Integrity--BC's NaNo (WORDS OMG LOOK AT EM ALL)

[Sabre]

I was feeling like that before I even got 5k into my story, because so much is happening. But then I realized that I actually still had a lot more of the plot to write about and that might actually carry me through the rest of the fifty thousand. (Betrayal, disappearance, accusation of murder, and being arrested all happened within the first 5k) I'm still going to go through it and revise it at the end though, but hey, this is just the first draft. It's not meant to be perfect--something I'm still learning to cope with.

[Breakingchains]

It's not meant to be perfect--something I'm still learning to cope with.

Likewise. ; I have a lot of trouble not tinkering with something for ages when I'm still in first draft, especially big scenes that are supposed to have a lot of emotional impact. I'll ponder the same line for twenty minutes sometimes. (...I sort of like doing this, though. I like to get dramatic stuff passable the first time, even if it takes forever.)

But then, despite yesterday's whine...

DAY THIRTEEN REPORT

5K? 5K =D

So, yeah, I'm at 60k now. Another 15k-ish, and I've have beaten my previous one-month record, which will be very cool indeed. At the moment I'm still unsure of my work, but I'm trying to build a general sense of mystery and increase the intrigue of certain characters who have been, unfortunately, pretty boring so far. I hope I'll have another excerpt before too long, but a lot will depend how much time I have handy, between this and a couple other projects I have going simultaneously.

Incidentally, the weirdest stuff ruins my writing focus sometimes. Such as a nagging twisted ankle. Ow.

[Breakingchains]

DAY FOURTEEN REPORT

Things continued nicely today; I stopped 30 minutes before midnight at a total of 64k. I'm going to challenge myself to another 6k day tomorrow, though I have no idea how that will go. x3 We're going into some of Edward's backstory, the main villain is playing speed chess behind the scenes, the alien girl is being a horrible combination of my worst primal fears (namely, bugs, unnatural movement and distorted faces) and tension is building in general. Also Black Wolf just got called an incompetent redneck.

Once this month is over, I'm gonna play video games until my brain turns into jello.

[♥ Bre]

Still steaming along, I see, BC? ^_^ Again, so amazed by your progress and ... general all-around awesomeness!

Your plot---your characters---your enthusiasm---your witness---your ... your ... *cannotcompute!* D: Everything just seems perfectly balanced and brilliant and~! Gah!

Congratulations, 64K is stunning.

[Breakingchains]

Still steaming along, I see, BC? ^_^

Shockingly, yes. xD I keep wondering when I'm going to fizzle out, and then just keep moving... it's getting surreal. Anyway, thanks--I hope this turns out anywhere near as good as it apparently looks from your end. xD

DAY FIFTEEN REPORT

I didn't hit 70k today, but I'm so close it's freaking me out. 7k more and I'll have beaten by previous record; and as I understand it, 12k more and I have a project of a good salable length.

I had a nice, big, uninterrupted chunk of time today, and honestly thought I could hit 6k easily, but then my brain gave out. I ended up just sitting there with my mind going in fifteen directions and my brain refusing to cooperate, staring at the page for close to twenty minutes. Finally I said "heck with it" and went to read e-books for an hour. I lost time, but I came back able to concentrate a lot more easily; I'm worried this may have been an early sign of burnout, so I'm going to try to strike a balance between writing time and goof-off time over the next few days and see what happens.

[Breakingchains]

*is lazy*

*too lazy to make a proper update*

GUYS GUYS

75k

And I think the slow/boring phase is over, 'cause the novel has eaten my brain again. I dreamed about the characters. I feel obsessed. My supervillain has just blown up a nice chunk of a city, and the heroes are baffled and horrified and doing the best they can, and not realizing just how horrible things are really about to get just offscreen. A major chunk of the plot just got replanned right under my nose. Things are moving, and they're moving fast.

I... may actually be done with this in like a few days to a week.

*dun dun dunnnn*

[Rikku]

GO GO GO. <3 You can do it! (Of course.) Tell the story! And. Stuff. *bounces* It is seriously so cool to see when a writer's being eaten by their story. That's, like, pretty much the bestest part of writing, when it flows and surprises and consumes. And things keep on happening and. Yes.

*sort of thoroughly impressed!*

[Breakingchains]

DAY EIGHTEEN REPORT

Things have gone all to heck. Er, in the story, not in real life. xD

Edward and Stanley are both missing, the villain is being terrifying, and Matthew's about ready to go "HECK WITH THIS" and run off to save them. From a well-guarded SD military base. Which will end juuuust about as well as you expect. =D

After that, people will run around like chickens with their heads cut off! Marilyn will be awesome! Black Wolf will be awesome! Everyone else will also be awesome! And Chicago will face the imminent threat... of going kablooie! >=D

Incidentally, writing supervillains kinda makes me feel like a supervillain. :B MWA HA HA HA HA.

[Breakingchains]

ASDFGHJKL;

I... kind of feel like my ability to focus is shot.

I keep writing scenes, then realizing those scenes are pointless. Nothing has really happened for 3k words or more. I know where the story needs to go. But I can't seem to figure out a way to get there, so at this point, my characters are just sitting around rambling while I try to find a coherent line of thought, and I get more bored with every word.

I think I need to step back, breathe, and take another break to work out a decent game plan, or this is just going to go right down the tubes and result in 10k of pointless blather.

[♥ Bre]

Your story sounds absolutely fabulous and ... GAH! The fact that you're so into it really has to mean something and I wish you the best.

And I often face the same problem with writing meaningless blather ... Most of the time, I'll write huge chunks of dialogue that mean almost absolutely nothing, then have to delete all of it, which can be extremely annoying--I guess I just get too caught up in my characters and I hang onto every word that comes out of their mouths. XD

Best of luck, BC!! ^_^ Your novel still sounds amazing and with a plot and enthusiasm like that, you're sure to go far!

[Breakingchains]

^ Yes. xD Sometimes I'll be working on a project, the characters just talk and talk and talk, and then two hours later I go, "...Wait. I was supposed to be getting to the point about the recent rampant ninja attacks, and instead they're telling random 30-year-old anecdotes and coffee brands." And then I have to delete 1500 words. ;_;

In any case, I'm at 89k now, it's week four, and this thread is now one of many things that has fallen by the wayside while I try to muddle my way through this. xP I'm not sure how much longer this is gonna be, but I'm beginning to think it will surpass 100k, which is a frightening thought.

On a little side note, my longest-ever project (which was a fanfic so terrible it was abandoned after one draft) was 107k. If I went past that, that would officially put this project into "Holy crap I have spontaneously evolved into some kind of eldritch prose-monster" territory. Just sayin'.

[♥ Bre]

Over 100k? Heading into epic fantasy territory? I think so! ^_^ Hehehe :3

[Sabre]

... excerpt?

[Breakingchains]

Bwuh. I knew someone was going to ask. xD *bites nails*

Sorry I haven't posted another yet! To be honest, I've been kind of squirmy about it--partially nerves, partially busy with the writing itself, and partially wondering which scene to post, because most of my choices seem to be either boring, or with massive spoilers... which, um, I have no idea if anyone will be reading this for a long, long time anyway, but for some reason there's still that nagging thing in the back of my head saying "DON'T GIVE SPOILERS, BLOCKHEAD" and yeah...

Blargh, cannot brain today. ; I'll go through soon and grab an except. Right now I want to slap myself for taking so long on this post, then go and try to hit at least 2.5 to 3k for the day. xD

[Breakingchains]

*pulls excerpt from nowhere*

So. His powers are incredibly undertrained and he's not sure why on earth someone decided to send him on a mission, and here he is in a small town that's going up in smoke because of some lunatic with flamethrowers. He's been ordered to focus entirely on putting out fires, but he hears a crash and instinct kicks in:

SPOILER: Click to show

Matthew ducked, trying to get beneath the smoke as he ran—but it was hopeless. Something big had gone down. He held one sleeve over his mouth as he fought his way through, orange light painted on the plumes around him—he fired a burst of wind, trying to clear the air, then another, but it only helped so much. Somewhere a man was shouting frantically, and now he could see it; the burning beams of what might once have been a home, half of it completely collapsed, wood and scorched belongings spilling out into the street. He ran into the road, eyes scanning back and forth—everything around him was burning.

Then he heard the voice again. He whirled to the left to see a man staggering in the darkness—short and pudgy, middle-aged. He called out into the dense air, once, again, three times; and Matthew rushed to his side as he collapsed into the street, taking him by the shoulders. The man looked up—eyes streaming with tears that left two little trails in the gray ash that coated his face, trembling, glassy-eyed as he stared. Then he pointed wearily at the collapsed building, saying only one word:

“Carla.” His arm trembled as he pointed, then his entire form began to shake, and Matthew felt a pang of terror. “Very small…”

Matthew turned and left him, running straight into the wreckage—stumbling over wood and kicking up ash as he rushed into the burning two-level home, shouting:

“Carla!” She was going to die. “Where are you!?” The smoke swirled thick around him in the dark room, and he shot rush after rush of wind into the air—but almost as soon as it would clear, smoke would rush to fill the gap. His hand found what seemed to be a banister, and somewhere in the swarming darkness, he heard a thin little cry; he scrambled blindly up the stairs, his throat burning, screaming despite the ache in his lungs: “Carla!”

He reached the top of the stairs and paused—he was almost blind. The air was once again lit by fire, orange splotches dancing on the smoke. “Can you hear me?”

At first, nothing. Then a little whimper and a cry, and he was running again—leaping over little flames and dashing right through large ones, hoping to God that wasn’t his own burning hair he smelled… and also praying that it wasn’t hers. Tears kept welling in his eyes, and he told himself they were only from the smoke, pure physical irritation. He came to a door, and kicked it hard, bashing it open into the room.

There. She was down on the floor, a little girl perhaps eight, surrounded by the flames and curled up in a ball underneath a window; her brown hair was tangled as if she’d just gotten out of bed, her nightgown clinging damp to her legs with sweat. He rushed straight into the ring of fire—and made the leap to the other side, landing hard in front of her.

Then his foot sank. Something snapped, and a board gave way—his leg fell clear through the floor up to the thigh, and a shock of pain ran through him as the broken wood dug into his skin. He yelped as he scrambled to yank his leg out, feeling the warmth of blood seeping into his costume. The girl was shrinking back, yelling at him questioningly in Spanish—he tried to keep his voice level as he struggled and finally freed his leg, speaking through clenched teeth with pain.

“It’s all right, it’s all right. I’m… I’m a super hero. I’m here to save you!” Well, that felt weird to say. She stared at him like he was an idiot; then a horrible creak sounded through the building—wooden beams screaming somewhere in the walls as they splintered and cracked, coupled with the sound of roaring fire. He watched from his place on his knees as the walls began to lean—separating at the baseboards and ceiling, the wooden paneling breaking into slats, ash and swirling embers blown into the air.

The building was going to go down.

Without a word, he reached out and seized Carla, holding her tight to his body—and then pushed himself up with tremendous effort, limping toward the window. The frame was already loose with the warping of the wall, and one punch sent the entire window careening to the street below—dragging one leg, he climbed agonizingly into the hole, clutching Carla so tight she wheezed…

…and launched himself into the air.

That terrified scream he could hear was probably himself.

Okay, I'll admit I'm somewhat unsure of this scene. The whole "Le gasp, child in a burning building!" thing is a pretty common scenario in superhero works and elsewhere. But I decided to risk it because it fits well with Matthew's character arc; he needed a major moment early on to kick off a lot of his character development--including a streak of overconfidence. So I decided to go with something classic, unquestionably heroic, and immediately accessible. Whether that fell into "cliche melodrama" by accident is an exercise best left for the first round of editing. xD

...Oh, and now's probably a good time to note that the poor boy can't exactly fly...