Almost There

It is very strange. There is a certain story I am working on called WhiteWashed. I have not told you about it yet because this is the story behind it:

One day on the way to watch fireworks at a Secret Undisclosed Place I wrote a page or two that i considered to be about Cinderella's side-kick. I thought, la de da de da. It would be fun to finish this one day.

The aforementioned one day happened when I was going through all my notebooks and typing bits and pieces into Glom (my laptop) when I came across Cinerella's Side-Kick.

20,000 words later I stopped typing and realized that it was much darker outside. It was very weird. So I saved the document after hemming and hawing over what to wall it. You see, I almost never get past 8 pages without knowing what to call it. I had gotten to like, 20, and still had No Idea. It was very disturbing. Finally I settled on WhiteWashed and had no idea how the name of the book would tie in with the actual book. That was Not Good.

A month or so later brought around the month of October. I was determined to finish one more book this year besides my NaNo one (more on that in a later Blog) because of a Decision that I made at the beginning of this year to write a novel every month. I failed after the Thanet's Curse fiasco (still haven't finished that). So last week or so I started typing away and wrote about 4,000 more words. Then I knew I was going to get a job soon and started write All Day. I hit 9,000 in one day and went to sleep with my eyes feeling Dead.

Now I'm at 58,000 words and I don't know what to do. I haven't even gotten used to the idea of Writing this story and it's already finishing up. I mean, I love that. Somehow the title of the book ties in wonderfully and there are more psychos in one book then I ever thought I'd have (well, other than the story about the Psycho Place, but that doesn't count). Oh. And she's not really Cinderella's side-kick. Cinderella ended up with a slightly different name and is not important, I am so glad. I did end up with a bunch of mythological creatures and the most popular 'The Ooze.' Who does not look like this:

I almost want to buy one of these...

The good news is that editing will be Fun because the story is still like new to me.

Does anyone else have Surprise stories that snuck up on you when you weren't looking?

More Contests From Super Cool People

Elana Johnson is having another contest and it is super cool. Good books, people, good books.

Also, Suzette and Bethany are having a contest as well, which includes all sorts of cool things. Go ahead and check them out. :)

Oh, and duh, my amazing sister Sonshine is having a contest too. This one includes those popular owls floating around.

Awwwww...

One day I will figure out something cool that I can give away, and I will have a contest as well. Because I have 12 followers now, and twelve is one of my favorite numbers ever. And 23. I think that when I reach 23 followers I will have a contest.

For now I will run off and write a story, whose title is Shut up, I'm an Alien! At least for now. *sigh* I think I'll have to put off querying agents for a year, and just use this year to write whatever I stinking want. Next year I'll query my face off, but for now I think I just want to write and write, because I'll probably never have this kind of opportunity again. No deadlines, no looming sense of failure.

Cause this is what everyone thinks of when they think of

Looming Failure

Err... Now I will.

Now I'm really creeped out.

I'm going to write, I'm going to write!

*Runs out of room screaming and waving arms*

Oh, that reminds me of Palindrome/Hannah's blog about Sunflowers. Some things need to be run away from, and sometimes when running away it is best to write a very bad poem.

When My Life is Like a Creme Puff

My friend and I are writing a book together. We write letters back and forth from the perspective's of our characters. We got the idea from Sorcery and Cecelia. It is probably the most emotionally draining thing I have ever experienced (because my life is basically a slightly sour creme puff. Nothing really terrible has ever happened to me, which is why, I suppose, I write such depressing stories?) My friend, Emdy, just sent me the next installment to our little story and I was terrified of opening the e-mail. (I know, such a wimp, aren't I?) I didn't know what I would find in there. Anyone could have died, any terrible thing could have happened. I've already killed off a record reaching amount of people. (I mean, I killed off an entire city in one swipe.) Plus, I had an idea about what would happen next in my story, and anything she said could ruin that, so I was also being a little bit selfish with my plot point.

Heaving in a breath, I opened the e-mail, copy and pasted it into Word, and read. Oh. My. Bananas. It is crazy. You see, we do not tell each other anything about the plot. It is all suspense and surprise. It's just a little bit maddening. There is definitely a little adrenaline rush when I see that the next installment is in my inbox. There's this feeling in my stomach of excitement, and dread, and it is fantastic. We are probably almost a third of the way through, and I'm trying to figure out how everything is going to work out. I only have so many more people that I can kill of ;)

Random Words

I had an idea the other day (and yes, I know my ideas can be dangerous, but calm down, this does not involve knives or juggling) and I thought I might see how it works.

Because I am having difficulties with Thanet's Curse, I have decided to ask for your help. If any of you fine folks would like, give me a word: it can be a noun, verb, adjective, etc. (but not articles, prepostions, or most adverbs, because we want to be interesting here). Once I have collected these words I must integrate them into my manuscript, at least once, preferably twice.

Last October when I was doing Nano I had a couple of random words I found through the forums there, and I decided to find a way to incorporate them into my story (like defenestration.) Currently I am trying to find a way to use 'antipode,' and already used 'proffered,' so I would like a couple of new ones.

The novel is set in a fantasy world of little islets (think Ursula K. LeGuin's Earthsea Trilogy). Remember, there are no such things as giraffes or wombats in this world (*tear*), and please keep it clean. I am not going to put the word 'poop' in my novel. Just not happening.

Anyway, I am going to go do homework, and if any of you would like, feel free to comment a word for me. Yay! I'm excited to see how this works out.

Oh! And because I love pictures:

He is picking out random words. See his lovely wrinkled hand.

This is SO pretty. Love, love, love.

For any of you who post a word I thank you in advance and am showering butterflies on you in my head. Though... I suppose that might be gross, but in my head it is lovely, so you'll have to take my word for it that I am not insulting you.

Awards Make Me No Longer Depressed

I am having issues writing the sequel to Blackburn's Prisoner (which I think I have decided to call Thanet's Curse). The problem is a) I got waaay behind in word count, 2) I don't care about the characters or the situation they're in (I seriously am trying to figure out what happened to the people and story of Blackburn's Prisoner that I loved so much.) This may not seem like a huge problem, so what if I FAIL entirely? Well, the problem is I am planning on querying an agent for Blackburn's Prisoner, and if I can't write this stupid sequel, that will be a big problem if I ever sell the first one. For some reason publishers want an author to be able to write a sequel if the first book ends in a major cliff-hanger. *Shrugs*

A cliff hanging Robot! My story is not as cool as that.

And I really don't want this book to hang-over into March, because I was planning on writing something else, something that I am really excited about. Usually, this would not bother me, since I'm a pantser I just go with the flow and write whatever I am excited about. This does not finish novels. This leaves me with a ton of beginnings (many of which I love), but not a lot of middles, and even fewer ends. (<-- Except for this one story where I have only been able to write the ending scene. What is up with that?) I do not want Thanet's Curse to end up wallowing in the mud somewhere without me. I want to finish it. I must! I must! (Oh, another issue I'm having with it: it is sounding way too much like another story I wrote. No. That is so not allowed.)

Wow.. There is a whole book description of this over HERE. Bizarre.

---

I just got home from work and went back on blogger to finish up this post, but before I did I ran over to Musings of a Palindrome, because I thought I was following her already, but I wasn't, so after I finished gasping in astonishment I clicked on the follow button. Then I read her post. And nearly died.

I didn't even know she knew I existed!! Well... Not enough to give me an award. I nearly cried my eyes out.

Seriously. This came up under "cry my eyes out."

Someone out there understands the evils of high heels. I applaud them.

But the Award specified Slumpvis Musings, so I will post more fully about it over there, even though I have something in dire need of posting over there. Gah. Too many, many things.

The Fine Print I

Today two of my friends asked me to join them (as well as a group of other people) to read through the Fine Print submissions. Every year the little college I attend collects students' short stories and poetry, a bunch of nerdy people read them, and eventually some get collected into a book-bounded form. It was the best thing EVER. It reminds that I totally want to be an agent, even if none of them screamed PUBLISH ME NOW, but there were a couple that said "I actually know how to write, I have potential, please read more of my stuff." Especially the one dude. I probably upped his scores a little bit, just 'cause his was so much better than anything else I had read. There were just a couple of parts I think he could have written stronger, and I know he would agree, so I don't feel bad posting it on the web. Especially because no one knows who I am talking about. (Raspberry Moose!)

This is a moose. He is made of Raspberries.

The thing with poetry is either I love it, or I hate it. There was one poem that I loved, and the other person who looked at it did not love it. So we passed it around. And around. And there ended up being a whole discussion about whether or not it was good enough to put in the Fine Print. My opinion? If you can write anything that gets people choosing sides and trying to persuade others to agree with their point of view, you have done something special. No one else discussed any of the other works. Just that one. So I say publish it. If it gets us talking... Well, you just did something no one else achieved. I take my invisible hat off to you.

This is the antipode of an invisible hat

There was one thing disturbing about the whole event. The one dude and I kept scoring things scarily close. For poems there were four options: clarity, content, form, and impression. I freaked out when we did the one EXACTLY THE SAME. Very weird.

Also, I decided today that I need a new college. [Because as far as I am aware one cannot become an agent without having some form of degree. Sad face.] As depressing as this sounds, it is true. I am tired of being one of the smartest kids in class. Ugh! Disgusting. I am not that good people. I am bored. I can pass a test I did not study for. I can get A's on papers I finish right before class. I refuse to get a degree simply because I can. I want a degree because I worked for it, because I slaved over it, because I nearly died from pure stress in order to achieve it. Maybe that's what graduate school is for? I don't know, it just seems that a senior in highschool is at a higher education level than a freshman's first year at college. What is wrong with that picture, I ask you?

Seriously, what IS wrong with this picture?

Moving on to actual writing things: Today I wrote 4,ooo words. Hoorah! I wanted 8,ooo, but we all knew that wasn't going to happen, so I kept my hopes at 2,ooo. I beat my score! Hopefully this means I can finish the sequel before the month ends, but I don't know. I still got a ton left. I still have about half the novel left. Sadness. Despair. Lack of cookies.

This fish is sad he has no cookies

The kitten is sad he has no brains

(Take THAT EB! I have your kitten trapped, trapped I say, bwahahahahahaha >:)

In conclusion all I have to say is that I MUST send out a query this month, I must, I must.

Let Me See...

Today was a bad week in writing. It was chock-full of good things, nonsense, and white noise. (White noise is for the parts of this past week that I know happened, but I can't remember anything but a white fuzz. You'd think I took drugs or something, but I hate even sudaphed, and I never take advil or tylenol. They're of the DEVILLLLLLL! Ok. Not really. But if in the end they do end up being of the devil, I totally called it.)

The closest I could find to devil tylenol. Sadness.

All this to say my word count is low. I forget exact, but I'm pretty sure I haven't hit 20,000 yet, and it's pretty much half a month over... Wait.

I promised myself I would not be all whiny-whiny, I'm a baby! I hate my life! Kill me now!

Stormtroopers hate their life too. We will commiserate together!!

So here is the good news: 22,038 is my word count! yay!

Here is the bad news: 30,362 is where I am supposed to be. FAIL.

Good news again: I can write today!

Bad news again: 8342 is how many words I would need to write to make it up. That's at least 17 pages.

So what am I doing here instead of writing like a banshee?

This is a banshee.

What I am doing is waiting to tell you a story! Just a quick one...

I was scrolling through what I had written last night when I saw one of the *gasp!* red squiggly lines letting me know I had spelled something wrong. Death! dying! Destruction! Yeah, no. Writing fantasy or anything fantasy-related means that there are squiggly lines all the time. it doesn't matter if Nadra, Cynferth, Cenweard, and Braeden are all real names (Afrikaan, Welsh, English, English) the dictionary does not recognize them. And in order to make my book more friendly all curses are in a language that doesn't exist, so there are squiggly lines under Yila! Kriev! Yuksiy! etc. (Although Yila doesn't count, I just like saying it).

So when there was a squiggly line I wasn't too worried, but I read it anyway just to make sure. And it was a good thing I did. It turns out my one character, Damaria, was sitting on a pile of plankets.

Yup. Instead of soft woolen blankets, she was resting on a whole bunch a' slabs of wood. How comfortable.

Wait! Wait! Wait! Plankets are REAL! Check this out:

I just had a #8 E-o-M experience

The description is hilarious, so check it out here. Oh my puppy dogs and windshield wipers. Incredible.

Very, Very, QUICK

Okay: I should be doing schoolness related stuff, but I just wanted to give a quick update:

1) I am STILL at 10,000 words and it STILL makes me very happy

2) Tomorrow I MUST write a query letter to this agent dude, or else anyone who reads this has permission to hunt me down and kill me. (Except for my sis Sonshine, because... We have really sharp knives in my house. And my brother Dave has a machette. That's just way too scary for me to handle.)

3) LOST starts tonight. Season 6! Oh my stars I cannot wait. Oh my garland. Sweet muffins, it is amazing. I am just dying because I have to wait a super long time until it begins. Argh! Gah! How can I endure this waiting? (And LOST may seem like it has nothing to do with writing, but it is very... um... Inspiring? And stuff. IT BLOWS YOUR MIND! Almost an 8 on the excite-o-meter. Okay. End of LOST rant.)

And that is everything. Oh! Except for this:

And:

Everything Will Be Okay
In The End

If It’s Not Okay
Then It’s Not The End

Which isn't necessarily ALWAYS true, but it's by some anonymous person, and I just think it's a nice saying.

Exciting Stuff

Today is an exciting day. And not just because Carrie Jones is on the NYT bestseller list twice! Although, that is very exciting, and probably much more exciting than my news, but my news is exciting to me because... Well, I suppose because it's my news. Or something. Anyway, before I start creating an exciting-o-meter I will get right down to it.

Okay. I admit. I tried making an Excite-o-Meter, but I am so bad at Computer techie stuff that this is what it looks like:

8 - You Are Now Dead Because You Are So Excited

7 - The End of the World as We Know it Exciting

6 - Can’t Even Breathe Exciting

5 - Way Beyond Super Mad Exciting

4 - Super Mad Exciting

3 - Super Exciting

2 - Realy Exciting

1 - Real Exciting

0 - Exciting

-1- Pretty Exciting

-2- Kinda’ Exciting

-3- Possibly Exciting

-4- Maybe Exciting

-5- Not That Exciting

-6- Not Exciting

-7- Not At All Exciting

-8- So Not Exciting That You Are Bored and Dead

Yup. A list. Lame, I know. I was having difficulties even putting it in a box. Ah well, what can I say? Anyway, back tot he exciting matter at hand: I have reached 10,000 words in Blackburn's Prisoner's sequel! I know. It still has no name. It is driving me nuts, because usually by page eight, at least by page 14, I know the approximate name for a manuscript. Here I am at 21, 21!, pages and I still have no name. I know, I know. i have time. But it's like having a baby. You can have it for 8 months without naming it, maybe even 14 depending on the state (I don't know, i'm making that up) BUT after 21 months, you better have a name for that puppy. Baby. I meant baby.

This is a puppy:

This is a baby:

Now that everything is clear, we can get to the reason why it is exciting that I have 10,000 words done. 1) I am a fifth of the (approximate) way to being done. 2) I wasn't even suppose to start writing this until tomorrow, so I am way ahead. 3) I am 10,000 words closer to knowing what happens.

Yes. I don't write outlines, remember? This means that I have no idea what's going to happen. I mysterious ship just arrived manned by some dude named Braeden. I don't even know what Braeden looks like yet! But I promise you he does not look like this:

I have no mouth!

And today I found out this HUGE thing about Revlin. Yes, Revlin. Not Revlon.

And I was gasping and unable to breathe! That's a 6 on the Excite-o-meter. I cannot wait until Wednesday, my writing day, because then I will know even more of what is gonig to happen. Squee! And I am going to take another shot at writing a stupid query letter for Blackburn's Prisoner. *sigh* It's just so... #-8.