He’s Baaack!

National Novel Writing Month, you have been conquered. My book is finished, and I’m four days early. Whoo-hoo! I finished at 8:42 p.m., and the final word count is 52,452.

Considering I’m easily distracted, I’m proud of my achievement, and the book is quite entertaining, if I do say so myself. I think this calls for a celebratory interview about the book. My favorite interviewer just happened to be nearby when I stuck my head out the back door and whistled down the street. He’s settled at the kitchen table with me now.

Cranky Interviewer:  I thought I told you not to call me when you finished this book.

Me:  There was no one else available, and I’m excited to get the news out.

C.I.:  Just so we’re clear, I want cash this time. … The title is Windy City Hunter, right? Was it windy?

Me:  Yes, Windy City Hunter, because the setting is Chicago, and of course it was windy. Chicago in December two weeks before Christmas? It was near-blizzard conditions at times.

C.I.:  Well, let’s cover the important stuff first. How many bags of m&m’s did you go through?

Me:  Two and three quarters.

C.I.  You’re kidding, right? That’s nearly 400 m&m’s!

Me:  They inspire me.

C.I.  How many beginnings, middles, and endings are in this tripe, er, I mean this stunning masterpiece of fiction?

Me:  Why do you always have to be such a wise guy? You know my writing is light, breezy, and easy to read. My books are entertaining and a good escape for a day or two. You should try one. To answer your question, there are three beginnings, three middles, and three endings.

C.I.:  You’re kidding, right? You convoluted this book, too?

Me:  It’s not convoluted. There’s a murder, a mystery, and a sort of mystery/puzzle thing going on. I gave that a beginning, middle, and ending, too. I didn’t want to leave any loose ends.

C.I.:  I hate to ask the next question, but everyone is going to want to know. How many exclamation points?

Me:  You will be happy to know there are only 83 exclamation points in this book.

C.I.:  Jeez Louise, will you never learn? … What’s this I hear about zombies? How could you possibly incorporate zombies into one of your fluffy books?

Me:  They were on television. Susan was greatly affected.

C.I.:  Oh, for crying out loud. You’ve been hyping zombies for weeks, and now you’re telling me they were on television. You’re killing me here! … Does Susan cry very much in this book? Why does she cry so much?

Me:  Of course she cries a lot in this book. She’s sensitive and emotional, but she laughs a lot, too.

C.I.:  How about a quick synopsis?

Me:  Sure. Susan and Darby are in Chicago to compete in a cooking competition. They stay in Darby’s Uncle’s condo, and shortly after they arrive, a tenant is murdered. One of them, Darby or Susan, I’m not telling you which, is eventually suspected of the murder and ends up in jail. So, you see, it doesn’t matter which side of the bars Susan ends up on, she’s upset and crying.

C.I.:  Where’s Mick during this crisis.

Me:  He’s in England. He doesn’t have much of a role in this book.

C.I.:  There are rumors that your blogging has seeped into your writing. Are some of your blogging buddies going to be embarrassed by what you’ve done to them?

Me:  Oh, you bet! There will be acknowledgements in the back to thank one awesome guy for allowing me to seriously abuse him, and I described the photos of another blogger as artworks in a gallery. That was very cool.

C.I.:  You’re going to get sued, you know. … When are you going to publish Windy City Hunter?

Me:  I’m not going to rush it. I want to be careful with the editing, and I have to give my niece time to do the cover, so I’ll probably publish in January. It would have been a neat accomplishment to publish five books in one year, but I’ll settle for having written five in one year.

C.I.:  Yeah, whatever. … Last question. Will there be another Susan Hunter book after this one?

Me:  Of course! I don’t have a working title yet, but I know Susan is going to be writing children’s picture books in the next book. I’ve had a few suggestions so far: Zombie Hunter, Flushing Hunter, and Rat Hunter (thanks, guys!).

Cranky Interviewer Dude

C.I.:  I’m outta here. Good job on that NaNoRhinoceros thing or whatever it was you just did. I’m not interested in your next book at all. I hate kids. Please don’t call me.

Me:  Ok. Toodles!

Take NaNo and Stuff Your Chicken With It

First things first. My husband’s name is Rich. I’m tired of calling him hubby, and I have no pet nicknames for him, so there you go.

Next, I was thankful on Thanksgiving Day. I’m always thankful. I say that upfront lest you think I am ungrateful as this post continues.

Rich and I were in the kitchen Thursday morning as we prepared our Thanksgiving dinner to take to my mother’s house. Music was playing, and we enjoyed the time cooking together. But every time something would go into the oven, I would run to my computer to type a few sentences, and then back to the kitchen, I’d go.

It was time to throw together the corn bake. My family calls it corn shit. “Hey, Maddie! Are you bringing that corn shit again?” Anyway, the corn bake was popped into the oven, and I was off running to my computer to type a few more sentences. … In a nutshell, National Novel Writing Month was a terrible idea. Who thought doing this in November was optimal?

My mother doesn’t care for turkey, and we don’t care what we eat, so I stuffed two chickens instead. Imagine my surprise when it was time to leave, the oven door was opened, and the chickens weren’t done. Neither was the corn bake. I can only assume the oven decided to be persnickety about cooking chickens instead of turkey.

We dragged it all out anyway, and we took off for Mom’s. I called ahead and told her to turn her oven on, and we would finish cooking everything there. Well, that was just fine with her because she wanted to go to the grocery store and stop off at the drug store to pick up her prescriptions. On Thanksgiving.

Mom and I left Rich in charge of the food, and off we went. Having a husband with a strong feminine side is wonderful. He browned the chickens, finished the corn bake, and heated the noodles, sweet potatoes and extra dressing. When we came home forty-five minutes later, he had the meat off the chickens and onto a platter. Our son had arrived, it was just the four of us for dinner, and it was very nice. … Until several hours later when NaNo raised its ugly head inside my brain. I had to go home right then. I had to work on my book.

I did write for a few hours that evening. I was even a teeny bit cranky about it. Ok, I was a lot cranky about it. I would have much preferred to visit blogs and see how everyone’s Thanksgiving turned out. When I finally gave up and went to bed, I had crossed 30,000 words – still 6500 words behind. Sigh.

By the end of the day Friday, I was at 33,710 words – still 4600 words behind. On one hand, I wanted to throw in the towel. The book would get done eventually, and I’d rather blog than write. But my mother has been reading the book a few chapters at a time as I get them done. I gave her two more chapters on Thanksgiving. She called Friday evening and told me to hurry up and finish the book. She said she loves it, and can’t wait to find out what happens next. She went so far as to say that this one might be her favorite. Hmmm … I was partial to the ghosts in New Orleans; she must like the zombies in Chicago.

So here I am on Saturday evening at midnight. I was tempted to visit blogs today, but I restrained myself, and it turned out to be a good writing day. Rich and I played a little Dr. Mario when I needed a break, but for the most part, I started writing around 2:00 and kept at it for the day. Word count at midnight: 41,188. The finish line is in sight. Today, I was a writing goddess.

Click for a closer look and to see what Susan is doing now.

Blogging, Blah Blah Blah, NaNoWriMo

Well, obviously, I can’t do two things at once. My brain can either produce the writing for my book, or it can produce something for my blog, but not both.

It took me over four hours last night to go back and read blogs from the week, drop likes, and leave embarrassing comments. Even though I was late to everything, I did find that being the last one to leave a comment can be a good thing. Fewer people are likely to read the crazy things that come out of your brain at 2:00 in the morning.

—–

My cousin sent a link to me this week. It was for some old pictures of our grandmother, grandfather, and aunts and uncles. I have to show you one photo that I just love. My aunt and uncle (brother and sister) look like they came right out of a Mad Men episode. They both have drinks and cigarettes in hand, and the furniture was fab.

—–

Of course, I saw my mother this week. She doesn’t have a computer, but she does have a Presto machine. It’s a printer for receiving emails. Before I went up to see her, I sent the first chapter of my book to her. We were waiting in line at the drive-thru at the bank, and she said, “I don’t like your book.” My heart sank. If my mother didn’t like the first chapter, I was in trouble. There was no way I was starting over, and I didn’t have another idea. I said, “Aww, really? What didn’t you like?”  She tried, but she couldn’t hold back a smile, and she said, “Oh, I’m just teasing you. I loved it. I can picture everything, and it’s really good. I didn’t like that you left me hanging.” Grr! Mothers! She took a week off the life of my heart.

—–

NaNo is a bit of a pain. When I wrote my other books, I just wrote when I felt like it. Some days produced a lot of words, other days a few or none. This is Day 10, and I’m supposed to be at 16,667 words by the end of the day. That’s not going to happen. The story went completely cattywompus in the condo, and I have no idea how it got out of control. But it’s making me laugh, and I’m going to go with it and see what happens. It’s as though all of those ideas and notes I made before November have flown out the window. The detective in the Santa suit – out. The major mystery at the cooking competition – out. A man wearing a gorilla head – in. Susan and zombies – in. It’s as though I’m possessed. Oh, and we’re only at 11,627 words.

Hubby is on vacation next week. I’m sure I’ll get a lot of writing done then. /sarcasm

So, what’s shakin’ in your neck of the woods?

National Novel Writing Month – Day One

Thursday, November 1, 2012

9:00 a.m. – Drag myself out of bed after six and a half hours of sleep. Brrr. It’s cold. Remind myself to find the time to work on clothes warming invention before it gets really cold.

9:30 a.m. – Take out dog. Make a cup of cocoa. Clean off my desk in preparation for big writing day.

10:00 a.m. – Show up at a blog and drop a haiku. Mess around reading blogs for a while, write and send an email.

12:00 – Surf websites looking for floor map of condo in Chicago. Walk around the streets of Chicago with Google Street View. Oh, look! A squirrel! Make myself stop surfing clothing stores and go back to condos. Zillow sucks me in, and I shop for my own condo.

1:30 p.m. – Finally have floor plan, room samples, and list of condo amenities. Crap! There’s no paper in the printer and none in the house.

1:45 p.m. – Play a few rounds of computer game.

3:00 p.m. – Drop a comment on a blog and leave a typo. It’s a curse. Read more blogs.

4:00 p.m. – Take out dog again. Did he really wait this long to ask to go out? Converse with hubby about dinner. Leftover spaghetti?

4:15 p.m. – Microwave still dead. Pile leftover spaghetti and sauce in baking dish, top with Parmesan cheese, and plop into the oven.

4:30 p.m. – Run to store for chocolate. Pat myself on back for remembering to buy paper.

5:15 p.m. – Hubby home. Dinner is good. Spaghetti is always better the next day – or was it from last week?

6:15 p.m. – Crash on sofa in den and play Dr. Mario with hubby. Crank up music and realize Pitbull and Flo Rida both have new songs out. Hubby loving and singing along with new Rihanna tune; I’m not so sure I like it. I am tonight’s champion. Yay!

8:00 p.m. – Back at my desk. Ok, I’m ready to write. Ready, set … oh, look! A squirrel!  Country Music Awards are on.

8:25 p.m. – Text from son; he works afternoons. Haven’t seen him for a while. Decide to run up and see him over his lunch break.

9:30 p.m. – Back home. Country Music Awards are still on. Fast forward to catch up live. Motorboatin’!

11:00 p.m. – Awards over. I can write for a couple of hours now. That’s plenty of time to crank out more than 2,000 words. Commercial comes on for Nashville with that cute girl from Heroes, Hayden Panettiere. Hey, I missed that last night. Find it online to watch missed episode.

Midnight – Nashville over. Take out dog again. Dog goes to bed. Hubby sleeping on sofa. Now I can write!

12:10 a.m. – Grab notebook and start handwriting notes for first scene. No actual manuscript writing, but look at me! I’m accomplishing something!

12:15 a.m. – Oh, look! A squirrel! My dvr is recording something. What am I recording now? Check the listing and see Project Runway is recording. Well, I’m not waiting to watch that! It’s the All Stars.

12:30 a.m. – Give up on writing and put together a blog post chronicling first day of NaNoWriMo while I watch Project Runway. After all, this blog was originally intended to track my writing journey.

National Novel Writing Month – Day 1 – Number of words written: ZERO

Blasted squirrels.

National Novel Writing Month – Why?

After a beautiful week of near 80-degree temperatures, we dropped into the forties with rain all weekend. That kept us from doing yard work, but we managed to accomplish a few other tasks.

It was good to take the weekend away from the blogosphere. I watched a few movies, hubby and I dusted off the Nintendo 64 and played a few rounds of Dr. Mario, and I made some preparations for NaNo – as well as a pot of chili. Yum.

I wasn’t going to participate in National Novel Writing Month. I didn’t really see the point. All four of my books are in the 50k to 57k range, and the first three were all written in a three week period of time (with editing after, of course). House guests and a few other projects cropped up in the middle of book number four, but the actual writing was about four weeks with one day producing 7100 words. I didn’t feel the need to challenge myself by participating.

I’ve been enjoying reading about what others are doing to prepare. Some have everything planned down to the number of hours to write in a day, food choices, number of words to write daily, housekeeping schedules, etc.  I’m highly competitive, and the thought of being a “winner” is enticing, but that wasn’t a strong enough motive to participate.

The reason I finally decided to sign up is that I’ve been dragging my feet about writing at all. I only want to write two more Susan Hunter books, and I just haven’t been able to get started on the next book other than the first two paragraphs. I’m thinking NaNo is the kick in the pants I need.

But there are other things happening behind the scenes. Writing came out of nowhere for me this year. After seeing other people sell short stories for a dollar on Smashwords, I just wanted to see if I could write a story, too. The fact that a book – let alone four – came out still astounds me. I’ve said it a million times, my books aren’t extraordinary with fantastic plots, but they are entertaining, which is all I ever hoped for.

If this next book goes well, and I enjoy writing it as much as I did the others, I’ll keep writing. (I’m kind of afraid it will all disappear as fast as it showed up. Or my shades of ADD will kick it to the curb for something else.)

I did manage quite a bit of research and preparation over the weekend for the official start on Thursday: From right to left:

-My notebook with my original thoughts on scenes, characters, and how I want the story to unfold.

-More scribble notes with a scribble map of where I want events to take place.

– Printout of a Google street map in Chicago. I’m having Susan and Darby stay in a condo where I once stayed. The building and the surroundings are familiar to me and will make writing the story easier.

– Notes from a pulp fiction story that is in the public domain. It has the elements I want to use for a sub-plot in the condo.

– Another map outlining crime areas in Chicago. I can’t very well have Susan walking around in areas that are noted as high crime areas.

– Scribble notes with research needed for Susan personally, and I also jotted down some things that came to me for the opening scene at a gas station.

-Obligatory dish of m&m’s for research and writing.

– The typed pages atop my scanner are other details I previously worked out for the book, as well as all of my research into cooking contests.

I still need to do a bit more research based on the criminal element of the story, and then I’ll be ready to start writing. If I don’t make it to 50,000 words by the end of the November, that’s ok. If I do, I’ll be editing like crazy around the clock so I can publish right away. It would be awesome to have a book with a Christmas theme published in time for Christmas.

I wish everyone good luck and joy as they write during National Novel Writing Month.