Chao's Christmas Story - DONE!

[Chao]

This will be my first year at NaNoWriMo, but my muse was thrilled with the idea of participating, so I thought: 'Hey, if my muse is willing, we might try to use NaNoWriMo to write our yearly Christmas Story.'

For the past five years, I have written Christmas Stories for a friend's Advent Calendar, one story per year, of varying length. And though I already have an idea for this year, my muse was a bit reluctant to move from the planning stage to the writing stage. Which is not good, as this year's idea is one that promises to be a bit longer than usually.

In order to keep my muse in line, I know I need a place to discuss the story, so when I discovered this section here, I decided to unlurk and become a part of the community.

I don't know if the idea of the story is actually worth 50,000 words, but even if it is not, the NaNoWriMo and the opportunity to discuss the story and its progress here, will have helped a project I will be proud of in the end.

The story will be written in German as this is my native tongue and the Advent Calendar is for a German speaking audience. So unless some users say they want to read German excerpts of the story, I will only discuss the general contents and plotline here.

SPOILER: Click to show

As always for the Advent Calendar it will be a Christmas Love Story. This year the setting will be New York. Protagonist A is the CEO of a publishing house, Protagonist B is a chauffeur.
A looses their driver's license because of driving under the influence of alcohol at labour day. Because of their work, A is granted a special license to drive to important business meetings. Which means their secretary sends in a list of the meetings to the judges office for approval, so that when stopped on the road, A can produce the approved list to show that they are allowed to drive there. However, on Thanksgiving, A's latest relationship (they were actually thinking of asking their partner to tie the knot) breaks up and in order to clear their mind, A drives around at random. This causes A to loose the special license. As A still needs to be able to get to all the meetings and appointments they hire a chauffeur - B.
B is quite a few years younger than A, and works as chauffeur to pay the hospital bills of their grandmother. As the grandmother was the only family B had, they could not stand the thought of granny not having a good medical care till the end and luckily the hospital agreed that B could pay the bills in installments. At the time the story begins, granny has been dead for a few months and B has only a few more installments to pay and the offer to be the exclusive chauffeur to A would free them of their debt, so B could move on and resume their studies at college/university. Currently B is studying in a night school program.
Now, of course, during the month B is A's chauffeur, they gradually fall in love, though A is reluctant because of the age difference, his late relationship and various other reasons, which of course in the end, are not important at all.
I know the idea is nothing new, but nontheless, it's always fun to read such a story.

[Zylaa]

Writing for a friend's Advent Calendar sounds like such a great tradition! And my first year of NaNo, I used it as motivation to work on a story-in-progress. It really does help. Good luck!

[Chao]

Yeah, it's a great tradition and a lot of people are always looking forward to the calendar, as there are quite a few good writers, including the friend who organizes the whole. (And one of my best friends is happy that despite all the Kitsch that is just part of the season my story this year won't feature any kids ;D )

SPOILER: Click to show

- Find out if there is a minimum age B has to have in order to be allowed to work as a chauffeur in NYC
- Remember to take Beowulf to work to read it at lunch break
- Find a way to make A's ex-partner the proper villain every longer story needs. Obviously Ex is jealous of B and wants A back. Not that it's going to work, but it adds a bit of drama and action. I can't have Ex kidnap B, as I had a kidnap scenario in my Advent Calendar story two years ago. Ex could try to buy B off and when this doesn't work, Ex could try to set B up for some crime... sounds really dramatic. Any idea as to the sort of crime?
- Decide on the side characters: A's family, B's friends

[Chao]

Good news:
My main characters now have proper names, the idea with the crime set up is getting more detailed and I actually took Beowulf with me to work.

Bad news:
I forgot to take it out during lunchbreak. *sigh*

(The reason for reading Beowulf besides broadening my horizon regarding classic literature is that B is supposed to read this story during one of the many waiting periods he encounters as chauffeur.)

SPOILER: Click to show

A = Grayson Hammond
B = Cole Bishop
X = Cecile Wentorf

[Chao]

Okay, I guess I should really clear my writing schedule. Luckily there is only one more thing on the list. And with some luck I'll manage to write this either tonight or tomorrow.

SPOILER: Click to show

Stuart - A's cousin (by marriage) whom he dislikes greatly
Lucy - B's coordinator and kind of best friend
Alice Buchanan - A's secretary
Chuck - X's cousin, burly and a brawler
Margaret - A's mother
Elsbeth - A's aunt
Nancy - A's cousin and pregnant wife of Stuart
Ben Mack - A's Godfather
Alfred - Margaret's brother and A's uncle (g?)
Ruth Bishop - B's deceased grandmother
Paul Saunders - Lucy's father and B's boss
Erica Saunders - Lucy's mother and Paul's wife
Mike Saunders - Lucy's younger brother
Matthew Harris - lawyer of the Hammond family and the publishing house

[Chao]

1842 words. Not bad, but not good either. Hope I do add another thousand tonight. I actually brought my favourite writing CD with me.
Good thing though: I have not even introduced B so far, so a lot of room. *g*

[Chao]

I'm not sure if I shall be happy or disappointed that I actually had enough work at the office today to keep me from writing for the greater part of the day. Regarding NaNo it was disappointing, but being bored at the office because of the lack of work isn't great either.

I like my thread here, as it allows me to keep track of my side characters who keep popping up as I write. I never know if they might not be of use later in the story.

[Chao]

Today's post will have me starting a list of locations, so I don't mix them up or forget them.

SPOILER: Click to show

The Hammond estate (Glen Cove, Long Island)
Cole's abode ('studio' in Mott Haven, Bronx, NYC)
Grayson's apartment (Upper Eastside, Manhattan, NYC)
Hammond Publishing House (SoHo, Manhattan)
PELM office and Parking lot (Brooklyn, NY)
NYU-SCPS (graduate school Cole wants to attend)
Colorado State University (Fort Collins, Co, option for Cole to attend)
Shale Hills Farm (Sussex, NJ, christmas tree farm)

[Chao]

Yay, for once my muse didn't come up with new side characters for two days. (At least none which were deemed important enough to be given a name, so even if they speak a line or two, they are only nice to look at, but soon to be forgotten.)

Plus, as we went along, my muse finally had me tell a bit more about my second main character B (Cole). I now know how he met his best friend Lucy, what he does as hobby (Poi), and what he is going to pursue for graduate school (tourism and travel).

As for the story, by now I have introduced the two protagonists, have managed to have Cole acknowledge at least to himself that he would not push Gray off the edge of his bed, and I am now planning Cecile's next appearance which will help take the relationship of Gray and Cole from Employer and Chauffeur to the somehow friends level.

Current word count: 7,503 words. Yes, I am lagging behind, but well...

[Chao]

Finally got back to lagging only 1 day's quota behind. Plus I intend to write a bit more today, which is great. So I finally got my first 10K. Yay me!

I also established a writing routine:
- open the document
- open a great story online to read while writing (my muse tends to take small breaks of five minutes now and then, so I read while she comes up with the next sentence which gets me writing for another couple of hundred words)
- open google (for impromptu image and map related research... like parking situation in New York's Upper East Side)
- open wikipedia (for more impromptu background research)
- open leo (online dictionary in case my muse suddenly switches the language and I have to translate her English ideas into German)
Unfortunately having this many internet tabs open, I usually open neo and ntwf and animexx as well, so there is also the danger of squandering time there... *drop* (But it's next to impossible for me to write without my instant-research pages!)

[Chao]

Current progress of my story (also known as things I have already written):
A and X are no longer together, and A definitely will never consider taking X back. As a result, their break-up also created a situation for A and B spending time together by outside force. (In case you have never noticed before, any romance novel/love novel tends to have an outside source forcing the MCs to spend time together, because how else should they find out that they like each other?).
B is instantly attracted to A when meeting them, though is careful not to show it too much, knowing that A is not attracted to them in return.
Despite not being attracted to B, A finds B interesting, great to talk to and spend time with. Which causes B slowly to fall in love with A, not standing a chance not to.

Upcoming scene should lead to their first kiss. I want A to be the focus in this scene as it's the more important character (after all, A is not yet in love with B), yet can't find my first sentence for the scene. Hopefully it'll soon come.

[Chao]

Almost one week later since my last post. Story is still alive and still progressing nicely (with my usual lagging 1 day's quota behind). By now I have had my two main characters kiss twice, had the ex reappear, to slowly heaten the story up - the ex is kind of catalyst in the story, but also the villain - and now I am introducing some kind of sub plot, which I had not originally planned, but which fits so nicely as the possibility of it was hinted in the very first scene of the story, so in order to stand a chance to reach 50k this subplot has to be written.

[Chao]

I so hate the scene I am currently writing. It's propably the worst scene of the whole story. I just hope I find the time to edit it, before it goes online with the Advent Calendar. *sigh*
Okay, on second thought I will find time for it, because most likely my muse won't go on with the story till we did.

Since yesterday I also have a master index of the scenes I wrote. Just to keep track how many scenes I have and to make sure that no two scenes start with exactly the same sentence. And Chuck turned out to be Ceciles smart elder brother Charles, and the brawlers are two goons he found at his fitness club.

[Chao]

Another week later and having written now more than 30k I am in danger of running out of plot. The story started with a scene taking place on Thanksgiving day and the upcoming scene to write is already Christmas Eve. Even the addition of the Nancy-subplot did not help that much. I might be short 10k in the end, so - please don't make the angry battle weewoos descend on me - I might have to enhance both plot and subplot by means of a blizzard. *ducks*

[Chao]

Yesterday for the first time since the beginning of November, I managed to catch up with the regular daily quota. And thanks to a very, very, very, very, very boring day at work (I was lent to another company as technical support for a telephone hotline which receive a total of three calls the whole day and none were about technical questions) I have already written today's quota plus started tomorrow's quota. And guess what: It feels great!

I also decided that in case even the addition of the blizzard does not get me to the 50k threshold, I need not despair. I'll simply write a few outtakes related to the story, which might include some of the various NaNo-Dares.