November is NaNoWriMo month. Fifty thousand words in thirty days. First draft material all the way. This years project is a prequel story to a previous novella. I decided to work on a character’s back story and explain how he got started as a supernatural troubleshooter. Having lots of fun with the story, which I’ve done a lot of jumping around, working on whatever scene catches my fancy. This year I’m working in Scrivener and finding it works really well in letting me jump around. Each scene is it’s own little section, letting me drag and drop as needed. I’m ahead of the game and not having to rush at the last minute for a change. Course it is the last minute, but who’s counting.
In the meantime, three more short stories were published, bringing the total to six in print, number seven due out in January, and number eight eventually. Three other stories are out to calls and I did manage to write two more short stories that aren’t due until after January 1. On a roll and hoping to keep up the pace in 2014. With a couple of years, I’ll have enough urban fantasy/fairy tale stories that I could slap together as an anthology in my own right. Need to make a bigger name for myself in the meantime.
Handed a couple of books out to some NaNo folks so they could read my stories. Best feedback was one gentlemen that wanted more and he said the opening sentence was quite “descriptive”. Bonus points for hooking them at the start. Looking at the cast of characters that are running through my head, there’s a lot of story potential out there and I want to try other viewpoints. Put the spotlight on the “supporting” characters, develop them further, and see what makes them tick. The best thing I like about writing to the short story calls is being able to pull from the stable and seeing who fits. It’s given me the chance to write a Beauty and the Beast story with a twist. When I started writing it was fantasy or post-apocalypse stories, maybe a couple of hard sci-fi tales. First story sold? Suspense. Second story? Horror. I remember sitting on a panel and one of the speaker said don’t limit yourself to a genre. Now I get it. Write to what works. Let the characters be the focus, tell their stories, and it should work out fine.
As a followup, I broke 50,000 words and won for the 6th year in a row. Still not done with the story, but got an early finish for a change.
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