Courtesy of the NaNoWriMo website, not my own work or like whatever. COPYRIGHT etc etc
So I’m almost 10 000 words in (9 955 words to be exact at the posting of this uh…post) and I’ve written myself into various dilemmas! Understandably though as my characters are progressing this fictional world and getting thrown into situations that aren’t favourable to them and it costs them dearly! Funny thing is that they are actually just making their own decisions and I’m incorporating the world around them to fit. Don’t laugh! I’m serious. I’m just typing along la di da di da and then BAM “hey I want to go left, what’s left?” and I’m like “Uhhh vampires? I guess…” and the character is all “I love vampires, remember that time you wrote a vampire short story? The stakes were high on that one!” and I’m like “But you can’t have vampires! They don’t fit” and next thing I know I have vampires infiltrating a well thought out romance novel (uhhh…yes occasionally I write at twilight? What do you mean its a movie/book? Sparkles???)
So what’s the dealio Thito?
Well firstly my world is suddenly populating with characters that I had not anticipated, characters suddenly sprouting opinions and ideas of their own forcing me to incorporate them into the big scheme of things and they have proven to me that they are worthy of being included. Imagine that! They are just screaming at me to make them part of the story so I have and I’m liking how they are shaping up and I have already foreseen how they will either aid or hinder my MC’s as they continue of this quest.*breathes* Did someone say excitement? Oh and then there is this one character, sneaky sneaky! He is creeping in to every little arc like some sort of sneaky antagonist who never gives any of the MCs or SCs (Main characters and Sub characters…in case you have been confusing them with rappers or whatever – like I did the first few times. What’s up with this Master of Ceremonies showing up everywhere! – I digress – lol always wanted to say that…I wonder how much can be put in to parenthesis before it becomes its own little paragraph…maybe I should remove the parenthesis …parentheses…I’ll add an authors note!) a chance. #Authors note. Read previous sentence excluding sentences within the parentheses to make sense of it.
So how easy is it to make a fictional earth?
Well let’s take a look at it shall we. There is a planet. The planet has to be designed somewhat and of course named. I suck at names. What’s worse? The planet is made up of continents – continents have names! I so far planned only 5 continents and if I really have to add more I will but I can handle five, besides I only need these five to progress my story. I can do a whole Japanese RPG thing and bring in this one separated continent in the middle of nowhere, hiding a giant floating city (or underwater city oooh) where the final battle ensues. Or I could just go with what I have. Then each continent is made up of countries. Many countries in fact. South America with 12 countries is a continent with the least number of countries (excluding those frigid landscapes that have NO countries. I like that idea better!) and each country has a name. Argentina comes from the Latin word Argentum which means silver and was used at first to speak of a Silver River. Brazil stems its origin from the brazilwood tree which was its earliest commercially exploited product. In Portuguese brazilwood is called pau-brasil, from the Latin word brasa meaning ember or rather red wood. What about my countries? Do they have such rich historical roots? Nope! Which means that I have some work to do in building a background for these countries. Oh and do you know what’s in each country? Yeah…. states and provinces and cities and villages and towns and suburbs and streets and roads and avenues and mountains and hills and tourists sights oh gosh!
Freakin out there ?
Uh yeah no. I mean I’m like one fifth in already right? 23 days to go to write the remaining 40 000 words (40045 to be exact) and what I have is this unraveling of characters and places and events that each lead to their own separate story arcs. Each arc building up to that cataclysmic conclusion where the protagonist and antagonist clash swords, shoot energy balls at each other and achieve their ultimate form that pushes their power level beyond all human understanding and probability. Okay that’s not happening in my story but you get the gist of what I’m saying right? Great!
Any fears?
Yes! I’m afraid that my novel might be longer that 50 000 words because as things are progressing, my storyline is slowing down. I feel like its moving a bit too fast you know, like you won’t get to know and understanding these characters as they are and by the time you have a sense of who each one is, they are already shooting energy balls at each other and the one dies and its like, whoa whoa whoa! Who are these people and why should I care that a sword has been driven into his chest!? And what do you mean they rode off into the sunset? It can’t be over already!
Do I have a fear of not finishing?
Hmmmm I think somewhere in the recesses of my mind I’m contemplating it. When fatigue sets in at 500 words and I know that there is still another +-1200 to go before I can call it quits, at those times I feel like quitting. Who needs this novel anyway. The worst times are when I can’t come up with anything to progress my story and I read it over to see how I can move them along to where they need to be but no ideas come to mind – and its 23:00 meaning I have an hour to write over 1000 words. Pressure! Frustration! But with NaNo on my case and numbers publicly displayed and coaches hashtagging twitter and e-mails with updates constantly reminding me of this novel that I’m writing, how can I fall away. All this pressure. So I push. But I also push because I’m enjoying the writing. Its invigorating and fun and you know sleeping at 00:01 because I had to make sure I reach my daily quota is somewhat satisfying. Thankfully at the end of it I’m so fatigued, I fall asleep almost immediately. I mean writing is emotionally, mentally and physically tiring. But I love it.
Well with that said let me bid you adieu. I haven’t written anything so far, I used up more than a 1000 words writing this post which means I have to dig deep to find another 1600 or so words in the next… 4 hours. Procrastination tells me I can play some League of Legends or Battlefield 4 or a game or two of Fifa14. The rest of my working brain is screaming at me to get to work. Guess you can check my word counter on the right hand corner there to see which one of ’em won.
To all other NaNo’s out there. Keep writing, keep pushing and let’s finish well.
A-Scribe To Describe 