Chasing Caviar with a Double Shot of Gin Killed My Stomach

National Novel Writing Month last year was a hoot.

I remember the experience being frustrating, but I had a blast. I wrote Christopher De Voss into my book as zombie actor, Chris De Floss. When Susan and Darby ordered a pizza, they asked for the toppings from one of David Harding’s real-life pizzas. Two photographs of a fellow blogger were described as paintings in the book. They are hanging in a fictional gallery on Rush Street in Chicago. I used elements from a pulp fiction story in the book, and the cover is fabulously cheesy with a man in a gorilla head mask. I think it all turned out great.

National Novel Writing Month this year? Blech.

Before I could start my new book, I simply had to finish Maple Leaf Hunter. I wrote over 27,000 words from the first of the month to the tenth. After that, I did a little editing, suffered distractions from family members, and finally started writing for NaNo on the 18th.

The new book is a humorous murder mystery. I love my opening line:
Chasing caviar with a double shot of gin killed my stomach.

You can’t beat a murder in the first sentence, and I was off and running. I raced the clock for the next thirteen days and finished with only a few hours to spare at 52,677 words.

For the first time ever, I wrote without editing, and the book is a mess! There are a ton of crossed out words and sentences that need rewritten. I didn’t research as I wrote, and there are numerous details to look up and fill in.

I generally do most of my writing after 7:00 at night. In the morning, I read what I wrote the night before and clean it up. By the time I’m writing again, I know my book is in pretty good shape, and I’m in the right mindset for going forward.

I took the time to edit the first chapter of my new NaNo book. The word count went down by 735 words! Yikes!

So how are things in your neck of the woods?