NaNoWriMo = National Novel Writing Month – a world-wide event run every year. The goal is to write at least 50,000 words in the month of November.
Kicking off November 2019 with 3 projects fully outlined and ready to go:
- Spawn of Heliodor (later renamed to The Merlin Paradox) – an original arcanepunk fantasy with half-demons.
- Cursed. Book 2 of The New Order of Merlin series – an epic multi-fandom fanfiction. Mix of magics and myths.
- Hunt for Unseelie Jack – a Carnival Row AU fanfiction – a steampunk fantasy with fairies, werewolves, and vigilantes.
Nov 30th. 3,751 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 43,769.
Total words for Hunt for Unseelie Jack: 7,558.
Total words for Cursed: 33,458.
Total words written for NaNoWriMo 2019: 84,785.
I didn’t last the entire night of Write All Night but it was a success. I wrote 4,695 words while sitting there with the other writers. When there are fewer distractions, you have nowhere else to go and writing is the only activity nearby, it gets done. But there are limits.
Challenge: After a good nighttime writing session, I hit a wall. To combat it, I returned to the planning mode and wrote scene summaries.
One cool thing: I was hoping that this book wouldn’t be as long as the first but then when prepping for NaNo, I developed the plot and its complexity made me think that it might be just as long. But now that I was forced to plan out the scenes, I can see that I’m about halfway there. I’m getting close to act three and this means that this book will definitely be shorter. Good! Because I’m also planning book 3 and I’d like to get these projects done so I can work on the other ideas that are bouncing around in my head.
SOOOO
NaNoWriMo 2019 is done but of course, I’m not done writing. I will continue to write and edit through December. You should start seeing the works I was working on during this challenge in the coming weeks.
Thank you, to whoever might have read this journal.
Nov 29th 3,622 words
Total words for Cursed: 29,801.
Challenge: I’m at a WRITE ALL NIGHT event. It is now midnight and I’ll try to stay up as long as health allows.
I’m at 81,034 words right now. Still quite a lot from my goal. There are 24 hours left before November is officially over. I think that hoping for 18,966 words in one day is definitely overly optimistic. The most I had done during this month was 5,826 and that happened only once.
Nov 28th 1,918 words
Total words for Cursed: 26,179.
Happy Thanksgiving. Now, let’s get back to writing.
Nov 27th 3,163 words
Total words for Cursed: 24,290.
Challenge: mentally preparing for a defeat.
I won NaNo, yes, but I didn’t meet my unofficial goal. I really wanted to get to 100k mark but with the low word counts recently, it won’t happen. I’m at about 75k right now and even if those last three days happen to be spectacular, 25k is a very fat chance. We’ll see.
One cool thing: I explored the emotion of shame, and wow – what an impactful emotion. It created a character arc I was not expecting.
Nov 26th 1,571 words
Total words for Cursed: 21,098.
It’s really frustrating when you think you’ve written a lot and it turns out to be so little. Sigh.
One cool thing: DRAGONS!
Nov 25th 2,119 words
Total words for Cursed: 19,527.
An opportunity presented itself for some comedy. I think I’ll take it. There’s quite a lot of tension going on and a little laugh will be a good break from the drama. But I need to think it over. I want it to be epic.
Nov 24th 2,571 words
Total words for Cursed: 17,408
Very productive day. Maybe the word count is not impressive but I got some good writing done. All of the main characters had their catalyst moment by now – that inciting incident, a decision, a choice that will lead them on one path and not the other.
So, now, act 2 officially starts. Fun and games, the promise of the premise, etc., and the action will keep rising from now on.
One cool thing: Including the chapters I wrote before NaNo, I’ve got about 30k worth of words for this book already and that’s really cool. Fans of the first book keep asking me when the new one will come out so I’m glad I’ll have something for them. I just hope I’ll be able to finish this book in a reasonable time. If I could finish it by the end of December, that would be awesome but it might be too optimistic.
Maybe I’ll set another 50k goal for December?
Nov 23rd 3,376
Total words for Cursed: 14,837.
Challenge: Keep this up. I’ve had a lot of off days lately. In the first half of the month, I was averaging about 3,500 words a day. Now, some days I don’t even go over a thousand. I need to find how I can ensure that I find the time for it every day. Adulting definitely gets in the way and finding the time to write often means saying NO.
One cool thing: Lots of cool scenes today. There’s action, drama, and a big reveal. I’ll have the readers gasp and have one of those “I need the next chapter” moments. At least, I hope.
Nov 22nd 758 words
It was another one of those off days. Let’s hope it’s the last one.
Nov 21st 2,907 words
Total words for Cursed: 10,703.
I tried to make up for yesterday but only partially succeeded. I haven’t had one of those superb word-count days over the past week. And this is why goals matter.
Challenge: Don’t lose the momentum.
One cool thong: I’m keeping this typo for hilarity’s sake. In other news, I got to the main catalyst moment.
Nov 20th 200 words
That’s an estimation. I don’t even know how much I wrote. I went to bed early and that was it for the day.
Nov 19th 1,693 words
Total words for Cursed: 7,871.
Challenge: Life happens. Gotta work, adult, etc. But there’s always at least a little time for writing. A few minutes here and there eventually adds up.
One cool thing: I got to the scene where The New Order of Merlin series name is explained. Yes. There’s a purpose to it. It’s not there just to be cool. I keep wondering if this should’ve happened in book 1 but there was no good spot for it there.
Nov 18th 1,377 words
Total written for Cursed: 6,178.
Challenge: I’m growing complacent and it shows in the word count. I’m not tired of writing, no, it’s just that now that the big milestone is done, I don’t feel like rushing. The competitive part of me is kicking the complacent part to get a move on when the latter wants to chill, and I’m stuck in the middle, unable to make either of them happy.
One cool thing: Unrelated to this story or nano at all, my Halloween story collection Spooky Zone won 3rd place in an ambassador-hosted contest and that’s really cool. I’ve entered a few prompt-driven contests and won nearly all of them and that definitely is a nice motivator.
Nov 17th 3,655
Total words for Cursed: 4,801
Things are going well. I’m on chapter 7 already (few chapters were written prior to NaNo).
Challenge: I worry that I’m stretching the story out again, it takes a while to get through the Set Up portion. But I shouldn’t worry about it too much at this point. I will get a chance to address pacing when I edit. November is all about squeezing those words out.
One cool thing: I got to write things as silly as:
It’d be hilarious as a stair-climbing rainbow-colored slinky spring.
But I also had a little moment that made me cry big, fat tears. It probably won’t make the readers cry, it was only a moment, but I’m happy that I was able to connect with a character this early in the story.
Nov 16th 2,012 words – Project switchpoint. Starting Cursed.
Sooo. I’m flexible. Let’s call it that.
I was having a hard time moving Hunt for Unseelie Jack forward. I think some serious brainstorming is necessary to get those gears moving. Maybe I need to rethink what kind of story I’m writing.
But this is November. There is no time to think in November so I decided to shelf the project for now and move on to the next. So:
Total written for Hunt for Unseelie Jack: 7,558.
Challenge: Switching to project #3: Cursed – book 2 of The New Order of Merlin series. Switches require reading so I couldn’t get a whole lot of words in today.
One cool thing: Once I sat down to write, words were flowing as they should. I am very familiar with these characters (book 1 is about 250k long) so it’s much easier to write about them. Also, book 1 gathered up a number of fans so I’m happy to write the book readers are waiting for.
Why I didn’t start with it: Because I thought Hunt for Unseelie Jack would be quick and I could get to both projects in November.
Total written for Cursed: 1,146.
Words better not dry out on me because I didn’t prep any more projects. This is it, peeps. Nothing else to fall back upon.
Nov 15th 2,833 words – 50,000 passed!
The title says it.
50k.
The big one!
I got a thing to brag about.
So, it doesn’t have my name yet. Apparently, it’s too early and the certificates don’t work yet. I have to wait. Patience is a virtue.
That is my one cool thing for today because it doesn’t get cooler than reaching the goal halfway in the month.
But I’m not done. No, I’ll keep this up for the entire month of November just because I’m curious how much I can write in a month if that’s all I’m doing.
Challenge: The story is not writing as smoothly as I’d like it to. I’ll try it for a couple more days but if it remains this sluggish, I’ll switch to the third project which I hope will be smooth sailing.
Nov 14th 2,674 words
Total words for Hunt for Unseelie Jack: 3,859.
One cool thing: I’m only 2,741 words away from 50k!!! So close. I was hoping today would be the day but there just weren’t enough words in me to reach it. Tomorrow. Must be tomorrow. Must!
Challenge: Someone take YouTube privileges away from me, please. It’s like a time sponge. You click on a short video and suddenly it’s nearly midnight and how did this happen? No YouTube allowed in the month of November!
Nov 13th 1,300 words – Starting Hunt for Unseelie Jack
Total words for Hunt for Unseelie Jack: 1,300.
One cool thing: I competed in a NaNoWriMo region vs region Word War where for a period of time we wrote as much as we could and the average per region determined the winner. My region won thanks to a couple of insanely fast writers in the group. Yay to us.
Challenge: Switching projects from one day to another is hard. Seriously hard. The characters from the earlier project refuse to leave my head. So now, I tried to write for a fanfiction I was so excited about before and had a hard time. I feel unprepared.
Maybe it’s been too long since I’ve done the prep for this project and need to dive into research mode for a couple of days, maybe watch a couple of episodes to get into it. We’ll see. I hope I won’t have to shelf this project for another time.
Nov 12th 2,132 words
Soooo… Remember how I said that yesterday was the last day of working on Spawn of Heliodor?
Yeah… Today, I wrote down the beginning and some notes for book 2 of the series and so TODAY was the last day. I hope so because I think I wrote down all I had and if this extends any longer, I won’t have many words to add.
Let’s tally up again.
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 43,285.
Let’s hope tomorrow I can stick to the plan a bit better.
Nov 11th 4,956 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 41,153
One cool thing: This is it for this project. I. Am. Done!!!
It doesn’t mean I’m ready to publish, far from it, but I did as much as I could during NaNo. The rest will require meticulous rewriting and objective edits.
But I’m not done with NaNo yet. I’m switching to the next project: Hunt for Unseelie Jack. Starting tomorrow, that’s what I’ll be writing.
Challenge: Switching from a project to project from one day to another will be challenging. We’ll see how well or badly I’ll do with that.
Nov 10th 2,330 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 36,197
Challenge: The easy part is over. The main scenes are done. Today, I went back to the beginning, looking for what could be missing, what transitions are needed, what needs more work. I was able to fill in some of the gaps but there are more left.
One cool thing: A song-fic is making its way into this book!
I’ve been planning to write a song-fic about the blow song (“W dzikie wino zaplątani” by Zakopower) for a while. And now I thought, instead of writing a short story about it, why not put it into my book? I’ve never written a song-fic before so it’s unknown waters. But I’m excited about it.
I think you can imagine what type of scene I’m planning when you read my rough translation of the lyrics.
In wild wine entwined ?
W dzikie wino zaplątani
Poem by Jan Kanty Pawluśkiewicz. Originally performed by Marek Grechuta.
The above video is a remake by Zakopower.
In the garden by the house
Life is grand and lush
You could have that, milady
But what can I do
The garden has grown wild
And we're entangled within it
Because in the garden grows a vine
The world's entwined in wild wine
Because in the garden there's a grapevine
Who planted it there, girl?
Say, who could've planted this wild wine
Maybe it was you, hey girl?
Say, who could've planted this wild wine
Who left it here?
???
When she tells me, she wants a ride in my carriage
She talks to a wall
It's not that I don't have one
But I'm a little tangled up
Because my home's overgrown with vines
Windows got tangled with doors
Because in my home there's a grapevine
Who planted it there, girl?
Say, who could've planted this wild wine
Maybe it was you, hey girl?
Say, why would plant this wild wine
Why leave it here?
???
Enraged, I dive into the unruly maze
I rip it off the walls and doors
Then, she says that she craves wine
In a vine-clear house, I'm entangled again
Where's that wild grapevine?
Why won't it entwine us again?
I could get lost in the vines with you
Hide in their tangled shelter
Say, who will plant us wild wine now?
Maybe you would do it, hey girl?
Say, who will plant us wild wine now?
Who will leave it here?
???
Nov 9th 935 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 33,867.
This Saturday, I had family obligations so I didn’t get a chance to sit down and write. The good thing that came out of it is that it gave me time to think, read back notes I’ve made before and reflect on the challenges of this project.
Challenge: The day before, I tried to bridge the final fight with the ending and found that it was dragging on for too long. Taking the time to reflect made me realize that the reason why I’m struggling is that too much has been unresolved, undeveloped, what I’m trying to squeeze into the ending should have happened earlier.
And so now, I’m going to have to go back and create those missing scenes. Thankfully, my word count is still low so I have space to add more subplot to this book without it becoming too long for the genre.
One cool thing: It looks like we’re going to have a hint of a romance in this book. It’s not the main focus and it won’t go far. It’s mostly just that these characters have good chemistry and they’re demanding a moment.
Nov 8th 3,558 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 32,932.
As mentioned in Day 7, the results of the first draft of the final fight would require me to go back and edit some important parts throughout the novel. So, to ensure I really want to do that and not rewrite the final fight instead, I read through the finale chapters beginning to the end (something I haven’t been doing during Nano – need to keep writing, reading/editing slows me down).
Result: I bawled my eyes out. There are some very strong feels in this, the action flows well and just works. I think I’m going to keep it. And that is my One cool thing for today’s entry. Feels have been activated. I hope I make you all cry!
Challenge: Several details will have to change earlier in the story to make it work. But I think it’s worth it.
Nov 7th 4,132 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 29,374.
One cool thing: the entire writing spree was a cool thing. lol, I was working on the final battle.
In my previous stories, readers have politely grumbled when the final fight was too short. So this one won’t be. It’s epic. I’ve got a cool location, lots of action, drama, plot twists, the feels – the whole package. The only thing I want to add more of is a little more magic. I’ll look for opportunities how I could enhance it. What type of a story with Merlin would this be if there’s only some magic.
Challenge: I have lots of doubts if where this final fight took me is where I want the story to be. I tried to brainstorm it ahead of time, even built and entire Save the Cat outline for it but in the end, it took a life of its own and took me to unexpected places. In short, now, the plot requires adjustments to make this work.
Nov 6th 4,651 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 25,242.
Another milestone! 25k!!!!
I am very close to finishing. The only scene that’s not written is the big boom – the explosive finale. I already have everything leading up to it and after it. Just the big boom! I’m very excited and I’m glad I was able to keep this novel short. It will be much more manageable once I start editing it.
One cool thing: I’ve got a double climax, or rather, fake climax. Apparently, it’s a popular technique. I’m going to pretend that I planned it that way.
Nov 5th 3,604 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 20,591.
Break out the confetti. We’re past the 20k mark!!!
One cool thing: I got to meet two of my fellow nanites at a write-in. We got some writing done together. Hanging out with writing friends is fun because you don’t have to make excuses as to why you don’t want to socialize right now. You just want to write. And so do they!
Nov 4th 3,687 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 16,987.
Since the original outline barely resembles this story, I redid it to get a grasp on what else is needed and I’m glad to see that I’m more than half-done. There are very few scenes that haven’t been written yet. Most of the work will be in enhancers: setting descriptions, mood amplifiers, character development, interactions with the world, etc. And it’s only day 4. I’m very happy with this result.
Challenge: The easiest part is done. Trying to patch up everything that’s missing is more strenuous work. My daily word-count will most likely go down but it is what it is.
One cool thing: I’ve found a use for the creature! The coolest thing about this breakthrough is that she can leave clues to use in this book AND book 2. Yes. This is most definitely only the beginning. Book 1 happens in Glass Gardens – an Earth city. Book 2 will happen in Heliodor which is in the Nether. We’ll be crossing realms, dears. We’re going epic!
Nov 3rd 4,718 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 13,300.
Very productive weekend. In only 3 days, I’m already 26% in of Nano goal of 50k words! Of course, I intend to write more than that. Not necessarily for this novel. I don’t want this one to be too long but I have two more prepped which will definitely keep me busy throughout the entire month of November.
Soooooo… I think I’m getting rid of Tristine’s POV. Gasp. No way. You’re cutting her out? No, I’m not. She’s still in the story but I’ve decided that there’s not enough reason to keep her as a main character. The story is progressing very well without her and I think it might add a little suspense to not know what she’s doing but only show her interactions with the two main characters.
I’ve found a possibility of simplifying the finale. I had this whole thing planned of a dilemma, sacrifice, and a rescue mission but while writing a scene that came before that (I’m not that far in, I’m writing out of order), I noticed that the drama of this chapter would be enough to serve as the climax and there is no need to overcomplicate it with multiple climaxes. I think it’s a wise choice. I’ll add some cool magical action to it and wrap this baby up.
Challenge: This draft is such a mess, I’m getting lost in it, trying to figure out what scene I’m writing next. It will be an editing nightmare. Most scenes have notes like “Interact with setting” or “Need beginning” or “Need transition” and are mostly just dialogue. So yeah, this will be a doozy later but at least it will be a written doozy. A novel that’s written is better than a novel that’s in your head, no matter how perfect that head-novel of yours might be.
One cool thing: There is a character I came up with during prep that I thought would be really cool to include – a mysterious creature with mysterious motives. I really want to expand on it, especially since I’m going to reduce Tristine’s appearances, but here’s the problem: it’s so mysterious, I don’t even know what this creature’s role in the story is. LOL. We’ll see if I find something interesting for her to do.
Nov 2nd 5,826 words
Total words for Spawn of Heliodor: 8,582.
It’s Saturday so I’m expecting a good amount of words today. I want to get ahead, just in case if later in the month I find myself with no time. It’s not that easy though. There is no peace and quiet in this house.
There were some weak points in my outline that I worried about, but today, it’s starting to come together. I got to the catalyst point for two characters. Making progress. ?
I’ve been avoiding writing Tristine POV scenes so far, just making notes for them. I never locked down her character in my prep. I hope that once I get to writing her scenes, she’ll finally come to life.
Update: I got a good amount of words in and created a lot of independent scenes. None of them are complete of course (this will be editing hell) and many scenes are missing but I’m happy with the progress.
Challenge: family. It’s not like I can tell them to get lost, I’m writing. It’s also not like I can write every minute of the whole day so I must find time for them. I just wish we could get things done all in one chunk so that I’d have a nice long chunk of several consecutive uninterrupted hours dedicated just to this. It sucks when you’re in the zone, you know exactly what you want to write and then you get the “I need your help now” request. Maybe leaving the house to write is the only way? I hope not. I like writing at home where I can play my music, pet my cats and grab snacks whenever I feel like it. Not to mention, not having to deal with public restrooms or people staring at me. One time, I was writing at a roller-skating rink and people were very much confused about what I was doing there with a laptop (not inside the rink).
One cool thing: I’m chatting with my region nano buddies on Discord. It’s a fun group. I hope to meet some of them in person one day.
I almost made myself cry on a couple of scenes. Almost. We’re nearly at the “hitting the feels” levels.
Also, I changed my Google doc settings to simulate a dark mode since Google refuses to implement one (reminds me of Wattpad now). It’s not perfect, I have to zoom in to make it work properly. There are chrome extensions that do that but I try to limit my use of extensions whenever I can. There are quite a lot of security concerns about them – I wrote an entire article about this.
Hmmm. I just realized. Safari has some built-in controls like that. I’ll check it out.
Nov 1st 2,756 words – Starting Spawn of Heliodor
Words written for Spawn of Heliodor today: 2,756.
I already have a part of Chapter 1. Chapter 2 and 3 scenes – a little bit of set up and a catalyst moment for one of the MCs, not the others yet.
Earlier outline created with Save the Cat beat sheet is a huge help – it’s a good go-to to keep myself in check, so I know exactly what I’m supposed to be writing.
Challenge: using notes and parentheses instead of deleting. I can’t help but make inline edits or notice sentences that require more rewording but I’m trying to just leave notes instead of spending too much time on editing. Being my own critic is a hard-to-break habit but I’m trying to not let it impede my progress. I console my inner perfectionist with the assurance that I won’t let anyone see this messy first draft before I have a chance to go back and fix it. It sucks that I will have to wait so long before I can share it with any of it with you. It’s a cool story.
One cool thing: The entire month of October, I was writing for the Wattpad Halloween challenges – every day. Even though some of the challenges were as short as 6 words, I think it was a great primer for NaNo. It’s not easy to write an independent story with a new theme, characters, and setting every day. The word limit is an editing exercise but more important is the idea of a brand new story on each try, the hook, that end that’s popping – that takes some effort but after a while, it got easier. In contrast, writing a novel that’s roughly outlined already should be a breeze. It’s the same characters, the same story, I already know the hook, emotions, and the desired outcome. I just need everything else in the middle.
