Gretchen C. Hohmeyer's Blog, page 99

The NaNoWriMo Aftermath – What Now?

And that's that. It's December 1st. November is at an end. NaNoWriMo is over. Writers everywhere have put down their laptops and pens–possibly thrown them out windows–and now have the daunting task of dealing with the tornado of words that NaNoWriMo has left them with. But…what is that?

If you didn't reach your 50,000 words, don't worry about it! That doesn't mean you failed or anything. Whether it was a lack of time or a busted plot, don't let it sour NaNo for you. There is always next year! Besides, some people just aren't wired to write the NaNo way, and that is also fine. Everyone writes in the way that works for them, and no way is wrong.

Now, say that you did get to 50k. First off, CONGRATS! Whether it's your first or fifteenth time, reaching 50k is always a thrill, especially if you had some trouble along the way. Which you would have, unless you are inhuman. Maybe your book finished in 50,000 words, maybe it didn't. Either way, there are some options for what you can do now that apply to any word count–just make sure to finish up the book first! If you do have to finish up the book, I recommend you write at the same fervored pace of NaNo. You'd be surprised just how much your writing style changes when you aren't writing to win, and whether you are at halfway or nearly done, that is not a good thing.

The first step after NaNo is always the hardest. First, you have to actually review what you've written with a critical eye. After writing, of course, you have to edit, and now that moment has come. Avoid the urge to burn the manuscript–I know it's strong, but it's not the right thing to do. Even if you are utterly convinced your novel is crap, there is always, ALWAYS some gems to be found within them, whether it's a sentence, a description or some other little passage or character–anything! Sometimes it's just fun to read through the parts that you wrote in delirium. For example, during one midnight writing sequence I started writing editing notes under my chapter headings to remind myself of a plot change that occured right after my sweet, innocent, blonde narrator up and killed someone. The notes get progressivly worse and culminate in my favorite about my main character (Shadowed Thoughts spoilers ahead!):

Do you see what you did at the end there? You're a genius. Now make it look like you MEANT to have Natalia's power overrunning her own head and warping her mind with other peoples' thoughts. Thank you.

 Even if I hadn't enjoyed myself during NaNo, pretty sure it all would have been worth it just for that.

So then you've reviewed. What next? Well, that's your choice. It's perfectly okay to stuff the book in a closet and leave it for another date. You aren't required to do ANYTHING with your NaNo. Not even edit it, or even review it. NaNo is FUN, remember? If that's your choice than that's your choice. Don't let what other people are doing influence your choice. Do what feels comfortable to you.

If you decide to move forward, your first step is to edit. Edit, edit, edit. Edit until you are blue in the face. My NaNo editing starts with me editing the book myself, and then I send it off to three friends for their edits. People say that a critique circle is one of the most important tools a writer can have, and they aren't lying. Remember, if there is someone or someones you want to edit your novel, they should be people you trust to be perfectly frank. The "Oh, you're amazing!" from your mom or whatever is nice to hear, but not helpful.

My editing and waiting for edits back from my friends usually takes until about June, when the CreateSpace offer is set to expire. If you've checked out My Books, then you know that I self-publish my NaNos through CreateSpace. This is one possible option for your NaNo, even if you don't want to push the books to the general public. When I first wrote Mind Evolution, my first book that was self-published after NaNoWriMo 2009, I hadn't planned on selling them. It was just for me and my sense of accomplishment. There is nothing quite like holding a print copy of something you wrote in your hands. I tend to recommend at least redeeming the free proof copy order, because it's just that amazing.

Some people don't believe in self-publishing, and that is fine. If you think your NaNo is good enough for the agent route, good luck! I'm sure you know plenty about agents and publishing houses and all that other stuff that could overload a blog if I tried to get it all into one post. Don't think that just because your novel is a NaNo means that it isn't a good piece of work, no matter how much I've called NaNos crap. Plenty of them have been published, and at least one–Water for Elephants–was made into a movie.

NaNoWriMo was a challenge to exceed your limits. Even if you didn't win, it doesn't matter. Even trying has allowed you to break barriers in your limitations. Now, the sky is your limit. Enjoy the ride, bask in your glory and…LET'S GET PSYCHED FOR NEXT YEAR!

Review: Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

Review: Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

 

5 stars

"Anna is happy in Atlanta. She has a loyal best friend and a crush on her coworker at the movie theater, who is just starting to return her affection. So she's not too pleased when her father decides to send her to a boarding school in Paris for her senior year. But despite not speaking a word of French, Anna meets some cool new friends, including the handsome Etienne St. Clair, who quickly becomes her best friend. Unfortunately, he's taken—and Anna might be, too. Will a year of romantic near misses end with the French kiss she's been waiting for?"

When I started this blog, I swore I would be analytical. I swore that I would look at a book with a critical eye no matter how much I enjoyed the storyline. Since then, I've done that. Or at least, I think I have. (Drop me a line if you think there's a way for me to improve my reviews!) Either way, if you like a critical book review…stop reading here. Almost nothing in this book is going to be critical. I am going to allow myself to be the 17 year old girl that I am and just…gush.

Because I loved this book.

I'll admit, I nearly gave this book 4 ½ stars simply for the fact that I don't want to be one of those people who throws around 5 star ratings. But then I stopped and thought…why? There is absolutely and utterly no reason.

I should start this off with a disclaimer: I usually HATE books that are entirely teen romance. I hate them. I literally hate them. It's like all YA authors think that these things need to be filled with a bunch of clichés and fantasy. (Disagree? Comment and give me a book as an example!) When you pick up Anna and the French Kiss, the synopsis doesn't seem promising. Girl goes to boarding school, girl meets guy, they fall in love, PLAY THE SAPPY HAPPY ENDING! It is the plot of ten dozen different teen novels with the same exact premise as this one.

But that is not what happened here.

Anna and the French Kiss was REAL. In some YAs—and this is especially horrible in the first person, as Anna and the French Kiss is written—the main character is clearly being written by an adult. There are a myriad of ways that this shows itself, but all us teens know it. During this book, however, Anna was either absolutely and utterly exactly like me or at least a girl I would kill to have as my best friend. She was actually a teen like me, who thought like me and talked like me and related in every which way to me. Even if this book hadn't had some other amazing qualities, I could have liked it just on that alone. But it got better.

The plot was REAL. Alright, it was fairly fairytale, what with the Paris setting and the hot English guy, but I'll forget about that for now. Anna was not a sad, swoony girl who knew that she and Etienne were soul mates from the first second. Etienne did not fall in love with her at first glance, nor was he a jerk who changes his ways because of her or some other cliché. He was a real guy. She was a real girl. They both had their issues that weren't just limited to their families (though there was certainly some fairly cliché family/father drama). They both had their own personality issues, and they both made some choices and had views that weren't necessarily correct.

Hallelujah for an author who gets it.

Alright, the ending is pretty fairytale. They all live happily ever after in the most swoon worthy fashion. That didn't bother me all that much. Maybe a little bit of fairytale isn't that bad after all. The plot was real enough and I loved the characters so much that I honestly wanted that happily ever after. Despite its premise and ending, though, Anna and the French Kiss has been an answer to my prayers. It's a teen romance I can stomach, has a main character that's real and has a love story that's parameters weren't set up by the Brothers Grimm. It's well written, it's cute, it's funny and it's REAL. I hear that Perkins's next book, Lola and the Boy Next Door (on shelves now), has a more realistic setting and I am jumping up and down to get a hold of it. Anna and the French Kiss isn't just a good read; it's my new best friend.

Review: Wither by Lauren DeStefano

Wither by Lauren DeStefano

4 stars

"Thanks to modern science, every newborn has become a ticking genetic time bomb—males only live to age twenty-five, and females only live to age twenty. In this bleak landscape, young girls are kidnapped and forced into polygamous marriages to keep the population from dying out.

When sixteen-year-old Rhine Ellery is taken by the Gatherers to become a bride, she enters a world of wealth and privilege. Despite her husband Linden's genuine love for her, and a tenuous trust among her sister wives, Rhine has one purpose: to escape—to find her twin brother and go home.

But Rhine has more to contend with than losing her freedom. Linden's eccentric father is bent on finding the antidote to the genetic virus that is getting closer to taking his son, even if it means collecting corpses in order to test his experiments. With the help of Gabriel, a servant she is growing dangerously attracted to, Rhine attempts to break free, in the limited time she has left."

Yes, another dystopian! What can I say? This stuff is in vogue right now and there's only so much I can see or hear about a book before I snatch it off the shelves and go FINE ALRIGHT ALREADY. (It was also on sale, so that helped too.) I had researched this book on Goodreads once again, and found that several friends whose opinions I trust had loved this book, but some others had also disliked it. Once again, I came at it with lower expectations.

I must say that I was pleasantly surprised. Despite DeStefano's world seeming to be even less of a believable concept than that of Ally Condie's Matched (whose world building issues were discussed at length here), I believed in it—which I hadn't believed I would. How could anyone make both extremely short life spans and polygamous marriages work, right? Apparently, DeStefano—very well, I might add. But onto that in a minute…

Let's get what I didn't like out of the way first, shall we? There were two things that really got to me: 1) Rhine and Gabriel and 2) the "tempo" of the plot. The relationship between Rhine and Gabriel might have been more of an issue with my personal taste, but it just felt forced. First they're friends and then they're kissing and then they're friends and then they've got their hands on each other and then they're friends again. I was honestly quite baffled by their relationship. It felt like a sincere friendship, but the story seemed to be trying to force it into something more. Clearly these two have a relationship coming in the next book, but I would have preferred to see them as just honest friends in Wither (which was done well in the spots where they were just friends).

The tempo of the plot was a much bigger issue, though there's really less to say on it. There was certainly things happening and I could barely stop reading, but the book never affected by heart rate if you know what I mean. There were certainly points where the plot got to me, but they were more flashes than anything else.

But you can bet your life I'll be reading the second book in this trilogy, titled Fever and expected February 21, 2012. Why? Because of everything DeStefano did right, and her way with words. Perhaps her way with words is one reason the plot never got to my heart rate—sometimes short and succinct are better and more gripping, aspiring writers!—but I refuse to put too much blame there because she has a way with words. Descriptions, analogies, etc—I wanted to write them down and steal them.

Also, polygamy. No matter your feelings on the subject, that's a tough thing to write about. DeStefano never blinks. You're never given the feeling that the marriages are right, but they never feel contrived either. How she managed to make polygamy feel like a societal convention but wrong at the same time is beyond me and I like it.

All and all, I think dystopian fans should definitely give Wither a shot. Unlike Matched, which was very romance oriented, Wither felt much deeper and plot oriented, with just enough romance to keep romance lovers happy but not turn off people who think YA romance should be burnt. Relationships in the book—such as the friendship between Rhine and Gabriel and the camaraderie between the sister wives—are excellently written and feel decidedly real. It hints at moral questions but doesn't get preachy. In a nutshell, I found Wither to be a fine addition to the dystopian titles exploding off the shelves right now. If you enjoyed Divergent by Veronica Roth and/or Matched, I totally recommend that you give it a shot.

Review: Matched by Ally Condie

Matched by Ally Condie

4 stars

Cassia has always trusted the Society to make the right choices for her: what to read, what to watch, what to believe. So when Xander's face appears on-screen at her Matching ceremony, Cassia knows he is her ideal mate . . . until she sees Ky Markham's face flash for an instant before the screen fades to black. The Society tells her it's a glitch, a rare malfunction, and that she should focus on the happy life she's destined to lead with Xander. But Cassia can't stop thinking about Ky, and as they slowly fall in love, Cassia begins to doubt the Society's infallibility and is faced with an impossible choice: between Xander and Ky, between the only life she's known and a path that no one else has dared to follow.

I came into this book not having very high expectations. Since I frequent Goodreads, I read up on this book quite a bit in deciding which of my 3 new books to read first. When a lot of different reviews say the same thing, I worry.

However, Matched was not as horrible as I had worried it would be. It certainly wasn't the next Hunger Games, as it was boasted to be on the back of the book, but it was a fairly solid novel all the same.

After I had read the book, I went back to the reviews again, and I found myself amused. Many of them had to do with how unbelievable Cassia's world is. While it is true that Condie's word building could have been better—much better in places—I don't believe she deserves entirely all the flak. Matched is a dystopian book. To me, the entire idea of a dystopian book is to shock the reader with how unreal it seems. We are supposed to wonder how the citizens can put up with the conditions and lies that the usually totalitarian government is forcing on the citizens. That's the whole point of these books: the system needs to change. Sometimes it seems that the more outrageous the scenario, the better the book goes along. After all, how believable is a world in which kids as young as 12 need to be trained to play a game to the death? Not very, but don't tell Hunger Games fans that. Condie's fault lies not in creating an unbelievable world, but not explaining her world well.

I will give Condie props for handling her romance pretty well. The book is described to have a love triangle, which I think is rather false, because Cassia was never really in love with Xander though he was in love with her. It was always very clear that she was going to choose Ky. The romance between Ky and Cassia was very real, and didn't happen in an instance, which gives Condie instant points from me. The romance is the definite center of this book.

All in all, I did enjoy Matched. To enjoy the book yourself, however, you have to be prepared to let go. If you are a reader who needs to understand every facet of the world around the characters, this probably isn't for you because you will focus on all the holes, not the story. However, if you can let yourself just sink into the story and go along for the ride, I think you'll enjoy it—especially if romance heavy books are something you enjoy. If you don't enjoy teen romance, I'll admit you'll want to stay far away. As I said, romance is such the center of this book that perhaps the world building wasn't even as focused on as that. After I stopped caring about the world and the lack thereof or ineffective description of why the world is the way it is, I certainly did enjoy it myself. Despite the reviews of the second book, Crossed, I am eager to pick it up. Condie has a chance to do some great things with the world that she's created, and Matched was good enough that I'm willing to give her the chance to win me over again.

Review: Cleopatra's Moon by Vicky Alvear Shecter

Cleopatra's Moon by Vicky Alvear Shecter

4 stars

As a historical fiction enthusiast, I'm always excited to see historical fiction on the shelves. More and more lately, I've been excited to see some of this coming to young adult shelves, especially since it's some of my favorite stuff. I'm a huge fan of Egyptian history, specifically the Michelle Moran books for example. When I saw Cleopatra's Moon on the shelves of the Teen section, I was instantly curious. Michelle Moran had already covered the topic of Cleopatra's daughter Cleopatra Selene very well, but I was interested to see what the young adult take on her would be. The results were actually quite interesting.

The beginning of the book was very similar to Moran's, to the point that I was almost bored. Honestly, this isn't Shecter's fault: historical fiction is historical fiction. My interest began to rise, however, as Shecter began to make the different decisions, like letting both of Selene's brothers live when they were at Rome. A few other plot twists and differences developed, and I was ecstatic. It really morphed into a different take on who Selene was, while keeping her likeable and relatable.

Perhaps the most amusing difference between Moran and Shecter's books is dictated by the shelves I found them on, adult and teen respectively. Though Cleopatra's Moon was on the teen shelf, Shecter's Selene actually makes more adult-ish decisions than Moran's. Whether its witnessing her father's death or planning to seduce a Roman man just like her mother did, this Selene is far more headstrong. Here is how Shecter gets Selene to transcend time and fit in on the teen shelf. She doesn't hold back. Selene becomes a fighter, a girl determined to retake her homeland at any cost while asserting her pride in her female identity.

Don't get me wrong, I adore both books. Cleopatra's Moon is going to go into a slot right next to my Michelle Moran books. This is what I so enjoy about historical fiction, these different views on the life of one person, and how they interacted with the other historical figures of their time. I certainly recommend Cleopatra's Moon for all lovers of Egyptian historical fiction, teen or adult. Unlike Moran's books, however, which were much more steeped in fact and historical story, I also recommend this book to readers curious but perhaps not entirely into historical fiction. (Moran's books can also be read by non-history lovers, but I believe they're more enjoyable when you have the background.) Whether you like history or not, the Selene of Cleopatra's Moon is a feisty female heroine that every teen girl can relate to and take courage from.

Review: Unearthly by Cynthia Hand

Unearthly by Cynthia Hand

3 ½ stars

 

As a fan of the Fallen series by Lauren Kate, I was pretty psyched to get a hold of this book. The Fallen books are great, but I was really looking for a fresh take on angels and I got it. The main character, Clara, is a quarter angel who is trying to be a normal teenage girl while also trying to fulfill her purpose from God, which comes to her only as a short vision. Yes, the "normal teenage girl who actual [insert superpower/secret here]" premise has been well tried, but Hand pulls it off quite well.

The problem, however, comes with the middle of the book. The beginning starts off fast and interesting, but the middle kind of sinks. It focuses more on the teenage stuff as we wait with Clara for her purpose to reveal itself and be fulfilled, but the waiting—while realistic—takes far too long. I blew through this book only partially because it was compulsively readable. The other reason was that I kept flipping through pages looking for the next big angelic event, not prom. Clara falling in love for real was cute, but it felt like filler. Once you get towards the end—if you can hold on that long—you are rewarded, as things start happening one after the other in a very exciting way.

Once again, I'm going to harp on the fact that young adult books have this horrible tendency to have their main characters—typically females—fall instantly in love with their guys. Love at first sight is great, but I've seen this so many times it makes me groan. I understand that Christian was the guy from her vision and all, but come on. All these female MCs falling head over heels for guys the second they meet is making me lose faith in my own gender. Hand's insta-love was certainly not the worst I've ever seen, and she even tried to balance it out, so I'm being unduly harsh in this particular review, but the constant issue of this is pushing me onto my soapbox. I'm off now.

Despite how unflattering this review sounds, I am genuinely excited to read the next book. I think that now that Hand has things moving, events are really going to start happening. Unearthly was compulsively readable and hard to find a stopping point even at its dullest middle event. The ending was very vague in a way that leaves me conflicted as to whether it is good or bad, but either way it does its job. There were so many loose ends that the next book has the possibility of being jam-packed with excitement. The end of Unearthly gives me faith that Hand can pull that off is she doesn't feel locked into waiting for Clara's purpose to show itself in a realistic timeframe. You can be sure you'll hear how that goes!

 

(The second book in the Unearthly series, Hallowed, is expected to be released January 17, 2012)

Guys, its only NaNoWriMo – CALM DOWN!

Now, I know what you're thinking? Right now, you're frazzled writer's brain has taken in this title and is screeching at me because WHAT DO YOU MEAN CALM DOWN WRITE WRITE WRITE WORD COUNT FRENZY GOGOGO! I'm not talking about that at all. I'm talking about how you shouldn't be letting your expectations get the best of you.

NaNoWriMo is more like a sprint than anything else. Anyone will tell you, most NaNos end up being a lot of crap that takes months of editing to fix. (If you don't think this, you are either the Writing God or far too overconfident for your own good, I hate to break it to you.) Nothing written this fast has a possibility of being perfect the way you've written it. Hell, nothing written EVER has the possibility of being perfect the first way you write it. Maybe parts, maybe sentences, maybe the idea in general is solid, but you can't tell me you've ever written something and gone "Wow, this doesn't need editing." Because unless you are the Writing God, you are wrong.

Yesterday evening, I was minding myself, NaNoing away, when my father walked into my room utterly depressed. He was completely despondent about his NaNo. Nothing was coming out right, he said. He felt like there were critics sneering over his shoulder, mocking him. He could not understand why everything he was writing was coming out looking like utter crap no matter what he did. (Okay, my paraphrasing. I swear what he said was more elegant. Hi Daddy!) If you have ever written a paragraph, then you know that this is a feeling that often occurs. Sometimes, though, we tend to forget something else.

THIS IS NORMAL.

Just because the last thing you wrote was this short story or paragraph that completely blew your mind doesn't mean this won't happen again. Just because you've gotten used to long periods where the words won't flow doesn't mean that this won't happen again. No matter how many instances you find where you feel like Shakespeare's got a hold of your fingers, you will have two times wherein you feel like a wreck, a good for nothing and just plain trash.

NaNo is a very potent time for this to happen. Given that you've got this word count to meet, you basically give your soul to this novel for 30 days. Sometimes you'll get these flashes, where you're just writing and writing and you think, "THANK YOU WRITING GOD, FINALLY!" because everything is flowing out of your fingers and you understand your plot and everything is just BEAUTIFUL. Then, the next day, when you can't recapture that feeling, you drop straight down into the depths of despair, crying and holding yourself because everything is over. Your novel, you realize, is crap. Even what you wrote yesterday is ridiculously horrible. You're done as a writer, after this. And this is where it comes back to: CALM DOWN.

When my father came into my room yesterday, I took pity on him and read him the "Shitty First Drafts" chapter out of Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. If you have not read the excerpt or the book, I strongly suggest it. If you have, you may remember Lamott's overall point: first drafts are SUPPOSED to be crap. No one is ever going to see it if you don't let them, and no one has to. It may be horrible to feel like a complete writing failure, but just remind yourself you can fix it later. In some of my own delirious NaNo moments, I've written in red ink under the chapter headings of things I have to add or fix later. There's nothing wrong with that. Even if this wasn't NaNo, there's NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT.

In the moment, it's hard to remember this–I know–but that's why I'm here. Guys, its only NaNoWriMo. There will be months after this to edit and laugh at your sillier things. Overwrought descriptions and unneeded filler are really, truly par for the course in November. So add everything you want. Let your characters make fools of themselves all over the pages. Let yourself be a fool all over the pages. Really, that's what NaNos all about. Just remember that there will be time to edit later. There will be time to care about grammar and spelling and plot continuity LATER. You aren't alone, believe me.

Okay, I'm off my soapbox now. This has been your PSA to remember to not tear your hair out over those little editing things you can take care of later. Just hit your word count. That's hard enough. (Oh, and don't interrupt another NaNoer with your own woes. They will angrily blog about it later. …love you, Daddy dear!)

Review: "Mastiff" by Tamora Pierce

Review: Mastiff by Tamora Pierce

3 stars

So, I suppose it's time I get around to this, I've been done with this book for weeks, but I haven't been able to bring myself to write this review. I guess I finally ought to, just to get this out there and off my chest.

I should begin by saying that Tamora Pierce is not just my favorite author. She is my idol, and the only person whose books have never gone out of style with me. Other authors are interchangeable to me. Pierce is a rock. I also got the chance to meet her and spend 3 days with her last August, and immensely enjoyed her as a person as well. I don't just "judge a book by its cover" with her, you can say.

That's why Mastiff was such a painful read. Out of all the works I've read, the Tortall universe is my favorite. I want to drop myself right in there beside all her main characters. When Pierce returned to Tortall for Terrier, I was blazingly excited and the book did not disappoint. Bloodhound, the second book, was certainly a change of pace, but a good one for the most part. Mastiff should have been a glowing finale but to me it's…not.

To be fair, there is technically nothing wrong with Mastiff. It's written in the typical, amazing Tamora Pierce style. It's funny. It's exciting. It's impossible to put down. If we were judging this book on technicality alone, it's an immediate 5 stars. It's the reason I couldn't give it any less than three.

The problem is that it's a third book. It's the FINAL book.  The problem is that we have been set up for two large books and gotten to know the characters. The problem is that, by now, I am so invested in the characters that I wanted something grand and blinding for the finale. Maybe the fault lies entirely with my opinion, but I just don't feel like I got it.

~MILD SPOILERS AHEAD~

The book got off to a very bad start for me. Its 3 years after Bloodhound, and Beka is burying her fiancé, who was mentally and physically abusive towards her. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems vaguely out of character that Beka would allow that to go on. Especially when she says that the only reason she even vaguely loved this guy is because of the great sex. I just couldn't wrap my head around this for Beka. Things just go downhill from there, as the entire Corus gang minus Tunstall, Pounce, Achoo and Sabine are absent from this book except for a little bit at the beginning. I did like Farmer as a character after the fact, but when he was introduced I was just in the disposition of not liking him. Plus, I really loved Rosto, even though I knew nothing between him and Beka would never happen. I just thought SOMETHING would happen between them.

Still, up until the end of the book, I was tolerating things. I tolerated Beka's new, bordering-on-obsession with sex. I tolerated the lack of the Corus crew and the injection of new characters I got less than a whole book to love, who played major roles when I thought they'd be taken up by characters I knew well and loved well. If the end of this book hadn't happened, it would have managed a 4 to 4 ½ star rating, perhaps. I'll never

know.

I'm going to try to do this without spoilers here, but…argh. Beka's jumps out of character were bad enough, but I can't forgive something this bad. I can't say much, but there is a traitor at the end of the book and … it's bad. It's unforgivably bad. I never would have expected it, true, but not in a good way. Never before have I had such a huge desire for the book to end with "And Beka woke up to find that it was all a dream."

I'll repeat again that, technically, there is nothing wrong with this book. To another person, there might not be anything wrong with this book. Personally, I just wanted so much…more, for Beka. I wanted so much more for all the characters, really. I guess the ends of series can never be everything you want them to be, but Mastiff disappointed me more than most.

My character did WHAT? – Lessons Learned from NaNoWriMo

(Yes, I'm blogging during NaNoWriMo. So listen up, because these words are words I can't count into my word count. )

Anyways! As previously discussed, NaNoWriMo is the time when EVERYTHING can happen. No matter if you wrote up 50 character sketches and a color coded outline before beginning or you just ran with it, no one is prepared for what NaNo can do to a story. Seriously, no one. It's only day five, guys, so don't think that because this hasn't happened to you yet that it won't. Because it will.

I write…fast. My friends will tell you that this is an understatement, but I'm just going to stick with fast. That means that I'm already at 12-something thousand. For the first time in my NaNo history, I went into NaNo with an outline and a pretty good idea on who my character was. After all, this is the 3rd book in my Mind Evolution series I'm writing here. I was probably one of the most in-tune with a character around the NaNo-world. But, guess what?

NaNo got to my character.

None of what I just wrote out was supposed to happen. My MC was supposed to be my innocent one. Girly. Possibly kind of airy. Funny like that. AND THEN SHE UP AND KILLED SOMEONE.

Character sketch? No good. And then the sweating starts, because I'm thinking, "MYPLOTMYPLOTMYPLOOOOT!" 5 days into NaNo isn't a good time to be trashing that already, even at 12.5 k. Plus, I hate writing them and I've got a series to further, here. This is how it HAD TO GO. But with NaNo, there isn't time to go back and fix it, so I had to move on. And do you know what?

I realized that what had happened WORKED. Believe it or not. I couldn't myself, not at first.

As it turns out, my MC knew what was happening to her better than I did after character sketches, plots–the whole nine yards. With one action that I believed to be completely beyond her, she added layers to my plot and deepened some of the most serious plot points of her story. My plot before was good. Now, it was better. All because my character had apparently gotten out of character, and I had allowed myself to run with it.

Whether you're doing NaNo or not, there's something to be learned from this. There is a difference between events that happen that are out of character. Some writers think that they know their character so well or they're so attached to their plot that the characters can't make up their own minds. Some people might have backspaced my MC killing this person and let her be the damsel in distress she was supposed to be. I probably would have, if I had the time. But the thing is, when you're writing, you're telling this character's story. This is their life. If something just all the sudden happens that just seems totally out of character, maybe–just maybe–it actually isn't. I'm not saying, of course, to let everything fly. Some things you write that you just know aren't right. But for just a second before you hit backspace, think about it. Experiment and see where it takes you. It might not follow your plot or be in character, but it still might be the best thing that ever happened to your story.

What is NaNoWriMo? *gasp!*

It's November. To any normal person, it is a dreary month, a boring month, that month before the month that brings holidays and the New Year. If you are me and a bunch of other writers worldwide, November is none of those things.

November is National Novel Writing Month.

If you are unfamiliar with the event (or as it is commonly called, NaNoWriMo), then you should know that it is basically a challenge in the month of November to write a 50,000 word novel. Beneath that, it is so much more.

As writers, we're so caught up in making our writing perfect. Some of us are such perfectionists that we can't even finish a piece because we get stuck trying to edit it before we write THE END. We work laboriously, trying to come up with something that maybe—just maybe—doesn't suck. Nine times out of ten, we can't help but disappoint ourselves. After all, the second you start thinking you're the next Shakespeare is the second you need to find a new hobby.

NaNoWriMo is a time to throw all that out the window. If you work like a perfectionist, you'll never be done in time. Nothing irks a perfectionist like not winning, right? Everybody can be a winner if they try hard enough. However, winning requires that you stop caring about quality writing. You stop caring about discrepancies, clichés and even spelling sometimes. You have to learn how to stare into the eyes of writer's block, because you literally don't have time for that. You need to be able to kill off a character just to get things moving, or yank the story in another direction because your plot just isn't working. The challenge of NaNoWriMo goes far beyond just finishing.

Have I scared you? I hope not. Everything I just outlined above might just possibly be some of the best writing lessons you ever learn. Mostly because, above all other things, NaNoWriMo is fun. You push yourself, you push your characters and you have a blast. NaNoWriMo isn't a thing you have to do, but I certainly recommend it. Don't worry about if what you're writing is sucking. It probably will be. Everybody's will be. And it's going to be amazing.