For the second straight year, I won National Novel Writing Month, where the goal is to write a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. It's something like running a marathon, but with words.

Last year, I decided to do it at the very last minute, and soldiered through even though my story was pretty disjointed. At the end, I was proud of having written so many words, but I didn't feel like it was a "real" novel. Still, it unlocked a flood of creativity for me, and really got me past my self-imposed writer's block.

This year, I had a really good idea up front, and spent a lot of time researching and planning. And though this story is still very much a draft, I can see a solid framework in it. I feel like I've written a "real" story.

That said, I'm not quite finished. I'm about 2/3 of the way through my outline. I hope to finish the story in December (at someone of a more relaxed pace), take a few weeks' break from it, and come back and start polishing next year. I want to have something that people will want to read by the end of 2009...

But this is a good start to that, so .. yay, me!

Well, today has flown by, but the Novel Cram was definitely the right place for me. The teacher is FANTASTIC, and really helpful. The first part of the day was spent focusing on "prewriting" - determining the goal of the piece, your main character, their character arc, the inciting incident that starts off the piece, etc.

We all met then tonight and started talking about the inciting incident, the problem for the main character and their goal to solve the problem.

I was surprised when she suggested I skip right to writing Chapter One, instead of focusing on the plot outline tomorrow. I'll of course participate in the session, but for me, she wants me to do writing instead of putting together a plot chart. I was the only one she asked to do that; everyone else will be doing the charts.

I was pleasantly surprised; apparently, the story feels more solid than I thought it did...

Anyway, I'll give more info later, because I'm obviously exhausted and have more writing to do!

So, I made it through my crazy weekend in (relatively) one piece. Here's a brief update (since I know you're all dying to know every detail of my weekend):

( Details behind the cut... )

So, that's it. I did get my advanced submission story for the Writer's Conference into the mail, so that's good. I need to get writing done this week and finishing reading Anatomy. I'm sure there's a bunch of other stuff I need to do, but I don't have enough caffeine in me yet to know what they are...

I'll write another screenplay, this one based on the sci-fi short story I wrote about fighter pilots.

It's trite and been done, but it's just practice, and I like the characters. I've been going over them in my mind all morning. Of the pilots, I really only developed four in the short story: Hera, Copernicus, Dracul and Acer. (And honestly, Acer just had a story - no real personality.) Of the four, one is badly mangled and one dies.

I'll have to develop the other pilots and the narrator, Scout. I'm thinking more deaths, too...but who? Acer's girlfriend Fox is definitely on the chopping block. Dracul? He's the best flyer after Cope and Acer exit, but that's no protection. Even the captain herself isn't safe.

Writing is fun. :)

I won Script Frenzy. Look!

Once my characters started marching toward their denouement, the story happened pretty quickly. This morning, I wrote until they were done. And the story is done; again, it needs a lot of work to get it up to snuff, but for my first screenwriting effort, I'm pretty proud of it.

Since I did NaNoWriMo just after my last birthday, I have finished a novel, a screenplay and six short stories. I can't express what an accomplishment this is; before that, I really had never finished anything. I had a major block about writing, even though I knew I could do it. I would read crappy books that had been published and think, why aren't you doing this? But I never did...

And now I am.

Maybe I'll never be a published author, but I'm now at least making an effort to be one.

And that feels really good.

Well, there are four days left in Script Frenzy (remember? 100 page screenplay in 30 days) and I can see the finish line.

Here is my writer page. As you can see, tonight I hit 82 pages. I wrote 14 pages today, so I'm able to write a lot more pages in a single day. Partly because of the formatting or maybe the fact that it's mostly dialogue and less description, but this seems way easier than NaNoWriMo was. I'll do as much as I can tomorrow, and I see no reason I won't finish before Wednesday.

Moreover, I actually like my story. My NaNoWriMo story was a mess by the end, because I hadn't really thought it out and just kept changing things up. In this case, I kind of knew what my story was about, and because I'd done a short story, I already sort of knew my characters. Granted, one of the secondary characters (Rob) in that story turned into the main character of the screenplay, and this will need a couple of rewrites before it's ready for the light of day...but I can see what this will become.

And I like it. :)

I've got 20 more pages to go, and things are looking pretty dire for Rob. The clock is ticking on the big destructive thing he has to stop; he's separated from his friends and all alone. His friend who is the big fighter is apparently dead, and his "deus ex machina" - Neil - has just been captured by the bad guys.

I have 20 pages to save his skin...

To be "on track" for ScriptFrenzy, I need to write 3.3 pages per day. (100 pages divided by 30 days in April.) Today, the 13th, that would put me at 43.3 pages.

As of this morning, I was at around 26.

I just finished up to 21 pages today, to put me at 47 pages overall. So, I not only caught up, but I'm a little ahead. And definitely on track to be at the halfway mark by April 15th.

The story is coming along well, too. My "heroes" just had their first "test" of their abilities, and I've introduced all of the team of main characters, as well as the main villain. I have also introduced our heroes' arch-nemesis. So, it's all going according to plan...

(My actual screenplay-writing, from a formatting standpoint, is crap, but I figure that part I can go back and tighten up - as long as the story's decent.)

I passed the 1/4 mark today: 26 pages.

It's going pretty well. Some parts are kind of lame, but that's to be expected when writing a draft - especially a draft at this pace. And some of it is actually quite good; the piece I wrote tonight was unexpected (for me, at least) and was pretty interesting.

It never ceases to amaze me when a story starts to tell itself, and you have no idea how it got there...

So, yesterday at about 5:30, I finished my novel. I am now, officially, a novelist.

My Author Page

It seemed appropriate to finish at work, since everyone at work was so supportive. My friend Jay had bugged me (nicely) about my novel every day - sending me daily text messages demanding my word count and shouting as he walked past me in the halls: "Write! Write like the wind!" My officemate (and resident Greek God), Michael, had chosen my novel idea for me out of three front-runners on Halloween day, and had listened patiently while I whined about plot problems. One of my managers actually was an original Municipal Liaison for NaNoWriMo back in the day, so she constantly had words of support.

So, at the end of the day yesterday, I took my laptop into a conference room, and banged out the last 800 words. (Yes, I actually ended the story, too.) When I was done, I walked into Jay's office with the laptop. He dropped everything that he was doing, and we pressed the button where I submitted my word count to the site. When it flashed up the words "You Won", I got more emotional than I expected. Jay was SO happy for me; he hugged me for a good minute, then found another designer to fill out the downloadable winner's certificate with my name in pretty handwriting. Michael, of course, pretended not to care and that he wasn't proud (he and I have that big sister/little brother thing going), but he SO was. :) As good as it felt to win, it was even sweeter because they were there.

The real point of this was that in all my years as a writer, I've never finished anything this long. I've never actually finished a book. Yes, it is rough and needs to be rewritten, but it's FINISHED. Plus, how many years have I wanted to do NaNoWriMo, and always talked myself out of it - I was too busy, my writing sucked, I was not good enough, etc. And as I said to Jay (when he called me cause he just had to say congratulations AGAIN), this is one of those "if, then" accomplishments - if I can do this, then I can do anything!

Now, on to the next one. (Although, the first thing I did was go out and buy an Xbox 360; I've been lusting to play Oblivion again, and refused to allow myself to get it until I finished my book...)