Posts Tagged ‘National Novel Writing Month’

Toyland: Second Draft Finished!!!

Posted: October 14, 2020 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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What is sleep? There’s too much to work on right now! And I just got another thing done! The second draft of Toyland is finished! Glory hallelujah, pour the alcohol (in this case, German festbier) and play some celebratory music (Voodoo Child by Rogue Traders better be on the playlist).

So, if you don’t know, Toyland was last year’s National Novel Writing Month project (glad I managed to finish it before the one-year anniversary of starting the book). It’s a Gothic horror/dark fantasy novel revolving around a boarding school in southern Ohio, and the spirit that’s said to haunt it.

My God, this draft was a roller coaster. As I said in a previous post, I had a lot of cleaning up to do. Lots of unwieldy passages and paragraphs where I thought to myself, “What the hell was I thinking when I wrote this?” But I managed to keep going despite the cringe factor and knock out a second draft.

And I think I was successful in cutting out anything unnecessary from the story, including the epilogue chapter. Yeah, it was a good epilogue, but ending it without the epilogue made for a better ending and a better story overall.

Speaking of which, I just did a word count. Even without the epilogue, there’s not much of a difference between drafts (so maybe I added a ton more material than I cut?). The first draft was 360 pages (8.5 x 11-inch paper, Times New Roman 12-point font, double spaced) and 97,128 words. The second draft was 358 pages and 96,088. Still a bit shorter than my longest novel, Snake, but still long as hell.

So, what’s next? Well, I think a few more drafts. The novel’s a good deal better, but it still could use some work. Maybe a beta reader or two ought to take a look at it at some point. And then I can consider what route to go with publishing it.

Of course, there’s a few other things that need to happen, along with more drafts, before I can get to that point. What they are, I can’t say. But I think I’ll accomplish some of those within the next year or so.

Well, it’s late, so I think it’s time I hit the hay. I do have work tomorrow. Good night, my Followers of Fear. If you see some dragons flying through the sky, they’re not mine. I swear. Until next time, pleasant nightmares!

My Next Big Writing Project

Posted: September 14, 2020 in Novel, Progress Report, Scary Stuff, Writing
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Ugh, today was an awful day. I did not get any sleep last night, so I was running on fumes and frustration this morning. Then I started feeling off after lunch, so I had to take leave for the rest of the day. I took a long nap, and felt better, but I had to get this post out today before an early bedtime. There goes my movie plans for the evening. At least I got an email from work informing me of a pay bump. That was a bright side.

Where was I? Oh right. Big announcement. Back to it.

I hinted in my last post that I was going to make a big announcement about my next writing project. After all, when someone says in their last post, and I quote, “And as for my next project…well, I’ll save that for a blog post tomorrow,” you get a feeling it’s going to be a big deal. And this is a big deal. For my next project, I’ll be working on…the second draft of Toyland!

Yeah, I made a new graphic for Toyland. It’ll work until I can find the story a publisher. Also, fun fact: the font the title is written in is called Germania One. It’s based on older German fonts like Fraktur, as well as newer fonts like certain sans serifs. You see it used in titles relating to Germany or Germany-related subjects, such as one of my favorite horror movies, Overlord (on my list of underrated horror films to watch this Halloween season).

Getting back on topic, if you’re unfamiliar with Toyland, it was my National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, project last year. I started it in November and finished it in late February this year. It’s a Gothic horror/dark fantasy novel set in a boarding school in the southern half of Ohio, one haunted by a ghost. A ghost obsessed with a children’s book and who appears to be terrorizing the student body.

Yeah, weird concept, but would you expect anything different from me.

I’m sure you’re wondering why it took me so long to get to work on a second draft. That’s just usually how I roll. I need to put a story away for a while in order to look at it with fresh eyes for the second draft. That’s especially so with novels. The longer the novel, the more space. And Toyland was over ninety-seven thousand words long, the second-longest story I’ve ever written.

So I focused on shorter stories. And I wrote one more novel, The Pure World Comes, though that was on accident. Anyway, I’ve gotten an average of one story a month written since then, some of which I’m shopping around to various publishers, others I’ll edit soon. But I think it’s damn time I get to work on editing Toyland. That won’t mean it’ll be ready to be published, but the story will be a bit closer to that point.

I hope to start this editing process tomorrow or Wednesday. Given that I edit faster than I write, I think might be done some time around Halloween, maybe a bit later. And after that…we’ll see.

In the meantime, I’m exhausted and need a nap. I’ll see you guys soon with a new review.

Until next time, my Followers of Fear, stay safe and pleasant nightmares!

Oh, and if you need something to tide you over until I get Toyland or something else out, I have a short story collection and two books for you guys. Click the links below and check them out. And if you read them, please leave a review letting me know what you think. I love reader feedback, and it helps me out in the long run anyway.

The Quiet Game: Five Tales to Chill Your Bones: Amazon, Createspace, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Smashwords, and Kobo.

Snake: Amazon, Createspace, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Smashwords, and Kobo

Rose:  Amazon US, Amazon UK, Amazon Canada, Audible

Update on My Novels Waiting in the Wings

Posted: June 1, 2020 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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So with the completion of The Pure World Comes last night, that brings a total of three novels I have waiting in the wings. By “waiting in the wings,” of course, I mean three novels I need to edit, update and hopefully someday publish. And since some of you have been asking about those books, I thought I would take a moment to update you on each individual story, as well as tell anyone who’s unfamiliar with them what they’re about.

River of Wrath

 

River of Wrath, inspired partly by Dante’s Inferno, is about a small town in Mississippi which, one day in the early 1960’s, is visited by one of the circles of Hell. I recently got back all the beta reader copies, so I can finally begin doing some editing on this story. And given that the plot of this story deals with a lot of issues that are as current now as they were in the 1960’s (you can guess which ones), it might be a good idea to get to work on that one sooner rather than later.

In fact, I was hoping to get started on River this summer. Most likely August, if things work out for me. Seeing as I finished this one in 2018 and it’s now 2020, and the problems of racism only seem to have gotten worse since then, I think it’s about damn time.

 

 

Toyland

I don’t know what it is about Toyland, but for some reason, several of my Followers of Fear are champing at the bit for this story. My National Novel Writing Month project which I began in November 2019 and ended in late February, Toyland is a Gothic horror/dark fantasy novel centered on a boarding school in southern Ohio and a ghost there obsessed with a children’s book affecting the students. Yeah, that’s the plot. It’s bonkers, but did you expect anything else from me?

As for when editing will commence on this one, it will hopefully happen very soon. But as for publishing, that might take a while. I need some things on my end to happen before I can think of shopping this book to publishers (or consider self-publishing it. That’s a possibility as well). What those things are, I can’t say at the moment, but I deem them necessary to happen before Toyland can be released. As events unfold, I hope to have more updates on this subject. For now though, just know I’m working on paving the way for Toyland‘s publication as best I can right now.

 

The Pure World Comes

I know I finished it last night and you have probably read the elevator pitch already, but I’ll restate it anyway. TPWC takes place in 1894 and follows a maid who goes to work for a mad scientist. As I said last night, I have sent this novel off already to someone for feedback. With any luck, I’ll get some pointers on how to improve this story in the second draft and where to send it.

Speaking of which, I do hope to find a publisher for this one, but I can see it being rather successful if I self-publish it. In fact, I had an idea for that: many novels written in Victorian England were released chapter by chapter in a serial format, usually in a magazine or newspaper. Charles Dickens did this to great effect, using reader feedback after each chapter to improve the story by upgrading or downgrading certain characters and following plot lines readers found interesting. In other words, he gave the fans fanservice, and it worked for him. Anyway, after all the chapters had been released, only then would they be collected in a traditional book format.

I doubt I’ll do the whole give-in-to-fanservice thing Dickens did, but I could see myself releasing each chapter one at a time, perhaps as an ebook exclusive, before releasing the full book as both paperback and ebook. What do you think? Would that be a fun way to read a book, as well as a great callback to the publishing methods of yesteryear? Let me know.

 

Anyway, that’s all for now, my Followers of Fear. I’m off to relax and regain my creative energies, but I’m sure you’ll hear from me by the end of the week. Until next time, pleasant nightmares!

Toyland: First Draft Done!!!

Posted: February 23, 2020 in Living and Life, Novel, Progress Report, Scary Stuff, Writing
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Call the press! Pour the honey wine! Sacrifice your neighbor to the eldritch deity of your choosing! The first draft of Toyland is done! To be specific, I finished it early this morning at around four in the morning. I started working on the last two-and-a-half chapters around ten o’clock last night, after I wrote my review of The Lodge, and just didn’t stop.

And now that I’ve gotten some sleep, I’m blogging about it, because that’s what you do!

Now, for those of you who are unfamiliar, Toyland is a Gothic horror novel I started writing back in November for National Novel Writing Month. The story takes place at a boarding school in southern Ohio, and follows students being menaced by a ghost obsessed with a children’s book. Yes, that’s the plot. I can assure you, it’s just as bonkers as that pitch sounds. I hoped to have it done by the end of January, but I’m glad I was able to finish it by the end of February, which is still a whole new record for me in terms of writing a novel (I think Rose had the last one at around six or seven months).

And how is the first draft?

Well, it’s a first draft, which means it’s crap.

Okay, that might be harsh. It not crap, it just needs a lot of work. First drafts are nicknamed “rough drafts” for a reason, after all. I’m going to have to do a whole lot of editing to get this book out to people. And I may need to have someone take a look at it just to make sure it can survive out in the world as a full novel. I did that with Rose, after all, and Rose is doing very well now, with an audio book and some awesome new reviews.

So how long is Toyland, anyway? I knew it would be longer than fifty-thousand words (the minimum word count for “succeeding” at NaNoWriMo), but I haven’t done a count recently. Give me a moment to do some math…holy crap! In terms of pages (with twelve-point, Times New Roman font, double-spaced on regular MS Word paper), Toyland is three hundred and sixty pages long and 97,186 words! For context, the first Harry Potter novel is around seventy-seven thousand words.

This isn’t the longest story I’ve ever written (that honor goes to my thriller Snake), but still pretty freaking long.

So what’s next? Well, obviously I’m going to party a bit (pizza and locally made mead tonight!). But in terms of Toyland, I’m going to let it be for a while. I always believe a story needs to lie and sleep for a while before editing, so I can look at it with fresh eyes. After a second draft, I may start looking for a publisher. Hopefully, it won’t take five years like it did with Rose to get it published.

I wanted to post this graphic one last time.

In the meantime, I’ll try to take a little vacation from writing anything except blog posts (though if the writing bug gets me, that’s that). After that, I’ll try my hand at those ten short(er) stories I mentioned in a previous post. Two of those stories, by the way, take place in Victorian England and one of which I hope to put into that short story collection I’m putting together. I’m looking forward to them. I may also work on an essay which has been cooking in the back of my mind. We’ll see what happens.

For now though, I’m off to relax. Thanks for supporting me during this writing process, my Followers of Fear. I hope you’ll check out Toyland when it comes out and maybe let me know what you think of it. For now though, how about checking out my novel Rose? It’s a Kafkaesque horror story about a young woman turning into a plant creature (and that’s just the start of her problems). If Toyland sounds up your alley, you’ll probably enjoy Rose. I’ll post the links below.

Until next time, pleasant nightmares!

Rose: Amazon US, Amazon UK, Amazon Canada, Audible

Fooling Myself a Little More Each Time…

Posted: December 26, 2019 in Living and Life, Reflections, Writing
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Before I start this post, I just want to let everyone who read that title and got concerned, thinking I was going to talk about something negative like giving up on my dreams or whatnot, that that’s not what this post is about. It’s actually a happy post.

Anyway, as many of you are aware, I’ve been making tremendous progress with the novel I started last month, Toyland. If you are unaware, Toyland is a Gothic horror novel about a boarding school haunted by a ghost obsessed with a children’s book. Yes, I’m writing a story with a premise that bonkers. Bonkers premises tend to work for me (click here for further proof). And as I said, I’ve been making tremendous progress on it. Or as my Grandma told me on the phone last night, “You’re just zipping along with it!”

(If she reads this post, she’s going to plotz over seeing herself mentioned here.)

I’ve noticed that zipping along myself, and I’ve wondered about it. Past novels I’ve worked on, as well as some short stories and novelettes, have taken months at a time to write. Occasionally, they’ve taken years (especially if I find myself stuck and have to take a break from the story). What’s so different about this one? A dark premise and some weird things occurring is not unusual for me, so it’s not the plot. And I’ve done National Novel Writing Month before, so that this novel started out as a project for that probably hasn’t affected much.

If I had to guess, I think it might be that I’m fooling myself by underestimating how long the chapters are going to be. Let me explain:

Although I’ve been writing this novel since January, I’ve been planning and researching it far longer than that. Going back months, or years, if you count when I started learning what constituted Gothic literature. Consequently, I’ve had some scenes in this story in my head for a while, and they always seem very short when I play it in my head.

What’s short in your head doesn’t necessarily translate as short once you put it down on paper. In fact, you can spend about twelve-hundred words or more describing a new setting, especially if it’s fantastical. Add in dialogue, action, exploring the characters’ emotions, etc. and what you’re imagining will be maybe sixteen-hundred words at most turns out to be nearly twice that! And yet, I still think to myself as I write, “Just a few hundred words more. Can’t be more than three hundred. Almost at the end.” Over and over, until the chapter ends, and it’s a lot more words than I expected.

Given that I’ve figured that out, however, there’s a chance that strategy won’t work for me after a while. I’ll know what to expect now and the spell won’t work. On that other hand, these past two months has been illuminating as to how much I can get done when I apply myself, so that may make up for it. At this time, I’m over halfway through the book, and on my way to two-thirds. A couple of years ago, this sort of progress in a few months would be confined to the realms of the imagination.

Now I know what’s in my imagination can exist in the real world.

If you need me, this is a great representation of what I’m up to these days.

In the meantime, I’ll use that knowledge, and keep fooling myself until I can’t anymore, and eventually, finish this book. As well as any story that comes after.

That’s all for now, my Followers of Fear. I’ll hopefully post something again before December 31st, but if I don’t, thank you for everything this fantastic 2019!* Have a fantastic New Year, and I’ll see you next week/month/year/decade.** I’m off to go finish a chapter.

Until next time, pleasant nightmares!

*Fantastic on a personal level, anyway. On a national and global level, while there were signs of improvement (looking at you, Greta Thunberg), this year has been a bit of a dumpster fire.

**Yeah, let that sink in. After Tuesday next week, not only will it be a new month, but a new year and a new decade. Crazy, right?

NaNoWriMo 2019: Final Progress Report

Posted: December 1, 2019 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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Well, November is over. And so, by the way, is NaNoWriMo. So you know what that means. Time to give you all my final report of how this past month went!

Now, if you’re unfamiliar, National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, is an annual challenge in November where authors around the world try to write a fifty thousand word novel in thirty days, or about 1,667 words per day. The last time I participated was in college, but I decided to participate this year and even took time off work to get a good start on the novel. My project this year is called Toyland, and is a Gothic horror novel about a boarding school in Ohio that’s haunted by the ghost of a girl obsessed with a children’s book.

Yeah, the premise is as bonkers as that of Rose. But hey, that’s kind of the way I like it.

So now that November is over, how did work on Toyland go?

Well. I think it went well. I managed to get quite a bit of work on the novel done in a short span of time. Yeah, my ADHD often led me to distraction, and the normal things that come up in life–errands, social events, and all the stuff you do as a functioning adult and member of society–took away from writing time. And after I went back to work, things only got more hectic. But I still managed to write and discovered just how much I can write when I really set my mind to it. And during the time when I was off work, I got a glimpse as to what life could be like if I ever am able to write full time (fingers crossed someday that happens), which was neat.

Anyway, time for the final word count (I won’t go into page count because that varies depending on a number of factors). At the time midnight rolled around, I was halfway through Chapter Ten of Toyland. As of my stopping to write this post, Toyland is now 34,284 words long. Last time I participated, I think I wrote about thirty thousand words, so this was some positive growth. So while I didn’t reach the fifty thousand word goal, I do consider NaNoWriMo 2019 a huge success.

Hell, I might do it again next year, and take time off as well. I already know what novel I’d like to work on next, so it’d work out, and I earn a lot more time off at work these days, so it could happen.

Still have plenty of writing to do on this book. And I plan to keep at it.

In the meantime, though, I’m still not done with Toyland. I have a feeling this novel’s going to be somewhere around eighty thousand or more words,* so I still have plenty of writing to do. I’m aiming to have it done by the end of January, but we’ll see what happens. You can’t rush perfection, after all. And even if my work is far from perfect, the sentiment stands.

That’s all for now, my Followers of Fear. I’m not sure when I’ll provide another update on Toyland or post again, but I can assure you it’ll be very soon.

But before that, have you considered a gift for the lover of the strange and macabre this December?** Why not give them a copy of Rose? The novel follows Rose Taggert, a young woman who wakes up in a greenhouse with no memory of how she got there. She soon finds her life, and her body, irrevocably changed forever, and with it comes many dark forces and powerful secrets that will lead to a desperate fight for survival. It’s dark and engaging Kafkaesque horror novel that will leave you glued to the page until you reach the end. Available from the links below (with an audio book link coming soon).

Rose: Amazon US, Amazon UK, Amazon Canada

Until next time, Followers of Fear, happy reading and pleasant nightmares!

*For context, the first Harry Potter book is about seventy-seven thousand words.

**Yes, I’m doing this. Can you blame me? It is that time of year, after all.

NaNoWriMo 2019: Week Three Progress Report

Posted: November 21, 2019 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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I’m a little amazed how quickly the month has gone by. As of today, there are only nine days left in the month. And after that, a different kind of countdown will commence.

But onto the main subject of this post. As you all probably know by now, I’m taking part in National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, this year. My project this year is called Toyland, and it’s a Gothic horror novel about a boarding school haunted by a ghost obsessed with a children’s book. And while the goal of NaNoWriMo is to write an entire fifty thousand word novel, I’d be happy to make it halfway, or even more than thirty thousand words (how much I wrote the last time I participated).

So if you read my post from last week, I was over twenty-one thousand words and six chapters into the novel. I guess it was inevitable that there would be a slow-down after getting so much done in two weeks, because this past week I only made so much progress. I didn’t even get any writing done on Monday or Tuesday, in fact, and that might’ve been the case yesterday if I didn’t wake up sick and had to stay home. Yeah, that happened. And for all I know, it may happen again (it is that time of year).

So how much progress did I make? As of last night, I’m in the middle of writing Chapter Eight and the novel is currently 26,746 words. Which is still good progress, but I was hoping for more by the time I typed up this report.

At least I’m close to making that thirty thousand word goal.

I’m also at the point of the first draft where I am questioning A LOT of my creative decisions. Should I include this? Should I write out that? Does that sound too preachy? Am I getting away from the point of my novel? This is something every creator goes through at least once while working on a project–I went through it every day during some of the later drafts of Rose–and it’s never fun. For the most part, I’m just trying to move past those feelings and make more progress on this novel. Because at the end of the day, even if this novel is totally bonkers, it’s my kind of bonkers, so at least I’ll be happy with it.

Anyway, I’m going to try and get some more progress on this chapter done tonight. However, I’m also going to try to go to bed early tonight, because as I said I’ve been sick recently and I don’t want a relapse.

With that said, I’ll sign off now, my Followers of Fear. The next update for Toyland will likely be December 1st, after NaNoWriMo’s done and I have the latest tally on the numbers. But don’t worry, you’ll hear from me in the meantime. And until then, pleasant nightmares!

NaNoWriMo 2019: Week Two Progress Report

Posted: November 14, 2019 in Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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So yeah, Toyland is going to be a lot longer than Rose, and way more than fifty thousand words. I always did like an expansive story.

So as you’re probably aware by now, I’m participating in National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, this month and I’m trying to write a fifty-thousand word novel before the month is out. This is my second time participating, and I’m writing a Gothic horror novel called Toyland about a boarding school haunted by a ghost obsessed with a children’s book. And while I’ve set myself a deadline of January 31st, I’ll try to get as much of it done this month as possible.

In my update last week, I wrote about how I was a little over eleven-thousand words and 3.5 chapters in. As of last night, I’m in the middle of writing Chapter Six and am currently at 21,566 words. So this story’s already into the novella word range, and it’s still going! I bet by the time I done, I bet this book will be four times its current length. Maybe more.*

And honestly, I’d be fine if that turned out to be the case. While it’s still a first draft and there’s still plenty of work to do (not even thinking about editing at this point), I feel like this is some of my most mature writing yet. By this, I mean my voice as a writer has matured. It’s reached a new level, gained from so many years of writing and editing and experimenting. I’m giving up the last of the clumsy bits that mark me as a new or young writer. I’m breaking out of my chrysalis.

Is this making any sense to you? I hope so, otherwise the points above are all meaningless.

Anyway, we’ll have to wait till the final draft comes out before we know for sure just how much I’ve improved as a writer. But in the meantime, I’m enjoying working on this story and seeing it take form. Even though I wrote an outline and I know what’s going to happen, I’m discovering new things with every word. Hell, what words I use are part of the discovery, and they come together to show me just how these scenes I’ve outlined actually shape out.

That’s all for the moment. I’ll be sure to update you all next week, but in the meantime, I promise there will be more than just a review in the meantime. I mean, there will be a review, but there will be more than that.

Anyway, until next time, my Followers of Fear, pleasant nightmares!

How’s your NaNoWriMo going? What’s the writing process for you been like?

*For context, the first Harry Potter book was around seventy-seven thousand words, so that should give you an idea of what we might be dealing with in the future.

Review: Doctor Sleep (2019 film)

Posted: November 8, 2019 in Review, Scary Stuff
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Now let’s get one thing out of the way: the Doctor Sleep movie is based on the novel Doctor Sleep by Stephen King, which is a sequel to King’s previous novel, The Shining. The movie is also an attempt to reconcile the novels and Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of The Shining, which King hates (and which I kind of agree with). And apparently King loved the script for this movie, as well as the final product. Everybody got that? Good.

Doctor Sleep follows Danny Torrance post-Overlook. He’s grown up to inherit his father’s issues with anger and alcohol, though once he arrives in a small New Hampshire town, he does sober up. At the same time, he makes a psychic connection with a young girl in a neighboring town named Abra Stone and who shines way more powerful than Dan does.* Which is good, because there’s a group of people known as the True Knot roaming around America in RVs, kidnapping kids with shine abilities and killing them to extract their power in the form of steam. In order to defeat the True Knot, as well as their leader, Rose the Hat, Dan and Abra will have to go someplace special to defeat them. A place Dan never wanted to revisit.

Well, I’m going to say this: it does feel like a Stephen King novel brought to film. In a good way.

So there are a lot of callbacks to the source material, as well as to King’s works in general. I had a private laugh at shots meant to pay homage to the Kubrick film, as well as to a field of corn and the number “19” showing up (folks who know King get it). And it’s really awesome to see the theatrical Overlook brought back to life (though degraded with age). And the novel does a great job of hybridizing the books and the Kubrick film in a way that would satisfy most King fans.

And the actors also do their jobs very well. I should mention that. The True Knot actors are particularly creepy when they’re sucking up steam or doing something else freaky, inhuman and cult-like.

That being said, there are some issues. For one thing, there is a lot of exposition, which in a novel we can get away with (especially in a King novel), but in a film it can slow things down. There are some things from the original novel that never made it to the movie that I would’ve liked to see, and there were some changes I didn’t care for.

And I didn’t find it that scary. I mean, there were a couple of moments where I jumped or was a little freaked out, but they weren’t enough to scare me. My criticisms of the Kubrick film aside, at least it’s unnerving to watch. But while the intent is there, Doctor Sleep can’t bring that unnerving feeling to life.

On the whole, I’m giving the Doctor Sleep film adaptation a 3.5 on a scale of 1 to 5. If you’re a big fan of the Kubrick Shining film, you’ll be disappointed. If you’re here for a horror movie, you’ll find it so-so. And if you’re a fan of King and the original novel, as well as interested to see how the film version can reconcile all the books and films, you’ll walk away satisfied.

That’s all for now, my Followers of Fear. I’m going to bed and getting into writing tomorrow. Until next time, pleasant nightmares!

*Fun fact, I named a character Abra in my NaNoWriMo project Toyland after reading Doctor Sleep. No psychic powers though. Not a spoiler, just a statement of fact.

NaNoWriMo 2019: Week One Progress Report

Posted: November 7, 2019 in Novel, Progress Report, Scary Stuff, Writing
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Hello, Followers of Fear! It’s been an entire week since I last posted. Did you miss me?

As many of you know, this year I’m participating in National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, this year. For those of you who are unaware, the goal of NaNoWriMo is to write a fifty thousand word novel in thirty days, or about 1,667 words a day. There’s no prize for actually making the goal (and it’s doubtful the resulting novel will be any good, as it’s a first draft), but it’s a good way to see what you’re capable of and push yourself. At least, that’s how I look at it.

So this year’s project is called Toyland, and as you may remember, it’s a Gothic horror novel about a boarding school terrorized by a ghost obsessed with a children’s book. This is my first Gothic horror story, as well as my second time participating in NaNoWriMo. How’s it going so far? Well, as of last night, I’m a little over eleven-thousand words in over three-and-a-half chapters. Over a fifth of the way there!

That’s my update. See you later.

Just kidding. I have more I want to discuss.

I have to say, it was a good idea to take some time off from the office to work on this novel. I’ve had a lot more time to write, which means I was able to get through three chapters in just under a week. It might’ve taken a month to get the same amount of progress if I didn’t take time off work and just wrote in the evenings. If I do NaNoWriMo again next year, I may take time off again to get a good head start.

As for writing in the Gothic sub-genre, that’s been a learning experience. As I mentioned in my post on Gothic horror (click here to read the full article), the genre has a very particular set of tropes that sets it apart from other genres of horror. However, there is more to the genre than I had room to include in that article. For example, you have to devote a lot of space to describing your main location. After all, Gothic horror is very place-centric. Hill House, The Overlook Hotel, the house at Kill Creek, your mother’s house (yes, I went there, and in more ways than one). All those locations are described in detail. Lots of detail. Gothic tries to make you aware of the place the story is in at all times, especially the darker aspects of it.

In that vein, I’ve spent a good chunk of Chapter Two just describing Auckland Academy, the main setting of the book. And I’ll be further emphasizing the location as the book goes on, as well as in subsequent drafts.

Of course, I’m still early in the novel. Including the chapter I”m in now, I have twenty-six more to go, and plenty more to learn about Gothic literature. I’ll let you know how things go when we reach November 14th. Hopefully I’ll have made plenty more progress by then. Even if I have to go back to work on Tuesday.

Well, that’s all for now. I’ve got some errands to take care of, so I’m going to get on that. I promise though, you won’t have to wait a week before I post again. Until next time, my Followers of Fear, pleasant nightmares!

Are you participating in NaNoWriMo? How’s it going for you?

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