Nano no no

For the last two years I've completed Nanowrimo and I've created two books, one of which I self published. But this year I've decided to give it a miss. The main reason is that I abandoned a very good project last year in order to start a new work, to meet the Nano regulations. 

Sadly, while the Nano product last year wasn't bad, and it might have potential as another self published book, it wasn't a patch on the one I abandoned.

So what I'm doing this year is going back to the work I left standing. I'm currently reading through the 21,000 or so words I have, to get back into the story line. And sometime in November I shall be adding to the total.

I don't expect to write 50,000 words. I'll settle for around 20,000, frankly. But November is a tough month at work this year and I'm not committing myself to anything.

Good luck to all of you who are going for it again in 2012.  I wish you flowing words and a kind Muse.

Billy Weaver

Billy Weaver wasn’t the sort to settle for the outskirts of town. Live fast, die young would have been his motto, although even he probably hoped to hang around a bit longer than he did. He was always a tearaway, too young to fight in the war, but old enough to work out where a profit could be made. The thing about Billy was how he looked – like butter wouldn’t melt even if he stood in front of a furnace. He had a cheeky grin, a cocky way and charm to bring the birds down out of the trees. And that meant he could have got away with murder, although as far as his family knew he never actually killed anybody. No, Billy’s talent lay in spiriting things away from their rightful owners and redistributing them to places where he could earn a few bob.
Even before he entered his teens he had made himself known to the local wide boys; done them a few favours and proved how his innocent face could be of value to them. So it was no surprise that he was at the heart of the black market around his local streets. If you wanted it, Billy, or his mates, could get it for you – at a price. He wasn’t totally bad. Like they always say, he was good to his mum. He made sure she had a few extras every week to bulk out her rations and to keep the other kids fed.

**************

I'm finally working on the novel again. (The one I thought I'd lost) I did this for Thinking Ten - just to make me write something new for it.

It's my own fault

I've been panicking this week. You see, about a year ago I was working on a fairly hefty (for me anyway) novel and I was about 13 chapters through it. It was coming along really well; something I could be proud of. Then NaNo got in the way and I shelved it while I produced something else.

What I should have done was just cheat on NaNo and continue with the work in hand, but I didn't. I'm not saying I didn't produce something good from Nano - far from it. In fact I'm seriously considering giving that a good edit (now it's a long way behind me and I can look at it with new eyes) and publishing it through LuLu.

But I shelved the thing I was proud of. Bad girl! Because this week, when I finally thought I wouldn't mind having another go at the WIP, I couldn't find it.

I'll pause a while for the other writers out there to take that in.

Thirteen chapters. About 21,000 words as far as I can remember. Missing. I was convinced that I'd saved multiple copies of it: at home on my laptop;  at work on my personal drive on my PC; on at least two thumb sticks. Apparently not.

I couldn't even find the notebook that I'd carefully planned the story in. Planned? Me?  Yes! That's what makes this work so special. I'm normally a seat-of-the-pants kind of writer and this is a HUGE thing for me. I know from the start what the story's about.

Well, I've turned the house over trying to recover anything of the story and first of all I found the notes. That's a start, but I didn't relish the prospect of rewriting the whole thing. I know there was some pretty good prose among the verbiage.

I have managed to rescue some chapters - quite a chunk, actually - but I know there are still gaps. I hope to be able to track down the missing pieces as I continue to search through the probably several million words I have turned out in the last couple of years. (I write professionally remember - I turn out a lot of words!)

The panic has subsided a little. I know I can recover the project with some effort. And there are now several copies of what I have found. But it's going to be tough.

An advent calendar of sorts Day 1. (Also a Thursday extract.)

To start off the countdown to Christmas (or in my case Yule) I'm giving you one last extract from my NaNo novel Seaviews. I finished the first draft a couple of days ago and do not plan to touch it again for several weeks, when I can give it a fresh eye.   Here's a description of Santa. Not the real one of course kiddies - we all know he's far too busy at this time of year to attend children's parties!

*********

Children’s entertainers are sometimes quite awful with kids and grown-ups alike.  Some perform OK for parents but they actually terrify the tots. Sometimes they work wonders with children but they can't convert to an adult crowd. This guy gave fun for everyone. In fact I would go so far as to say he was great with the little ones, when we had youngsters around. He really seemed to love them. And his costume was a dream. It wasn’t shabby and thin-looking like some of them. He had a proper red suit made with what looked like a woollen cloth and trimmed with soft, white fur, that moved in a convincingly real fashion. He styled himself on the American style Santa, with trousers and fur-topped wellington boots and a wide belt with a huge black buckle, rather than the traditional British long-coated one, but that didn’t matter to the festive folks. Part of his act involved handing out presents to all the guests and he carried them in a real sack slung over his shoulder. His ‘ho-ho-ho’ voice reached deep enough to challenge that mountain climber-actor chap.

50000 plus

I just declared my NaNo at 50,430. I freely admit that a very large chunk of that is disjointed ideas and descriptions of places and people, and comments on life and general junk that I've been letting off steam with during the last month. Eventually I'll make a large amount of it fit together to slot into the novel. But for now I've hit the total.

Now I have serious editing work to do but not for a couple of weeks at least!

NaNoWriMo 12 days in.

So I worked out that I was a bit behind on the NaNo. Since then I've been trying to write at least 2,000 words a day because the daily target is 1,667 if you do it every day from November 1. I am hoping by the end of today that I shall have caught up to the NaNo target. (Or the 'if you're going to make it to 50,000 words in 30 days you really need to have written this much by now' point.) My best so far has been 2,736 in a day, which was a chapter I LOVED writing. My worst was 2,027, which I thought I'd enjoy but in practice found much harder than anticipated.

Funny old thing, this writing lark.

I missed three days right at the start because I was arranging a big meeting in London. The meeting was a success. Several people have said it was good. The people who actually do the managing (ie. provide what I organise) said that my efficiency made their job much easier than it was with the other person who used to arrange it. Even my boss eventually got round to emailing me, although it took him five days and he didn't actually say well done. A message to say 'you did it' is what passes for praise in our office.

55 words from my NaNo project

As you all know, I'm doing NaNoWriMo again and I'm typing furiously to catch up with the target because my day job got in the way and I started late. So here's 55 words taken straight from yesterday's declared 2080.

The book is about a guy who lives in a hotel because he's spent his entire working life as a theatre dresser and has travelled so much he's got nowhere that he thinks of as home. He's finally settled down, in retirement, in a hotel he stayed in while he was working at the local theatre.  

There are a lot of advantages in living in a hotel, but it has its downside too. Take Christmas, for example. No sooner have we taken down the black and orange streamers and binned the pumpkin lanterns, than we have to declare the festive season and put out the tree and tinsel. People expect it.

Friday's 55 words are, of course, for The G-Man. Go visit him by clicking here.

Thursday extracts: Old Henry

I'm busy doing NaNoWriMo and I'm pushed for time to find you an extract this week. So here's a few words from my current NaNo project.  The book's narrator is a former theatrical dresser, so he talks a lot about what people wear.  I'm enjoying that bit, because it's not something I often do. 

Meet Henry:

He dressed neatly but never sharply. His clothes were clean and well ironed, but were worn well past the time that less frugal people would have consigned them to the rag bag. A charity shop would have turned them down. He had a penchant for cord trousers and heavy cotton, checked shirts with a plain white vest or t-shirt under them. He always wore a narrow, leather belt and I don’t believe I ever saw him in a tie. When he went out he wore a dark jacket, even on the hottest days, and the whole lot was topped off with a tweedy flat cap. I suppose he was used to the heat down in the mine and his skin rarely saw sunshine, so he preferred to be well covered up outside. His face and hands showed signs of weathering; not a suntan exactly, more erosion by wind and rain, but the rare glimpses of arms and legs that his outfits afforded showed the rest of him was a very pasty white. And remarkably hairy. Over his shoulder he slung an old canvas bag on a long strap. It was the same kind he had used for years to carry his ‘snap’, as he called it; his packed meal to be eaten during his only break in a working shift.

OK - I'm in

Well, I'm registered for this year's NaNoWriMo, but I've changed my name from the last two years. You can now find me as MorningAJ. 

Are the rest of you joining in this time?

FFF55: A soldier's tale

Edward Moffat joined the army and went off to fight in the mud and gore of France. He miraculously survived the whole thing and came home a hero, only to be struck down by Spanish Flu in an epidemic that wiped out a great number of those who had managed to live through the fighting.

*****

Edward Moffat is a very minor character in my latest attempt at a novel. His entire tale takes little more than two paragraphs but his death is relevant to the ongoing story. 

Spanish Flu was the same strain (H1N1) as the bird flu that hit last year. Unlike most strains of flu (and other diseases) it hit the young and healthy and left the old and frail relatively untouched. In a world that had just suffered massive losses among its young generation because of the 1914-18 war, the deaths were felt particularly badly. The first cases were reported in late 1918 and the disease continued to spread around the world for two years.  In spite of the name there is no evidence to prove that it started in Spain.

FFF55 is a weekly challenge to tell a story in just 55 words.  It's hosted by the G-Man over at Mr. Knowitall Go visit and read more.

Researching

I've started work on the next book.

So far it consists of a basic idea that will involve a family story over four generations. Seemed like a good idea until I realised that I was going to have to make all the dates fit onto a family tree.

There is a huge sheet of paper with lots of boxes on it that are linked by various lines in different directions. As usual I'm stuck for names and have got as far as working out who will share the same surname along the paternal line.

And I have a notebook with two pages dedicated to each potential character so that I can jot down ideas about their lives and how they are all linked together.

This is the most planning I have ever done for a written project. Wish me luck!

Oh my! What have I done?

I swear I fought it. I wasn't going to do this. But I've fallen for it. After trying to track down an old book online and finding that it was no longer available in print I realised that the only way forward was electronic.

I promise I didn't mean to. I thought I'd never get used to the idea of reading anything but a block of printed paper in my hand. Not so. I have been seduced by a lightweight (about the same as a bag of barleysugars) shiny, silver siren and promises of free books. FREE BOOKS!

Yes folks, I can now hold in my hand around 100 (because I haven't uploaded any more yet) classics. I have the complete works of Dickens, ditto for Oscar Wilde, some Austen, Brontës, poetry, plays, and novels I haven't even heard of - let alone read!

And it's easy. So easy to read from the machine. A touch of my finger turns the pages and it feels so good.
I have crossed to the dark side

Now all I have to do is finish writing it...

I had a parcel in the post yesterday. This is what was in it:

Some time ago I won a competition hosted over at the wonderful Year of Writing Dangerously by the equally wonderful Michael G-G. This was my prize!
I would just like to say

THANK YOU

for choosing me as the winner.
(A quick scan has already informed me that my current WIP is around 25,000 words short.  That's almost half as many again then.............. Back to the keyboard AJ!)

Thanks again Michael. I promise to make good use of it.

Gardening

It's been a gardening sort of day. I thought I'd give you an extract from my 2010 NaNo novel. Based on reality and still in edit.

I took the photo, surreptitiously, from an upstairs window and he was not aware that I was there. He is wearing a white, open-necked shirt and dark trousers, rolled to the knees, to make way for a pair of workmanlike Wellington boots. On his head is the inevitable straw hat, protecting his ears and neck from the sun. I had been watching him for some time, turning over the ground with a spade and raising small terraces of earth where he was planning to plant potatoes. I was familiar with this ridge and furrow method that he used. It allowed the potatoes to grow freely in soil that was not compacted and did not inhibit their development. The furrows between the rows allowed efficient watering without swamping the plants, which would have encouraged disease. The preparation was effective and we had a regular supply of spuds from the earliest, sweet, new potatoes through to November’s bakers that we would use to warm our hands on Bonfire Night as we watched the whizzing, banging fireworks and burned our Guy Fawkes effigy.

The system was hard work though. He had to dig over the soil twice to break it up enough for the seed potatoes to go into the ground, and raking up the ridges was a back-breaking task. The photo shows him resting on his spade as he seeks a moment’s respite from the toil. Although it is faded I can see that he has nearly finished preparing the area and the rows have been built up behind him, ready for the seed. Beyond where he is standing I can make out squared-off sections that would each hold a different crop. I know there were strawberries, one of the few luxuries that Dad allowed space in his well-worked plot. There were cabbages and carrots, celery and lettuces, radishes, onions and rows of beans. Broad beans and French beans and runners stood side by side, with the climbers snaking their way up bamboo teepees made from three sticks tied with raffia near the top. I can recognise the shapes of four small apple trees near the end of the garden and there is a smudge of green that shows where the bramble grew.