I didn’t finish NaNoWriMo… again…

Ah dear. I tried, I really did. But I got to nearly 7,000 words and that was it, I was done.  It didn’t help that my little Dude decided to get six teeth from 30 October all through November, which meant he was more restless than usual and therefore even more difficult to help sleep.  And there was some real tough shit going down in the Curiosikat house that needed some serious attention, heated discussions about moving house and just general adjustments to having a child… yes, still.  So I bombed out with NaNo again.

The fridge where I used to live in London

I’m disappointed, but there have been some positives:

1. I realised that my ‘idea’ is very different in theory to what it is in practice. That is, when I wrote, I found myself just telling a long-winded story about myself and what happened and never really even got to the stuff that the actual main bit of the story was about! I kept rabbiting on… ‘and then I did this and that was pretty awesome, but then I did this other thing and that was also awesome…’ bla bla bla bla bla… So all it really became was a glorified hindsight diary entry.  It wasn’t good writing at all.  There were some good memories there, but that wasn’t why I decided to write about this idea.  I had grand plans, to come up with a really unique yet marketable real life story of… well, I don’t want to talk about it too much.  But suffice it to say, it’s a pretty awesome idea.  Or at least if I could write it, it would be.  I found myself absolutely hating what I was writing, as it was just ‘and then…’ over and over.  There was no real story there.  Frustrating, yes, but eye-opening.

2. I actually did manage 7,000 words, which for me, with a baby, is pretty good.  And some of those words were written 2,000 at a time, which means I’m more than capable of making that 50,000 in the month.  It was refreshing to just let myself blurt out words, even if they weren’t that wonderful, and I’m glad I did actually manage something.

3. I now know my idea a lot better. I know that there’s heaps of memoir type stuff floating about in my brain in amongst the ideas, and I think I got a lot of those out, which leaves more room for good ideas.  I also know that what I was planning on writing wasn’t just another boring self-indulgent diary entry; it was actually a good story, worth writing and worth reading.  So I will attempt it again, one of these days.

4. I can give some other ideas the go ahead, now I’ve done a bit of work on that one.

All in all, yes it was a failure, but not a dismal one.  And I will be back with a vengeance and some new ideas next year!

NaNo: the idea

So November is here and despite only having written 535 words, I’ve actually begun NaNoWriMo for the fourth year running. And for the first time with a very full on baby taking up all my time!

But I’m pretty pleased with myself because, unlike the other years, I’ve got myself a very clear novel idea! I actually know what I’m writing for once!

Wanna know what it is? I feel a bit odd divulging my plan on such a public forum, but who am I kidding, no one reads my blog anyway so I may as well indulge in some crapping on about my idea.

This one has been in the pipeline for a couple of years now. It’s nothing that spectacular when I describe it but I think it could be freaking awesome. The story is about London and the rite of passage for most antipodeans that is going there to work and live and get perspective. Or whatever reason seems feasible. There’s more to it, but that’s the gist.  I think I’ve actually written about some stuff on this blog, stuff that actually happened, but my NaNo novel is a fictionalised account.  I’ve got ideas for about half a dozen key characters and some storylines, but I’m not sure how they all fit together yet.  Because it’s NaNo, I’m just going to write whatever and see what emerges – no time for editing!

My NaNoWriMo challenge

So it’s NaNo next month.  And I’ve decided to do it again.  After a few failed attempts in the last few years, I still think I can do it!  I always remind myself of the time I wrote 12,000 words in a night and think, yes I can!  Not that those words were actually any good.  I read back through some of that story a while ago and… well… wow.  It’s shite.  I mean really, really shite.  There are some bits that are salvageable but overall the story is total crap.  Anyway, I digress…

I have no idea what I’m going to write about, but I don’t remember what I wrote about the other times I did NaNo so I’m just going to go with the flow.  Gotta do some thinking over the next couple of weeks, start forming some ideas in my head.  I am totally sticking by the rules though, no starting writing until 1 November.  And this is the first year I am attempting NaNo with a child in tow, Lord help me!

I’ve got a book review due on 2o October, so stay tuned for that, and once that’s out of the way I can begin to really think about my NaNo ideas.  I’ve got three novels in  my head (well, let’s not exaggerate, three novel ideas in my head) but for some reason I’m hesitating about using any of those ideas for NaNo.  I think I need to rethink that.  Hmm… Ooh, baby crying, I’ll be back with more later!