A quick word count update!

Time for a quick revision update!

My initial 2017 revision of DAPHNE took me from 107,902 to 126,249 words.

Last time I checked in about word count, I had shed around 3.5 - 4k of words, but today I have a more encouraging update. I'm down to 116,968 words. So I've shed 9,281 words so far.

I'm not entirely sure where I want or need my word count to be, honestly, and I'm not usually the type to worry more about word count than about the story making sense and flowing well. I'm sure there are a lot more words I can cut simply because they're not needed. And some parts still need rewriting.

I don't have much more to say, I suppose, so I'll leave it at this very short update. For now...onward!

One new scene = SPANNER

Oops!

I added one new scene to my novel, and it messed with my entire timeline! I spent a couple of days writing out chapter / scene summaries, and printed the summaries out and scribbled notes all over them, etc. Eventually I worked out how to rearrange sections so the timeline made sense again. I was helped by reading an article about using metadata settings in Scrivener to create a timeline. Using that advice, I assigned dates / date ranges to chapters and shifted said dates where needed. Phew. Crisis sorted.

Another 'oops' moment came when I realised this current edit has not removed words as I hoped, but has added them. So where my first revision word count was approx. 107,902, the current count is 126,249. Yep, I've done it again. I know I have some padding that can be trimmed, and thankfully I think I'm at the point where that can be my focus now.

Speaking of padding... During my last revision of this novel, I mentioned a minor character that was a bit of a "darling" I might have to kill. She started out as a source of humour, but in truth there is a lot more to her that we're not even going to learn about in this novel. So she could even be seen as a bit of a blue herring - ya know, a herring with no purpose. ;) So really there is no point keeping her, at least not for plot purposes. I'm reluctant to let her go, but maybe I can revisit her story in some other way in another setting sometime.

Anyway, that's my update for now. I hope you are all doing well with whatever you're working on.

P.S. My addiction to Louise Rozett's Confessions series has been rekindled, sadly for no tangible reason - e.g. there is no FOURTH BOOK YET! She hopes to write one, but needs a contract. I offered to buy it off her even if nobody else does, I'm that desperate to read the rest of Rose and Jamie's story. ;) Anyway...I shall continue to wait and hope for another instalment, while moping in a very morose fashion as long as I don't get it!

Tagged: the 'Be Inspired' meme

My NaNo profile.

Recently I got tagged by Chris over at the Kelworth Files with this "Be Inspired" meme thingy. Thanks, Chris, for thinking of me! Basically how it works is that I answer some questions about "my novel", and then tag 5 lucky bloggers. ;) Since I have many, many novels, I guess I should just close my eyes and throw a dart at a list of them, right? Actually, that's an idea... Seriously, I think I'll talk about the novel I'm going to work on during November this year.

1. What is the name of your book?
The original title was MEET DAPHNE STUART, back in the day, but that was back then. Now it's called simply DAPHNE. Naturally that's just a result of my "can't think of a title so I'll just name it after the MC's first name" habit. Someday, the book will have an actual proper title.

2. Where did the idea for your book come from?
I started this story back in 1999, during my first year of university. I had hardly any friends and hardly any life, so I started writing about a girl whose friends/boyfriend were her life. Somehow, though, this poor girl got lumped with a horrible family. I'm rewriting DAPHNE during November, and the rewrite, though still giving her plenty of crap to deal with, will at least give her some happiness in the end. Largely unlike the original draft.

3. In what genre would you classify your book?
Back then, there was no such thing as "New Adult" fiction, at least not that I'd ever heard of. This story is New Adult, but as for genre? Probably just general fiction. New Adult contemporary fits, too, I guess.

4. If you had to pick actors to play your characters in a movie rendition, who would you choose?
I used to cut out pictures from magazines to fit my characters, but they were never actors, so...yeah, got no clue. ;) There's also the fact that there will be new characters and possibly a lack of some old ones after my NaNo rewrite.

5. Give us a one-sentence synopsis of your book.
As Daphne's life descends steadily into chaos, she clings to one goal: getting through her first year of university.

6. Is your book already published?
Far from it!

7. How long did it take you to write your book?
It took me...*blush*...10 years. But this time around, as I rewrite, it will take me heaps less time than that. I'm a different animal these days. ;)

8. What other books within your genre would you compare it to? Or, readers of which books would enjoy yours?
To be honest, I don't know. I think I've taken inspiration from many different places, for e.g. in my plans for my rewrite I have a character partly inspired by Michael from Roswell (LOVE that show and that character). I also recently read TULLY for the first time, and the main character Tully has a crappy childhood and a frustrating adult life. But unlike Tully, Daphne's got many siblings to worry about, so again, their lives are different. Plus, my story will only focus on a year in a life, not decades.

9. Which authors inspired you to write this book?
Honestly, I can't remember what was inspiring me back in 1999. That was when I still read mostly fantasy, so...yeah. This story is different. Maybe there is a proper answer to this, but if so, I can't conjure it. ;)

10. Tell us anything that might pique our interest in your book.
Don't worry, it won't be totally miserable? hehe. And there will be a hot bad boy in it! Plus some nice lurve.

11. Tag five people!
I think I may be past the era of tagging specific people. From here on in I may have to do the cop-out thing other people do and just say "if you want it, take it!" Better that than inflicting it on people who just aren't interested, I figure.

NaNoWriMo 2012 - gulp, I've committed

My NaNo profile.

As usual, I've signed up for NaNoWriMo in November. Not quite as usual, I'm feeling a bit nervous about this year's challenge. I'm going to rewrite a novel I refer to simply as DAPHNE, or at least that's what I tell myself...and everyone else on the NaNoWriMo website. But I'm not all that familiar with doing rewrites. It's not my usual "thing".

This year, I did complete a rewrite and was very happy with the result. I am also currently working on a partial rewrite of that rewrite. So I know I can do it. I'm just nervous that I will start on this year's NaNo and lose my way.

Despite my decent track record with NaNoWriMo, I have been known to fail in the past. Twice. There was a third year when I didn't even participate at all, knowing that if I tried, I would fail miserably. But other than that, I've succeeded with NaNo every year since 2002. It's a tradition I fully intend to keep up, if I can help it.

Why am I nervous? Well, the first time I wrote DAPHNE, it took me 10 years!! I started it back in 1999, during my first year of university, and only finished it at the start of 2009, after a whole lot of years had passed and my life had changed drastically. I was a different person by the time I finally got it done.

Luckily, I do have a good, meaty general plan for my character Daphne. I'm just not sure how successful I'm going to be at writing out her revamped story. But I'll sure be giving it a good shot!

Are you doing NaNoWriMo this November?

Permission to fail

In 2011, I set myself some rather hefty goals. I achieved every single one of them. It was a hard push towards the end of the year to get everything done, but I did it! And it felt good. This year, I decided that if I could do all that stuff in 2011, I could sure do a similar amount in 2012. But this year I've found that, all too often, life has got in the way.

I'm still achieving some things, I suppose, but I'm behind in most of my goals, and it's going to take quite some effort to catch up. I know I can do it, but I've also realised this year that if I fail at some things, it's not the end of the world. I suppose I've given myself permission to fail, here and there. I have failed, here and there - like with NaNoEdMo, dismail failure there. I don't really want to take that too far, though...'cause who wants to feel okay with becoming a slacker?

Perhaps instead of working on my goals,
I'll just stare at this photo for a while...
Ahhh, Australian winter!

So far in 2012, I've accomplished the following:

• Preliminary read through/edit of FIRE
• Write 50k for BuNoWriMo 2012
• Finish off NaNo 2011 novel #1 (DANNA)

But I still have to do the following:

• Finish off NaNo 2011 novel #2 (VICTORIOUS)
• Win NaNo 2012
• Rewrite DAPHNE from scratch (I am thinking I'll probably use November to do this one)
• Revise all Chrysalis stories (I'm only up to #11...yikes!)

Amongst other miscellaneous things (photo sorting, blog posting, song writing, etc.).

But what am I doing instead? Working on my rewrite of SUNDOWN. It's fun, it's exhilarating, I love it. I guess I should give myself permission to do what I love, instead of what I said at the end of 2011 I would do. Right? But I'm one of those weirdos who really wants to do what she said she'd do, even if it's a little bit akin to watching grass grow.

How's this year shaping up for you so far?

Ivy and Jasmine and BuNo '12

At present, Ivy and Jasmine are my main characters. But I will probably have to rethink the name "Jasmine", because that is a little too Disney if you get what I'm saying. haha.

Ivy Night
is 16% complete

8433 / 50000 words written

I've wound up writing at a slow and steady pace, doing the minimum amount of words each day. Usually I'd be spewing out 5k a day or more, but I've opted for the slower run. I'm really enjoying the story. A few days back, I was not only writing my day's word count but also going back through the story and injecting more "magic" and more "Disney" into it. Enter the cute, furry animals. None of them talk, except psychically. Not yet. I'm not sure they should. But if it's going to be real Disney-like, then they should talk out loud. Still, I don't have to make it that Disney.

Anyway, my slow writing pace for BuNo means that I can also keep working on other projects during June. That's how I got my revisions of FIRE done a few days ago. I made the occasional report of how my word count was getting whittled down, but the final results are in. I went from 146k (though way back when, I stated that my word count had originally been 148k!) to the current figure of 106,923. The ultimate goal is to get it to 95k, but for now I'm putting it aside and moving onto something else.

What, I don't know. I have a lot of catching up to do on my Chrysalis story revisions, so I could focus on that. However, another goal I set myself is to revise DAPHNE this year. Yikes! That is quite a big one. But I did set the goal, so I have to take a stab at it. It's just that it's not so much revision as a total rewrite. I'm not used to those yet. ;) I also have yet to finish off VICTORIOUS, my second novel from last year's NaNoWriMo. I've been working haphazardly on that, but it'd be good to get it done and dusted pretty quickly. Maybe even within the next week. Probably wishful thinking, but it can't hurt to make it a tentative goal.

Anyway, I hope you are all doing well with your current projects, and enjoying your Junes!

Query letters are hard to write because...

<< Hope Roberson recently wrote a "Best of the Best" post which focused on the art of writing pitches and loglines. In that post she talked about how whenever somebody asks her what her story's about, she gets all incoherent and "um, blah" (I paraphrased). Her point was that, surely since she wrote the story, she should be the one who knows it best, and should be able to easily summarise what it's about. But she has troubles with doing so.

I think many of us can relate to that! For me, reading her post reminded me that I've always struggled with writing queries. Maybe her post wasn't really about queries, but still, for me it's a similar deal. I wrote a successful logline once, and it garnered some serious agent interest. But queries are a different matter altogether. Sometimes it's like you've got too much space in which to ramble on, and so you end up doing just that - rambling.

But one thing I realised back when I was attempting to write queries was that...I don't actually understand my own story as well as I thought I did. The example was DAPHNE, which is the first novel I ever started other than my epic fantasy of doom that shall not be named (except it's called RAGEWATER). As I was attempting to write queries for DAPHNE, and getting seriously in-depth critique at Absolute Write, I realised I don't even know the core of what my story's about! I'd really thought I did, but the more I tried to summarise the story, the more obvious it became that I didn't.

Suffice it to say, I've stopped attempting to write queries for the time being. My novels need to actually become what they're meant to be before I can try to write a summary of what they are.

Have you mastered the art of the pitch/logline/query?

Jenni Merritt, BuNo, ABNA...and Helmet

Gotta love the acronyms! But "Jenni Merritt" is not an acronym of course. ;) It's a person! Or rather, she is a person. Okay, now that we've sorted that out, I want to mention Jenni Merrit's Race to 100 Followers. She's sooo close, and just needs a few more followers before the fun begins. Not that it's not fun already! Hehe. Anyway, just so you know, prizes are involved. And Jenni is worth following!

BuNoWriMo - I wrote a bit more last night. Today is the last day, and while I've already won in terms of getting past 50k, I have more work I can do on JUST ANOTHER DAY AT THE OFFICE. Yeah, it's a working title, and I'm okay with that. Hehe. I'm really loving the story. You can see some excerpts on my Lovin' the Language Blogfest entry, and also you can read the whole first bit (which may or may not have since been edited/expanded upon) over at the Chrysalis Experiment blog.

ABNA - I've decided (I think) to work a little bit on getting FIRE ready, and using that to order my free proof copy from CreateSpace. I did think about doing some kind of compilation thing so I could include some of my BuNo stories, Chrysalis stories, etc. But then I thought nahhh, I'd rather do a full novel. I contemplated doing DAPHNE, but I have a plan for how to completely revise that, so there's no point in ordering a proof copy of it yet. And speaking of DAPHNE, I'm really excited about my plan for that one!! So anyway...that's the plan!

And finally, I went to a gig on Tuesday night - yes, in my city even the big artists/bands tend to play on "school nights". It makes me maaaad! Anyway, I saw Helmet, who I've been wanting to see since I was 14 or 15 years old (I'm almost 31 now). You can read my rather lengthy review of that show here, if you are bored with nothing else to do. Hehe. But suffice it to say, it was one of the most amazing gigs I've ever been to! I met Page Hamilton, had a chat with him, and got his autograph. Very, very stoked over here.

And that's all I have to say for now! Gonna go check out some blogs, which I've been kind of slack at lately due to being overwhelmed by life's demands on my time.

How are you?? What have you been up to?

Oh my, it's here! A-Z blogging challenge... letter "A"

It's time indeed to kick off the A-Z (this is my first go!). If you want to join or just find out more, click on the image above! Anyway, onto business!

Guess what letter I'm starting with? Yeah. A. Just to be different. Ha. Thinking about it last night, I decided to go with (A)ngry Moments as my theme, with various characters of mine in mind. Below you will find some excerpts (very brief) from WIPs about angry moments I've forced some of my characters into.

Let's start with Daphne:

Her back is to me so she doesn’t see me. I’m no longer aware of anyone but her and myself. The fury is rising within me as each second passes, with each step I take, and I am increasingly certain that this is my destiny—to end the monster’s life once and for all, right here and now. After all, this creature doesn’t deserve to live, not when other creatures have died so long before their time.

Somebody calls my name, but all I can see is my mother turning to face me, eyes widening, mobile phone flying through the air. My hands and feet lash out at the one who gave me life and then viciously took it away, day by agonising day.

Now Jared:

"I'm all right. In fact, I'm better than all right. I haven't felt this way in…well, I don't remember ever feeling this way."

"What way?" Adelai asked, stepping back to give him more room. And perhaps because she wasn't sure what to make of this new him.

He smiled at her, a grim smile. "What is this, therapy?" When she opened her mouth, he said, "No, it's okay. I'm happy to talk about it. I'm pissed. I'm angry. I'm…infuriated." He tilted his head in thought. "Maybe I've always felt this, but just didn't know it. Maybe it was always in there. Waiting."

Aaand finally, Squeaky:

“Don’t mind McLean,” Rodentia said to the bird. “Seriously—he’s always overreacting. I mean, just two weeks ago I was innocently lying on a beach in the Ballama–”

“That’s it!” Squeaky held up a dramatic paw. “I can’t hear anymore of this cat food. You two can go on having a nice chat, and I’ll go and do my job. Or our jobs, really, Raines,” he added with a pointed look at his partner. “Enjoy!” he snapped, and turned away.

And I'm done. But I'm curious - have your characters had moments like these? :D

Talk about 'taking a break'

I was saving DAPHNE editing for NaNoEdMo. But guess what happened? I gave into the compulsion to start editing NOW NOW NOW. I'm finding that the parts I haven't really edited seriously for 11 years (yes, I started this novel at the age of 19, which happens to be my protagonist's age too, and only finished it at the beginning of 2009, when I was 28.5 years old. Now can we got on with the blog post?! Cheers.) are kind of easy to edit. Of course, I cut out a whole chunk of Chapter 1, put the polished remains on AW, and got feedback very quickly that made me see how I needed to pretty much rewrite the chapter. Which I since did, and I'm a lot happier with the result. Got to wait on some feedback on that now. But I'm feeling positive.

Still, my whole point was...you know how people say it's good to take a break once you've finished your novel, to catch your breath/gain some perspective/recover? Well, I guess I took a two-year break after completing the novel. But from the vast majority of it, I took a ten-year break! That oughta give me perspective, don't you think?

When I started this story, I didn't know where it was going. That's how I've written most of my stories. No clue how they were going to end. There have been a few exceptions, namely last year's NaNo efforts (SUNDOWN and friends), but for the most part, I've made it up as I went along. So I fully expect Daphne to be a complete mess (not just the character, I already know she's a mess; with that family, who wouldn't be?). But it feels good to already have some idea of what I am going to need to look out for during my edits/rewrites. I think it's really helped me, working on formulating a query letter for Daphne. I've been forced to think about what the real heart of the story is about (guess that's the glory of query letter writing, isn't it?), and I'm going to carry that into the editing process.

Anyway...what's NaNoEdMo gonna do without Daphne?

I'm thinking I'll either go back to Plan A, which was editing FIRE from last year's NaNo series. And that novel sure as heck needs editing (I won't even repeat the word count here, it's so obscene). OR I could look at this year's NaNo story, NAUSICAA. But...I don't know if I'll be ready to face that for a while to come yet.

Oh, and I should mention I did work a bit on writing out more of my travel memoir. But it's hurting my brain. I think my plan there should be to finish transcribing what I can of my actual journals (it's hard to read my handwriting sometimes...not good!), then print it all out, THEN get around to the actual writing out of the memoirs.

I think that's all I feel the urge to say about where my writing/revision is at for now.

I hope everyone's going well with their own revisions/story writing. And happy holidays to anyone who's going AWOL for Christmas/New Year's!

P.S. I also tried to get back to writing STORM, book 5 in last year's NaNo series. But there was no flow. I think my plan there is to re-read from the start, to get back into the feel, before adding any new material. And actually, THAT is a novel that could use a blog post all of its own, so I can discuss the peculiar 'disjointed' feeling I got while writing what I have of it so far. But yeah...some other time maybe I will get around to talking about individual works of mine, when I'm not in the midst of a "AHHH must edit EEEEVERYTHING in sight!" frenzy.

Writing G O A L S + 2011

2009 Achievements:
1. Finished off DAPHNE, after 10 years of writing it (I was 19 when I began, and 29 when I finished). Still needs editing!
2. Wrote little bits and pieces of stories, and edited bits and pieces of others, during the year, until November, when...
3. During NaNoWriMo I finished a 116,000 word story (the first in the Midnight SUNDOWN series) and quickly started in on its prequel, for which I wrote about 20k before the end of November

2010 Achievements:
1. Completed 3 novels in the Midnight SUNDOWN series, then realised that the 2nd novel actually needed to be divided in 2. The second half of it made a complete novel, but the first half needed some better ending. I still haven't given it that.
2. Started book 4 (which since the division of book 2 became book 5) in the Midnight SUNDOWN series, and still have not finished it.
3. Completed first revision of SUNDOWN, taking word count from 116,000 to 147,000. Yikes.
4. Cut about 19k from SUNDOWN during 2nd revision (have not finished this revision, but hoping to get there in the next week or so).
5. Participated in NaNoWriMo 2010, and won with a 94k novel.

And now onto the point of this blog entry: things I want to achieve in 2011.

Things I know I can do in 2011
1. Finish current edit of Sundown and order a proof copy of it via CreateSpace (this is free!!)
2. Participate in NaNoEdMo 2011, working either on book 4 of the Midnight SUNDOWN series, or my DAPHNE novel - at the moment I'm leaning further towards concentrating on Daphne
3. Participate/run the short story year-long workshop project with my critiquing buddies, possibly will be showcase this on Blogger - the Chrysalis Experiment
4. Keep my writing blog at Blogspot going & hopefully prospering a bit
5. Win NaNo 2011
6. Finish off first draft of STORM from the Midnight SUNDOWN series
7. Maybe look at doing a preliminary read-through/edit of Nausicaa (NaNo '10 novel)

Things I'd like to look at but probably will not get done in 2011
1. Preliminary edits of FIRE and EXCISION from the Midnight SUNDOWN novels
2. Figure out how to finish off CARNIVAL from the Midnight SUNDOWN novels series
3. Finish off 2008's NaNo novel (TURKEY BOURKE)
4. Get through 1st proper edit of SQUEAKY

Things I KNOW I will not get done in 2011
1. Finish off RAGEWATER book 1
2. Finish off SOMANA from the RAGEWATER series (probably has 40k to go)