NaNoWriMo - Day 8 - Excerpt

The first five days of NaNoWriMo were extremely productive for me.  I wrote 5k+ words each day and I was quite satisfied with my progress.  But then on Day 6, things started to fall apart.  On Day 7, I didn't even write a single word.  On Day 8, I did my best to get back on track, but only managed about 3,500 words.  But, at least I'm still writing and I should eventually make my 100k word goal, although I doubt I'll make much more than that.

Even though I didn't reach my word count goal for the day, I did manage to pull an excerpt from my novel and post it on my NaNo profile, (although the page is still having issues and there are some wonky things going on there).  Here is a little excerpt from my current novel, Captive Princess, for your reading pleasure:

NaNoWriMo Day 3 - Synopsis

It has taken until Day 3 of NaNoWriMo for me to finally write a synopsis for my current story.  I hate writing synopses, whether it's two pages or two paragraphs.  It's always been my weak point.  But, since I'm blogging about this novel, I thought it might be important for people to actually have some idea of what I'm writing.  So, after meeting today's word count goal, I sat down to write a synopsis for Captive Princess (Yes, I'm still not too keen on that title.) and this is what I came up with:

Six hundred years ago the Earth was devastated by the Great Cataclysm, an event so destructive that it left half the planet uninhabitable.  The surviving population has moved southward, below the equator, and in the rainforests of the Amazon, only the bravest survive.

Remy de Zy’Aer is a bounty hunter and a hired gun who will do anything for a price.  When a runaway slave girl becomes ensnared in one of his traps, he has every intention of returning her to her master for the reward.  But there’s something about the errant princess that stops him at every turn.  Her beauty and bravery haunt him, and he finds that despite his best intentions, he just can’t let her go.

India of the Savannah Tribe is on the run.  Sold into slavery by the man who murdered her father, she will do anything to make it back home and avenge her father’s death.  But Remy de Zy’Aer has other plans for her, and she is determined to escape him, to save both her life and her heart.

Total word count for Day Three: 15,562

NaNoWriMo Day 2 - Blood and Handcuffs

Last night, when I was lying in bed, it occurred to me that the first two chapters I had written for my current NaNo novel, Captive Princess, could both be summed up in a few short, rather bizarre words.  If I just chose an element or two from each chapter, I could come up with some really interesting chapter titles.  Now, I write romance, so I generally don't title my chapters, but if I did, this particular book would have some pretty interesting ones.  Thus far, they are as follows:

Chapter One: Anaconda Stew
Chapter Two: Zip Ties and Tupperware
Chapter Three: Blood and Handcuffs
Chapter Four: Deerskins and Bacon

Can you tell I'm writing a post-apocalyptic novel about a runaway slave in the Amazon rainforest?  It's all there in the chapter titles.

I wrote another 5k words today.  I had planned to take some time to finally write and upload a story synopsis to my NaNo profile, but I just didn't have time.  I'd also like to design and post a book cover, but again, I'm spending so much time writing the actual novel, that I don't have time to work on all these peripherals.  The only reason I'm blogging is because I've promised myself time and again that I would and I'm just trying to see how long I can keep that promise.

Yesterday, it took me 6 hours to write 5k words.  Today it took 5 hours.  At my best, I can write 2k words in one hour, but it's a feat I hardly ever pull off, mostly because I procrastinate a lot.  I will try to do better tomorrow, but since I have absolutely no idea where my story is going, just getting to Chapter Five may be a feat all its own.

Total word count for Day Two: 10,286

NaNoWriMo - Day 1

Today was the first day of National Novel Writing Month (or perhaps I should say yesterday was the first day, as it is now well past midnight).  I was hoping to write 5k words to get ahead and stay firmly on track to meet my target goal of 100k, and somehow I miraculously succeeded.  I'm still not sure how it happened.  At six o'clock this evening I was sitting on the recliner in my bedroom, laptop propped up on my knees, staring hopelessly at a blank page.  I had no idea what I was going to write and yet, at the end of the day, I pulled out more than 5k words.

For the past few weeks, I've been trying to come up with the perfect story for this year's NaNo.  I think I've driven nearly everyone around me crazy, fretting over it.  The only solid idea I had was to write a sequel to last year's NaNo novel, Taming the Savage, but I was reluctant to do that because the story I had in mind was just too dark.  And the last thing I wanted to write this year was something dark.  And yet, nothing better came along, so here I am, several thousand words into a story I didn't really want to write, hoping that I can somehow make it through the entire month.

Right now, the working title of the new novel is Captive Princess.  It sounds almost like a fairytale, which I can assure you, it is not.  Sixteen pages in and I'm already dealing with kidnapping, slavery, and bondage.  Not really the lighthearted story I was looking to write this year.  But for now, I will persevere because I really do want to make my word count and maybe, somehow, something good will actually come out of this novel.

Total word count for Day One: 5,071