31 October 2007

On Your Mark, Get Set, NaNo!

It’s heeeeerrrrreeee. November. Time to dust off that half-baked plot and try to mold it into a culinary masterpiece. Or at least force it to cough up a bunch of words that form coherent paragraphs.

I’ll be doing NaNo Light this year. I have family obligations and a week long mandatory training for work I can’t weasel out of. I know the spirit of NaNo, according to its founders, is to write no matter what, but you also have to know your limitations. After eight mind-numbing hours of learning a new computer system that isn’t working right yet, coupled with rah-rah sessions extolling the virtues of the latest strategic plan, believe me, I won’t want to write. At least not anything but bloody battle scenes involving Admin vs. Fiscal.

Since I did NaNo last year, I know what I’m capable of, along with the limitations. I’ve set my goal to complete the novel I’ve been working on instead of starting anything new. I’ve spent the past two months tap dancing around the ending and getting nowhere. It finally dawned on me I had a logical inconsistency that had to be addressed before I could move on. Identifying it and figuring out how to handle it opened up a few new possibilities, made things consistent, and gave me my ending. Mostly. (The thuds you hear are from the “Know the ending before you write the book” crowd, fainting in horror.) I knew the ending before I started. But that was before the book mutated along a much more interesting path. So it goes.

So I will NaNo along the best I can, and bull my way through to the End That Remains Elusive In The Light Of Day. I’ll be chopping down those logical inconsistencies one at a time until I’m through the Irrational Jungle.

And here “Anonymous” thought my philosophy degree was a waste of time.

If you need me, I’ll be off NaNo-ing my ending, and thinking deep thoughts about being underemployed.*



*For a bonus Gnome, named the philosopher whose quote I ripped off and blatantly rearranged.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Au contraire!
I never thought your philosophy degree was a waste of time!
Without it,you wouldn't be smart.

Carla said...

Good luck!

(What's second prize? Two gnomes?)

Constance Brewer said...

Anonymouse, don't you mean without it, I wouldn't be a smartass? :P

Constance Brewer said...

Carla - SHH! It was supposed to be a secret!

Gabriele Campbell said...

Can anyone tell me why I always get my PMS during the first Nano weekend? It sucks, my writing sucks, the weather sucks, my life sucks ... you get the picture. ;)

Constance Brewer said...

All the better to write battle scenes with, Gabriele!

Kristopher said...

I would wish you good luck, but since it's NaNo month, you really shouldn't be wasting time reading blog comments anyway.

I'll just wish you get back to work.

Constance Brewer said...

kristopher - you live! and are almighty cocky since you put Unleashed to bed. :P Any suggestions on avoiding Scott Oden-Type Ending Paralysis™?

Out, damn'd Ending! out, I say!—One; two: why, then 'tis time to do't.—Hell is murky.—Fie, my lord, fie, a soldier, and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our pow'r to accompt?—Yet who would have thought the old ending to
have had so much blood in it?"
*

*Proudly misquoting the Bard since 1975