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Post by Belle on Oct 25, 2006 9:09:53 GMT -5
Um...yeah...time to talk to myself.  What I need to know: - My schedule for next sem (yarr...better plan which classes I'm going to take as early as possible. Like maybe now. 0_o) Ze Plan: - Genre - Plot - Characters - Possible chapter outline To find: - Free writing software (possibly simpler than Word) with NaNoWriMo timer) Status: Success!  I actually found something: yWriter. And now to learn how to use it. - Make little NaNo schedules (and actually organize some parts of my life for a change) To-do: - Improve timed writing skills (write a drabble in 2o minutes everyday -- for seven days *blinkblink*! November = busy month. <.< - Actually come up with a plot. And characters. *hyperventilates* |
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Post by Belle on Oct 25, 2006 18:40:35 GMT -5
Plot idea:
A collection of interrelated short stories about a young girl (possibly the girl from Fallen). It could be the story of seven different characters all finding their way to one another through the girl. The girl could just be always in the background, more of an outsider than really part of the story. Each story will be all about how each character's life changes when they see her.
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Post by Belle on Oct 25, 2006 22:45:56 GMT -5
Very fragmented thoughts... <.< NaNo Plot Ideas Idea 1: A collection of shorts focusing on a young girl (possibly the girl from my drabble, “Fallen”). There could be seven different characters with different backgrounds and stuff. Their lives change after they meet the young girl. Setting: Can I distort everything and come up with a fantasy world? That’s it. What if they meet the girl in their imagination? Yeah. That’s a start. The girl only exists in their troubled minds. And what is her role? Why is she there? No reason. She’s just there. Perhaps she doesn’t know why. Perhaps she’s someone who died and never got to heaven. And she spends her time wandering into other people’s minds and showing them what is real and unreal. Hm…what if they lived in different decades, lands, even planets? Yeah. I think I like that idea. But now I’ll have to think of seven different worlds and stuff. But, wait, why do I keep saying seven? Significance? Seven deadly sins? Could there be another meaning to the number seven? Research on this. Possible significance of seven (snitched from encyclopedia  ): - Deadly sins o anger, covetousness (desiring things that belong to others), envy, gluttony (greedy eating), lust, pride, and sloth (laziness) - Seven seas o are the Antarctic, Arctic, North and South Pacific, North and South Atlantic, and Indian oceans - Muses (there are nine of them, though – choose 7?) o Each Muse ruled over a certain art or science. Calliope was the Muse of epic poetry; Erato, love poetry; Euterpe, lyric poetry; Melpomene, tragedy; Thalia, comedy; Clio, history; Urania, astronomy; Polyhymnia, sacred song; and Terpsichore, dance. - Seven wonders of the world (ancient, natural) - Seven continents - Seven dwarfs Young girl: - Could possibly be nameless but perhaps I could find a name suitable for her. Something that either means joy, sadness, or nothingness - Who is she? Where did she come from? What is her purpose in life? - Give her a past. She died because…? Was she abused, run over by a train maybe? I have a feeling I want it to be gory. Check Edward Gorey’s children’s story. Possible protagonists: None yet. (This could either be a very good or very bad NaNo idea. It seems like it’s going to be a ‘serious’ type novel and it might be difficult to churn out 50000 words of this in a month. Note: Belle is not good with realism. Maybe turn this into a sub-fantasy of sorts.) Additional idea: To make it easier for me, perhaps make each story a fairy tale. Each character could be living in a fantasy world where they are the heroes/heroines. |
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Post by Ginz ❤ on Oct 25, 2006 22:49:22 GMT -5
Your NaNo sounds really interesting, Belle! Good luck with it.  |
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Post by Belle on Oct 25, 2006 22:55:26 GMT -5
Thankies, Ginz. p:p My inner voice is actually in semi-panic mode and I want to start writing. pXD Nuuu...
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Post by Ginz ❤ on Oct 25, 2006 23:01:49 GMT -5
Thankies, Ginz.  My inner voice is actually in semi-panic mode and I want to start writing. Nuuu... XD Heh, that's okay. I felt like that last year. The first days of NaNo were the best for me because I had all that excitement and expectation piling up inside me, which made me feel inspired, so I wrote very fluently. ^^ |
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Post by Belle on Oct 26, 2006 1:50:44 GMT -5
Okay, I think I know her name now.
Clara.
How did she die? She drowned. But I'm not sure if she committed suicide or if someone just watched her die.
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Post by Belle on Oct 26, 2006 2:02:02 GMT -5
Thankies, Ginz. My inner voice is actually in semi-panic mode and I want to start writing. Nuuu... XD Heh, that's okay. I felt like that last year. The first days of NaNo were the best for me because I had all that excitement and expectation piling up inside me, which made me feel inspired, so I wrote very fluently. ^^ I can't help it. I'm excited. p:D Especially since it's my first time to do this. p:) |
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Post by Belle on Oct 26, 2006 6:21:22 GMT -5
Back to do some more talking with myself. pXD Mulled over this for a bit and here's the updated version of the story...
Plot Update
Kate's life is a mess [what exactly is this mess?] which is why when she meets a young girl whose life is in ruins, she figures, hey, since she can't fix her life, might as well fix another person's, right? Clara is a little girl who enters Kate's life as if she had come from nowhere. All Kate knows is that Clara doesn't know anything about herself except her name. So she resolves to help Clara regain her memories.
But as soon as Kate befriends Clara, her world changes. Suddenly, a mysterious young man in weird [define weird] clothes appears. His name is Iggy and he claims he knows who Clara is.
What follows is a wild goose chase with Kate and Clara running after Iggy who keeps appearing and disappearing in different places. In each place [not yet sure how this is going to go], Kate unlocks one of Clara's significant memories. And as Clara regains them, she becomes a different person altogether, so different that she antagonizes Kate making her wonder why she wanted to help the girl in the first place.
[More stuff here]
*goes off to eat ice cream*
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Post by Belle on Oct 30, 2006 21:54:01 GMT -5
NaNo in less than a day for me. *frets* I'm still thinking of whether or not I should start at midnight or when I wake up in the morning (which might be a problem because I've been waking up late these past few days).
--
Plot-wise, my storyline has evolved again. ^^ Might divulge the developments in a while. But here are the final names for my characters:
Sage - protagonist, main chara
Clara - little girl whom Sage meets while storytelling in the library
Will - Sage's moody older brother
Selena (not the final name <.<) - Sage's younger sister
Iggy (Ignacio) - Sage's irritating classmate/friend who holds the key to Clara's memories
Ii (tentative name) - wise man who keeps on appearing in Sage's dreams
Bridget - Sage's Mom
Sage's dad - still nameless
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Post by Deleted on Oct 31, 2006 17:27:35 GMT -5
This all sounds quite fascinating, actually!
I am oddly reminded of the movie Gothika, and the TV show Lost.... Perhaps they're all insane, and their odd worlds are in their minds, and some of those guiding figures are psychiatrists? Or maybe I've been reading too much Koontz lately.
Well, no matter my ramblings-- Good luck!
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Post by Belle on Oct 31, 2006 22:07:07 GMT -5
This all sounds quite fascinating, actually! I am oddly reminded of the movie Gothika, and the TV show Lost.... Perhaps they're all insane, and their odd worlds are in their minds, and some of those guiding figures are psychiatrists? Or maybe I've been reading too much Koontz lately. Well, no matter my ramblings-- Good luck! I had that in mind for a while but I thought I wouldn't be able to pull it off (hehe...at least, not in this stage of my life p:p ) so I'm going a different way. ^^ I'm still thinking of the 'this is all just in your imagination' scenario but I'm not sure if it's going to happen. pXD Good luck to all of us. p:) |
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Post by Belle on Oct 31, 2006 22:22:32 GMT -5
An excerpt (I might decide to share more soon but for now, this is what you get pXD ):
It wasn't like I was getting paid for this, anyway. I was a student volunteer. She should be happy that someone actually volunteered for an after school activity. A typical teenager had a social life to deal with. Mine didn't seem to exist, at the moment, so I thought, what better way to spend my after school hours, than locked up in the library reading to midgets?
I was caught off guard when a small brown hand reached for a pillow. I looked up to see a girl…the girl. She was looking at the ground now and fluffing the pillow with both hands. Her long black hair threatened to fall all over her face. I watched her as she picked up another pillow, her mouth set in a determined line. Not once did she raise her eyes to acknowledge me.
I picked up a bunch of already fluffed up pillows and started piling them up behind a nearby desk. “Aren't you going home?”
She didn't answer. She followed my lead and carefully arranged some pillows behind the desk.
“What's your name?”
Silence. She glared at me and I had a glimpse of her startling brown eyes. She reached for another pillow.
I suppressed a smile. The girl had just started attending story hour last week. She was a silent, brooding child and she looked the part. Her dark hair was as straight as spaghetti noodles and it fell down her back like dead weight. She was thin, thin, thin – malnourished, I'd say, except that her dark blue school uniform fit her perfectly. She looked like a doll minus the fair skin (hers was a dark chocolate) and the pretty face.
I felt the urge to talk to her, make her speak somehow. She was a fascinating child, the only one who listened to my story with a skeptical ear. I knew the eyes that had watched me intently a while ago belonged to her. “You don't need to stay here, you know. The other kids all went home.”
She raised her eyebrows at me and I could almost see her curb a smirk. Ah, a child after my own principles. “Yes, I noticed.”
Her voice wasn't the high-pitched childish voice that the others had. I realized that I expected it to be like this, soft and a little low. “Hey, I was just trying to make conversation. Besides, it's my job to fix up this place after you guys leave.”
This time she smirked. “You're not very organized.”
Well. The child had a point. But how she would know was beyond me. Oh, right. The books that surrounded me were a dead giveaway. They were children's books that I had been mulling over for the coming sessions. I hadn't even bothered to pick them up when the children came for story hour. I guess I thought they wouldn't notice. Or care.
“You'd leave this place a rat's nest, if you could,” she said, almost accusing. She gathered the books nearest to her and placed them on the desk.
“You're right. But I do care about this job so I wouldn't.”
She answered without looking at me. “That's why I said, if you could.”
What an impolite child. I wanted to laugh. She was just like me when I was younger. I helped her with the books. We worked in silence for the next few minutes.
I cleared my throat. “Why does all this matter to you, anyway? Like I said, this is all part of my job. You're just a child that I read stories to.”
She gave me another one of her glares. I stared her down. She shrugged it off and frowned at me. She was looking at me in a different way now, like she was trying to probe my thoughts.
Her forehead soon unwrinkled and she offered me her small hand. I stared at it. “My name is Clara Estrella,” she said, sounding both angry and impatient, like she didn't really want to tell me her name.
I smiled and shook her hand. “And I'm--”
“Sage Santos, I know.”
I blinked.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 1, 2006 14:15:37 GMT -5
That was an awesome excerpt! e likey. ^_^
If you don't mind my saying, Clara reminds me, in a way, of Dakota Fanning's character in Uptown Girls, or at least they way she spoke and was a bit too proper for her age. She seems to have much more depth, though, thsan what we have seen here.
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Post by Belle on Nov 1, 2006 23:01:45 GMT -5
*le squee* Thanks for the comments, Wolf. p:) I'm getting encouraged. ^_^ *continues writing*
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