Na____Mo: A Chronicle of WADD

So, I had hoped to spend November doing revisions and writing a draft of another novel idea. After all, November is NationalNovelWritingMonth or NaNoWriMo. 50,000 words in 30 days. And I got some good writing done.

Then my muse went on strike. Well, not exactly strike. She was more like a child who, when expected to do the dishes will instead repaint the living room. Let me tell you a little bit about my muse.

Instead of writing about politics and fairy godmothers and a prince named William who is NOT marrying a girl named Kate, I found myself compelled to look into quite different matters. The most side-tracked I got was actually because a friend, after being hit by a car, needed 300 stitches. Because someone referred to her injuries with a particular term, I looked up a Glasgow smile, which linked me to a Japanese urban legend, which linked me to black widows, which linked me to Celtic mythology, which linked me to banshees, which made me think about another plot bunny that's been bothering me. Basically my theory was that if there were a Narnia-type situation, a Daughter of Eve or a Son of Adam under different circumstances might just give rise to ghost stories or odd mythology.

Then that plot bunny kept gnawing on my brain and I had an epiphany on that plot. Because the epiphany happened at work, I spent four hours at home looking up vintage postcards. I even found one from 1906 that depicts the Golden Ball Tavern in my hometown of Weston, MA. That was fun.

In the meantime, the aforementioned stitched-up friend is actually the sister of one of my beta-readers, so I am definitely giving her a break in terms of proofreading. I have another friend who has many of the same opinions about pacing and she will be taking up the slack for a while. My best wishes go to that family. It was an unfortunate Sunday when that beta landed for Thanksgiving break in Salt Lake City only to find out that she should fly home the same day because her sister was in Intensive Care. We are so relieved that her sister is doing very well.

So, writing on my completed novel? Not so much this month. I have the entire first conversation between two main characters of the next book stuck in my head. I even know the religion of Ella's college roommate, as well as her name, her parents' literary hobbies and the color of her bedspread.

On the other hand, I still haven't gotten responses back other than those first two. I'm anxiously looking forward to any comments and am meanwhile looking for more people to submit to and looking forward to getting a new edition of Writer's Market.

And last Friday, I turned 30! When I turned 20, I didn't have a job, I spoke only one language and I didn't know most of the people who show up in my acknowledgments posts. So I think this will be a good decade.

The Lull

So, no new rejections. I haven't had the energy to do revisions in weeks because of the new job. It'll be my 30th birthday on Friday of this week. There's not much going on right now!

Revisisons

Aaaah, Saturdays. They are now my one day a week in which I can get anything done, since I finally got a new job and that's 8-4:30. I have to wake up early to get to work on time and my revisions have suffered.

But I do have three chapters of revisions to get through, thanks to my sister-in-law's betaing efforts. I have to figure out things like how to take smaller steps in the Ella/Alex relationship without stalemating it and how to make Mr. Mack NOT look like a pedophile, apparently! :)