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Support Thread for those continuing to write in December

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Eternal Light
62671 words so far Winner!

Hey Nano people. you guys have been a HUGE source of inspiration and motivation throughout the last month. what a cool journey it has been, I never expected this.

I ended the month a "winner", but still have a ways to go to complete my novel. I have built so much momentum and energy up with this project, that I don't want to let this fizzle out with a partially completed rough draft. So here is where I am going to continue posting my own word count daily until i finish my novel. I'm hoping just doing this will keep me connected to the experience, and keep me motivated to try.

So, expect me to post my word counts daily until i finish my novel, hopefully soon. If any of you are in a similar situation and need the continued motivation and focus, whether or not you made the 50k, please post in here as well. We can motivate each other to keep going forward and see this thing to the end! LETS DO THIS

I ended this day with 63012 words. So this will be my December Starting point :)

tregina12000
51644 words so far Winner!

When I started, I didn't think that I had enough story to make it to 50k, and now I find that I have something like 2 chapters worth of story left to go. Sadly, I'm hanging up on a transitional scene, and without the daily word count to motiviate me, I'm waffling, so I'm counting on you all to kickstart me to the end, please.

Eternal Light
62671 words so far Winner!

Awesome! We've come way too far to just stop! I'm going to try to update my word count every day on here, even if it isn't a lot. It's too late to lose steam, keep charging towards the end, and posting yoru word count!

Squiddish
28000 words so far

High. Five.

I originally started NaNo this year with noooo plan as to how my book would turn out. Switching novels midstream and some setbacks later, and here I am at the end of NaNo with only about 28k to show for it. But that's okay. About mid way through the month I knew I wasn't going to finish, and I planned on that being the case. I instead focused on plotting out my novel--using this month as a way to make sure I really knew I understood what I wanted to happen.

Plus, last years nano novel, while complete, was not pretty. And I know from personal experience that I will likely NOT edit it because everytime I look at it I tend to throw up a little. So I want a more complete, readable first draft. Nothing that will be publishable the first go round, but that I'll actually still be okay with at the end. So I've set the goal of finishing my novel by the end of January or February instead of rushing through it. (Or maybe even a little longer, if I need the time.) That way, I won't feel quite so pressured to get words on paper and be a little more concerned with getting /decent/ words on paper.

C: Can't wait!

Larkk
78478 words so far Winner!

Yay! I was looking for exactly this kind of thread.

I am almost done with my story, with one BIG scene (which, as usual, I'm overwhelmed by the idea of actually writing) and a few loose ends to mop up. I need the word count motivation to get me through the tough parts and to the end.

At the same time, I'm so sad to leave my story, that I might just write it a little longer ...

I'll post progress here with you guys. I'm shooting for about a thousand words a day, give or take. :)

Jump, and you will find out how to unfold your wings as you fall. ~Ray Bradbury

scrapacat
56007 words so far Winner!

Just a note: we have a year-round writing group called the Journey. If you're interested in joining us, all you need to do is send Tim (aka NewMexicoKid) an email and he'll get you started. I'm not sure NaNo stays active all year, I think it was just the three months of events. The word count apps also go away if I remember correctly from last year. Again, Tim can tell you what's the word this year. Happy writing!

Eternal Light
62671 words so far Winner!

Thanks KatherineWriting for the thread idea. Glad to see Im not the only one looking to continue forward!
I didn't get a lot written today, very busy, but got some, and will keep pushing on, hopefully making more progress tomorrow.

64001 Words :)

Larkk
78478 words so far Winner!

1061 words today, for a total count of 79,638.

I have to admit, though it's a relief not to feel that I have to write 10k words every weekend like I did during NaNoWriMo, I still have some things I want to add to this story. It's hard to know if I'm stalling because I don't want to leave it, or if the story demands it.
Or, it could be that I'm not used to the slower pace of normal year-round writing!

Jump, and you will find out how to unfold your wings as you fall. ~Ray Bradbury

Sapphire
56476 words so far Winner!

I haven't reached "the end" yet. That's about 6k off if my estimates are right (and I've gotten to be decent at estimating, so long as I've got an outline). Overall though, I'm proud of my novel this year. I took a well-deserved day off of writing to do some shopping, take a nap, and drink some particularly delicious alcohol (more of the alcohol coming soon because hey--it's Saturday and I don't work tomorrow). I am going to continue writing.

My novel isn't great, right now. It's likely to be terrible in many, many places. But the story is solid (although I lack subplots) and I have quite a few scenes that really shine. I think if I can edit this down and get a second draft out, this could be something pretty great. This is the second novel I've felt this way about--the first was A Bit of Human Driftwood, my 2008 novel and second-ever win.

KatherineWriting
201228 words so far Winner!

I'm not still working on my first draft, but I am continuing to write in December.

I'm starting with editing Barry's short stories. For this year's Nano, he was a rebel and wrote six short stories that take place in the universe of our novels. You can read one on CritiqueCricle (and critique it, if you like) at:
http://www.critiquecircle.com/queue.asp?action=lookup&id=84645


I've read and edited two of them so far. (We have a deal. He writes the first draft and then he doesn't have to do anything else with the writing--note, this isn't something I do for anyone else. And he does seem to like talking about any major changes I make to the stories, he just doesn't want to do the actual editing.) I will do several more passes on each, I'm sure. Focusing on something shorter is a pleasure, although I'm about to dive back into 'Making Family' a novel that is getting close to being ready for Beta readers. (It's been up at cc for a while.) And this week I hope to catch up on the dozen or so critiques that I got on cc during November.

Larkk
78478 words so far Winner!

1020 words today, total words 80,658.
Every time I sit down to write the ending scene, my characters keep talking and doing things that feel terribly important. I'm beginning to think I might have started my story too early, and that what I'm writing right now is the meat of the story.

I suppose I'll get to the end eventually. I've just never had this problem before!

Jump, and you will find out how to unfold your wings as you fall. ~Ray Bradbury

tregina12000
51644 words so far Winner!

Larkk wrote:
1020 words today, total words 80,658.
Every time I sit down to write the ending scene, my characters keep talking and doing things that feel terribly important. I'm beginning to think I might have started my story too early, and that what I'm writing right now is the meat of the story.

I suppose I'll get to the end eventually. I've just never had this problem before!


This happened to me a few years ago and I ended up splitting the story into parts 1 & 2, and saving part 2 for the following year. Worked out great, because the meat part of the story (part 2) ended up being another 50,000.

I just managed to hammer out 2,100 words and finish out my problem chapter.

One down, one to go.

TeenWriter
52359 words so far Winner!

I plan on continuing my writing in December and into the new year, with the hopes of finishing my story as it was originally outlined and then editing it like crazy. But first I'm taking a bit of a break...

DJRM
50000 words so far Winner!

I am not sure if this is the place for this but, I figured out what happened to my word count.
About 2 hours before the close of NaNo I was reviewing my word count and found a 3000 word gap between where I thought I was and the results I was getting. Now I know why.
Throughout November I went to write ins and other places. I moved files back and forth between my computer, my laptop and my flash drive. Between them I ended up with different versions of the files depending on when and where I was writing and saving. It turns out the files I was looking at to check my word count and do my validation were not the most up to date version of my writing. I did in fact reach 50000 words this month but I did not find the latest version of the files until this morning.

tregina12000
51644 words so far Winner!

DJRM wrote:
Between them I ended up with different versions of the files depending on when and where I was writing and saving. It turns out the files I was looking at to check my word count and do my validation were not the most up to date version of my writing. I did in fact reach 50000 words this month but I did not find the latest version of the files until this morning.


Dude, at least you made the 50,000 in a month in one version of reality. Talk to Tim about using some sort of version control software for next time.

-----------------

In other news:

I did 2,000 more words today, adding a brief fill in scene to move things along, and I now have only two scenes left to finish.

Keep going everyone!

Eternal Light
62671 words so far Winner!

Sorry guys i got super sick the last two days. looking forward to continuing tongiht :D

mochomito
59452 words so far Winner!

hoping that my novel ends up being about 80K or so - so i hope to continue writing and editing in December.

tregina12000
51644 words so far Winner!

Finished at 57674!

Nice to have a finished story. Now it's time to sleep. Maybe some editing later in the month.

KatherineWriting
201228 words so far Winner!

tregina12000 wrote:
Finished at 57674!

Nice to have a finished story. Now it's time to sleep. Maybe some editing later in the month.


And you accomplished something that is notoriously difficult, you kept writing after December arrived.
Woot!

Sapphire
56476 words so far Winner!

I've been writing during my lunch break at work. It's only been around 15 minutes of writing a day, but it's something! My word count hasn't really changed--I had written a chapter earlier that was meant to take place towards the end of Act II, and now that I've reached that part much of it no longer fit and I've had to retool it.

I'm also consistently surprised at myself. I read a little bit from a 200...8? attempt The Watchtower Lies that only netted me 6,000 words for the month. I was feeling pretty low at the time and took a two-year break from NaNo, but after reading through it's really a lot better than I thought at the time. Some of my phrasing was pretty darned good, if I do say so myself. Which brings me to:

What's everyone's plans for their novel this year?

I'm going to be double-spacing it with wide margins and getting it printed up and spiral-bound at Kinkos. I think I might also shove it into a Kindle format and re-read the entire thing that way, too. I'm mostly going to be looking at two things: What worked, and what didn't. I'll see what I have left after that and go from there.

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