Post-NaNo haze
Dec. 1st, 2013 10:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flonnebonneThank you to everyone who cheered me along and congratulated me for finishing NaNo,yo! It's been so much fun even with the sleep deprivation and stress and carpal tunnel and the itchy rash I developed a few days ago. I am still kind of amazed I didn't quit after day two. It's all thanks to all of YOU and your kind encouragement.
As a reward to myself, I didn't write AT ALL this weekend. (Not a good sign!) Instead I played board/card games, went to a house warming, tutored English for moneys, went to high tea, vacuumed, and cleaned my bathroom. Oh, and found a disgusting buildup of mould on my bedroom windows, because during the month of November I didn't open my curtains at all and my windows apparently let in quite a bit of mould-creating condensation. That is the price of NaNo: window mould.
Time Management
I think there is NO WAY I could have reached 50,000 words if I were working full time this month. I also don't have that many domestic/social/work obligations (and I kind of neglected those) and I live with my parents, so I don't have to cook/clean/do errands all that much. What can I say, I am spoiled.
But how on earth do busy people do NaNo? No sleep? They lock children and pets in the basement for a month? I am amazed at people who are not me.
I did manage to play badminton a couple times, and I went to my friends' houses pretty much every week--but always brought my laptop to work on the novel. They were awesomely cool about this. Same with my family, even when I neglected my responsibilities. I am pretty sure they were secretly annoyed though. Oh well! That is why they are friends and family. They put up with you.
The Novel
My novel is about 2/3 of the way finished, I think? It is pretty terrible!...but I still like it.
It's based on a ridiculous D&D game I run. Most hardcore D&D players would die if they heard about my game: we use rock-paper-scissors instead of dice, and the characters use cashews (or other snacks) to represent their hit points. When they get hit, they eat a cashew. No character sheets, no number crunching, and almost zero prep. It is heaven for a lazy DM like me. Ironically, I didn't play any D&D in November and I think the NaNo plotline is going to seriously mess up the game once I start it up again.
Anyway, you can imagine that a rock-paper-scissors D&D game with a lazy DM ends up being pretty silly, so the novel I am writing is silly too. It is mostly action, and a lot of the dialogue is of the "YAAAARRGGHH! I KILL YOU!!" variety. (Yes, in all caps.) That is me padding my word count all over the place. I do think there is a kind of slightly nifty metafictional idea at the centre of the story, because apparently my favourite thing lately is to write meta disguised as fiction, but the actual action-adventure plot is decidedly lame.
I'm being purposely vague in my descriptions of the story here, because I think I will actually send this thing to publishers. I have to tell myself that or I'll never finish the novel. I'm already sinking back into my natural lazy state and it's only the first of December! Why oh why is NaNo in November? December is such a slack-off month. No wonder so many people don't continue their NaNos.
What I Learned About Writing
1. Writing long stuff is hard. When I write short fanfiction, I usually make up the majority of plot points and character points as I go along, but in a long story you can really end up screwing yourself over when you do that. Good thing I had the D&D campaign to guide me along. Actually, for the the first couple days of November I was trying to write a completely different novel, some metafictional thing on superheroes (I told you I am really meta lately), but without at least a plot skeleton I was writing tons and tons of stuff that would need to be completely rewritten. A big part of the problem was research--the superhero story was set in the real world, so I would actually have to know some stuff, and the stuff I didn't know about was biting me in the butt.
That said, you don't need to know everything when you start writing a long story. As you're writing, you inhabit the characters' minds and they tell you who they are, what they want to do. (I know everyone says that, but I wanna say it too.)
I discovered a lot about my friends' D&D characters and the silly fantasy world they live in by writing this novel. I even made a chart to describe how magic is organized in that world. It's pretty simplistic but it's a start. (Hm. Maybe it'll make my D&D sessions better? I'll have to talk to my players about their characters about integrating the new details though.)
2. Don't edit as you go along. You are just going to delete most of this crap anyway. Intellectually, I already knew that, but I think I needed a push from NaNo to actually put the principle into practice.
3. Scrivener is really, really good for writing long stuff.
4. You can't be clever all the time. When I write short humour fanfics, I stuff in as many bits of wordplay in as I can. If you try to do that in a novel you will go insane. I had to tell myself to stop worrying about being funny and get on with the story.
5. Describing stuff is hard for me. I like writing dialogue. Wait, I think I already knew that.
6. When you push yourself to write every day, you are on. You are a writer. Ideas keep coming. Even ideas for other stories. I wrote down a few thousand words outside my novel--mainly for a couple of original short stories, but also for some long and short fanfiction. It was kind of annoying, actually, being almost constantly bombarded with impractical thoughts about fictional worlds, especially non-NaNo worlds, but it was exhilarating too. In a socially reclusive way, wah.
7. I really do like writing. It is fun. Torture, but fun. I think I need to do it more.
As a reward to myself, I didn't write AT ALL this weekend. (Not a good sign!) Instead I played board/card games, went to a house warming, tutored English for moneys, went to high tea, vacuumed, and cleaned my bathroom. Oh, and found a disgusting buildup of mould on my bedroom windows, because during the month of November I didn't open my curtains at all and my windows apparently let in quite a bit of mould-creating condensation. That is the price of NaNo: window mould.
Time Management
I think there is NO WAY I could have reached 50,000 words if I were working full time this month. I also don't have that many domestic/social/work obligations (and I kind of neglected those) and I live with my parents, so I don't have to cook/clean/do errands all that much. What can I say, I am spoiled.
But how on earth do busy people do NaNo? No sleep? They lock children and pets in the basement for a month? I am amazed at people who are not me.
I did manage to play badminton a couple times, and I went to my friends' houses pretty much every week--but always brought my laptop to work on the novel. They were awesomely cool about this. Same with my family, even when I neglected my responsibilities. I am pretty sure they were secretly annoyed though. Oh well! That is why they are friends and family. They put up with you.
The Novel
My novel is about 2/3 of the way finished, I think? It is pretty terrible!...but I still like it.
It's based on a ridiculous D&D game I run. Most hardcore D&D players would die if they heard about my game: we use rock-paper-scissors instead of dice, and the characters use cashews (or other snacks) to represent their hit points. When they get hit, they eat a cashew. No character sheets, no number crunching, and almost zero prep. It is heaven for a lazy DM like me. Ironically, I didn't play any D&D in November and I think the NaNo plotline is going to seriously mess up the game once I start it up again.
Anyway, you can imagine that a rock-paper-scissors D&D game with a lazy DM ends up being pretty silly, so the novel I am writing is silly too. It is mostly action, and a lot of the dialogue is of the "YAAAARRGGHH! I KILL YOU!!" variety. (Yes, in all caps.) That is me padding my word count all over the place. I do think there is a kind of slightly nifty metafictional idea at the centre of the story, because apparently my favourite thing lately is to write meta disguised as fiction, but the actual action-adventure plot is decidedly lame.
I'm being purposely vague in my descriptions of the story here, because I think I will actually send this thing to publishers. I have to tell myself that or I'll never finish the novel. I'm already sinking back into my natural lazy state and it's only the first of December! Why oh why is NaNo in November? December is such a slack-off month. No wonder so many people don't continue their NaNos.
What I Learned About Writing
1. Writing long stuff is hard. When I write short fanfiction, I usually make up the majority of plot points and character points as I go along, but in a long story you can really end up screwing yourself over when you do that. Good thing I had the D&D campaign to guide me along. Actually, for the the first couple days of November I was trying to write a completely different novel, some metafictional thing on superheroes (I told you I am really meta lately), but without at least a plot skeleton I was writing tons and tons of stuff that would need to be completely rewritten. A big part of the problem was research--the superhero story was set in the real world, so I would actually have to know some stuff, and the stuff I didn't know about was biting me in the butt.
That said, you don't need to know everything when you start writing a long story. As you're writing, you inhabit the characters' minds and they tell you who they are, what they want to do. (I know everyone says that, but I wanna say it too.)
I discovered a lot about my friends' D&D characters and the silly fantasy world they live in by writing this novel. I even made a chart to describe how magic is organized in that world. It's pretty simplistic but it's a start. (Hm. Maybe it'll make my D&D sessions better? I'll have to talk to my players about their characters about integrating the new details though.)
2. Don't edit as you go along. You are just going to delete most of this crap anyway. Intellectually, I already knew that, but I think I needed a push from NaNo to actually put the principle into practice.
3. Scrivener is really, really good for writing long stuff.
4. You can't be clever all the time. When I write short humour fanfics, I stuff in as many bits of wordplay in as I can. If you try to do that in a novel you will go insane. I had to tell myself to stop worrying about being funny and get on with the story.
5. Describing stuff is hard for me. I like writing dialogue. Wait, I think I already knew that.
6. When you push yourself to write every day, you are on. You are a writer. Ideas keep coming. Even ideas for other stories. I wrote down a few thousand words outside my novel--mainly for a couple of original short stories, but also for some long and short fanfiction. It was kind of annoying, actually, being almost constantly bombarded with impractical thoughts about fictional worlds, especially non-NaNo worlds, but it was exhilarating too. In a socially reclusive way, wah.
7. I really do like writing. It is fun. Torture, but fun. I think I need to do it more.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-02 04:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-03 06:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-02 07:08 pm (UTC)I am also NOT a dialog writer. I'm one of those people who think if there are not witty quips and banter in every exchange, then it is boring, people are sleeping and story is shot. So I get really discouraged by that. Descriptions and locales though? All over it.
Sigh. One day I'll finish. One day.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-03 06:55 am (UTC)I find dialogue so much easier than description, if only because it's the type of writing that is closest to the language we hear all day (talking, talking, talking). Hm, maybe I should read more. Anyway, it doesn't all have to be witty. Sometimes you just want to move the plot along. You just can't get too hung up about quality when you're doing NaNo.
Anyway, go you for managing to write even with a full-time job and gaming! 500 a day is nothing to sneeze at. I'm not writing that much right now...
no subject
Date: 2013-12-03 03:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-03 07:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-03 07:08 pm (UTC)I did get some good gaming done in November so I shouldn't complain.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-03 08:45 pm (UTC)I think November is in a way the perfect time for nano, because at least over here it's such a dreary month, and you really rather sit in front of the computer than even think about going out. But yeah... I've a feeling I won't be writing much in December, as it's so awfully busy time. I'm always dead when I come home from work (bookstore before Christmas = lovely place to work at...)
Heh, I kinda like your game & story. You had me at the cashews. xD (Never played D&D of any kind, so.)
The main thing I learned is that if you're really going to write about something you know nothing about, it might be a good idea to do at least a little bit of research before November...
But we did it! Yay for us! ^^
no subject
Date: 2013-12-05 08:01 am (UTC)Ha, my version of D&D is tons of fun. It's essentially just roleplay...inside a slightly violent fantasy world, ha ha. That's what the novel is too, in a way.
Yep, I definitely got bitten in the butt by not doing any research. That's why I asked people whether doing NaNo with just the seed of an idea was a good idea or not! Oh well, I'm glad people made me do it. :D
no subject
Date: 2013-12-05 09:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-05 11:13 pm (UTC)