NaNo Fail and Honest Scrap Award!

So I didn’t make NaNo’s goal of 50k. I managed 35,006. That’s an average of 1166 words a day, and in my opinion, not too shabby for my first attempt. I was never one to write daily. I power write on weekends, holidays and sick days, but to come home from work, boot up the computer and sit to write…that wasn’t something I could do. Even though I sit at work and write in my head, by the time I got home I was just too tired.

Or at least that’s what I told myself. When NaNo came along, and I decided to do it, I made myself go home from work, boot up that computer and sit to write. Instead of turning on the television, I turned on the CD player and I wrote. I didn’t do this every day, but I’d say 4 out of the 5 work days. I lost a weekend early in the month because of family visits and this past 4 day weekend was completely lost with all the baking and cooking and family.

So there you have it…my NaNo Fail…or maybe, my NaNo near success. Yeah, I like that better.

Now on to fun things…

Tricia over at Talespinning nominated me for the Honest Scrap Award! THANKS! The rules are that I must tell 10 honest things about me and then nominate 10 other bloggers. I’m only going to do 7 because I can only think of 7 honest things about me…so here goes:

1. Bunny rabbits and Hillbillies creep me out. A Hillbilly holding a bunny rabbit—forget about it!

2. I wrote my first novel when I was 19. Then went back and read it when I was 23 and cringed. It was so immature, but at 19 I hadn’t been in love, hadn’t had my heart broken, but by 23, life didn’t seem so rosy-lol.

3. I used to sneak my boyfriend into the basement when my mother was asleep and then take her car to drive him home…she never knew!

4. I had my first kiss when I was 12 by a boy named William Jeffreys. His voice hadn’t changed yet so it was still kinda high. When he called, my mother would think he was a girl and hand me the phone—I wasn’t allowed calls from boys until I was 15—but then my sister ratted me out. Then I had a “girl” friend who called and she had a deep voice, my mother would grill her every time, thinking she was a boy—LOL.

5. A boyfriend of mine bought a sex toy as a gag gift. Then his parents came over unannounced and saw it lying on the sofa. I have NEVER been so embarrassed!!!

6. When I was little, my grandmother used to make me put on her curly red wig and sing Tomorrow from Annie…This is my childhood trauma!

7. When I was a correctional officer, I saw more naked men then the law should allow…this is my adult trauma!

Here are the Seven Blogs I’ve recommended:

Karen Amanda Hooper
Amanda The Semi-Published
Caroline Starr Rose
Carrie Harris
Nicole Green
Stephanie Jenkins
Tere Kirkland

And thanks to all my new followers! Welcome to the family.

Over the NaNo Hump and Bon Jovi

Well, I’m at 31,588k words on my NaNo project! I’m still ahead of the game so I hope I can keep up at this pace. My two WIP’s are moving along nicely. I want them to be done already-lol! Sometime, when I write I want to be all consumed in what I’m creating. I’m like that with one of these projects, but my mind still gets cranked up thinking about it being done. It’s not like I want it to be over because I’m tired of writing it. I want it to be over because I’m anxious to see where it’s going. I’m eager to start the query process…I know, I know, I can’t do that until it’s sat for a while, edited, beta’d and then perfected to my satisfaction, but I’m still excited.

Part of me feels like I’ve turned my back on Light Bringers. I LOVE my story and I know I’ll never be able to shelve it. Maybe it won’t be my debut novel and it breaks my heart a bit just writing that, but I also know that I need to step back from it for a while, for the sake of the story and for my sanity. I’ll live in the current obsession of Dwellers and maybe that’ll let me see things clearly with Light Bringers.

On to other things…





Did anyone see Bon Jovi on Inside The Actors Studio last night? It was AWESOME! And maybe I’m dating myself—who cares—but the acoustic version of Wanted Dead or Alive gave me chills. I remembered watching that video and thinking Richie Sambora was the hottest thing on two legs. When all of my other friends thought I was crazy because they were loving LL Cool J or Run DMC. Don’t get me wrong, I loved Run DMC and LL, but I’ve always been one to explore all types of music, why limit myself? Now, I’ve added Bon Jovi to my playlist for Dwellers. It doesn’t fit perfectly, but it makes me think of desolation, of dusty roads and being tired to the point of insanity but pushing on anyway and THAT fits my new novel. I also have Kings of Leon’s new CD and most of the songs from Linkin Park’s Minutes to Midnight DC.

What’s on your playlist for your current WIP?

NaNo HIGHJACK!

This is not a post about losing my NaNo buzz. I don’t need a pep talk, even though I’ll never turn down encouragement. I was perfectly jazzed about my new WIP and was kicking away at full speed for the last week, cranking out twice the suggested amount needed to have 50k by the end of November.

But then something happened.

Another story highjacked my brain and I mean HIGHJACKED it. Friday morning, I woke up at 5am because my bladder demanded it (which pissed me off because my alarm goes off at 6am and so I was cheated out of sleep). As I lay in bed, cursing the bottle of water I drank too close to bed time and my bladder for not holding on for another measly hour, this scene popped into my head: A girl rigging a bomb while a guy stands guard. Then they are running, trying to out run the rising sun, trying to out run the mutated people climbing out of the burrow holes in the ground around them.

I tell you, it just kept growing and growing and I haven’t been able to think of anything else. I haven't even been able to write up another interview with the next character from LIGHT BRINGERS. (You can check out the other two Interviews here, and here).

I forced myself to go back to the NaNa WIP on Sunday and I still love that story, I’m just cheating on it for a little while. It’ll understand. I’ll bring it some flowers, maybe a diamond, take it out to dinner. We might need to go to counseling, but it’ll forgive me eventually.

This new story will be my NaNo story now. I don’t think NaNo cares, as long as I write daily and the words total 50k, that’s all that matters. I feel confident that I’ll meet that goal between the two stories. I’ve just never had anything like this happen to me before so I thought this could mean something and so I shouldn’t ignore it.

Tell me, ever have a story highjack your brain?