Words and Sniffles

I'm working on compiling a comprehensive outline of the first draft of my novel, after placing the work aside for about a month.  The book needs a lot of work, to say the least.  However, there are some good points to save.

Unfortunately, the process of getting in touch with my inner critic once more and revising the he## out of my novel is coming at a time when my head is going to explode with a nasty cold.  After three hours of reading and marking up my printed manuscript, my eyes are literally puffy and red and I can't breath with my mouth closed (get the picture?).  Now I'm off to get some sleep so that I can do the working thing and get back on to revising.  Hopefully I'll have more to report soon, but I don't want to push myself into an immune system shut down.  That just wouldn't help my productivity. 

Up and...writing

Well, I'm back.  For the next three months I'm going to be focusing on taking on the arduous task of revising my novel.  I have no fantasies of this being an easy process and I'm probably going to want to rip my hair out (or maybe just my brain), but when I eventually have that final draft in my hands the work will all be worth it. 

As I go along I'll try and report in on how things are going, what I'm reading and "ah-ha" moments that I'm hoping to have plenty of in the coming months. 

Time off before revising

Well, I'm taking a few weeks off to get some distance from my novel before jumping head first (or is it feet first?) into revision.  You may not see a post again until after New Years (is it really almost 2010?), but I'm sure I'll still be thinking about my novel no matter what I do.  More ravings will come...eventually.

Manuscript and Writing Workshop

I printed four copies of the first draft of my novel yesterday.  It's so strange to hold it in my hands, knowing that I wrote all those words and ideas.

Today I also attended a writing workshop where we had six one-hour sessions in different classes on various topics (more than 40 to choose from throughout the event).  The writing really taught me some things about the craft and potential points to change in my revision.  I even read at the open mic!  Having never done that before, I'm surprised I was able to do so and not fumble every word (well, not every word).  A huge thanks to my friends and family that donated to make my attendance possible.  I couldn't have gone without your support. 

I'd write more about the topics I learned about (some weren't really new topics to me, but a couple of the sessions really taught me a lot about writing style and immersing the reader in characters), but I'm too exhausted.  Maybe later...

Oh, and I am going to continue my work on the novel in revision, so look forward to more ravings and updates!

NaNoWriMo Winner

So, I just won the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) challenge of writing 50,000 words in 30 days.  I still have a bit to write to complete the novel (it's currently at 74,012 words total, with 50,012 of that counting towards the November word count), but this is a huge success.  Go me!