymore and go back and fix it. Now the second chapter isn’t working anymore and they fix that. At this rate, they’ll never finish the book.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: when writing, the first chapter doesn’t matter. It’s a jumping off point, but it’s expendable. You may know after chapter two that chapter one needs to be fixed. Fine, but don’t fix it yet. Don’t you dare touch it until after you’ve finished the book. It’ll need to be fixed again after chapter three. And again after chapter four. And you’ll need to delete chapter one and fix chapter two after chapter seven, and so on. The point is: until you write “The End” you won’t know what really needs to be fixed in those first chapters, so there’s no point wasting your time doing it as you go.

That’s what NaNo is about: putting pressure on you in the form of a wordcount and deadline that you don’t’ have time to go back and fix things. You have to forge on. It’s brilliant, and it’s exactly what many new writers need to get that first manuscript finished.

Now, back to my dilemma: I’m not a new writer. I don’t need the wordcount/deadline pressure. I know not to edit as  go. I know how to forge on. Do I need NaNo?

Yes and No. Not really. I still do it every year, and I easily make my word count. Right now, I have a novel I’m working on to finish a series. I should finish that. I have another in extreme revisions (so extreme you really need to hear an echo when you read that). I should work on that. I have other books outlined, things I may not get to for years – except for NaNoWriMo.

This is the one month of the year I get to pretend to be a new writer again. Sort of. I still have to do my normal author-y things, but writing – for NaNo it’s always something new. A new book, a new concept, a new genre. Romance is too easy now, I can’t write that for NaNo, it’s not a challenge. I’ve done YA a couple of times (didn’t actually finish them, I may go back and do that.) I’m somewhat scary as a YA writer. I finished a zombie book (there’s a reason you haven’t seen it). Last year I wrote Rerun, my first suspense novel, and finished it up at 65k - the shortest novel I’ve ever written. This year…I’m not sure yet. Will I participate in NaNo? Probably. I’ll write something new.

I'm Back

Okay, first a few words on Multiple Sclerosis relapses: they really suck. I’d like to opt out now. Enough said there. I’m back, let’s get caught up.

When I left off, Darth Jingles had a collar on because she was injured in a cat fight. So while I was lying around hating life, a small black cat was shut up in my room with me going stir crazy. Misery loves company, right? No. She did recover and get the collar off before I strangled her. It was just in time for a series thunderstorms and rain showers to hit town and keep her locked inside longer. Since she was used to spending time walking all over me, and deciding my feeble attempts to bat her away were a signal that I wanted to play, she decided to grace me with her presence a little longer. Lucky me. There is nothing I enjoy more than having a cat pouncing on my toes with claws and teeth while I’m in a dazed never-land state. It makes for wild dreams. Particularly when I’ve been watching The Walking Dead.

On writing: I haven’t been doing much of that in the past few weeks although I have a collection of hastily scribbled notes that I now can’t read. Really. It’s like who taught this three year old cursive before she could color inside the lines? Anyway, I’m optimistic I’ll decipher enough to get the gist of these random nuggets of inspiration and file them away for use later. Or they could be useless. It could go either way.

That brings me to my muse. Imagine if you will a spindly woman with wild hair wearing an oversized cardigan and crystals around her neck, collecting herbs, and followed everywhere by a seemingly never-ending stream of cats. Got that picture in your mind? I’d be fine with a muse like that. She seems like a slightly crazy but creative sort. No, mine is the kind that sits in a coffee shop that pipes in the sort of music you don’t listen to, at a volume slightly too loud to be ignored, and won’t meet you anywhere else. She always has a coffee that’s half-finished and it’s just reaching the point where it’s the incorrect temperature so when you are finally making headway in any conversation with her, she sighs and gets up to go get another one because hers is suddenly undrinkable. Like anyone who hangs out in a coffee shop all frickin’ day would really have a problem with their coffee being slightly cooler or their ice melting. You learn to cope! And when she comes back from getting a new coffee, her attention is no longer on the wonderful idea she left with, it’s on that new purse or shoes she saw at the department store, or her nails need a fill, or her hairdresser is on vacation but she really needs her highlights touched up this week. That’s my muse and we’ve spent a lot of time almost communicating lately. (hence the pages of scribbled notes) We’ll see if anything comes of that.  

For those of you who don’t deal with muses, the above is something along the lines of getting a good idea then — oh look, a squirrel! That’s the real world equivalent. FYI. Oh, except every once in awhile, you get to write part of the idea down in lipstick on the mirror before you get attacked by the squirrel. But you can only find your favorite lipstick, and you have to write fast because you’re in a hurry – squirrel.

Now, I have to go decipher hastily written notes. Thankfully, they’re not in lipstick on the bathroom mirror, and there has been no actual squirrel attack. Although, if The Girl could catch one, she’d give domestication a shot. Heaven help us.

The Cat in Black Strikes Again

If it isn’t one thing, it’s another. Teens and cats. The Boy started high school, and decided it isn’t to his liking. That’s been a drama. I thought The Girl was the drama princess around here, but it’s apparently a trait she opted to share with her little brother. Just peachy. The good news was that at least his little black cat was doing her job in keeping him relatively calm.

That ended. Darth Jingles got in a cat fight and lost. We didn’t notice when she came home the other night. She waltzed through the door like she owned the place, which in her mind is probably accurate, and proceeded to chow down on her dry cat food. For whatever reason, Jingles prefers dry. The Girl pointed out the next morning that half her face was swollen. Poor misshapen kitty. Although she didn’t act like she was in pain, as long as you didn’t try to touch it. Huh.

Over the course of the day, the swelling seemed to go down a bit, she acted fine. Then she scratched it, and made a big mess of herself. I won’t describe it here, but it ruined my appetite. Taking her to the vet was a no-brainer. Now she has a cone around her head, much like Princess did a few months ago. The vet bill was enough to make Hubby wonder if she was really worth it, briefly, but she’s The Boy’s comfort animal and he needs her right now. Plus she’s been a good cat. And grumble as he might, he’s not really that heartless.

So I sat there for hours last night being the cat’s comfort animal. I’m serious. She came home high as pair of mating swallows and nearly as oblivious. I’m a lot less bony than either kid, so she just lay in my arms, and stared at her boy as if he was the most wonderful thing ever. The Boy took it well. We put on a show so he’d sit still and let his cat stare at him.

Then we discovered she was too out of it to figure out how to eat or drink. So I fed her one kibble at a time (patience…) and gave her drinks with a dropper. That was fun.

When Princess had a cone on her head, Jingles couldn’t avoid her enough. The reverse is not true. Princess is fascinated by this turn of events and Jingles is not amused. Hiss hiss swat miss. So Jingles is confined to my room/bathroom with the new litter box in the shower (yay!) to keep her 1) away from Princess who’s really become a pest in the last 12 hours and 2) from hurting herself because she’s a drug lightweight and cannot figure out how this cone thing works. Seriously, Princess adapted quicker and she’s (putting it politely) dim. I have hope that Jingles will come up to speed soon because the prospect of feeding this cat kibble one at a time and giving her drinks with a dropper regularly over the next week or more is really unappealing.

And she’s restless at night and in my bathroom. For the first time in I don’t know how long, Hubby went to bed at a decent hour and actually fell asleep. Therefore I didn’t. Because the bathroom wasn’t as cat-proofed as I thought. Oh, sure I put away everything breakable, just not everything knock-down-able. Well, it’s mostly taken care of now. Of course now I have a mix of spilled shampoo and body wash in my garden tub and kitty prints tracking it all over the bath mats and counter…