NaNoWriMo - Done!

It's official -- I am a National Novel Writing Month winner!!!! Yipeee!!

Okay, so now what?  Finish the book, of course.  Fifty thousand words does not a novel make.

Thanks everyone for your support, encouragement and friendship.

Ta-ta for now,
Notebook Blogairy

Day 28...

Colored kaleidoscopes are a nostalgic way to view one's past.  The hues help one to see previous events with a different lens; a different perspective.  But that's all it is, a different perspective.  The events are the same but how we now look back at those events tells the journey of how we came to become what we are today.

It's now the predawn of Day 28.  It's really early, or really late -- depending upon your perspective.  Day 28 of what?  National Novel Writing Month.  I've been totally obsessed with it all month.  My word count is almost at the desired goal of 50K.  It's now standing at 47,060 -- less than 3,000 words away.

But what, why do I hesitate?  Why did I watch 5 episodes of Fringe yesterday delaying and shortening my writing time so close to the finish?  The last of the demons?  Who knows.  The real significance of doing this writing blitz challenge is that I've done something very differently from what I've done before.

I've pushed through quote, unquote barriers in time.  I said I didn't have any time to write.  Well in 27 days I wrote over 47,000 words.  I'm not going to denigrate my success by qualifying if the words are "good" I'm going to say they are but that's immaterial.  I wrote an outline with all the milestones of the story.  I have stayed on plot and on track throughout the month.  The characters are relating well to me (they're still kind of pushing me around and doing what they want to do but hey, you can't have everything!), writer's block?  What's that?  And I've done research as well.

I can never say -- it can't be done -- ever again.  I just need to focus and find the time to get the story out of my head and into reality.  Thoughts float from head to head, I've been told.  So, if I don't put it down in reality...someone else will.

I hope you all had a very enjoyable and memorable Thanksgiving.  I know I did.

Day 19...

 National Novel Writing Month was something I had vaguely heard about.  It was so vague that all I knew was that it was some sort of speed writing thing where insane people decided to write a book in a ridiculously small amount of time.  My brain could not conceive of such a thing so it just didn't take it in.

National Novel Writing Month, affectionately known as NaNoWriMo, has been my life, my lover and my all-consuming passion for the past 19 days now.  Somehow, this summer it all just...clicked.  I wanted to write a new novel -- really badly.  BUUUT...I was still revising one that took me 5 years to write (68K+ words).  I shook my head and shrugged my shoulders.  Who needed a new novel when I could slave over my old one.  That was August.  Fast-forward to mid-October and I start getting the emails from NaNoWriMo.  It's gearing up!  I don't really look into it because I lost my username and password!  Too lazy to get it out I didn't bother.  A storm was coming and the news kept telling those on the East Coast to prepare.  (Yeah, yeah.  It'll be a big blow over.  Just watch. -- infamous last words...)

SuperStorm Sandy hit on Monday, October 29th.  The City of New York turned off the MTA so there was no way to feasibly get to work.  New York shut down the schools.  There was no feasible childcare options when everyone was home.  So, after baking, cooking, playing Monopoly and hoarding food -- not necessarily in that order -- I decided to hunt and find my keys to the Golden Ticket of the NaNo experience.

On the 31st of October, I finally was forced (maybe shoved is a better word) to write an outline for the novel that had been brewing in my head since the summer.  It took me about 2 hours but I got it down.  I felt ready to start.  Oh, I managed to find my password and username.  Then, the race began at midnight Thursday, November 1st, 2012.  I had 30 days to write 50,000 words.  That's 1,667 words average per day.  Nuts!

Week 1 was wonderful, exhilarating.

Week 2 was okay, not so exciting because I realized I was EXHAUSTED.  Writing that many words felt like pouring out my brain matter onto the keys and having to do it every DAY felt like sheer lunacy.

By the end of Week 2 I had a breakdown of sorts.  I felt all kinds of crazy, stupid and incompetent.  I thought my life was done.  My job was done.  I was just a hopeless mess and that I had no right to lead/help anybody or anything because I was such a failure.  Yeah, pretty extreme.

At first, I thought I was just having a really bad day but then as it got time to go home I didn't leave work.  I stayed really late.  I then didn't go home.  I wandered around the City.  It finally dawned on me I was avoiding writing.  See, by doing this little itty bitty challenge of writing consistently every day and meeting a goal, I was challenging every demon that every lived inside the four walls in my mind.  Those demons were going apeshit...and I was letting them win.

A very good friend of mine talked me down and helped me to see the garbage and the demons for what they were.  So, while I only got down about 495 words that night I WON.

This past weekend I did a 4-hour writing stint and got back on track because, of course, I had fallen behind steadily all through last week.

Week 3 -- Dunno.  Just embarked upon it.  It feels good.  It feels like a car that has broken into the last lap and has been around the track a few times and it knows what to expect.  Just look to your right and you'll see my current word count.  I'm on track! :-)

I've never written a novel under these conditions.  This is only the second novel that I WILL have completed.  So, the feel of the story, the rightness of the story are still new things to me.  I'm getting on my novelist sea-legs.  Right now, I still have to take 'Dramamine' to get through the ride (read COFFEE lots of it) but hopefully soon, I won't need the stimulus of coffee to keep words flowing onto the screen.

Kudos to the Office of Letters and Light, the nonprofit behind the NaNoWriMo experience.  I want to thank them for making this possible for 299,999 other writers like me to experience a rekindling of their craft.  They even have a challenge for Young Writers!  They are truly awesome.

So, if you've stuck with me this far please take a moment to donate even $1 to the Office of Letters and Light to help keep them going so they can help keep writers all over the world going.

Ta-ta for now,
Notebook Blogairy

Rise Above Mortal Distractions...

Creating another world, possibly in another place or time period, is daunting work.  Yet, over 300,000 writers have embarked on this adventure of writing a novel.  You may say, That's awesome.  But here's the caveat; these adventures must be written in 30 days.

National Novel Writing Month, affectionately known as NaNoWriMo to its adherents, started in 1999.  People write about it, curse it, love it, don't know about it.  Whichever category you fall under if you're an aspiring writer, NaNoWriMo is a site you should visit.  Here's some good advice from writer Carolyn Kellogg -- Get off the Internet.  The other great (no-brainer) idea is to shut off your smartphones, click off the boob tube, and box up any gaming systems you have lying around.

Here in New York, there's a huge built-in distraction that's a hair problematic to ignore...Hurricane Sandy not so affectionately nicknamed FrankenStorm. 

I'm in Brooklyn and we're a lovely little island on the same piece of land as Long Island and Queens.  As you well know, Manhattan is an island as well.  Given that New York has not seen such a bad storm in 108 years, most of our infrastructure is below-ground.  Guess what the waters that overflowed their banks did?  Bingo!  Flood our our infrastructure including our venerated subway system.

I write all of this to let you know that even though my normally 40 to 45-minute commute was an hour and 45 minutes in length on Thursday and a little over two hours this evening.  Yesterday, a companion and I walked from E. 24th Street to Delancey Street before we caught a bus over the bridge (oh yeah, no trains are going over the three bridges connecting Manhattan to the outer boroughs).  Even with all of these distractions, I still have written 4,549 words and it's still technically Day 2.

Writing this post is part of me working on my second wind to see I can get in a few hundred more words in tonight.  The goal is 1,667 words a day in order to keep on pace to finish 50K by November 30th.  I'm figuring that with Thanksgiving late in the month the last few days are not going to be very productive so I should push for the higher word count in early in the month.  Gotta have a strategy right? :-)

So, if you're still here and reading this, and need to read some Sandy stories click here.  Then right after this, click off the Internet and get to writing.  We have only one life.  Let's do what we say we want to do and stop the games.

One last thing, you can't even say you're going to watch the NYC Marathon on Sunday to support the athletes.  It's been cancelled.

The Plot Monster...

Preparing for National Novel Writing Month is much more intense than I believed.  I thought you could have a fully fleshed out synopsis (idea) and then run with it.  Today, I was fortunate enough to have a NaNoWriMo mentor decide to work with me this November.

The first thing she did was sent me a pre-Nano checklist.  Guess what was on it?  My favorite nemesis -- plotting!  She suggests doing a basic outline and characterization for my main characters (at least)!

Okay, okay.  So she's right -- but ouch!  All that has to be done in the next 23 hours or so!  NaNo starts on 11/1 at midnight.  Arrgh!

So, I'll stop complaining and start plotting...my story that is. :-)

Ta-ta for now!

Gearing up for NaNoWriMo!

So, for my entire writing life I haven't bothered with NaNoWriMo.  I've peshawed the entire angst of trying to write a 50,000 word novel in a measly 30 days.  Why?  Because I'm above reproach?  Because I do not deign to mingle with the rabid competitive writers that hold up their yearly wins and bash any with their prizes and status for not participating?  No!

I just never bothered because I thought I was too busy with life's other responsibilities.  In looking at it this year, the kids are older and I'm more sane (or, so I'd like to think!).  National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) now looks appealing, challenging and the great take-away?  Anything you do consistently for 21 (or 28 depending upon which system you follow...) becomes a habit.  So, writing about 1700 words a day becoming a habit does not sound like a bad idea to me! :-)

It's not too late to join, either.  There are 3 days left in which to come up with an idea and an outline for your novel.  Yeah -- you can do that!  But, no writing of the novel!  That's cheating.  Because think about it, if you wait until 11/1 to create the novel idea and figure out the plot structure and characterization, you'll have used up practically all of the 30 days.  This way, you hit the ground running and just have to flesh out your skeleton story.

Get more deets here.  Registration is fun and easy.  Join the group closest to your region for cheerleader emails and information.  If you're in the NYC area, there's going to be a kick-off party on Friday, November 2nd at 6pm in Lower Manhattan where you will meet with other wordies and wordsmiths who can become your NaNoWriMo writing buddies.

Get off your duffus, dust off your keyboard and start plotting your new novel today!

Ta-ta for now,
NoteBook Blogairy

Book Thoughts: Secrets by Liz Schulte

Initially, the switching first person point of view in each chapter threw me.  Viewing the same event from two different perspectives was -- jarring.  Yet, by chapter five, I had totally bought into Ms. Schulte's manner of storytelling.  For this story to be told correctly, it is clear that differing point of view are necessary.

Secrets is a story that asks the question, Can evil change its nature and become good?  In truth, the Guardian series (currently three books strong) ultimately will answer that question but Book 1 (Secrets) lays the groundwork for a fascinating read.

The main character, Olivia, and her best friend, Juliet, have known each other since Junior High School.  They're now in their late 20's and neither have married but they are both having trouble in the dating arena.  Both having recently come out of relationships, they are equally frustrated and feeling lonely for male companionship.  Juliet a bit more than Olivia.  However, Olivia is the one that seems to have attracted quite a male following in only a couple of weeks.  Two men whom she met quite accidentally have peaked her interest -- Holden and Quintus.

Olivia keeps the bulk of what's happening with her from Juliet because Olivia cannot fathom how quickly and how deeply she's fallen for Holden.  It had only be a handful of days yet he was an enigma to Olivia -- a dangerous one at that and Olivia's conflicted about seeing him.

Shortly after Olivia's love life picked up, Juliet met a man also who was totally different from the kind of guys she was used to dating.  However, Olivia and Juliet agreed that a change of pace would be a good thing.  On the heels of their good dating fortune, Olivia's ex-boyfriend dies suddenly throwing them both in a tailspin of emotions that led to them not communicating or sharing as they had in the past.

The unusual non-communication between these two women opens the door to chaos.  In quick succession, a number of disturbing events occur changing the women's lives forever.  These changes also allow the forces of good and evil free reign in the women's lives most times the evil outweighing the good!

Escalating passions, cryptic handsome men and skeptical intuitions are all major players in this paranormal thriller that will leave you breathless and sleepless as you race through to the end.

Secrets by Liz Schulte is a must-read!

Roaming Around in a Quiet Head

Hi Folks!

It's been a while since I've posted and I've been aware of it.  I cannot put blame on my wrist -- it's healed.  (Still in physical therapy with it though!)  So why haven't I been posting?  Did I stop reading?  No.  I've read several books since I've last posted.  However, I wanted a timeout so I could more fully understand what I was 'thinking' about.  Sounds odd, huh?

If you think about it, if you are constantly moving, doing the things that we do in this thing called "LIFE", we get busy.  We then stop thinking and just do.  I've been doing for several months yet very little real writing is getting done.  I am so busy posting, researching, reading and writing reviews, caring for my family and doing 'fun' summer stuff.

It struck me when I had a few days away from my family that I needed quiet time.  In our fast paced society, what is that, right?  It just so happened that Deepak Chopra had a 21-day meditation challenge around the time I began feeling close to burnout.  It started mid July and went until the beginning of August.  The meditations were led for the first few and last few days by Deepak and the other days were led by other meditation practitioners with the Chopra Center.

At first the 15-minute, or less, meditations bugged me.  In my 'spiritual' past, I used to do marathon meditations that lasted over an hour in many instances.  So, the brevity of the meditations irked me.  However, by the 6th and 7th days, the depth of the meditation made me wish the meditation was shorter!  The theme was Free to Love and there were so many aspects of this theme that were challenging for me but I stuck it out and did not give in to the temptation to stop.



At the end of the 21 days, I learned some things about myself that were a tad frightening.  So what to do about it?  More meditations, of course.  In my travels, I found a wonderful CD, Tibetan Incantations: The Meditative Sound of Buddhist Chants.  Playing it now, in fact.  The 3 tracks on this soothe me in a way that's indescribable.  I tracked down and tried over a dozen different meditations I found on YouTube.  I began going back to some of my previous marathon meditation sessions -- all very time-consuming but well worth the effort.

What have I discovered?  I need quiet time.  I need the ability to roam around in my own head and peek in corners that are filled with spiderwebs and clear them out.  I also found out that following your own gut instincts is a wise thing.  So, while I may not publish as regularly as I used to when I do post, I will bring something of real interest to the table.  Posting just to post is not what I want to do as a writer, or as a person.

The next thing I will be posting is a book review of a Native American novel called Restoring Hope.  I am thoroughly enjoying this story.  Even those someone close to me poo-poohed the book and said it would be a sterotypical Pocahontas story.  In some ways, it is.  However, in other ways it's not.  I look forward to sharing with you.

Book Review: What Your Childhood Memories Say About You

Once upon a time, there was a little boy who was the last born child in his family.  He was mischievous, fun-loving and, most of all, he enjoyed making people laugh even if it was at his own expense.  After many years of forging and solidifying this jester persona, his Truth Therapist's (his Mom) words finally began to hit home.  He decided to do better.  His "D" and "F" grades turned into "C" and "B" grades.  He also began getting a few "A" grades!  He finished college and went on to grad school and became a doctor.  What was that little boy?  Dr. Kevin Leman, author of What Your Childhood Memories Say About You.

"As the youngest child in my family, I accepted early on that my role was to entertain people, to have fun, and to push limits whenever possible.  The only way I could stand out from my scholarly sister and athletic brother was to cut my own path, which was by being a goof-off.  Some children strive for attention in positive ways; others strive for attention in negative ways.  But one way or another, all kids strive for attention." (Location 129, Kindle Version)

Dr. Leman's own childhood is an excellent example of his book's premise; that recalling and reviewing one's early childhood memories can reveal what is your "private logic".  Once you know what your private logic is, you can change it and make your life better.  Your private logic is the way in which you view the world and how you respond to the people in your world, or your modus operandi.

You can discern your private logic by recalling your 3 or 4 most vivid memories from when you were 5, 6, 7 and 8 years old.  These memories, once viewed through the filters Dr. Leman details in What Your Childhood Memories Say About You, give you your life pattern and private logic that is probably still driving you to this day.

Dr. Kevin Leman

Dr. Leman believes that your vivid memories are the ones that your mind chooses for you to recall because they encapsulate your private logic.  To paraphrase Dr. Leman, of all the memories you could have remembered, why did your psyche choose the ones do remember?

 This book is a fascinating perspective to view one's behavior as well as the behavior of those around us...including your children's behavior.  What Your Childhood Memories Say About You is an excellent tool for writers, as well.  It  can help them delve deeper into their characters to make them richer and more complex.  So, if you're looking to figure out why you hate peas, or why the color purple makes you smile, or if you want to create a sensational three dimensional character, pick up Dr. Leman's book!


Rating: 5 Blogairy Notebooks

Being a Guest Blogger - Art & the Writing Life

Hi there!  Check out my latest guest blog post on Amelia Curzon's blog Carte Blanche - http://wp.me/p1OGR8-pn

Just to whet your appetite, here are a few images & a very memorable video to get you in the right mindset...