Speak Stiltedly and Wear a Yellow Shirt

Word count: 2650
NaNo link of the day: The Internal Cliffhanger

Thanks to RJ, I now have a ghostly, RSS presence on LJ. You can add my blog to your friends list using the instructions on my syndicated account page. I guess it means just adding jemima_blog as a friend. RJ is using RSSify to turn her Blogger blog into a syndicated account as well, but if you just want the plain RSS, here’s RJ’s feed.

RSSify is a good solution to the lack of Blogger RSS feeds; I stumbled across it back when I found myRSS. Unfortunately, you need access to the blog template to use RSSify, so I couldn’t use it to get feeds. But if you’re a Blogger blogger and you want to provide a feed, it looks pretty simple. It only took RJ a couple of minutes to set up, and the result is a full entry feed with just some minor link problems that most users won’t notice.

I must, I must, I must catch up in NaNo.

Word count: 700

I have about 7,000 words to go, and NaNo ends with November at midnight Sunday, local time. I think I can make it. The novel won’t be a real novel by then, but it may be the bare skeleton of one. Word count is all that counts for NaNoWriMo. I’m looking forward to writing some post-November drabbles after it’s done.

Veronica thinks the President is an idiot for going to Iraq for Thanksgiving, but I think it was a cool thing to do. Nevertheless, I’m trying to resist making a joke about turkey pardons…there, I didn’t do it.

Word count: 2075
NaNo link of the day: Simenon

After my heavy activity yesterday of post-resignation political maneuvering, I needed to rearrange some scenes for better use of the ex-wife/adultery subplot. That meant rewriting so that things that happen in year two of the novel don’t get mentioned in the past tense in year one, and the like. My word count so far consists of paragraphs added in here and there while rereading, but I’m not done yet. I’m also still behind and running out of days.

So I procrastinated and watched “Show and Tell.” Now I’m working on a drabble. I’m too far behind on my Stargate drabbles; I can’t afford to let a good idea slip away.

Word count: 725

I forgot to blog again! My NaNo characters were busy doing things I never expected, like flouncing out of the Senate, and then I was dragged bodily into a chat, and I completely forgot to blog. I blame Seema…

Word count: 2250

Sorry, I was writing so hard I forgot to blog. So why don’t I have any real words to show for it? Well, my day at the library turned into a huge linguistics research fest rather than the intended big writing event. I may have to try some of the NaNo recommended coffeeshops instead. Fortunately I don’t have an Airport card so wireless goofing off is out of the question…

I am catching up slowly. I think I’m only 6,000 words behind or so.

Word count: 2875

I’ve forced myself back on the NaNo wagon and I’m slowly recovering from the huge wc (wordcount to you non-unix geeks) deficit I ran up last week. The secret to subplot, I’ve decided, is adding a sufficient quantity of low-grade bad-guys, and letting them plot little plots. Right now, My Hero’s semi-ex-wife is about to blackmail him over some accidental adultery.

I still have too many good guys running around. I could kill some off, but that’s not really in the spirit of my peaceful 30th century society…

Word count: 0

After a heroic push to catch up yesterday, I’ve dropped the NaNo ball again today. But the weekend compensates for a multitude of sins. I find it encouraging to creep up page by page in the NaNo rankings - my best page so far was 26, while normally I hover with the just-caught-up types around page 50. Seema’s on page 3. Go, Seema!

Word count: 2000

Four new drabbles have been added to the Stargate fic page, and Jade’s award for Purple Comet and another interesting graphic are up on her page.

I’m still typing up a storm for NaNoWriMo, despite Rocky’s words of no nano. All I can say is that most writers need deadlines or they’d never get anything written. Procrastination is human nature, and NaNoWriMo is only a temporary antidote.

More random writing links: If you’re not feeling up for NaNoWriMo, you might want to look into IWriSloMo - International *Write Something* Month. Anyone can write bad short fiction for fun.

If you’re planning to sell your NaNoNovel, consider Marion Zimmer Bradley’s answer to the eternal question, Why did my story get rejected? To improve your ailing baby, sign up at the Critters Workshop for workshop-style critical feedback.

I’ve been suffering doubts about my planned NaNoNovel, and I think I’ll be switching from the poor, neglected Right Novel to a Whole New Novel based on three or four related short story ideas. I still have trouble figuring out when an idea is too big for the short-story format - leading to rejection #1 on MZB’s list. Maybe I even have too many ideas to fit into the novel (the 50,000 word “limit” aside), but it’s always easier to cut than to pad.

Yesterday’s word count: 1000
Today’s word count: 340

The server has been down. I’m having doubts about which novel to NaNo, and I’ve also been catching up on rasfc, which led to this old NaNo critique. (My opinion: the author was clearly cat-vacuuming when she wrote it.) Here’s my missing post from yesterday:

Seema signed up for NaNoWriMo, and immediately began vacuuming the cat at the NaNoWriMo forums. Here’s a handy Guide to Literary Fiction she found there.

I think there’s a much simpler definition of literary fiction: Literary fiction is anything that doesn’t fit into a genre of genre fiction. For the purposes of this definition, Danielle Steele should be considered as a genre.

Note that I’m taking “literary” to be synonymous with “mainstream” rather than with “good.” Everyone who writes wants to write well, and there’s nothing about the setting of, say, a sci-fi novel that keeps it from being well-written - but no one counts The Left Hand of Darkness as literary fiction.