Celebrate!!

Today is one of my favorite days of the year. No, it's not my birthday, or Christmas. (Um, hopefully you knew that already.)

Today is December 1, which means NaNoWriMo is officially done for another year! I love this event, I do, but it is also exhausting, both mentally and physically. I work far too many late, late nights trying to reach my word count, cheer on my region, and oh yeah! This year I added publishing a novel into the mix.

Side note: I will never again publish in November. There are 11 other months of the year when I can release books. It is simply insane to add all that extra work into an already packed month.

However! I am also excited because despite everything else vying for my attention, I am a NaNoWriMo Winner!! I'm thinking of buying the tshirt, which I've never done in the past. This year... I think I deserve it.

So, friends, I ask you: How did November treat you? If you were writing, did you reach 50K? And finally, what is your favorite day of the year?

(Oh, and also... after I wrote this blog post yesterday, I got a fantastic package in the mail. Two copies of my book, in paperback!! There will be more on this tomorrow over at Indiejane.org.)


His Good Opinion can be purchased from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, Amazon UK, Amazon DE, and Amazon FR.

NaNoWriMo: That Dream Within a Dream...

This month we’ve looked at The Princess Bride as an analogy for writing and NaNo. We learned not to listen to our Inner Fred Savage, to keep the faith even when it seems like our plot and our love for noveling has been killed by the Dread Pirate Roberts, to climb to the top of the Cliffs of Insanity, and to turn those random plot devices into Something Big.

Now, when I started doing these Princess Bride talks, I’m sure many of you wondered when I’d get to the Impressive Clergyman. I’ve purposely been keeping you in suspense, but now it’s time. After all… Novels are what bring us together today... That blessed arrangement, that dream with a dream.

Whether you wrote 50,000 words or 5,000 words, you have touched that dream. You took something that was inside of you and chose to share it with others. You stretched yourself, reaching for more than you thought you were capable of. The most amazing thing about National Novel Writing Month is not the novel you’ve written, but what it has done to your concept of possible versus impossible. You are capable of Big Things—we all are.

If your word count is somewhere in the 30s or even the 20s and you’ve already written this year off, think about this for a minute. 30,000 words in four weeks? That’s pretty incredible. Who’s to say you can’t push on and do another 20K in four days? People do it every year. Stretch yourself some more. You might reach 50K, you might not. Either way, you still will have written more than you thought possible 24 hours ago.

To do this, you might try taking a piece of advice from Prince Humperdink: Skip to the end. If you’re like many writers, you’ve discovered that your novel will take more than 50,000 words to tell. You’re probably somewhere in the middle section and you haven’t gotten to “the good stuff” yet. So skip to the end. Write a few paragraphs to sketch out what happens in the middle if you want (it does help the word count…), and then go straight to your climax. Draw out those awesome scenes as much as you want. Milk them for every word they have.

I have one more piece of advice for you: Love your novel. Love the whole experience. This is what matters in the end. And when December comes and another NaNoWriMo ends, we’ll all be able to say one thing: There were five months in the course of my life that I have labeled the most amazing, the most insane. This one surpassed them all.

PS: If you haven't heard, my 2008 NaNo novel, his Good Opinion, is now available for sale!

First Milestone!

Last night, I sold my 100th copy of His Good Opinion.

100 COPIES!!!

To say I'm in awe would be an understatement. A writer always hopes people will read her work, but you never know what to expect until you put it out there. I was fairly confident that some would buy the book right way--those of you who have been so lovely and excited about my release, right along with me. Beyond that, I really didn't know.

I certainly didn't expect to pass 100 sales in just 9 days.

Thank you so much everyone--you are making this a fantastic ride for me.

For those interested in a paperback copy, I ordered the proof from CreateSpace on Thanksgiving and expect it in the mail sometime next week. As soon as I'm confident the formatting will meet my standards, I'll approve it for sale.

His Good Opinion can be purchased from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, Amazon UK, Amazon DE, and Amazon FR. 

Thanksgiving

Today is Thanksgiving. It's a tendency in the blogging world to take off major holidays (as blog traffic drops significantly, and... well, we'd like a day off too). However, as I thought about it this week, I realized I have so much to be thankful for, there's truly no excuse for me not to post.

1. I am thankful for my family. They gave me the love of books that has brought me to where I am today, and to a person, every one of them has loved me and believed in me in a way I know is rare and precious.
2. I am thankful for Chris Baty and National Novel Writing Month for giving me the years of practice it takes to become successful at anything.
3. I am thankful to all the people who've read my fanfiction over the years. Thanks to you, I wasn't nearly as nervous when I published my first book. 
4. I'm thankful for the amazing team of beta readers and editors who helped me improve His Good Opinion this year: Jessica, Kaydee, Mom, Rebecca, Haley, Jaymi, and Carissa. 
5. I'm thankful to Jess (again) for all the formatting help she gave over the last two weeks--right in the middle of moving and doing NaNoWriMo. 
6. I'm thankful for the amazing cover, designed for me by Ed Melendez.
7. I'm thankful for the tremendous amounts of help Jennifer Becton has offered as I traversed the unknown waters of self-publishing for the first time.

And I am so very thankful to everyone who has purchased His Good Opinion in the last week. It's an absolute thrill to know my book is in the hands of readers. You have made my dream come true--thank you so very much.

His Good Opinion can be purchased from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, Amazon UK, Amazon DE, and Amazon FR. 

NaNoWriMo: Hello, My Name Is Inigo Montoya

You killed my father. Prepare to die.

Of all the quotable lines in The Princess Bride, this one is perhaps the most iconic. With the exception of one character (whom we will get to next week), no one in the movie is more associated with a single line than Inigo. It is absolutely central to his character—the whole story of his father’s death and his subsequent quest for revenge has shaped his life.

How does this apply to noveling? Well, the line comes up for the first time fairly early in the story. Westley has made it to the top of the Cliffs of Insanity and Inigo offers him the chance to rest before they duel. While they rest, he asks, rather off-handedly, if Westley has six fingers on his right hand. When it’s established that he doesn’t, he proceeds to tell the story.

At this point, it could just be a nice story. However, a few scenes later Westley and Buttercup come out of the Fire Swamp right into the waiting arms of Prince Humperdink and Count Rugen. After Buttercup has been taken away, Westley notices Count Rugen—“You have six fingers on your right hand. Someone’s been looking for you.” Hmmm… now it’s been mentioned twice, and might actually play a role in the plot.

We learn quite a bit in the next few scenes about how twisted Count Rugen is, and then it’s time for Fezzik to locate Inigo. Once again, the subject of the six-fingered man comes up—at which point Inigo promptly passes out. He sobers up, and he and Fezzik go on a quest to find Westley. You see? The thought of finding the six-fingered man is enough to shake him out of his drunken stupor and finally do the one thing he was meant to do.

I could go on and on here, because really this is the strongest sub-plot in the entire film. By the time we get to that pivotal scene where he’s been stabbed several times by Rugen, we understand that this is no mere throwaway line. “Hello! My name is Inigo Montoya! You killed my father. Prepare to die.”

We are entering Week Four of NaNoWriMo. Right now, most of our stories are somewhere around the Miracle Max scene—build up to the climax—and hopefully, we will all reach our own duel scenes in the next seven days. If you’re stuck for words or don’t know what to do with your plot, look back at what you wrote in the first week (not to edit!!) and find some random line or action that you can turn into this kind of scene. You may find that you’ve unconsciously built one in. Good for you! Take that thematic hint and develop it into a fantastic crescendo of plotty and wordy goodness.

If you don't have one already, that's why I told you to look back at your early chapters. Without looking at the grammar or spelling, skim for something that sparks an idea for this kind of scene. Don’t worry about including extra references to it throughout your story. You can go back and add those later. For now, just concentrate on that climactic duel and boost that word count!

Next week: Marriage. Marriage is what brings us together today...

PS: If you haven't heard, my 2008 NaNo novel His Good Opinion is now available for sale!

His Good Opinion--available now!

Yes! I hit go last night with Smashwords, and you can get the book there in any format you so desire.

ETA 11/21: And now also available from the Kindle store!
ETA 11/22: And now, NOOK!

Paperback formatting, thanks to Jessica Melendez, is finally finished. Once I get the revised cover I'll be able to request the proofs and get moving in that direction.

This week has been absolutely insane, filled with tons of last minute items. Some things were legitimately last minute, and some were of the, "Really? You haven't done that yet?" variety. It was crazy but now the hard work is over!

Thank you for all the help and support you have given me over the last ten months. I started this blog with very few expectations. I thought I might meet a few interesting people, and perhaps connect with some about books.

You have been so much more than that. I've got a whole blog post planned to thank you, but for now, just know that I appreciate you all more than I can say.

Hey guys? I'm a published author!

His Good Opinion can be purchased from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, Amazon UK, Amazon DE, and Amazon FR. 

NaNoWriMo: The Cliffs of INSANITY!!!

This is where you are right now. Like Westley, you have been tenacious in your quest. You have not given up on the thought of holding your own complete novel in your hands at the end of the month. You have sailed across eel-infested waters to claim it, and now you find one more hurdle ahead of you. However, you shall not be daunted, and thanks to all the typing you’ve been doing, you definitely have strong arms.

If you are Westley in this scenario, then Week Three is the Cliffs of Insanity. It is bracketed by the two most important word counts with the exception of 50,000: 25,000 and 35,000. That 10K climb is one of the most important in your entire NaNo experience. 25,000 is obviously the halfway mark. There’s something really cool about being able to say you’re halfway to the finish line. This milestone should come for everyone at some point this week.

The second is even more important. Westley couldn’t just grab hold of the rope at the bottom of the cliff and say, “All right, I’m done now. Toss Buttercup down to me and we’ll be on our way.” No! He had to take the rope in hand and start climbing the cliff. When Vizzini cut the rope, he had to cling to the sheer rock face with his bare hands and continue to pull himself up.

Even though 25K is halfway, 35K is the top of the cliff. That’s where you start to feel like you’re on the downward slide toward home. Taking Westley as our inspiration, once he was at the top of the cliff, everything else was pretty easy. He had to fight a duel, but he won handily. Vizzini? Simple! Iocane power will take care of him!! And then he had Buttercup and all that work was worth it.

If your week is comparable to the Cliffs of Insanity, your story’s week is like the Fire Swamp. “Unless I’m wrong, and I’m never wrong, they’re headed dead into the Fire Swamp.”

Your Inner Fred Savage is probably moaning a little at the thought. The Fire Swamp? We’ll never survive!! Smack it down with Westley’s chipper quote: “Nonsense. You’re only saying that because no one ever has.”

Week Three is one of the most awesome weeks for your story. This is when things start to happen. The characters you thought were pointless will suddenly step on a flame spurt, fall into the lightning sand, and be attacked by ROUSes. In other words, your story will start to develop… a PLOT! PLOT, you say? I don’t believe they exist. Oh, but you will my friend—you will. Just wait to see what week three brings to you. There’s a lot of craziness, and I’m not saying you’ll want to build a summer home there, but the trees are actually quite lovely.

So prepare yourself gang—Week Three is here.

Next week: Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya…