FINISHED!

I just finished the 50,000 words, and I'm so proud! I had to pay for some procrastination in the last couple of days, but it was all worth it. Next time I do this, I'm gonna be more strict that I have to sit down and write SOMETHING, even if only a few paragraphs, every day. It adds up fast! The daily 1,667 comes out to about 2-3 pages a day, so even if you only do one, that's one less to worry about at the end of the month.

I encourage everyone to give it a try next year! The community of the event is really great. They're fun and helpful. I had a great time cruising the forums and listening to the weekly podcasts. There's a really cool team atmosphere to NaNoWriMo.

Most of what I've written is on here, but not all of it. Since I hope to whip this half-novel into shape in the future, I'll be taking this blog down sometime soon. I'll leave it up for a few days or weeks for anybody who wants to take a look.

Thanks to Sam for creating the amazing world of Aethra Firma and to all of the players who breathed life into these fantastic characters. I feel bad for neglecting the Avians and Lot and Chaya, but I could only take so many voices in my head. I think splitting the cultures between me and Sam will help us stay true to the tone and beliefs and state of mind of all of the characters, rather than having it all become blurred together. Though maybe I can actually try to tackle their world when I'm not rushing so fast to spit out words.

Cheers!

Insane Sunday

Well, I took the opportunity today to put a big dent in my wordcount. I'm still behind, but about 6,000 words closer than when I started! I instituted a 500 words per hour policy, starting at the top of the hour and taking a break for the remainder (usually about 20 minutes).

Today I berated Zy, murdered Sharky, got a makeover, tried a new drink, got my boobs stared at, and wiped off my hand after touching a filthy human :P I love Cerulean!

All that and still finished up a research paper and a midterm. A very productive day!

Next is Pigeon Flats! Halfway done with the challenge! Though I still think it'll take about 60-70k to catch up to the current plot.

I'm starting to write shorter segments in each POV. I expected this to happen after everyone got together on the ship and I had a lot more interaction going on between them. I kinda miss the Martin-esque huge chapters with one point of view each. Also, I'm going to be writing around some of the RP's we all did. In some cases, I have no need to rewrite Cyrus stuff that I can just copy paste into the manuscript after my 50k words are done. Other big scenes, I'm skipping to work with Sam on later, or I just liked the original scene so much that I merely want to do some editing on them and not a total rewrite. The 50k have to be my own writing!

:(

I was more correct about Friday than I knew.

Playing catch-up this weekend.

These have been the worst 6 weeks of my life, and I'm not the only one. Please say a prayer for me and an ill friend.

Sam, I want a blog post by Monday night! Very eager to see!

Update

I was really happy with last night's work on Cairo. Felt like I finally hit stride with him as a character and I like the writing, too. I was reading Good Omens yesterday, which was probably a good influence!

I think I wrote earlier in a Zy post that Old Mecha was already levitating... I had kind of assumed that, lol. Lauren and I have done a good job at keeping our respective lore secret to each other. Easily fixed later.

Today's going to suuuuuuck

Rumble

I'm definitely going to tone down Zyanya's trouble in this section once I go back to edit. I had been trying to gradually build up her stress, resulting in an nervous, accidental shooting of Ruby when she meant to kill Cairo. When I got closer to that point (I've managed to stay a few days ahead of this blog in writing), I didn't like how that would play. I'll rewrite this stuff after NaNo to keep her as badass as ever. Still, part of me likes her little panic attack. I like how it rounds out her mental unbalance :P

I felt like this first Cairo part wasn't quite true to the atmosphere I wanted. It's somewhat better later.

I shot Ruby last night! ToT A lot of that sequence of events was switched around, notably the huge break between the gangs after that, Rodney rabble-rousing and Zy attacking Cairo. Didn't seem realistic that Rodney would take that long. He starts the fight before either gang has gone too far.

Thinking ahead to the Anton stuff... I've got a little plan to reorganize events that should work out nicely. Aleksi will be written out or his role in that scene will be minimized... it'll be Zy!

Day 01

Ugh, making little progress tonight with further Cyrus stuff. I want to rewrite what I've done today but I know I simply don't have time for that.

I have a full Zyanya chapter ready to roll but I didn't want to post so much of her all at once. Cairo, Anton, and Chaya are the next parts I'll be attacking soon.