crazywithkeyboard

I suppose it's normal, but ...

I'm going through some mood swings right now in regards to The Vedia Gamble. It probably happens to every writer (except maybe Stephen King, because he knows anything he writes is gonna get published AND sell millions of copies). But for the rest of us ...

Monday, I was happy and enthusiastic about my story. I'd just finished my latest editing pass and was really excited about some of the changes I'd made, and how some parts had really come together. No question about it, this book is GONNA get published.

Yesterday, I sent out fresh copies to all my beta readers. Still feeling good. Then sent some chapters to a writer who expressed an interest in seeing more of my book after hearing a three page reading.

... And the roller coaster plunges to the bottom of the hill. Gawd, did I really send that, and to a professional? What was I thinking? It's not that good. It's never gonna sell.

Then I sit down to write a synopsis (I need one for the Gather.com competition). I'd heard about how hard it was, so I'd been dreading it. I was pleased when it came together relatively quickly. Back up a little. Maybe things aren't as bad as I thought.

THEN I send the synopsis out to several people ... and post it on the wrimobuddies group over on LJ. Not only do I plunge back to the bottom of the hill, but my car derails. The feedback isn't precisely negative, just points out some weaknesses in the synopsis. It's good feedback, and important, but ... now I'm quite sure this story isn't good enough to be published, and never will be....

Oh well. First I'm gonna take a stab at re-writing the synopsis. Then I'll see what my loyal group of beta readers has to say. And I'm reminding myself that this is how I felt just before I did my reading at COSine -- which was a very positive experience overall...

Labels: NaNoBlues, NaNoObsessing

(Cross-posted to my LJ)

For the last few weeks, I've been diligently editing my NaNoNovel, trimming out excess wordiness, getting rid of passive voice phrases (which also usually results in shorter text), that sort of thing.

So can anyone tell me why the story is now 2,000 words LONGER than it was before?!?

Labels: NaNo Editing, NaNoObsessing

Yes, I'm still editing. I think I'll be editing forever.

In this round:

1) Trying to get rid of at least most of the passive voice bits (not being utterly compulsive about it, just trying to get rid of the glaring, obvious ones)
2) Along with the passive voice goes the check for excessive wordiness. (Me? Excessively wordy? Say it isn't so!)
3) Adding in the last few items suggested by phoenix14159 (explaining why the pirates are all so human-like, adding some hints that Phoebe's dad was a cop, thereby giving a bit of a basis for her apparently natural leadership skills).
4) Blending in a few info tidbits that got missed the first time around (did you know Phoebe has green eyes and sandy brown hair? Probably not, since I never got around to mentioning it...)
5) I actually put one of the "and thens" I got rid of last round back in. It needed to be there.
6) Still getting rid of excess commas. I, think, I've, only, found, eight, or, ten, this, round...
7) Oh, and I found yet another typo -- a missing beginning quote. Most of the typos have been either missing end quotes, or missing periods. Though I did have a couple of odd words -- an "a" or "the" left over from when revisions got made. Think I'm up to about 14 typos found since the version that got sent off to Lulu.

One bit I still need to put in: Phoebe needs to at least offer the music files to Prostus to help pay for her phasers -- and he needs to reject them out of hand.

My goal is to finish this run through, then read through one last time (looking for any remaining rough spots) and get it back out to the beta readers (if any of them are up to another reading).

Labels: NaNo Editing, NaNoObsessing

First:

Not counting ones embedded in phrases that have been deleted, thus far I have deleted 316 excess commas from The Vedia Gamble.

Second:

Acting on some very good advice, I went through the story and did a search on "then". I think I deleted about 75 of those.

Third:

The Lulu copy of the story is GORGEOUS. I finally got my mitts on it on Saturday. It looks soooooooo cool! I'm glad I took the time to do it, even if it's not the final version of the story.

Labels: NaNoObsessing

(Started to post this yesterday, then had problems with the connection, so ... pretend you just got into your time machine and it's about this time yesterday...

Got to re-reading the offer from Lulu for a free copy of my NaNoWriMo novel, and the deadline is midnight, January 16. Which, technically speaking, is midnight TONIGHT.

So ... I spent my lunch hour frantically incorporating a last few edits, then PDF'd it and uploaded it and sent it to print. I'm sure I'll now find 42 more typos (and my beta readers will find 442). But if that's what it takes, I guess it's worth it to get all of them out of the way before I start sending it out to agents and publishers.

Feedback from elanurel was very helpful; I still have more feedback from phoenix14159 to incorporate, and someday, rivkarivkina will come down from the clouds far enough to give me more feedback than, "Guh! Not work safe!" {grin}. And I may poke copies at a few more people and see what they think.

But for now ... Edit Phase 1 is done.

[EDIT: Not even 24 hours later, and I'm up to four typos that didn't surface until it was too late....]

Labels: NaNoObsessing

It's January 10th. My edited copy needs to be at Lulu.com by the 16th. That's next Tuesday.

I was hoping my beta readers would have their feedback to me by now, but I think they (and I) have been distracted by recent events. First, most of us got roped into cooking the feast for Twelfth Night. Then Rivka was offered admittance to the Order of the Pelican (for non-SCA folks, this is A Really Big Deal), so I doubt she'll be interested in doing much editing any time in the next three weeks.

I've added two more beta readers, though. Hopefully, they'll have good feedback for me, even if not in time for the deadline!

I've also done two more editing passes through it, and am starting to feel better about it. I think I have almost all of the gratuitous commas out. I am not taking out any of the gratuitous sex, however. :)

I have also done formatting, and have spent some time fretting over cover art. Think I will use something from the Hubble Space Telescope website; I checked their terms of use, and as long as it's for personal use (which this is; this edition of the story is my freebie from Lulu and will never be offered for sale), I'm good.

After that, my next step is to start working up a proposal letter to send to potential agents, and to compile a list of agents who are currently accepting new work. My goal is to have a good letter and a list compiled by the end of February, and actually start sending out March 1. Probably pretty ambitious, but what the heck. After that, I need to work up a summary and a submission packet, just in case. It will be good practice, even if I never end up needing it.

Labels: NaNo Editing, NaNoObsessing, NaNoPrinting

I've got about a chapter and a half left to go. Poor Phoebe; they're not going to be easy for her. But I think everything will come out okay in the end. :)

I passed 100 K words sometime in the wee small hours of yesterday morning (I had an upset stomach and couldn't sleep, so at least I was able to put the time to good use). As a result, I had my highest single word count day for this entire project, just over 6,000, most of it devoted to an action sequence. (I love action sequences; they breeze by!)

Current word count is almost 107,000. My self-imposed deadline to finish the story is tomorrow. I might or might not make it by then. It'll be close either way.

Labels: NaNoObsessing

Just saw a posting over on the wrimobuddies group on LJ, from someone who hasn't touched their story since the end of November, and was wondering if she was the only one. Apparently, she's not -- several other people have posted to say the same thing.

So maybe I'm the weird one. Maybe I'm the only one who was so obsessed with her story that she just keeps on writing and writing it ...

I only have five more days until my self-imposed deadline of Dec. 20. After that, I'm gonna be way too busy to do much writing.

Can I possibly finish?

I think this Sunday's free, except for holiday shopping ....

BTW, my word count topped 92,000 this morning. Maybe I could be a novelist after all? Who knew? Everything else I've ever written has taken me years to get this far!

Labels: NaNoAngst, NaNoObsessing

Dangit.

I've just reached the point in my story where, if I could sit still and write for six hours straight, I could probably come pretty close to finishing it. The problem is, I think the next time I will have a free six-hour block of time is probably sometime in March.

In the meantime, I've been stealing the hours between 10:30 and midnight every night to do as much as I can, plus an occasional stray lunch hour and the time between 6:30 and 7:15 am every morning (the time between when the alarm goes off and when I need to get ready for work).

It's just not enough.

And it's frustrating, because I find myself waking up at 5:30 with little plot bits whirling around in my head ... I should just get up then, and get the darned things out of my head, but I know I also need the sleep, but who can sleep when they're rushing down a big hill on the roller coaster?

*whine!*

Labels: NaNoObsessing

82,000 plus, since Nov. 1.

That's an average of almost 2,000/day.

Not bad!

Labels: NaNoObsessing

Still on a roll. Got to 40,000 words tonight, and I'm probably not done yet. But I hear ice cream (low carb, of course) calling me from the kitchen ...

Labels: NaNoObsessing

38,138.

I should be able to break 40K by tonight. That would be cool; just 10K to go!

Labels: NaNoObsessing

I've created a spreadsheet to track my progress and tell me how many words per day I need to produce in order to make it to 50,000 by the end of the month.

Looking at my spreadsheet, it's easy to see that while I got off to a pretty slow start, the last ten days have been pretty phenomenal -- my average word count for those ten days has been 2,800/day.

If I could keep up that pace, I'd be done with this whole thing by next Sunday, despite only having had 8,000 words done by the 10th.

Sadly, I think there are things this week that are going to interfere with that. But if I can still manage to crank out 7-800 words at lunchtime every day, plus another thousand or so at bedtime, I'll still be ahead of the game. I've already managed about 450 words today, and it's not even lunchtime yet!

Heck, according to my spreadsheet, I'm about two days ahead at this point. Not that I plan to take two days off, mind you. At least, not intentionally.

Labels: NaNoObsessing