you must tell them true stories, and everything will be well

I skipped doing NaNoWriMo last year to work on my thesis (lol) and I'd like to do it again this year, but I don't really have an original fic idea nor a big, long fic idea I could work on for 50,000 words.

Anyone have any ideas for alternative writing options for NaNo?

Now that NaNoWriMo has officially ended, and I've had two days to come down from the ~winner's high~ (or insane relief, more like it), it's time to take a look at what I learned about myself and writing in general. Because that's kinda of what you're supposed to after accomplishing something like NaNo, right?

( Five Things I Learned )

Current word count: 45,900

I'm going to try and get to 50K sometime today because I have a paper for class I really need to be working on in the next two days instead, and I'd like to get the rest of it finished so I don't have to worry about it any more.

I discovered on Thursday that my Word program has been callously lying to me about my word count for the entire month...but in a good way. I checked my word count with the NaNo Web site's verification gadget, and it added almost 200 words to the overall count. Apparently Word likes to count hypenated words just as one word, which is kind of a pain in the ass, but whatever. At least I don't have to make up 200 words, right?

The fic itself kind of hit a lull right around the 35K mark. Right now I'm more or less writing it just to get to 50K rather than for publishing-on-the-Web purposes. It is a pretty hot mess. I mean, I had Percy and one of my OC's talk about Twilight for 400 words the other day, even though it really didn't add anything to the plot, just because I could. Although it did generate this line:

They hadn’t been amused when Percy had pointed out the fact that he had been in the Bella in their situation, when both Rachel and Annabeth had been after his affections a couple of years ago.

And Rachel discovered that she could use her predictive powers to get free shit from demigod designers, so it wasn't all that bad. I guess.

--

In other news, some fantastically lovely person started pjo_kinkmeme WHICH WILL NOT HELP MY GOAL OF DOING HOMEWORK. AT ALL.

Word count: 29,201

If I've learned anything from the last couple days of NaNo, it's that when I don't have the time to obsess about what I'm writing, all the scenes just tend to drag with unimportant details. Or that when I don't exactly know what's happening next, I'll just keep writing a scene in the same POV until the characters are like, "Get us out of here, woman! Nothing's happening!"

With writing this latest scene, I've kind of realized that there definitely isn't enough foreshadowing in regards to the Snatchers, which is leading to some heavy infodump scenes that are beyond boring. If I slow it down and spread it out, it will probably help. I've just thought of a couple scenes I can put in the next draft that will remedy that, though. The important thing is that I'm getting the information out so I can use it later, I suppose.

I've also started to realize what words I use a lot. I seem to love tacking "you know" on to every piece of dialogue I can.

The scene for the day is short. Just Nico, Rachel, and Annabeth discussing the guy Rachel's dad is trying to set her up with while they're being sleuths. It also has the stupidest sentence I've written yet because it MAKES NO SENSE.

( Too tired to come up with a cutttt )

Word count: 22,091.

I'm less than 100 words away from beating my NaNo word count from last year, so that's got me excited. I'm almost positive that I'm doing to win this year -- especially if I have a good weekend and keep it up into next week. Even though I got kind of lazy during the latter half of the week, I managed to keep up with the daily word count schedule. Some of the stuff I wrote is definitely going to have to be redone because I either wrote it in a rush or my brain was fuzzy from lack of sleep.

In addition to going back and putting more scenes in during a later draft, I think I might change the focus of the story a bit. Now that I'm writing more plot heavy, interesting things, I really think the first part of the fic needs to have less Percy in it. After I establish him going away to college, his POV probably isn't going to pop up as much because his character doesn't matter until the actual fighting/quest bit begins...which kind of sucks, because Percy is a fun character to write.

So, story selection. I had a big Rachel scene planned, and I decided to throw Nico into it because a.) why the hell not and b.) uh, can I seriously write anything without throwing some Nico/Rachel action into it? No, I cannot. But there's less romance (so far) and more, "UGH ANNOYING KID GTFO" than anything. Most of this selection is a wonderful example of how I will just keep typing and typing anything to get my word count for the day.

( I can't write anything without Rachel/Nico banter, can I? )

Word Count: 16,092

See what I meant by not being worried about lagging behind? I caught up just fine. XD

I still can't believe I wrote more than 5,000 words today...and that I might write a couple hundred more before I go to bed tonight! It's honestly kind of blowing my mind; I don't think I've ever written that many words in one day. My wrists and hands do not appreciate this effort though. Hopefully they don't go on strike any time soon!

It helped that I was writing scenes that were fun and not just pure infodumping...and that I actively went and found places where I could get work done instead of sitting in my living room with the TV on and my roommate blabbing at me. Not having great Internet access at the beginning of the day helped out loads, and then putting myself in the library where, you know, you start to feel guilty for not actually doing something productive after forty minutes or so really helped.

Wrote scene for all main characters appearing in this fic today, minus Grover, but I wrote a scene for him yesterday. Percy's scene was, once again, the most infodumpy of them all because he met a new character who may have some sway on the plot later in the story. Hopefully his scenes start getting smaller as everyone else starts figuring out the mystery of the Snatchers. I am rather worried about the pacing - the reveal and set-up is happening kind of fast, and the villain isn't supposed to show up for another few days. Eh, I suppose things can always slow down after this chapter.

The scene for the day involves Nico and Annabeth, two of my favorite characters who I have actually never put in a scene together before! I'm a little worried that the Nico and Annabeth dynamic is rather like the Nico and Rachel dynamic, but without the obvious UST. Oh well.

And scene!

( 'Gods, no wonder you and Percy get along so well. You both like to strangle unsuspecting people!' )

Also, check out the pretty widget I added to my profile. Such a pretty little NaNo calender!

Word count: 6,748

My strategy so far seems to be getting the word count for the day, and then maybe going over by a couple hundred words if I feel like it. I'm in no rush to get to 50,000 - I'll just mosey my way on up there!

I've officially finished Chapter One, but it's about 6,000 words long, so I'll probably split it up when I start rewriting it in December. I'll probably end up expanding or putting in a new scene with Percy or maybe a scene with Grover that starts after the first one finished. I was reading the two scenes I wrote today, and they didn't seem to match what I had in mind for the first chapter. I think I might've just been writing ahead a bit because, while what gets mentioned in Rachel's scene is important to plot later on, it's probably too much information for the first chapter. Whatever - I'll just do the rearranging come December. ;)

And seriously? When I write fast, I just write infodump after infodump. I know when I take the time to revise this and look it over, I'm going to cut or rewrite at least 1,000 words because it's pure infodumping on all the characters. Or maybe I'm just being hypercritical of myself.

Anyway, the selection for day! The lovely Ms. Dare makes her first appearance, tormenting her poor father.

( Not that she would’ve needed to be an Oracle to predict that leading a protest against her father’s own company in Central Park would get her butt hauled into his office by his fiercest looking goons, but it probably would’ve been handy all the same. )

Now I'm off to read the latest 39 Clues book! I told myself if I got my word count, it could be my reward. :D

Took a break from the essay writing to type out the NaNo I wrote on the plane, and I got about 1,171 words in before midnight! \o/

Note to self: Try to keep a handwritten road map from now on; it works much easier.

Here's a selection from the prologue of this still nameless Percy Jackson fic. I might try to post a little bit every day of what I'm writing, just to make things interesting! I won't be posting the full thing until the end of November because it is probably going to be a hot mess. Just sayin'.

( Percy Jackson and the Olympians take on NaNoWriMo 2009! )


And now it's off to bed for me!

I signed up for the 2009 NaNoWriMo this week, although now I'm not too sure if I'm going to have as much time as I thought I would to write. Well, I'm going to give it the good ol' college try at any rate, and see if I can at least beat my 21K from last year if I can't win it.

I don't have a clear idea of what I'm doing yet, and as of right now, I'm leaning towards writing a novel-length Percy Jackson and the Olympians fan fiction. I do have a couple of original ideas, but none of them really stand out to me and I have an awful feeling that if I go the original fiction route, I'm going to do a repeat of last year where I stop in the middle just because I hate my story and characters. I'd rather stick with something I know I'm going to have fun writing, even if it is fan fiction.

Unfortunately, I've already started writing the PJO AU that I really, really like and I'd be -8K right off the bat. I'm sure I'd be able to get the AU to over 50K, but I'd hate to come up short at crunch time. But I do have a back-up idea I'm equally enthusiastic about, so it's all really a matter of me just making a decision about what I want to do.

How about everyone else? Decided if you're going to participate? What are you writing?