Without a doubt this has been the hardest and most hellish novel writing experience of my life.
Six years and six wins.
But I dare say this has been the hardest win of them all.
So many factors played into the difficultly - health (physical, emotional and mental), school, drama, leading the largest batch of first time Wrimos I have ever done, work, volunteer work, church...on and on.
Each one could have been a "valid" reason to quit.
Every time I got frustrated, closed out of the windows file and just wanted to scream....there was some small little blessing or joy that would help remind me why I torture myself like this.
If I do not write I think I would simply die.
It's so ingrained into me.
It's in my blood.
It is the response I have to so much in life.
As long as I breath I will have a need to write.
Although it seems like with every effort I put more and more of myself into the work and keep coming back so exhausted....but so much joy, so much lovely insanity!
Thank you for reading this blog throughout the month and although Nanowrimo 2012 is over Lame Creations is NOT.
All the latest and greatest in projects will be posted on here.
Thank you again everyone for being you.
For the support.
And the love.
-Matt
Not much to report.
Words were written.
Sinus sickness is coming back with a seething vengeance.
Between the sinus/head/lung pain and gunk I have managed to add more words.
I find it so weird that I seem to find a need to write an appendix and nearly encyclopaedic for each of my novels...detailing character history, biographies, written documents, poetry from characters, popular songs and this general mishmash I would say that almost could be considered a tabletop RPG supplement.
I'm working on the middle and have written half the climax leading up to the final showdown and battle at the old sanitarium.
Should be good stuff.
I'm also thinking of trying to better flesh out the World War I flashbacks and memoirs of the main character.
Did you think it was over?
That I quit?
That all the faulty technology, failed holiday plans, impossible to formulate homework, plot changes I couldn't keep up with and health problems were going to stop me?
Not on your life.
If you wish to know what has happend the past few days please look at the graph located on this page:
There is a bunch of plateau followed by explosions.
I have had trouble making myself work on the main plot so I started working on back story, diaries and stories. Emails and IM conversations between character set between 70-100 years into the future anaylyzing the event which my story was supposed to be about.
It's strange.
Weird.
Don't even know what genre it falls into..."Post-Modern Fourth Wall Jumping Self Criticizing" perhaps?
Don't look at me.
I don't writer or teach English Literature, I just help to lower the standards so others can be more easily published (Ha just kidding, Stephanie Myers I'm looking at you) but regardless of one's taste one has to enjoy words and their forms to do something as stupid as first draft writing in a month.
I'm drained and although it feels like I haven't...I still have managed to make headway (although less than twenty-thousand words left there are other writing issues demanding immediate attention) but I do regret slacking on the blog...but something has to give.
What is a bit of sanity loss?
Worst case you just roll another character sheet, right?
Oh wait.
That's me getting way too meta again.
Gotta stop that before reality breaks down.
At least dividing by zero hasn't happened on this blog...yet...
All the meta-meme related mind rolling around aside...the week is coming to an end sooner than I like and with it comes to end of what is always a beautiful, fun and tortured month of creation.
I'm not entirely sure why but this year has felt especially painful.
I have had some personal issues I won't bring up.
But as dark as the material in the book is, I'm hoping the positive and good can also be seen.
Where there is darkness the light shines ever so brighter.
But sometimes we see things best left alone.
What do we do then?
In this writer's case, dive head first back into the novel smashing his keyboard over anything that moves until the last twenty-thousand words are finished and I can safely begin to panic about homework and writing a ninety page thesis.
With everything either winding down or falling apart...I'm tired.
Not much to say.
I just wanted to let people know I'M alive.
Looking for a second wind.
Some air.
A perspective on something.
-Matt
Changes in the plot of our ...novels and life aren't always bad.
Sometimes the bad has to happen so we can grow, see things from another perspective or even new prospects.
With my worldview, I don't think God makes evil but because of our bad choices we have to suffer the consequences of our actions.
ave ge
We have choices to make.
Small and big. I'm not sure it's possible to go through Nanowrimo without doing the kind of soul searching that terrifies most people.
Forget the idea of an infinite all knowing God...we do our damnedest to hide from God, others and mostly ourselves. We justify, we write off and we delay...because we're afraid of being seen for who we are:
Imperfect.t be
Blemished.
Broken.
Needy.
Adrift.
But part of being human means that we need something bigger than ourselves.
Community for one.
And having an insane number of novelists writing with me has helped make this year something special.
I've never had this much back and forth interaction and feel I have genuinely made some friends.
As always the choice is ours of what to do next.
Where we go.
What we do.
I hope you all have an equally revelatory experience with this writing stuff.
I know I have.
It can just be so hard to express it.
Good luck.
-Matt
Inspiration seems to come in bursts.
Like how my cell phone tends to stop working when I actually have offers for work.
Or need it to help organize a trip.
Breakdowns happen.
Bad things occur.
Wasn't there some sort of quote about integrity being what you do when everything falls apart?
While I'm a fan of Christian Anarchy, I'm not a fan of anarchy by itself.
There must be a purpose to rebellion.
And if I could lead a rebellion it would be to murder every single cell phone on this planet.
Wipe them from history.
Eradicate them from ever being.
That is where I stand in the novel writing process.
Wanting to destroy cell phone technology.
How is YOUR writing going?
Hopefully well!
As for me I'm just going to give into the madness and find a way to make this a plot point or at least some meta/fourth wall breaking.
-Matt
When we are in the darkness, it feels like there never was light.
That the darkness will always be there.
These feelings of dread, this pain and not knowing is part of the adventure.
I was struck by a scene from a novel.
The scene is from C.S. Lewis' Chronicle of Narnia series.
"The Silver Chair" particularity.
I won't sum up the story except to say that at one point the main characters get trapped underground and all of them except the most negative person get bewitched into thinking there is no surface world, no Narnia and that they never needed to leave.
When Puddleglum figured out what was going on, he gave this amazing speech:
"One word. All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder.
I'm a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face
I can on it. So I won't deny any of what you said. But there's one
thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made
up, all those things - trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and
Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that
case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real
ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world.
Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when
you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're
right. But four babies playing a game can make a playworld which licks
your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play-world.
I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going
to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So,
thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young
lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the
dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will
be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as
dull a place as you say."
The Dark is unavoidable.
Failure is unavoidable.
Death is a question of when and not if.
Right now the selfdoubt, the self loathing, the inner editor and every single insecurity you have ever had is screaming at you to quit.
That you are a failure.
That all there ever was is this darkness.
I know because that swirling mess of dark is in my head.
And has been every year I have done Nanowrimo.
And every single time I dared.
Think about what you have been doing these past fifteen years...writing, creating and crafting.
A world that did not exist until you started the Word document.
No matter what The Dark may say that world is still there and needs YOU.
You owe it to yourself to sit down and be willing to feel the sting of failure by trying.
I have plenty of reasons to quit Nanowrimo.
To quit school.
To give up on life.
To give up on people.
But I am a Narnian.
I refuse to let this dark hold me.
The Dark will fight like hell to stop you but together we can make it through this.
By putting one foot forward, one step at a time, one prayer at a time, one breath at a time, one word at a time we can do this.
It's okay to doubt, to be afraid, to long for clear skies and hope.
I promise this darkness will end and The Dark cannot claim you if you resist.
Together, dear Novelists of Narnia, we CAN do this!
For a higher word count!
For a messy first draft!
For Narnia!
And for Hope!
I do not even want to write this stupid blog post.
In quite a number of ways it feel like life is crashing down (papers I am finding impossible to write, subjects too hard to condense, broken phone making it impossible for me to contact work - and NO we don't actually HAVE a house phone; that would be too convenient, physically I feel like crap, bills are mounting, every day it feels like the Chicago tripped that has been planned for a year and a half won't happen...and you know there is most likely a dozen more reasons to be angry/annoyed/depressed/stressed and want to pile all of my earthly possessions in one large mass and burn everything, including EVERY scrap I have ever written.)
Annoyance.
Depression.
Angst.
Confusion.
Being an adult sucks.
As a child you assume that when you turn twenty and graduate from university you will be handed a step-by-step guide on how now to screw up your life and how to be an adult.
I did not get such a thing.
Instead in the Freshmen orientation that began with a speech from the University President about how we would be learning to love God, become better Christians and meet our spouses by the time we graduated.
I did not have my spouse when I walked across the stage.
I either missed the sign up sheet or feel my school owes me thirty grand and a taco.
Tacos are much easier to manage than a relationship.
For those who do not know, writing is hard.
I can only speak for me but it's like how John Lennon talked about writing music "You just cut a vein open and let it bleed"
I let my soul bleed all over my poetry, my essays, my stories and everything else I do.
That (and integrity) is why I agonize over the smallest school assignment because if I'm writing something about Jesus, myself or both of us I am going to make damn sure it is the Truth. No matter how painful it is to face a perfect being and admit to being a screw up...I can't be too proud to accept grace because it's the only reason I am pulling air into my lungs right now.
Mediocre and self assured Christian writers who pat themselves on the back, offer three step formulas and act like we can divide all of humanity into black/white, good/evil, beautiful/ugly stereotypes and tropes are perhaps the ones in my faith I loathe the most (after Pat Robertson and the Contemporary Christian Music Industry.)
I want to be published.
Who doesn't?
But I am a moderate.
I feel it's important to show humanity.
I want attention.
All artists are attention whores who thrive off of being given shiny medals and told we are special.
But this...this writing.
I just want to stop caring.
People will read this.
Someone WILL get it.
They may do something with their soul being stirred.
Or they could just become a burned out recluse like me.
I cannot express the beauty I have seen.
Jesus is the most eloquent and beautiful phrase.
I hate this world.
I love people.
I hate your and mine governments.
They are self serving vermin who only want power.
And the one's who claim to love Jesus do so just for votes.
I am sick of the fear.
I am tired of the self loathing.
I do NOT want to hide the fact I love art and words.
I want to scream out the convictions in my heart.
I don't care if anyone listens.
I've held in the stories and the Hope and it burns in my bones.
Take from this what you will but I'm reaching an impass and things cannot remain the same.
Either I change.
I evolve.
I grow.
Or I die.
It's the way of life and writing.
The show must go on.
The poets must write.
The singer must sing.
People can listen.
Or turn a deaf ear.
As far as I'm concerned it's not my problem.
Bury your heads in the sand.
I have work to do.
I leave you with some words from one of the only Christian bands I respect:
" is it difficult to speak your mind when the world hates the things you have to say?
oh they screech and they bray, there is doubt and dismay, may the sun set on this day
when you dragged all of them effortlessly straight into the dark
while they where there they wondered:
what if the kings that we've put on their thrones aren't really kings at all?
what if they should fall?
and all of the false gods that we're prostrated before have no gracious reign in mind
what if we wake up to find ourselves coiled in their ashes?
we will finally start to wonder what it is that we should leave behind
we'll see the signs and realize there's never been a better time to overthrow the principalities
in all our words, in all our deeds
and storm the gates of hell to show them they will not prevail
if all our hopes and all our dreams fall on deaf ears
then let them see
the gates of hell will not prevail
and you've broken the chains on me
i needed to be vindicated for all of my frustrations
but dragging all my grievances was heavy as damnation
i don't need to feel so right, but I badly want to feel alive
i'm done with a contest of wills
and i'm not afraid to die"
-Showbread, "Two-Headed Monster"
Nearly halfway through the month!
And I am only a quarter through my novel.
In the past I've written anywhere from 12-35 thousand words over the last 72 hours of the competition but because of four papers due right at the beginning of December that is not a wise move.
The great thing about taking overlapping classes in historical theology is how I have so many of the needed resources on my bookshelf and more than a couple of papers written that I can borrow ideas/themes/motifs from and grow something organic and new.
The fact the main character in this horror/pulp novel is an ex-WWI chaplin/divinity professor no doubt has to do with the fact I have been writing theology from both ends of the candle stick...although I am not exactly sure how that metaphor works.
Uh...moving on...
I love an empty mailbox.
As far as I know I have replied to every single person I offered to mentor, helped some people with developing story ideas and helping them rediscover their plot in the midst of the writing frenzy.
Here is an example of the plot outline using this year's story 'Codex Shredder':
1.Professor Thomas is a conservative divinity teacher in the North East who has slowly been feeling out of place and time, however he discovers a cult on campus and a large unreported amount of students missing.
2.This cult is ran by a well financed chemistry professor whose social standings make him untouchable and seemingly beyond reproach.
3.Assembling what few allies he has, Thomas is forced to take up arms and relive his personal horrors of WWI in flashbacks while staging an assault on the cult and the abominations they have both created and summoned from beyond this world.
It's much wordier than I prefer but considering how insanely tangent filled my works tend to become I'm rather proud the story IS as straight forward as it is.
That said, it is never too late to start Nanowrimo.
There is a deep need inside all of us to express ourselves and one of the best ways is by writing.
Every word you write is one you have not written before and may be the release you need to find freedom.
Goodluck to you all in your writing endeavors!
-Matt
Another day, another day of some writing and all sorts of things.
I'm not entirely sure.
The lack of sleep is most likely not helping.
Words.
Writing words.
My brain if feeling all mushy.
I think I'm going to try and write some and see what happens.
Hmmm...will need to find sleep.
Sleep will make the word thing happen easier.
It's been a day of rest, a day of being tired, a day of sleep, a day of church and a day of playing games and a day of finding a corner to try and evaluate where my novel is going and should be going.
I'm at the gaming store now and "The Hunger Games" is playing on the large screen and it's a bit of a distraction but the dark look into the human psyche is acting to help push my imagination.
Dark look into society and humanity.
Which my novel has.
Here is hoping that things get pushed beyond the dark and into hope.
I think the easiest thing possible is for a story to stop at the easy point...which is portray humanity at it's darkest, most disgusting and worthless bits...but find something more.
The humanness of being human.
Making a caricature...some exaggeration of qualities and traits is easy...it's what actors do all the time on stage. But every time out of a thousand you get an actor and role in which something clicks and they are no longer a player playing something but they are the character in the situation.
That is what I wish for my writing to do.
To transcend the normal temptation of leaving things uncomplicated.
So that the characters are allowed to be flat.
But to get somethign more...it takes more.
And to get to that point it requires writing.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Part of Nanowrimo is that forced disicpline that at least ONCE a year I will write a novel.
No matter what,
Because otherwise there will be one less story told that needed to be.
That is my thoughts at least.
Certainly one reason I keep going.
Need.
And the hope that by writing it will do something unique, something special.
Just some random thoughts on the Nano'ing night.
-Matt
We're almost a third of the way through this noveling dream (and sometimes nightmare).
Currently we are going through what is known as The Dreaded Second Week. For the average Nano, this is where plots start to get tangled, ideas start to feel very stale and in general one starts to question WHY they are doing this when they can be doing something more productive like laying in bed and watching the ceiling fan spin.
From having done this for five previous years my "week two" starts around day three. I can typically write enough and get excited energy for those first few days...and then I just feel the creativity get sapped away while I'm distracted by other things.
One cure I found to this is getting hooked up with other writers (which action as a mentor has helped incredibly the past couplf of years) and another cure I like to use involves finding some movie or TV show that relates to your novel's theme/genre and give yourself a couple hour break.
Tonight I decided to watch the James Cameron sci-fi horror, thriller, action film Aliens. While not exactly tied to my novel in terms of setting...the tone of the film is something I hope to capture. I am not particularly attracted to the typical horror genre/tropes because of it almost involving people who are unable to defend themselves and just the same tired cliches.
However I love the idea of there being this huge, giant, impossible horrifying evil...and a group of people saying "So what? We all have to die someday and if we're going to die we might as well do something about it."
I hope that does not sound entirely fatalistic so much as I find the idea of good vs evil on a grand scale to be fascinating. Infinitely so when it is infinite odds where good has to decide if the fight is worth fighting (an analysis of integrity, deep held beliefs and willingness to sacrifice it all in order to do the right thing...because it is the right thing.)
For me at least, I have trouble writing characters until I understand them, their hopes/dreams/beliefs/desires/etc...both the good and evil ones. It doesn't have to make it to the text of the novel because once we know them it's like having a conversation with a friend...the words tend to come much easier.
I'm going to try and log in at least a thousand or so words before calling it a night.
Hopefully. We'll see what happens. Monsters of evil exploding, improvised weapons being created and hope is still flying. -Matt
A bit late posting this blog.
Better late than never, eh?
The charity food raising event for the local food bank seemed to go off without a problem.
Evidently the store will continue collecting goods up until Sunday which makes me happy...more days, more people to entry and hopefully more chances for people to give.
This weekend will either be insanely busy or quiet.
Not a clue which.
I'm starting to feel really worn out...mentally.
We're in the second week of novel writing which is where things get complicated.
The novelty, the exciting bursts of newness are wearing off and I know from personal expreine how hard it can be to put to coherent sentences together.
It's the point I always want to quit.
Run away screaming.
Go do something more productive like burn every scrap of writing I ahve ever produced.
But something that is easy to forget is that story is best developed organically and part of that development comes from conflict...either outside or inside the story.
I am finally starting to feel less sick.
Feels as though it has taken a small eternity.
The strangest thing about Nanowrimo this year is trying to force myself to write a daily blog and summary.
It's painful to say I didn't meet today's word goal and that each day I am more behind.
But at the same time it's liberating to be free.
This is a contest not against other people but against myself.
The prize is self discovery, mining creative thought.
It's actually setting aside time for work.
Important work.
Each story is important.
I tell every person I mentor THEIR story is needed in this world.
Because it is the truth.
It's a truth I have to remind myself of.
Besides blowing things up, one of the few things humanity excels at is telling stories.
It's part of our nature, something that helps give meaning to life. Making order out of chaos.
In it's own little ways.
It's a scaled down way of looking at life...all of these little decisions we make that build into what we call a lifetime, how each of the act and interact with one another.
I have no idea how coherent any of this is.
Feels like a bunch of random musings and philosophy thrown together...because, well, it is.
I'm just happy to be feeling less sick.
It's wonderful.
Going to keep going.
Wake up, get situated and take care of business.
But that means going to sleep.
Which I am ready to do.
Goodnight world.
Good luck to those noveling along.
-Matt
Sickness is running rampant and I managed to get the plague.
Or whatever the modern equivalent is.
Some hybrid flu or something.
I'm alive.
Not really writing.
Trying to look on the bright side.
All the silly people I'm mentoring seem to be doing well.
Some are ahead of me (pride dictates the teacher must never fall behind the students) but I'm planning a grand noveling comeback!
As well as trying to have almost all my homework done before next week.
That is a lofty goal but since a trip to Chicago seems like it will happen, the less stress I have for that the better. (Chicago TARDIS and seeing friends that are family)
But yes...priority in the morning is finishing up a paper, reworking an old paper into a new paper, breaking ground on a third paper and writing novel.
My weekend schedule is going to be free (except for a charity Magic:The Gathering tournament I helped organize for Friday night) so there should be several good novel writing hours.
So far I have managed to write every day about writing.
I may have missed my calling.
As I once heard:
"Those who can't do, teach. Those who cannot teach, write. Those who cannot write, consult. Those who cannot consult do motivational speaking."
I think I found a calling in a bit of everyone of those.
Good luck writing out there!
-Matt
Five days in and my novel is starting to feel like a millstone.
A lovely millstone set in the 1930's involving mad science, tomes of great evil, sawed off barreled shotguns and enough existential grief and horror to sink a small ship.
The main hero, which was much to my shock, is a divinity teacher at Miskatonic University.
Which if any of read H.P. Lovecraft is a strange place to find a sane divinity teacher with mostly orthodox beliefs.
Depending how loosely one wishes to apply the "Christian" label to something, I would very tentatively call this a Christian Horror/Suspense that is becoming more reminescent of pulp fiction of the 1930's which Lovecraft himself wrote only a couple of pieces in that sub genre.
Typically he focused on the fact we live on a small dot in a huge ocean of tiny dots and have little to no control over what happens to the dot and our dot could be swallowed up in an instant by some unfathomable horror. So if hope has chosen to exist in Lovecraft country that means heroes cannot just die, they have to fight and blow things up. As soon as the novel informed me that part of the line up of protagonists would include a senior studying chemistry and pharmaceutical I knew where those explosives and explosions were going to come from.
And most Christian novels tend not to feature anything more intimidating than a fluff bunny and it's not even the white bunny from "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" Add in the fact that this will include a body count, some adult languages, adult situations, monsters from the deepest part of the human psyche, some deeper underlying thoughts on hope and actually I feel that I have a Molotov cocktail of a novel. I hate the stigma of things labeled Christian but what do you expect from someone who is paying to sit around read theology, write theology, discuss theology, defend theology and think about it while sleeping. It's sort of a natural progression of things...I like tensions and dualities meeting up.
Light/dark, material/physical, metaphysical/concrete, literal/imaginative, dreams/reality, faith/disbelief, Good/Evil, etc and etc.
It's as Christian as Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter so far...except so outside of a genre that perhaps even labling it this early is a disservice to the work itself. I never really felt I wanted to write Christian fiction because what I write has no appeal for that section of Barnes and Noble labeled "Christan Fiction" and the stories I try to write are usually so organically strange that it's like trying to catch mist.
I'm not sure. Regardless. Writing is happening here, there and around the world. Voting is tomorrow so if you're in the United States go vote. Don't forget to feed your pets either. Good luck to those writing! -Matt
If I had to pick a title for this blog it would be "Time Management - or how I have never developed that skill and it is slowly going to kill me".
It is only day four but if it wasn't for the fact I managed to surround myself with such an absurd number of people with Nanowrimo I would have already found a cave to hide in.
I have talked more about writing in the past four days then I have actually wrote. I think I may have found a career: Novel Motivational Emailer. I would feel too guilty to charge cash so I would be paid in food, possibly in kittens since that is the preferred currency of the internet anyway.
...I had a point somewhere.
Although I am behind word count (roughly a day and a half) and still playing catch up with school work...a half dozen other things are waiting to ambush me in the coming weeks. I am the sort of person who need structure in order to function effectively so whenever I am not in school or have a regular work schedule my personal life sort of dissolves into this ineffective free-for-all of unfinished projects and forgotten ideas.
That said...I'm going to try and block out tomorrow and have set times.
Something like:
8:00-9:00 AM - Return calls to companies about charity food drive
9:00-11:00 AM - Reading Homework
11:00-12:00 AM - Paper Writing
12:00-1:00 PM - Lunch/Sanity/Walk break
1:00-2:00 PM - Get caught up on email
2:00-4:00 PM - Novel Writing
4:00-5:00 PM - Reading Homework
5:00-6:00 PM - Dinner
7:00-11:00 - Novel Writing and Nano Homework
11:00 - ???? Sleep...?
Or something to that effect.
Everyone operates on their type of schedule.
With class I believe I'm expected to do somewhere between fifteen to eighteen hours of prep time each week for all my classes with research and writing.
With part time work thrown in the mix when I get called it's not an exact day to day schedule but I think it will at least help me maintain some semblance of balance and sanity during this noveling month.
Regardless today's theme was scheduling and balance.
Brought to you by Nanowrimo and Insomnia.
Thank you ladies and gentlemen.
Goodnight.
Somedays you write five thousand words with ease.
Somedays you stare at the screen and decide that you've been staring at a screen for far too long and you need a break.
Being sick certainly had a major factor in it.
Day three consisted of alot of sleep, errand running, laying down, thinking, conversing with loved ones, trying to sort out some issues and plans...and in general not being around the novel.
Time away from Nanowrimo (in select and planned amounts) can be good.
Too much time away and you lose momentum.
But even if words are slipping away and it feels that time is the enemy (isn't it always?) it is okay to step away and get a breather.
Live too much in the novel trying to fine tune details and you can completely loose perspective and track of everything.
I cannot say the novel was not on my mind at all because when I start a writing project it becomes a part of me until it is finished. It sits there crying for me to come tinker, to work, to commit more of my soul, blood and energy to it...and sometimes the right answer is no.
But for a time.
Because there IS a time for everything.
Including writing fifty thousand words in a month.
This is your time.
The work you are doing now is a gift you can give to yourself that no one else could ever hope to.
The more I have written the more I have discovered about me.
In more ways than one, writing the five previous novels helped shape me into the man I am today.
Art is funny like that.
We attempt to shape something that ends up shaping us.
Pushing us.
Pulling us.
Directing us into paths we never knew existed.
It's often times scary.
Change always brings the unexpected.
But after a day of rest, I think it's time to see what's beyond the looking glass.
-Matt
Why do we wait?
Fear is typical and my reason.
Fear of the unknown.
Fear of never getting things right.
Fear that is we wait long enough things will work out for us.
Fear is powerful.
It's intoxicating.
It is why people stay in bad careers, unhealthy relationships and never bother to set goals because in their mind the battle has been lost.
One of the most simplistic but ingenious things which Chris Batty stumbled into when he first started Nanowrimo back in 1999 (if you haven't read 'No Plot? No Problem!' it not only has the full story but a lot of good advice) was how deadlines are great for creativity. Most humans, unless pressed, will take the path of least resistance in every area of their life.
Including fun, art and pleasure.
I found this post to be an interesting take on the notion and hope you find it as helpful as I did.
"Don't cross the streams." -Dr.Egon Spengler, Ghostbusters
Hooray. I have three separate streams and channels of time with this story. All in under two thousand words. I'm not sure if that is a new record for complexity for me or not.
I've met the word quota but I'm still going to keep going. I've never had THIS many mentees and people working on/with/talking to about Nanowrimo so I want the getting to be getting while it's to be had and good.
Somehow I managed to merge the idea of Gothic horror, time travel, Cthulhu Mythos and my little writing universe all together.
The novel is of course set in my universe of stories and is taking many cues from the H.P. Lovecraft Cthulhu Mythos. The first and what may be the most important part of the story takes place in the 1930's around Miskatonic University. The second time line is in the early 2000's where it appears a writer's work is coming to life as he is writing it. The third timeline takes place in the 2010's and is about an investigation by a freelance agents trying to reconcile the events of the first two and how it was possible for something written around 80 years later could have the same date and times line up and in effect the document seem to be an exact retelling or somehow responsible for said horrific events.
Because the events were horrific.
Dead students, indescribable sentient black oozes and what appeared to be some manifestation of a nightmare that appeared part human and part insect.
But I digress.
It could be the pressure from life, school and trying to keep up with everyone but I have never written so much of a novel this quickly before.
I advise everyone doing this silly novel trip to seize upon the energy of this first week and TRY to get ahead! Right now the skies are clear, the birds are chirpping and this may seem like the best writing you have ever had.
But the second week is when things get insane.
We will not worry about the dreaded Week Two, so in the mean time write!
Frolic in the newness of the novel!
Enjoy the fact you ARE writing!
You are writing a novel, ergo you ARE a novelist!
Never let anyone tell you different!
