JanNoWriMo 2013

WendyN

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Last night I spent three hours editing the prologue and first two chapters of my WIP, and am feeling overwhelmed. I think the problem is that this is my first ever full-length novel I've written (~60k words), so whereas in the past, I could edit through a whole work in a few hours, I feel like there's just so much to do. I've been using this nifty story analyzer which has helped me find a lot of the nitty-gritty issues (overuse of passive verbs, repetitive words, etc), but man, oh, man, it takes forever. :p
 

Caitlin Black

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Okay... So you've probably noticed that I have a habit of making far too many goals. This generally results in not achieving any of them (or only a few) and feeling pretty shitty about it.

The same thing is happening in January already. Too many goals...

So! I'm officially giving myself permission to just edit WIP#1, read and watch DVDs. Nothing else has to be done.

If I can get WIP#1 completely finished and uploaded online, it'll be a huge relief. After that, well, then I'll just have WIP#2 as my main problem to solve, maybe before Uni goes back, maybe not.

But I just have too much on my plate, and it's doing my head in. So starting today, all I need to do is entertain myself and work on WIP#1 to COMPLETION. Mwuahahhaaha!
 

VP_Benni

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Goals? We're supposed to have goals?

(Oh yeah... I made some too... better go see what they were before February starts...)

~Amber~
 

Caitlin Black

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Mmm, goals, yes. Those elusive things that cause me too much frustration. :tongue

In any event, I just edited chapter 2/26 of WIP#1. (I edited chapter 1 the other day.) Or rather, I'm re-editing. At this point, I'm pretty much just adding funny lines (it's a comedy novel) and cleaning up the writing a little. After the extensive edits I did in December, this round should go quicker, easier, and be more fun.

ETA: I added 200 words to this chapter. :) My WIP spreadsheet tells me I've lost words this month, which was from editing WIP#2. Not a lot - but a few hundred.
 

Sonneillon

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My workbook came in the mail so it looks like I'm taking a couple of days off for unrelated research. C'est la vie!
 

wampuscat

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Last night I spent three hours editing the prologue and first two chapters of my WIP, and am feeling overwhelmed. I think the problem is that this is my first ever full-length novel I've written (~60k words), so whereas in the past, I could edit through a whole work in a few hours, I feel like there's just so much to do. I've been using this nifty story analyzer which has helped me find a lot of the nitty-gritty issues (overuse of passive verbs, repetitive words, etc), but man, oh, man, it takes forever. :p

I've used Edit Minion http://editminion.com/, which does pretty much the same thing. It's pretty interesting to see. I don't mind the nitty-gritty edits so much. It's the full-blown adding a subplot or cutting a character, etc., that really makes my brain hurt. Good luck with yours!
 

bdwilson

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Oh, right. Goals. I knew I forgot something ;)

Your revised goals sound much better, Cliff.

And I'm now going to have to check out those tools, because I like new toys :D
 

WendyN

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I've used Edit Minion http://editminion.com/, which does pretty much the same thing. It's pretty interesting to see. I don't mind the nitty-gritty edits so much. It's the full-blown adding a subplot or cutting a character, etc., that really makes my brain hurt. Good luck with yours!
Ooooh fun new tools! Actually, I think I like this one better, at least as a preliminary tool; I like seeing how it all ends up fitting together.

Last night's three hours didn't even get me through a single chapter.

"SHOW DON'T TELL" advice that I constantly read about has been getting to me. I'm beginning to think that I don't really "get" it. Mine is a first-person narration, and part of her persona is that she doesn't share a lot with others, which means that in the early chapters I have a lot of explanations that only take place in her head. I tried mixing it up a bit and creating dialogue to explain these things, but it kind of feels forced :p I'm thinking of scrapping those edits and going back to the original.
 

wampuscat

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"SHOW DON'T TELL" advice that I constantly read about has been getting to me. I'm beginning to think that I don't really "get" it. Mine is a first-person narration, and part of her persona is that she doesn't share a lot with others, which means that in the early chapters I have a lot of explanations that only take place in her head. I tried mixing it up a bit and creating dialogue to explain these things, but it kind of feels forced :p I'm thinking of scrapping those edits and going back to the original.

If your MC doesn't talk much, I could see how that could be limiting. The draft I'm working on now (up to 9K woohoo!) is super dialogue heavy. I'm guessing I'm going to need to go back and add in some action and description along the way.
 

WendyN

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If your MC doesn't talk much, I could see how that could be limiting. The draft I'm working on now (up to 9K woohoo!) is super dialogue heavy. I'm guessing I'm going to need to go back and add in some action and description along the way.

Yeah, she's kind of a down-to-business, efficient, type-A person.... I think I ended up making her that way because I don't feel that writing dialogue is my strong suit, so maybe forcing myself to go back and make more dialogue would be a *good* thing :p
 

Caitlin Black

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Okay, I edited chapter 3/27 for TEC. (26 chapters + an epilogue.)

It's going a lot faster this time, which is good. I might be able to convince myself to edit multiple chapters per day. I didn't last time, because I was spending about 3 hours on each chapter, and was worn out.

ETA: Edited chapter 4/27. Not needing to change too much this time, which is good, because after this editing pass, I'm just going to give it a quick read to make sure I haven't got any glaring errors, and then declare it finished.

I've added about 350 words so far today, which is a stark contrast to the fact that I removed 7k from the novel on the last edit. At this rate, I'll wind up with an extra 2.5k words from this edit. It'll still be a shorter novel than the first draft, but a much better one.
 
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WendyN

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Took some time today to do some "big edits" and am feeling better. For some reason, dealing with the big picture issues and making those big changes energizes and encourages me ("Cool! I made my story even more awesome by adding that!"), whereas dealing with the nit-picky things just stresses me out ("AAaaahhh! I'll never get an agent with all of these passive verbs!").
 

VP_Benni

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I've been on AW exactly two years now. :) I like anniversaries for things... Very good at remembering dates of random events and getting weird looks from friends when I tell them about it. :D

~Amber~
 

Caitlin Black

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Hooray for 2 years!

Now would be a good time to mention the back entrance to this place, where all the shady dealings go down, such as selling each other adverbs and character names.

*whispers directions*

If the mods ask, you didn't hear that from me. ;)

...

Okay, it's early and I'm in a weird mood.
 

VP_Benni

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:roll: Thanks guys. :tongue Feels weird being here for so long... Makes me wonder where the time went... Wonder how those who have been here four times longer than I have feel about that. :D

~Amber~
 

WendyN

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Well, I found out my short story (that inspired my WIP) wasn't a finalist for the story contest I entered it in :( but I found that out on the heels of another request on the NaNoWriMo boards from someone wanting to Beta read my novel (YAY someone is interested in my story!), which seemed to lessen the blow of my first "rejection."
 

Caitlin Black

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Bugger, WK. Rejections suck. But at least you're getting yourself out there. :)

And Vamp, I've been here 3 years, 4 months. Not quite double how long you've been here, but still long enough that I sometimes have trouble remembering what life was like before AW. :tongue
 

Caitlin Black

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I'm pretty sure it was a time when you could walk down the street and see dinosaurs sweeping the sidewalk, when an ice cream cone cost 5c, and when my mind was still unexpanded by awesome.

Although I might be wrong about a few of those.
 

VP_Benni

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You mean back before the dinosaurs knew how to play pool and had to play street hockey with brooms instead? ;)

~Amber~
 

Caitlin Black

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Yes, that rings a bell...

I've been daydreaming about buying a house. I don't have the money, or even any real income beyond a study allowance, but I'm hoping against hope that I can make some decent money from writing this year.

To that end, I really need to get back to TEC (WIP#1) and try to get it out the door. Instead, I just went grocery shopping... Bought some things I didn't really need, but whatever. I got a bunch of things I was either out of or running low on. Like coffee! :D

So after I get my AW fix, I'll make a coffee and try to do some editing. :)
 

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"SHOW DON'T TELL" advice that I constantly read about has been getting to me. I'm beginning to think that I don't really "get" it. Mine is a first-person narration, and part of her persona is that she doesn't share a lot with others, which means that in the early chapters I have a lot of explanations that only take place in her head. I tried mixing it up a bit and creating dialogue to explain these things, but it kind of feels forced :p I'm thinking of scrapping those edits and going back to the original.

Forget the advice. Write the story the way you want to write it.

Edit: okay, maybe I should explain? The only thing that makes people like a story is your own, unique voice. When you get that grinding sensation in your head because you are following someone elses idea of how to write a story it is because you are grinding yourself out of the story.

So, while 'show don't tell' might be generally right, for this story it is wrong.
 
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WendyN

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Forget the advice. Write the story the way you want to write it.

Edit: okay, maybe I should explain? The only thing that makes people like a story is your own, unique voice. When you get that grinding sensation in your head because you are following someone elses idea of how to write a story it is because you are grinding yourself out of the story.

So, while 'show don't tell' might be generally right, for this story it is wrong.

Thanks for this advice... I think this was just what I needed to hear. The changes I had made seem out of place, so I think I'm reverting those paragraphs back to how I had them before -- telling is telling whether she tells it out loud or not, so turning it to dialogue wasn't working. The fact is, there are some concepts of the story that need to be told.

On a different note, my first attempt at writing a query letter has dead-ended halfway through the first sentence. I'm finding that coming up for a 'hook' for my story that isn't 50+ words long is going to be a challenge.