Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Hit 50k Today!

Technically, I "won" the 2010 NaNoWriMo today at around 10am. Huzzah! Practically, I'm a little over halfway finished with my manuscript but still, 50k is 50k. All that's left to do is put my manuscript into the "word count validator" on the NaNo website to make the win official. Authors can start doing this on the 25th and receive (along with the praise and adulation of their peers) one of those nifty winner's badges.

Here are the closing stats for this year's effort:

As of 11/24, I have written 50,257 words. That averages out to 2095 words a day and leaves me with a 193 page MS Word document (double-spaced).

Althought I could continue adding to my word count until midnight on the 30th, I'll be taking a break because I have lots to catch up on elsewhere in my professional career(s) -- including some more animation writing that will hopefully be coming very soon.

PLUS...I want to go back to the beginning and pound out some structural and character issues that need to be fixed. Right around 30k, I realized that I had a problem in my set up that would only get worse if I didn't do some serious re-thinking. Nothing insurmountable, but it would be better to fix these issues early in the game instead of piling more plot on top of them.

In general, I am very pleased with how this year's challenge went. I really feel I'm getting the hang of it as, with the exception of a day or two, the writing went smoothly and was a lot of fun. Thanks for the motivation, NaNo, you're the best!

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Home Stretch

Broke through the 40k barrier today (cue fireworks and marching band). Oddly enough, due to day job related distractions (aka auditions - a good thing), the bulk of the past 10k was written after dinner between 7:30 and 11:00. I say oddly because I'm usually a morning writer who likes to split my word count into 1k+ before lunch and the rest of it anytime during the day when I can squeeze it in. This night writing has been focused and quite enjoyable so, who knows, maybe I'll switch things around for a bit.

One thing I do know is that I get a little nervous I won't hit my word goal when I start late. Maybe that's why writing at the end of the day seems to be working for me. Go fear! Whatever the reason, I'll take the words.

According to my stats page, I'm averaging around 2200 words a day and at this rate should hit 50k on Tuesday 11/23. See you then!

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Feelin' Good at 30k

Hit another mile marker after a very comfortable day of 2431 words. Broke it up in chunks throughout the day so it didn't feel like I was pulling teeth to reach that number. Today's work included a big action sequence that was a hoot to write -- humans, a wizard, and several mythological creatures all squared off for a classic sword and magic smack-down. 

Onward to 40k!

Thursday, November 11, 2010

What He and She Said...

Author John Scalzi scores again with his blog post in defense of NaNoWriMo putting published anti-NaNo snobs on notice to just chill. A quote:

"So if you’re a pro novelist or whomever wringing your hands over NaNoWriMo, remember that hands are for typing, not for wringing, and get back to your own work and let the kids have their fun. If you’re a NaNoWriMo participant and you’ve heard the grousing of the pros, ignore it and enjoy your experience of banging out words. In the end, no one cares how or why or under what circumstances a novel has been created, they care about the words on the page. Readers don’t read process. They read novels."
Go over to his site and read the post in its entirety, then visit published author Mary Robinette Kowal's blog to see the (also) excellent post which inspired Scalzi's spirited defense.  

In other news, I broke through the 25k barrier by cranking out a satisfying 2029 words today, ending up with a total of 26430 words on the 11th day of the challenge. That's over halfway to 50k! Go me.

Monday, November 8, 2010

Chugging Away Past 20k

Surprised myself by hitting this mile marker a little bit earlier than expected. Not complaining in the least, mind you, just surprised. Here are my personal stats thanks to a stat thingy they added to my Nano stats page:

Today's Stats:
Words Written Today 2476
Words to Write until 1667: 0
Suggested Daily Word Count 1667
Cumulative Word Count 20147
 
Total Stats
Current Day 8
Suggested Cumulative Word Count 13334
Average Words per Day 2519
At This Rate You Will Finish On Nov 20
Days Remaining 22
Total Words Remaining 29853
Words per Day to Finish on Time 1357


I find this kind of stuff to be interesting. Then again, as mentioned in a previous post, I'm a "geedork". I'd really like to keep up this pace and "finish" the challenge on the 20th. As always, we'll see.

Onward!

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Some Get It, Some Don't

Here's a snarky anti-Nano article from a snob at Salon who doesn't get it, and here's a well-reasoned response from an editor at Orbit Books, who does.

Bottom line, while we all hope our NaNo project gets picked up by a major editing house and sells a bazillion copies, the main reasons we do NaNoWriMo are:

  1. It's fun.
  2. It helps improve your writing.
  3. You meet some very nice people through the forums and elsewhere online. 
  4. It forces you to get off your butt and give writing a novel a shot.
  5. It helps you learn what it feels like to write on a regular basis. And,
  6. It's fun.
That's good enough for me. What do you think?

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Ten Thousand Words and Counting

Hit the 10k mark today, a full day ahead of my personal goal of reaching that number by Friday. I must say, I'm really enjoying this round of novelling craziness -- we'll see how I feel about it in week four.

This is my first time writing a sequel and I'm liking that, too. It's an interesting challenge to find the proper balance between reminding the reader of what happened in the first book and not laying those reminders on too thick. I think I'm doing okay with that. In the back of my mind I keep hearing the voices of my then grade school aged daughters as they read out loud the later books in a series about a certain boy wizard. When they'd reach such a "reminder passage" they'd invariably sigh and say, "But I already know that!" I'd explain the (brilliant) author wanted to make sure everyone remembered that important bit of information, but the memory of their impatience has stuck with me and guides me. I try my best to "remind" only when it is absolutely necessary.

I'm also having fun spending some time with my characters from the first book. I feel excited about sending them off on a new adventure and even though they're entirely fictional, I sense they're excited about that, too.

In other news...I got nuthin'.

Look for the next NaNo update when I hit 20k.

Friday, October 29, 2010

The New Widgets are Here!



Okay, so I'm a geek. And maybe a dork. A geedork? Anyway, it's just not NaNo until I can slap a word count widget onto the top of this page. There it is on the right in all of its minimalist glory. During the month of November I will update it daily through my NaNo homepage. As you can see, it keeps track of the cumulative word count, percentage toward completion, and the number of days left in the challenge. Feel free to stop by and mock me if I start to slack off.

Boy oh boy! Things are going to start happening to me now!

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Moving Along Nicely...

...on the road to 2010 NaNo-dom. Just finished a rough outline for my next effort in the "month of writing dangerously." This year's novel is a sequel to my 2007 NaNo, Leonard the Great: Dragon Friend (still in editing hell). The working title is Leonard the Great: Boulderhead.

The outline itself is five full pages, divided into nineteen chapters. Most of the descriptions are two or three paragraphs long (per chapter). A few are five paragraphs long, others are only a sentence in length. The idea for this first draft is to get the very vaguest idea of what's going to happen in my manuscript. I have succeeded on that count and am pleased with the overall direction of the story.

I'll spend the rest of October going through this version, revising and expanding the notes I've made. Right now, the story mostly makes sense. Hopefully, it will completely make sense by the end of the month. No guarantees!

I'm not a rigid slave to my outlines, delighting in discovering plot and character elements along the way that I had no idea were coming, but a decent one really helps to get the ball rolling. Although some writers claim they can start writing without an outline, I can't imagine starting something as large and complex as a novel without having a pretty good idea of where I'm headed. Yay, outlining!

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Tick Tock

In less than a month, NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) begins. If you've ever fantasized about writing a novel, now's the time to get your rear in gear and finally do it. I started my outline today and hope to have something coherent enough by the end of October to propel me through the month of November.

The goal is to write 50,000 words by the end of the month. My daily goal is 2k a day which gives me a little pad in case I have to miss a day or two during the challenge.

This is my fourth year of doing NaNo and I've had a blast doing it each time. It's harder than it sounds and easier than it sounds at the same time -- and very satisfying once you reach Nov. 30th.

Come on, you know you want to do it.

Here's the link to my personal page.

Roger Eschbacher's NaNoWriMo Page

Stop by and say hi after you sign up.

Monday, September 20, 2010

It's the Writing, Stupid

John Scalzi, one of my favorite sf/f writers, has posted an inspirational exhortation for those who complain about not finding the time to write. Fortunately/unfortunately, I'm afflicted with a severe case of "has-to-write-itis" so I'm compelled to find the time to do so. However, not everyone is so lucky/cursed and for those Scalzi offers a vigorous kick in the pants of the "shut up and write" variety.

My favorite pull quote from his post:
"But if you want to be a writer, than be a writer, for god’s sake. It’s not that hard, and it doesn’t require that much effort on a day to day basis. Find the time or make the time. Sit down, shut up and put your words together. Work at it and keep working at it. And if you need inspiration, think of yourself on your deathbed saying “well, at least I watched a lot of TV.” If saying such a thing as your life ebbs away fills you with existential horror, well, then. I think you know what to do."
Amen.
 

Saturday, September 18, 2010

Dude, Still there?

I haven't posted in quite some time because I've been working on whipping Leonard the Great into publishable shape -- deciding that I should just get the darned thing done rather than posting about getting the darned thing done. It's been frustrating and a little embarrassing for me to consistently zoom past posted deadlines, so I'm just going to shut up and write (or, in this case, rewrite).

I will say I'm closer than ever and hope to publish Leonard by -- oops, almost did it again. Further updates will come when I get much closer to pushing the "publish" button. Whenever that is.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Leonard the Great's Revised Cover

Here's the new and much improved front cover for the book. I'm quite pleased with it. Thanks to thoughtful feedback from you guys and some inspired design work by Mike Wykowski, it looks much more like a middle-grade fantasy novel and much less like a historical biography.

One of the cool things that Mike came up with was the addition of images from medieval tapestries as a background layer in the black areas. It's a subtle add that features knights and mythological creatures doing battle -- and it looks really cool!

Thanks to Keith, Tom, Steve and everyone else (except the guy who suggested I add Lindsay Lohan in a bikini) for your extremely helpful notes. I asked for feedback and you delivered -- big time.

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Leonard the Great's Cover



Uncomplicated, uncluttered; just the way I like it. I think this cover gives a pretty good idea of what the book is about, too -- a kid doing knightly things.

 I'm very pleased with how it's looking so far, but I'm also (just) smart enough to be open to feedback. Let me know what you think.

Thanks to graphic designer Mike Wykowski for his help in getting it "just right".

Friday, July 2, 2010

Beta Reader -- Activate!

Just a quick update --

Spent the week doing a fairly rigorous edit of Caden before sending the manuscript off to trusted beta reader JZ tonight. I'm pleased with how things are going so far. To me, it comes across as a fun and easy read that I think kids will enjoy. Hope it comes across that way to him, too.

I'm kind of amazed at how quickly I got through the first edit, averaging about five chapters a day. I'm choosing to tell myself it went that fast because there are no errors and the story is really tight. Yeah. Right. Anyway, we'll see.

Hope you all have a wonderful 4th of July!

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