Novel: day 26

My wordcount right now is 50,050. That's right, I reached the target wordcount. The story is not quite finished, but by the wordcount metric I am officially a NaNoWriMo winner. The size of the text file is 273,958 bytes (267kb).

It actually wasn't as difficult to finish as I thought it was going to be. I wrote close to 3,000 words on the plane (in a Selectum Composition Book). I typed it out on my sister's computer this morning and added a little extra here and there. Bam, 50,000 words.

Now, the revelation that I thought the main character was going to have has not quite happened yet. Certain things have occurred, pushing him very close to the edge. But he hasn't gone all the way over yet.

Novel: Day 20

My wordcount at the end of day 20 is 43,082. I think my main character is right on the verge of an important revelation. A revelation that will propel him to act in such a way to bring the novel to its conclusion. I just haven't decided quite what form the revelation will take.

Novel: Day 19

At close of day 18 last night I had 38,753 words. With a little bit of effort I should be able to reach 40,000 by the end of today. The story is getting a little bit more complicated. For example, there is now a cat in the story. The cat doesn't have a name, though: it's very mysterious.

Novel: Day 16

At the start of day 16 I am sitting at 31,076 words. If I manage 900 words by the end of today I'll be right on the 2k-words/day pace. And If I can keep that up for the next week I'll be nearly done by next Friday the 23rd (46,000 words).

Which is good, because the last week of November will be a little complicated and busy for me. At this point it's hard to say but I very well may be drunk and/or unconscious for those six or seven days. I'm visiting my family, out of province.

Novel: Day 12

I just wrote a little bit first thing this morning, to bring my novel over the half-way mark. Wordcount: 25,147. I've got a few things planned that might bring me close to 28 or 30 thousand words. Then the real crazy roller coaster ride of action will begin for the final 20 thousand or so words. I have a vague idea of how the action will start, but I have no idea right now what exactly is going to happen.

Novel: day 8

My wordcount as of today, November 8, is 15,867. I'm almost keeping to my goal of averaging 2000 words per day. I have to confess that the quality of the writing is deteriorating a bit, but the story is moving along and that's the main thing at this point. November is for writing, December is for editing.

Novel: Day 7

For various reasons I didn't have much luck writing last night. I just couldn't do it. My wordcount right now is 13,580. I'd like to produce about 2000 words tonight and maybe be withing shouting distance of 20,000 before the weekend starts.

Novel: Day 6

As of this morning my wordcount stands at 12,281. So I am still going at a pretty good clip. The ideas are drying up a bit, though. It would have helped if I had started with even a rough plot in mind, I suppose.

Here's a funny, whiny, elitist blog post by a Writer (note the capital W I used there. That's because this guy is a Real Writer): Why I Hate National Novel Writing Month, and Why You Should Too.

Buddy, I know where you're coming from. I have a Computer Science degree. We'd like the Internet back. Please close the door on your way out.

Novel: Day 4

Well, I did it. I just finished writing for the night and the wordcount shows 10,365. I have achieved and slightly exceeded my goal for the week-end. It was difficult and I don't think it is going to get any easier. But I am one fifth of the way there.

Novel: Day 2

Wow, who would have thought that writing a novel could be so friggin' difficult? I sat down last night for a couple of hours and only managed 500 words. Combined with about 500 from earlier in the day my total is now hovering just over 1000 words. That is well below the pace I need to achieve (and maintain!) for the rest of the month.

Other aspects of novel-writing I am finding frustrating:

• This morning during my bicycle ride to work I thought of a super-fantastic title for my book. I should have pulled over and written it down, though, because now I can't remember it.
• The U key on the old laptop I'm using for this endeavor is sort-of broken. If you're not paying attention while typing and making an effort to strike that key in a very specific and forceful way, your keystroke will be lost. So for example the phrase Shut up! is recorded as Sht p!

More updates may follow next week. I'm going into a deep hermit-like seclusion this weekend and I want to hit the 10,000 word mark by Sunday's end. So don't even try to contact me, as I'm unplugging the phone and will only be checking my e-mail 5 times per hour.

I'm writing a novel

It's (Inter)National Novel Writing Month. I've decided to give it a shot. The pressure and taunting from The Filthy Critic was finally too much to bear.

For the purpose of this event, a novel is defined as 50,000 words. That works out to an average of almost 1700 words per day, over the course of the 30 days of November. If I commit to doing a solid uninterrupted two hour session of writing per day, that's about 14 words per minute. I'm feeling pretty relaxed about it because I took touch-typing in high-school and I was clocked at like 70 words per minute. So this should be no problem.

Here is my NaNoWriMo profile, where interested parties can track my (lack of) progress.