I keep Doing This--Confessions, Again

I have something to tell you, and right now only one other person knows what this something is. Once this post goes live, then everyone with an interest in my writing can learn what I'm doing. What I've done.

I'm doing NaNoWriMo (You know, National Novel Writing Month). Which isn't really much of a revelation. The confession comes more in how I'm doing NaNo this year and not that I'm doing it. You see, as October ticked along without me being able to complete The Lost Princess (I know, and I'm more profoundly sorry for that than I can express right now) I began to question whether I should do NaNo at all, or if I should concentrate on finishing the book everyone's waiting for instead.

The very last week of October, when I'd intended to just sprint write the rough draft and clean it up later, I realized the story had stopped speaking to me. Again. I've never had such a hard time writing anything in my life, not even the ghost writing project I did a while back. I felt cast adrift. How in the name of anything can I finish a story when I can't get a grasp on any of what should happen? By that time I had almost 30k words done in different sections with huge gaps in between. I needed things to fill in the gaps. I'd even skip around to different sections to write what would come to me, but I still couldn't finish the book.

That was a low point for me because I feel like I'm always announcing a launch date and then having to go back and amend it. I'm going to get this story our for Halloween. Well, maybe next Halloween. I'm going to launch this romance short story for Valentine's. Well.... You get the idea.

Back to NaNo. I hadn't done it in four years, and so many ideas were swirling in my head it's no wonder I couldn't nail down the details of The Lost Princess. So I made a decision that really ended up being twofold--to do NaNo, to get something out of my head and also to prove to myself that I can still finish a book for goodness sake!

So I started Birthright on Nov 1. If you're my NaNo buddy you know I've only got 8k words so far but when you consider that's the fruit of the first two days of November it's pretty cool. I'm happy with that. What's truly amazing is what happened after I started writing Birthright. And also where that confession comes in.

The night of Nov 1 I chatted with my sister in law, Mel, who is in a similar spot writing-wise. What started as a chat turned into a full-blown brainstorming session where she helped me work out some of the kinks in TLP and I (hopefully) helped her with her blocks. I got up Saturday morning and added 2500 words to The Lost Princess--vital words that tied the huge front section to the beginning of the sagging middle section. Just like that--bam! The story revitalized. The next thing I have to write is about a death and that will give me a great deal of fodder for the next few thousand words.

But here's the confession part. I'm doing two NaNo projects. Yes, you read that right. I also set up a pseudonym account on the website and I'm writing ANOTHER 50k word book this month. Actually, at the rate I'm going I fully expect to have at least one, if not both, NaNo projects done before the third week of November. Definitely before Thanksgiving since the kids and I have some great plans for that extended weekend.

What makes me think I can do it? Honestly I don't know what happened between Halloween night and November 1st but something did, something incredible. Since I got up that Friday morning I have written 22,278 words in three different projects. And I'm going strong, focusing on the one story that speaks loudest and then going on to the next one.

I don't know why I'm sharing this. Partly to apologize for TLP being late, again, but also in part for some accountability. If I can remain strong and focused then I may have one project done by the end of this week alone. Right now it's practically writing itself, and there's no end in sight to the inspiration I'm getting. I sort of stalled out on the other one but I don't expect that to last, since the next scene I'm writing is going to be one of those intense, life altering scenes that have to happen to our main characters.

I also promise to keep you posted. They may not be long updates, but at least I can share with you my progress and when I finish each book. The floodgates have opened and I've got to get back to work.