Well, we're done. There were times - far too many times, really, sometimes lasting as long as a week - when I didn't really add to my NaNoWriMo word count at all. On the final day, Friday, I still had 10,000 words to make the total, didn't really have any major scenes to insert, and - just to make things more interesting - had to go to work, and had a stand up gig to deliver in the evening. I had roughly six hours to come up with 10k, which sounds roughly like the plot to a straight to DVD movie featuring Shia LaBeouf, and just about as impossible to sit through.
The thing about me having to a stand up gig that night was particularly apt, though. Set Up, Punch is a book that's set around the amateur stand up scene in Brighton, and so it seemed fitting that the final thousand or so words were hacked out in the downstairs room of a pub whilst I could hear the laughs and cheers of the comedy gig above me. Luckily enough, I was first up, so it meant that I could get my set out of the way. I never normally say that - I hate going on first, I don't think I'm a natural choice for an opening act, and I think it's far too easy to simply die horribly if you haven't judged the mood of the audience right. That said, so far, audiences have been very kind to me and laughed in all the right places. It might not need saying that, as well as not liking going on first, I don't generally like whatever I do at all. About 70% of my set (which was probably only about seven minutes long) was new, and while not brilliant, was OK enough to get the audience on side (and had a watching comedy night organiser, who was also performing at night, compelled enough to ask me if I wanted to do a spot at his night, so presumably I wasn't as painfully terrible as I was convinced I must be). After waiting for the first interval, I then popped downstairs to see if I could finish the novel. It took ages, and my hands were beginning to cramp (I'm not even a very good typist), and as I got closer to the 50,000 mark, I realised a very fundamental thing: I wasn't in one of my usual writing haunts that comes with free wifi. It was entirely possible that I was going to be able to write enough words to make the count, but not be able to validate it on the NaNoWriMo word count in time. Not without hacking out the final chapter, hopping on a bike, racing to an entirely different location, and delivering the manuscript with literally minutes to spare. I imagine this is how Douglas Adams' producers must have felt during the second radio series of Hitchhikers Guide.
In the event, I actually managed to validate the novel (with, according to the website, roughly 500 words more than I thought I'd managed). I'll now leave it alone for a bit before I begin to attack it in an attempt to bring it up to the status of first draft (ever mindful that, confiding the conditions under which it was written, I'm not exactly waiting for the moment when I have 'more time' to work on it). Interestingly, I suspect it needs another 20,000ish words on it to make the story really work. I mean, when it's done, it's not going to be a demanding read - it's very much an example of 'big mac and fries' style writing - if you don't read a great deal, it'll pass by in a pleasant enough fortnight, equally, if you're the sort of reader that tends to have about six books on the go at any one time, then you'll probably be able to sink this one in a single evening. Now that the book is done (of course it's not done, it's about six drafts from being done), I think I need to read some more in loosely connected genres. Modesty Blaise springs to mind, as do the books of Peter James, none of which I've yet read.
There are about eight other books that I've never gotten around to writing yet (six of them part of the same series), and it does seem like NaNoWriMo is an excellent launch pad to actually get the bloody things started - particularly in the case of the six-series, where the overall arc is so twisty turny that I've avoided actually writing it for years, but for now I'm going to attempt to retain a grip on the fact that I was able to hack out 50k in a month where I was relatively busy elsewhere. If I'm capable of that, then a couple of short stories should be no problem.
Next up: a couple of short stories. You know, when I've got the time.
I agree NaNo has been a great launch pad for me to get something underway that's been bubbling under the surface for years. I always thought of it as my second novel, something on the back burner for the future, but as the first "novel" (or more like random collection of personal memories dished out between an assortment of characters and threaded together by a very poor plot) came to a halt years ago and the memoir I was trying to write from my blog became more difficult and painful to stick together, I decided to give NaNo a go and kick start my latest WIP!
ReplyDeleteWell done you for actually getting more than 50K written, my final total was 27K give or take but NaNo has given me some kind of momentum and some words that could one day morph into a reasonable first draft.
I've told so many people about what I was doing that hopefully I will get enough friendly nagging to give me enough of a push!
Storm before the Calm? Maybe this is just a break in the rainclouds, enough to dash out and stock up on supplies before the next downpour!
All the best with your WIP.
Sarah