What a wonderful feeling it is to write.

It's been a while since I last posted and I admit that it's partly because I have been postponing it and also because I am finally writing. Hurray.

It has finally happened after all this time and all this preparation. The countless hours spent on the story arch, the plotting, the characters, and of course the gaping plot holes that where sincerely trying to swallow me whole.

I do credit Camp Nano for being what it took to force me into action and the great cabin members that I have there. We are equally as crazy and sometimes lazy so the atmosphere there is perfect .

I do admit that it's been somewhat of a slow start and I am far behind my word count but it doesn't matter. The story is progressing and I am already at chapter two. Which for me feels beyond wonderful.

The first draft of the scenes are extremely raw. I have conquered my fear of writing, but at the same time I do know I can do better. What I have managed so far are only the bare bones of what these scenes/chapters can be.

My fingers are already itching to start revising what I have already written and I am debating with myself if I should give in or wait until April is over or I have completed the manuscript. There are pros and cons to both options so I will have to see what best benefits my writing and keeping the story going.

This will be all for now but I will keep you updated as things go on.

Happy Camp Nano month

To much time and to much fear - my killers of creativity.

Having nothing to do kills creativity faster than anything that I have ever known. It's not like I don't have chores that I should be spending my time on and wouldn't take as long to do if just jumped up and did them, but now nearing the eight month of my pregnancy I just don't have the energy to do much for a long periods of time. This dilemma has resulted in me sitting in the comfy chair in my living room more than is healthy. I sit there almost all day watching some tv show, as the day slips by.

I could be writing but I can't even muster up the enthusiasm to do that. My brain just completely shuts down at the mere thought, which is very frustrating. I have all the time in the world to be working on the novel and all I do is waste it. 

The second thing that is killing my creativity is fear. It's been almost six months since I have written a full scene and now that I am ready to dive back in, it terrifies me. I feel lost and without a sense of control. I come up with endless excuses as why I should not start, I don't know enough about this scene, I don't know the characters well enough, I have to plan more scenes ahead. The list goes on and on and none of them are all that good, most of these excuses aren't even true. 

I know enough about the first few chapters that I should have no problem writing them, and if anything I would probably have a great time with them and learn the things that I will need later on. But I deprive myself of the experience and enjoyment by constantly postponing the writing. 

There will never come a perfect time to start and any time is better than never doing it at all, so why wait, why make this fear control me. I need to face the fact that the first draft will not be the final version and it's alright to make as many mistakes with in it as humanly possible. It's the first draft, it's supposed to stink. It's supposed to be the worst version of the story. The novel can only improve after the first draft has been written, never before. 

I have a second deadline to start writing, April 1 , as the other one didn't take. For an added pressure I am going to write 50,000 words over the month of April as a part of Camp Nano. Now I am wondering why I am waiting for April 1 to start writing, will it be any easier then than it is now. Shouldn't I be using the next week to getting in the rithm of writing. To get over the fear and into the flow. 

I need to jump in and get over my fear by submerging myself in it. That way I will have conquered both the writers block and my insane boredom.  I hope I have the self control to force myself to do this.

Forgotten Magics Synopsis first peak

  Finally the first draft of the novel synopsis is here. 

Forgotten Magics Synopsis

Progress so far

When I set the deadline for February the 14th I thought it was a reasonable one. I saw the novel I was working on rather clearly and thought with dedication and a lot of hard work I would nail the outline in three weeks.
That didn't work out, for one I had to babysit three of my nephews for a week which left me falling asleep in the chair in their living room around eight-nine every evening. I had a couple of hours to work on the novel a day but no much more. Then when I got back home, the flu hit me.
Two weeks of my three had gone and there had been very little work accomplished. I tried to make the most of the week I had left but it proved not to be enough. I think even if I had the other two weeks to work it wouldn't have been enough.
It is now almost a month later and I have to admit I am still working on the outlines.

I have realized that I though I was writing one series centered around a character that I barely knew but was obsessed with keeping as a main character. There was a cast of characters that I new where going to be in the series and I had the plot somewhat nailed down. The only problem for the last ten years that I have tried to write this story is that the story goal was never that clear to me.
I knew that I wanted to write a story about epic magic and a world filled with wonder. There had to be some great power that the characters where after and trying to stop.

I blame both laziness and fear for not pushing harder to define what the story goal really was. While I didn't narrow it down my daydream of becoming a writer was still intact without screwing the story up spectacularly. This is the worst cop out ever and I know it. I can't very well sell books without ever writing it. I knew this but still fear and maybe a small self-disciplinary issues kept me from really digging deep.

It took me a while but finally I have got down the story goal and the plot. I got a little sick and tired of not knowing what the story was really about and with out the story goal I  was going to keep on changing the story a thousand times without ever getting any closer to finishing it.

What happened though after I narrowed down the story was that I don't have the one series I though I was going to write but two connected one's (with a little room for standalone story's in the same world). The story I was focused on writing all these years can't work with out the story that comes before it. All this time I thought that was just back story but it turned out to be equally or even more fascinating and exiting story there than I had originally thought.
Characters I thought were only secondary or even villains have taken center stage and I have to admit I am having more fun working on the story now than I have had since I had the first idea.

I have no idea if this will work or not, or that these series will ever get published but I have finally found out how the story is supposed to be. If that isn't a small victory in this long journey I don't know what is. ; )

Going through all of my notes

It's amazing how much paperwork you accumulate over the span of about ten/twelve years when writing a novel.
I decided to go through all of my old notes on the story since I began writing it and it's amazing too see how far I have come.
I may not have everything figured out, but with in these notes lies the complete story, I just have to shift through them to find the little gold nuggets.

It's true that I have underestimated how far along I have come. When you are so close to the project it's easy to get lost and think that nothing is happening.
It was two of my best friends that were the ones that made me step back and appreciate how much I had accomplished and how close I was to the finished novel.
When I went through my cabinet yesterday to get all of my old notes for the story, I thought I was going for a small stack of paper but it was five or ten times bigger than I had originally thought.

We always judge our selves so harshly and I realized that all the hard work I had been doing over the years wasn't worthless, it was a preparation for this. It's important to remember that when you  are doing something you love, something that makes you happy, that it is never a waist of time.

At least now I have learned to appreciate all of the sleepless nights over the years working on this story. All the times I was glued to the laptop in a writing frenzy, to exited to stop even for a minute. I know I am not getting paid to write, or to invest all of my time doing it, but it doesn't matter for me. This is what I love and one day, probably sooner than I think, I know it will pay off. Even if it doesn't I will never regret one minute of it ; )

A preview of my work plan

This is the bare bones of my writing plan for the next month.

The importance of Pen and Paper

                                 


I am reminded of a scene from the movie The Words. It's a story about a struggling writer that stumbles on a manuscript that changes his life. I recommend you watch it so I am not going to go into details about the movie but the scene that got my attention and captured the essence of a serious writer is when the old man comes over and asks if Rory could sign his copy of Rory's book. Roy searches for a pen but he doesn't have one on him. He asks the old man if he could borrow a pen from him and the old man looks at him a little surprised and says something along the line of  "a writer that doesn't carry around a pen?" Rory only replies "It's a reading day"

The old man so clearly distinguishes himself from Rory right then and there when they first meet that it hit home for me.

I think you can chose to write, but I don't think you chose to be a writer.

Being a writer means so much more than just typing a few words, it's a passion that knows no bounds. It's a form of obsession that takes over your whole life. It becomes such an integral part of it, that without it you won't function right. This is why what the old man said hit me so. If writing is such a serious part of your life you should take it serious, and to take it seriously you should always be prepared.

This is where the importance of pen and paper come in. You never know when ideas come, how big or how small, or how important they are. You could be on the bus, driving home from work, waiting for the doctor, on vacation, like me just about to fall asleep or even like Rory on a reading day. There is no right or wrong time for ideas to come, and they don't give you a notice before they arrive.

I always have a small notebook in my purse with a few pens that I take with me everywhere I go, even if it's for a quick run to the gas station and back. When I want to work on the novel I carry the main notebook with me in my purse.  Over the years I have come to feel naked if I don't have a notebook with me or near me at all times. In the rare cases I leave the notebook somewhere I at least have to have a pen.

Most writers will know the importance of writing everything down, even the smallest detail. I know we want to pride our self's on how great our memories are, but being realistic, with everything that is happening around us every day, how in the world are you going to remember it all.