Hillary DePiano's Blog, page 21

The pen is mighty. (A post election NaNoWriMo pep talk)

I had a pep talk all ready for this week that was your standard NaNoWriMo stuff but I scrapped it because we’ve had anything but a standard NaNoWriMo this year and it’s silly to ignore the elephant in the room. (Pun intended.)

How can Ibe all “Rah rah, writing!” when we’ve just had an electionthat threw the entire nation in turmoil? Many people are in a state close to grieving while others are living in fear and uncertainty for the future. It’s more than just distracting, it can be all-consum...

Want to finish your novel? When you feel like quitting, DON’T!

This is post 7 of 7 in the series “Tips for NaNoWriMo Success”

You’re working on your novel. You’re writing away and the words are flowing great and then it hits you. The doubt.

You have no idea where you were going with this. The charactersare all stupid. What made you think you could pull this off? You’re just so sick of this story. More than that, you’re sick of this whole writing process. Why should you give up another night to this boring book nobody’s going to ever want to read anyway...

October 2016: Falling Back

Here’s what October 2016looked like in writing… YearlyGoal 662,661/600,000 words (110%) Monthly Goal Only goal this month was to get ready for NaNoWriMo which wasn’t numerically based. Total Words Written 50,370 words Average Words Per Day 1,625 words Things completed: All theNaNoWriMo MLstuff! Other Works Actively in Progress this Month: TheMG novel nicknamed WOC1 Overall I’m writing this early because I actually have time at the moment (which will not be the case during NaNoWriMo) so I don’...

NaNoWriMo Mania!

November is National Novel Writing Month, an international event where participants attempt to write a 50,000 novel in 30 days. I’m a Municipal Liaison (aka ML, fancy name for a local volunteer) for my area (NE NJ), you’ll find the website somewhat “taken over” by NaNoWriMo posts for the next few weeks. I appreciate your patience if you aren’t participating in the challenge and will return you to your regularly scheduled blog in December.… Read more

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Want to finish your book? Make the commitment. Then make it real.

Back in the day, I used to work for one of NaNoWriMo’s sponsors. We were encouraged to sign up for NaNoWriMo and try to participate so we understood what the event was about when customers came to us with questions. I dutifully signed up and joked about writing a novel in a month with co-workers but never wrote so much as a word year after year.

But 2007 was different. While the process of signing up wasn’t any different than any past year, it felt different to me because this time I was real...

I’m doing a NaNoPrep talk at the Maplewood Library on Monday, October 24th at 7 PM

Let’s chat NaNoWriMo! Come hang out with me in person this Monday night at 7 PM at the main branch of the Maplewood Library where I’ll be answering questions and offering tips, tricks and advice on how to get through your first novel and the NaNoWriMo challenge! Ideal for anyone who’s a first timer, curious about the event or has done it before but wants to get a little bit more out of it this year but everyone is welcome regardless of your experience level.… Read more

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September 2016: Setbacks and set-ups

Where did the last month of my life go? Did one of you take it? If you did, I won’t even be mad, just give it backbecause I am seriously not ready for it to be October already.

Well, jeez, I guess this is happening so we might as well get down to it…

(If any of you were wondering what level of dorkI am, I made all these graphics in one day last year so I’d have them ready to use each month.)

Here’s what September2016looked like in writing…

YearlyGoal
614,495/600,000 words (102%)

Monthly Goal...

Masks now available for standalone licensing and purchase

Exactly a month ago, I told you about my new short drama, Masks, which is part of the new anthology Bullying, INK. from YouthPlays. While you can purchase the play or license it as part of that collection, for the first time, it’s now available as a standalone play here. It’s available in eBook and printed acting editions here, with special commentary from the author, aka me. This is the first play I’ve ever written that is truly based on real events so you’ll want to get all the behind the s...

How I Wrote The Green Bird (full length stage play adaptation & one act version)

Novelists have been doing this sort of post for a while, an all-in-one debrief on exactly how they wrote one of their books day by day (here’s one exampleand another but there are many out there), but it hasn’t caught on yet in the playwriting community. It’s a shame because writers are strangely secretive about their process when transparency is really the best way from us to all learn from each other. To that end, I decided to keep track of the whole process of exactly how I wrote my adapta...

Months of craft work & a new outline later, I’m still stuck in the exact same spot

Reader, I am frustrated. It’s about the MG book I’ve been working on for a while now that is based on two of my plays. “A while” here meaning a period of time impossible to properly quantify as I originally spent a year writing what I realized was actually Book 2 before I got the story started in the right place. The problem is the midpoint. What happens before that point? Great. What happens after that point?… Read more

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