Let's Try This Again

I find it rather disheartening that I haven’t posted anything in this blog since November of last year.  (It’s been more than five months!)  Back in November I had every intention of blogging my way through NaNoWriMo, posting every day - or at least every other day - about my story, my word count, and the general ins and outs of writing 100k words in 30 days.  Well, writing 100k words in 30 days got the best of me and I gave up blogging after day eight.  I did, in fact, finish my NaNo novel, Captive Princess.  I still haven’t had time to read it through, but I was generally satisfied with the story.  I think it makes a nice companion for my 2013 Nano novel, Taming the Savage.

One of the reasons I haven’t posted in a while is because I was getting rather frustrated with the whole blogging thing.  I’m a writer.  I’m hoping to be a published writer someday soon.  And because of that, I had convinced myself that everything in my blog needed to be writing related.  It’s hard to relate every single thing I like or experience to how it affects me as a writer.  And so, I became both frustrated and disenchanted with blogging.  Then, a couple of weeks ago, I attended the Long Island Romance Writers open house and learned something extremely valuable from the panel of published authors present.  Writers seeking publication do not always need to blog about writing.  It’s perfectly okay – in fact, it’s more than okay – to write about your personal interests because it’s a good way to connect with readers on a personal level.   It may sound naïve of me, but I honestly didn’t know that.  Sometimes I take this whole writing-as-a-career-thing so seriously that I forget that it’s okay to still be human, to express more than just my love of the written word, and to share all of myself with the world and not just one part.

So, what does all this mean?  It means that, henceforth, I plan to blog about all sorts of things – even things that have absolutely nothing to do with writing!  It will give me a chance to branch out a bit, to get more comfortable with the medium, and to actually start enjoying the experience.

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

Preparing for NaNoWriMo

Every year, when NaNoWriMo rolls around, I get it in my head to not only write a novel in a month, but to blog about it as well. And in all the years I have participated, I have always failed at that goal. It seems silly to publicly declare, yet again, that this will be the year I actually do it. But I'm making that declaration anyway. After all, that's part of what NaNoWriMo is about. Trying even though you might fail. And when you do fail, trying again next time. 

NaNoWriMo 2013

So, here I am, trying again. This past week, I spent a lot of time updating my NaNoWriMo profile, specifically my Novel Page.  I created covers, wrote synopses, and posted excerpts for eight of my novels (I've written eleven altogether, but I can only post one for each year I've participated). I'm rather pleased with the result.

The only thing that is missing is the info for this year's novel.  That's because, with less than two weeks to go, I still have no idea what I will be writing.  I have a few ideas, but I just can't seem to pick one and start planning.  This has happened several times before.  The worst instance being my second year participating when, two days into November, I still had no idea what I was going to write.  All I had was two character with a great back story and no idea what in the world I wanted to do with them.  And they weren't lovers (my usual stock in trade) they were brothers, and I couldn't figure out which one was the romantic lead and which one was the second banana.  Once I finally started writing (with more than 48 hours already gone) the story made the decision for me and it ended up being the best novel I've ever written. 

Still, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't just a little bit nervous.  Going into November without an idea for a novel, kind of feels like getting into a lifeboat without a paddle or life preserver.  There's just as much chance that I'll sink as that I'll float. 

Temptation

The last time I wrote even a single word of fiction was back in November of last year.  My 2013 NaNoWriMo novel, Taming the Savage, is the longest one I have written so far, coming in at just over 111k words.  Initially, it ran so long because I was determined to surpass a friend's word count (he beat me anyway), but by the end, I just wanted to beat my previous record of 110k.  Anyway, the point is that, since November, I have not written anything, and now I am tempted to write something so bizarre, so out of left field, that I don't even know how to feel about it.

A couple of months ago, a friend at work got me into watching Game of Thrones.  I watched all 30 episodes of the first three seasons in two short weeks.  It was a whirlwind love affair, and of the seemingly millions of characters on the show, I fell absolutely head over heels for Tyrion Lannister.  Honestly, how can you not? 

Now, although I am a born shipper (my first ship was actually Remington Steele and Laura Holt when I was six years old) I do occasionally find works of fiction that are so compelling that I do not feel the need to get caught up in a relation"ship" in order to love them.  Supernatural falls into that category.  So does Red Dwarf and a bunch of other great shows.  And, up until a few a weeks ago, I thought the same thing about Game of Thrones.  But that was only until . . . well . . . perhaps I should insert a . . .

SPOILER ALERT FOR SEASON 3 EPISODE 8 - SECOND SONS . . .