Some other NaNoWriMo Thoughts

Trying to write 50,000 words in a month felt like holding my breath under water – everything else was suspended while I worked on writing. I basically ate, slept, went to work and wrote. I cut out television, most socializing and practically all other stuff that invades my day. Trying to keep the house clean, pay attention to twitter or running errands all those distractions went on the back burner. (Facebook was a must, though – because interacting with the NaNo Indy group was a lifeline to keep me going.)

It worked, largely because I removed a lot of barriers to focusing and getting in the zone to writing, and the forced deadline can work wonders.

Is that sustainable, though? Can I really zone out my friends, turn off the television and blow off the house all the time?

I wish there were a better way to balance. Because not writing is not an option, now.

Cutting out the television is pretty easy. Helping around the house, running errands and socializing are more difficult. I’m considering whether twitter really has much of a place in my life anymore.

I need to simplify things so I can both write and interact with my spouse and go to my job without becoming an ascetic.

Your thoughts would be greatly appreciated on this matter.

Posted on 2012-11-30 by Hawthorn Fire

NaNoWriMo 2012 – Validated

So.. I won NaNoWriMo again this year.

I finished three days early – with 50,058 words written this year added to what I wrote last year. Now I need to write the actual final chapters and not just scenes from the climactic ending, but hey – I’m a lot closer to a complete work than last year. Now it’s not a question of if I will ever self-publish, but when.

Last year at this time, I was reading over my novel, and I was really frustrated, because it seemed complete unrealistic. At about the half-way point of the story, I had one of my two main characters do something completely out of character for the way I had written about her up to that point. I did it because I couldn’t think of any other way to get her in the excruciating position she needed to be in so the villain could torment her and drive the rest of the plot. But that false note made all the rest of it seem really hard to believe. It just didn’t read right, and all the following events seemed flat and desperate, like a huge rationalization. I chewed on that for the whole rest of the year and didn’t know what to do. I loved the beginning and loved the characters, but I hated the middle and the end.

This year Garrett Hutson said something at the being of November about plot development along the lines of – “know where your characters are going to go, but to get them there, use a compass, not a map.” That set me thinking – okay, if that plot point seems out of character for my main character, what would she actually do instead? I threw out everything except the end where the characters needed to go, and started writing from just before that false note… and I realized if I changed the villain slightly, and added secondary villain who was working with and also at cross-purposes to the first one, I could get the MC into that excruciating position in a more real way, and then all the dominos started to fall one by one. Now I like the whole story from beginning to end. Even though I threw out 23,000 words I wrote last year and started over, this is a much better story, and one that makes me really happy to read throughout.

I’m in danger, though, of not keeping up with the story now. I hate that the 50,000 word mark was a finish line of sorts, because it’s not done at all, and I still need to keep writing it. It’s good, I think, and original, and interesting, so I need to actually push through and finish.

It was a huge accomplishment that I never thought I could do once, let alone twice. I need to make it work for real. If you could – cattle prod me, please? Bug me about it as much as possible so I don’t get complacent. This was cool, and something that was important to me to do, so I don’t want to let it slide.

Posted on 2012-11-30 by Hawthorn Fire

NaNoWriMo 2012 – Day 9

8. 13,336 – 2750 (14497, +1161)

Those are my notations for Day 8 of National Novel Writing Month.

13,336 – that’s “par for the course” or the least word count for day 8 to stay on track to “win.”

2750 – the number of words I wrote yesterday.

14497 – total word count for November 2012. I have the chapters I wrote last year, but I’m not counting them in this years’ event. Some of those will get trashed and some considerably altered when I’m finished.

+1161 – the number of words I have as a “word count cushion” over the minimum to stay on course.

So I’m keeping up the pace pretty well. I’m poised to do more this weekend that I hope will really put me ahead. I have a pretty clear idea of where I’m going, too, but I’m trying to be flexible enough to make sure I can make changes. As our friend Garrett says – “Know where you’re going, but use a compass and not a road map.”

I have a much more fully formed notion of setting this year than last, which really helps me add detail to scenes and paint a more interesting visual picture than last year, and helped me add detail to the action as well. And I think I have a more complete and satisfying ending in mind that I did last year, with some nice turning points to get us there.

I’m very optimistic that I can get closer to complete by the end of November, and ready to polish. My goal is to have it ready to show my editor – that would be Stephanie – by February. I have one or two other people I want to get feedback from as well. And with editing and revisions based on feedback, I’d really like to have it ready for publication by the end of April. I’m going to use Book Tango to self-publish for e-publication, I think. I don’t have an agent lined up or anything, so I don’t anticipate being able to get the attention of a traditional publisher at first. We’ll see.

Posted on 2012-11-09 by Hawthorn Fire

NaNoWriMo 2012

Yup, I’m going to do this again. I’m basically going to add 50,000 words to my novel from last year in hopes of finishing it. Wish me luck. I did it once; I can do it again. Of course last time I took a week off work to do it, and this time I’ve already used my vacation. But if other people can do it, so can I.

Posted on 2012-10-30 by Hawthorn Fire

Evolutionary Psychology and its Top Ten Failures

This is worth reading… Via Dr. Beetle: Evolutionary Psychology and its Top Ten Failures.

The dreadful pseudo science of evolutionary psychology is founded upon concepts such as survival of the fittest, selfish genes, inherited instincts and mind modules. It has shot to prominence in science and societies’ thinking, and found many a willing ear.

Posted on 2012-10-08 by Hawthorn Fire

25 Ways To Plot, Plan and Prep Your Story

25 Ways To Plot, Plan and Prep Your Story.

I’m struggling with my novel quite a bit right now, trying to untangle the plot and see if I can figure out what I’m trying to convey. I had a really frustrating time last weekend trying to work it out. The “fly by the seat of your pants” method got a lot more done for me than the “meticulous plotting” method. But it also resulted in some of the plot tangles. So… I have a couple good suggestions from my NANOWRIMO group – and I have this awesome reference. I can see at least 3 different ways of approaching my plot in this article that would probably help me sort out my thinking.

Posted on 2012-09-12 by Hawthorn Fire

Pixar story rules

The Pixar Touch – history of Pixar – Blog – Pixar story rules (one version).

These are some fantastic story writing rules from Pixar Writer Emma Coats, as collected from her twitter feed.

Pixar story artist Emma Coats has tweeted a series of “story basics” over the past month and a half — guidelines that she learned from her more senior colleagues on how to create appealing stories:

#1: You admire a character for trying more than for their successes.

#2: You gotta keep in mind what’s interesting to you as an audience, not what’s fun to do as a writer. They can be v. different.

#3: Trying for theme is important, but you won’t see what the story is actually about til you’re at the end of it. Now rewrite.

#4: Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___.

#5: Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You’ll feel like you’re losing valuable stuff but it sets you free.

#6: What is your character good at, comfortable with? Throw the polar opposite at them. Challenge them. How do they deal?

#7: Come up with your ending before you figure out your middle. Seriously. Endings are hard, get yours working up front.

#8: Finish your story, let go even if it’s not perfect. In an ideal world you have both, but move on. Do better next time.

#9: When you’re stuck, make a list of what WOULDN’T happen next. Lots of times the material to get you unstuck will show up.

#10: Pull apart the stories you like. What you like in them is a part of you; you’ve got to recognize it before you can use it.

#11: Putting it on paper lets you start fixing it. If it stays in your head, a perfect idea, you’ll never share it with anyone.

#12: Discount the 1st thing that comes to mind. And the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th – get the obvious out of the way. Surprise yourself.

#13: Give your characters opinions. Passive/malleable might seem likable to you as you write, but it’s poison to the audience.

#14: Why must you tell THIS story? What’s the belief burning within you that your story feeds off of? That’s the heart of it.

#15: If you were your character, in this situation, how would you feel? Honesty lends credibility to unbelievable situations.

#16: What are the stakes? Give us reason to root for the character. What happens if they don’t succeed? Stack the odds against.

#17: No work is ever wasted. If it’s not working, let go and move on – it’ll come back around to be useful later.

#18: You have to know yourself: the difference between doing your best & fussing. Story is testing, not refining.

#19: Coincidences to get characters into trouble are great; coincidences to get them out of it are cheating.

#20: Exercise: take the building blocks of a movie you dislike. How d’you rearrange them into what you DO like?

#21: You gotta identify with your situation/characters, can’t just write ‘cool’. What would make YOU act that way?

#22: What’s the essence of your story? Most economical telling of it? If you know that, you can build out from there.

Posted on 2012-06-13 by Hawthorn Fire

Indiana Romance Writers of America: Golden Opportunities Contest

From the Indiana chapter of Romance Writers of AmericaIndiana Golden Opportunity Contest.

We welcome you to help us celebrate the 22nd anniversary of Indiana’s Golden Opportunity (IGO), one of the Midwest’s premier contests. The Indiana chapter of Romance Writers of America® (IRWA) has a well-deserved reputation for offering detailed, encouraging comments to our contest entrants from experienced professionals. Our four-page score sheet is designed to help entrants identify the elements of storytelling at which they excel while pinpointing the elements that require more attention. This means entrants will receive feedback that will help them create a quality polished manuscript. Many past winners have successfully sold the manuscripts they entered in the IGO, and we like to think we played a part in that. The contest is also a great way to prepare your work for Golden Heart. IGO attracts some of the most well-respected names in the industry as category and final judges.

This is an interesting opportunity for me, especially given that I’ll hopefully have a much more complete manuscript at the end of June than I do currently for my NaNoWriMo book. I could potentially enter this.

Posted on 2012-05-07 by Hawthorn Fire

How to Commit to a Goal

via How to Commit to a Goal — PsyBlog.

The key, according to PsyBlog, is not to simply fantasize about how much better it will be when you achieve your goal, or to wallow in how unhappy you are now, but to contrast those two with each other each time. Fantasizing tends to make you give up the goal because you hoax yourself into believing for a bit that it’s true. Wallowing in the reality tends to bring you down.

But contrasting the fantasy with the current reality motivates you to make a change.

Posted on 2012-03-19 by Hawthorn Fire

Episodic v. Serial – Complications Ensue

Episodic v. Serial – Complications Ensue:

So when we actually saw Rob Thomas (creator of VERONICA MARS) giving a talk at Banff, DMc asked him about his thoughts on episodic vs. serial.

Rob busted out a factoid I’d heard before, but which really hadn’t sunk in. When people say they watch a show, on average, they watch one out of four episodes.

One out of four.

It’s a shock, because when I watch a show, I really want to see every episode. I missed maybe one or two FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTs last season, and I was really unhappy about it. One out of four? So the average audience member is really not that involved in the season arcs even of a soap opera like FNL; they’re just going along for the episodic ride.

Rob said if he’d been able to do a fourth season of VM, he’d have made it entirely episodic. No serial story at all. That was a shock.

Wow, one of the better shows developed for episodic viewing, and the writer wouldn’t do it that way again. Also – who watched Friday Night Lights that way? Good god. That show was amazing for layers and building. Why would you watch it for an episode here or there?

Maybe many people watch TV that way, but I sure don’t. There’s got to be two camps on this – I wonder what the split is?

And could you write a show that works for both camps?

Posted on 2012-03-18 by Hawthorn Fire

Brainstorming and Groupthink

From the New Yorker – Groupthink: The brainstorming myth, by Jonah Lehrer

In the late nineteen-forties, Alex Osborn, a partner in the advertising agency B.B.D.O., decided to write a book in which he shared his creative secrets…. His book “Your Creative Power” was published in 1948. An amalgam of pop science and business anecdote, it became a surprise best-seller. Osborn promised that, by following his advice, the typical reader could double his creative output…

But Osborn’s most celebrated idea was the one discussed in Chapter 33, “How to Organize a Squad to Create Ideas.” When a group works together, he wrote, the members should engage in a “brainstorm,” which means “using the brain to storm a creative problem—and doing so in commando fashion, with each stormer attacking the same objective.” For Osborn, brainstorming was central to B.B.D.O.’s success. Osborn described, for instance, how the technique inspired a group of ten admen to come up with eighty-seven ideas for a new drugstore in ninety minutes, or nearly an idea per minute. The brainstorm had turned his employees into imagination machines.

The book outlined the essential rules of a successful brainstorming session. The most important of these, Osborn said—the thing that distinguishes brainstorming from other types of group activity—was the absence of criticism and negative feedback. If people were worried that their ideas might be ridiculed by the group, the process would fail. “Creativity is so delicate a flower that praise tends to make it bloom while discouragement often nips it in the bud,” he wrote. “Forget quality; aim now to get a quantity of answers. When you’re through, your sheet of paper may be so full of ridiculous nonsense that you’ll be disgusted. Never mind. You’re loosening up your unfettered imagination—making your mind deliver.” Brainstorming enshrined a no-judgments approach to holding a meeting.

The trouble with the absence of criticism was that it doesn’t work – groups working together to solve problems come up with fewer solutions than individuals working alone. But what does work with groups? Critique does. A group can come up with better, more creative solutions if ideas are criticized and evaluated and discarded if they aren’t used. Challenges to our thought process cause us to reevaluate our ideas and take us off in new directions.

According to Nemeth, dissent stimulates new ideas because it encourages us to engage more fully with the work of others and to reassess our viewpoints. “There’s this Pollyannaish notion that the most important thing to do when working together is stay positive and get along, to not hurt anyone’s feelings,” she says. “Well, that’s just wrong. Maybe debate is going to be less pleasant, but it will always be more productive. True creativity requires some trade-offs.”

Another factor that helps open the door to mass group creativity is the makeup of the group itself. Brian Uzzi began studying what ideal teams should look like by studying teams responsible for creating Broadway Musicals. He picked a particularly successful period of Broadway shows and analyzed their creative teams:

Uzzi wanted to understand how the relationships of these team members affected the product. Was it better to have a group composed of close friends who had worked together before? Or did strangers make better theatre? He undertook a study of every musical produced on Broadway between 1945 and 1989. To get a full list of collaborators, he sometimes had to track down dusty old Playbills in theatre basements. He spent years analyzing the teams behind four hundred and seventy-four productions, and charted the relationships of thousands of artists, from Cole Porter to Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Uzzi found that the people who worked on Broadway were part of a social network with lots of interconnections: it didn’t take many links to get from the librettist of “Guys and Dolls” to the choreographer of “Cats.” Uzzi devised a way to quantify the density of these connections, a figure he called Q. If musicals were being developed by teams of artists that had worked together several times before—a common practice, because Broadway producers see “incumbent teams” as less risky—those musicals would have an extremely high Q. A musical created by a team of strangers would have a low Q.

He discovered that having a low Q was bad, but having a really high Q wasn’t the most successful configuration of a team either. It took having mostly incumbent members with a few new folks to challenge their thinking to keep interactions from becoming stale.

Another important component of creative thinking on teams is space and how it’s arranged. Physical proximity matters to group interactions, and having creative teams run into one another and interact in a casual way sparks lots of creative ideas. Steve Jobs understood that concept and continually reworked the architecture of Apple to generate those sorts of spontaneous interactions among his employees.

And a famous lab building at M.I.T – Building 20 – was ground zero for some of the most successful scientific and cultural collaborations in American history, simply because it had a ramshackle design that encouraged creative thought – researchers could rearrange their space they way they wanted and routinely knocked out walls and rebuild their labs if needed – and the building’s convoluted layout meant that researchers from wildly divergent teams ran into one another in the hallways, formed friendships and triggered intellectual thought outside of their area of expertise.

Posted on 2012-02-24 by Hawthorn Fire

Word Counts of Famous Short Stories (organized)

Shamelessly cribbed from Classic Short Stories and re-organized by word count from shortest to longest for comparison purposes. We’re discussing short stories with the Indy NaNoWriMo group this afternoon, and I thought it might help to have a word count chart similar to the one I did for Famous Novels back in November.

Of the 161 stories listed, 3081 is the median word count (number in the middle) and 4052 is the average word count. Duotrope (a free writers’ resource listing over 3950 current fiction and poetry publications) caps their search for short story publishers at 7,500 words, which means most publishers are looking for stories of less than that length.

Words: 710 – Virginia Woolf – A Haunted House
Words: 762 – Fielding Dawson – The Vertical Fields
Words: 810 – Mark Twain – A Telephonic Conversation
Words: 994 – Gabriel Garcia Marquez – One of These Days
Words: 1274 – Saki (H H Munro) – The Open Window
Words: 1354 – Guy de Maupassant – The Kiss
Words: 1377 – Saki (H H Munro) – Mrs Packletide’s Tiger
Words: 1411 – Guy de Maupassant – A Dead Woman’s Secret
Words: 1429 – Guy de Maupassant – Indiscretion
Words: 1464 – Guy de Maupassant – Moonlight
Words: 1472 – Guy de Maupassant – Coco
Words: 1503 – Anton Pavlovich Checkhov – A Slander
Words: 1520 – Saki (H H Munro) – The Mouse
Words: 1552 – Guy de Maupassant – Yvette
Words: 1564 – William Carlos Williams – The Use of Force
Words: 1618 – Liam O’Flaherty – The Sniper
Words: 1624 – Guy de Maupassant – Farewell
Words: 1657 – Guy de Maupassant – Friend Patience
Words: 1691 – Guy de Maupassant – The Drunkard
Words: 1720 – Guy de Maupassant – The Christening
Words: 1764 – Guy de Maupassant – A Vendetta
Words: 1797 – Mark Twain – Luck
Words: 1830 – Saki (H H Munro) – Sredni Vashtar
Words: 1831 – Ambrose Bierce – The Boarded Window
Words: 1857 – Guy de Maupassant – Bellflower
Words: 1862 – Guy de Maupassant – In the Wood
Words: 1870 – Guy de Maupassant – The Dowry
Words: 1896 – Guy de Maupassant – The Unknown
Words: 1914 – Guy de Maupassant – A Family
Words: 1921 – Guy de Maupassant – Misti–Recollections of a Bachelor
Words: 1944 – Guy de Maupassant – Confessing
Words: 1978 – Anton Pavlovich Checkhov – The Lottery Ticket
Words: 2023 – Guy de Maupassant – A Humble Drama
Words: 2071 – Guy de Maupassant – Two Little Soldiers
Words: 2073 – E B White – The Door
Words: 2083 – Guy de Maupassant – Humiliation
Words: 2093 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Tell-Tale Heart
Words: 2098 – Rudyard Kipling – How the Leopard Got His Spots
Words: 2098 – Guy de Maupassant – The Hand
Words: 2106 – Guy de Maupassant – Old Mongilet
Words: 2109 – Saki (H H Munro) – The Storyteller (Saki)
Words: 2112 – Patrick Waddington – The Street That Got Mislaid
Words: 2149 – Mark Twain – A Burlesque Biography
Words: 2163 – O Henry – The Gift of the Magi
Words: 2208 – Guy de Maupassant – The Hairpin
Words: 2256 – O Henry – The Whirligig of Life
Words: 2284 – Guy de Maupassant – Denis
Words: 2350 – Mark Twain – Italian without a Master
Words: 2383 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Masque of the Red Death
Words: 2384 – Herman Melville – The Fiddler
Words: 2385 – Anton Pavlovich Checkhov – A Day in the Country
Words: 2385 – Guy de Maupassant – Waiter
Words: 2399 – James Joyce – Araby
Words: 2414 – O Henry – The Princess and the Puma
Words: 2421 – Dorothy Parker – A Telephone Call
Words: 2434 – Guy de Maupassant – Madame Parisse
Words: 2457 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Imp of the Perverse
Words: 2479 – Guy de Maupassant – Timbuctoo
Words: 2495 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Cask of Amontillado
Words: 2500 – O Henry – The Last Leaf
Words: 2530 – Guy de Maupassant – The Piece of String
Words: 2543 – Ambrose Bierce – A Horseman in the Sky
Words: 2544 – Rudyard Kipling – The Elephant’s Child
Words: 2555 – O Henry – The Coming-Out of Maggie
Words: 2623 – Mark Twain – Italian with Grammar
Words: 2631 – Mark Twain – The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
Words: 2637 – Guy de Maupassant – Theodule Sabot’s Confession
Words: 2649 – James Joyce – Clay
Words: 2652 – Guy de Maupassant – The Marquis de Fumerol
Words: 2720 – Herman Melville – The Lightning-Rod Man
Words: 2731 – Guy de Maupassant – The Devil
Words: 2747 – Frank Stockton – The Lady or the Tiger?
Words: 2768 – Guy de Maupassant – Julie Romain
Words: 2797 – Gabriel Garcia Marquez – Eyes of a Blue Dog
Words: 2811 – Edgar Allan Poe – Von Kempelen and His Discovery
Words: 2871 – Anton Pavlovich Checkhov – The Bet
Words: 2901 – Evan Hunter – The Last Spin
Words: 2989 – Guy de Maupassant – The Donkey
Words: 3016 – Dylan Thomas – A Child’s Christmas in Wales
Words: 3056 – Guy de Maupassant – Toine
Words: 3081 – Guy de Maupassant – The Father
Words: 3091 – Guy de Maupassant – The Necklace
Words: 3159 – Guy de Maupassant – A Coward
Words: 3208 – Nathaniel Hawthorne – The Wedding-Knell
Words: 3211 – Irwin Shaw – The Girls in Their Summer Dresses
Words: 3283 – George Orwell – Shooting an Elephant
Words: 3343 – Nathaniel Hawthorne – The Ambitious Guest
Words: 3400 – Graham Greene – The End of the Party
Words: 3448 – Ambrose Bierce – Beyond the Wall
Words: 3620 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Facts in the Case of M Valdemar
Words: 3624 – Bret Harte – Tennessee’s Partner
Words: 3642 – Guy de Maupassant – An Affair of State
Words: 3690 – Paul Bowles – In the Red Room
Words: 3772 – Charles Dickens – The Baron of Grogzwig
Words: 3773 – Shirley Jackson – The Lottery
Words: 3801 – George Saunders – The Falls
Words: 3804 – Ambrose Bierce – An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge
Words: 3878 – Edgar Allan Poe – 7 Mesmeric Revelation
Words: 3899 – Roald Dahl – Lamb to the Slaughter
Words: 3998 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Black Cat
Words: 4058 – Guy de Maupassant – The Wreck
Words: 4134 – W W Jacobs – The Monkey’s Paw
Words: 4190 – Bret Harte – The Luck of Roaring Camp
Words: 4279 – Guy de Maupassant – That Pig of a Morin
Words: 4309 – Gabriel Garcia Marquez – Eva Is Inside Her Cat
Words: 4356 – Charles Dickens – The Poor Relation’s Story
Words: 4372 – O Henry – The Ransom of Red Chief
Words: 4490 – Guy de Maupassant – A Vagabond
Words: 4492 – James O’Keefe – Death Makes a Comeback
Words: 4618 – Guy de Maupassant – Mademoiselle Fifi
Words: 4625 – Roald Dahl – Man From the South
Words: 4722 – Katherine Mansfield – The Stranger
Words: 5028 – Anton Pavlovich Checkhov – The Darling
Words: 5046 – Ring Lardner – Haircut
Words: 5072 – Roald Dahl – Beware of the Dog
Words: 5114 – Guy de Maupassant – The Inn
Words: 5215 – James Joyce – A Little Cloud
Words: 5231 – Stuart Cloete – The Soldier’s Peaches
Words: 5285 – Nathaniel Hawthorne – The Minister’s Black Veil
Words: 5387 – Nathaniel Hawthorne – Young Goodman Brown
Words: 5505 – George Orwell – Politics and the English Language
Words: 5547 – Jesse Stuart – Split Cherry Tree
Words: 5557 – Katherine Mansfield – The Garden Party
Words: 5565 – Honore de Balzac – A Passion in the Desert
Words: 5637 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Premature Burial
Words: 5672 – O Henry – A Blackjack Bargainer
Words: 5703 – Nathaniel Hawthorne – The Great Carbuncle
Words: 5704 – Bret Harte – How Santa Claus Came to Simpson’s Bar
Words: 5707 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Thousand-And-Second Tale of Scheherazade
Words: 5751 – Guy de Maupassant – Mademoiselle Pearl
Words: 5896 – Rudyard Kipling – Rikki-Tikki-Tavi from The Jungle Book
Words: 5952 – Tobias Wolff – Hunters in the Snow
Words: 6015 – D H Lawrence – The Rocking-Horse Winner
Words: 6078 – Frank Stockton – The Griffin and the Minor Canon
Words: 6155 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Pit and the Pendulum
Words: 6366 – Ambrose Flack – The Strangers That Came to Town
Words: 6758 – Ring Lardner – The Golden Honeymoon
Words: 6776 – Guy de Maupassant – Useless Beauty
Words: 6815 – Robert Louis Stevenson – Markheim
Words: 6826 – Nathaniel Hawthorne – Ethan Brand
Words: 6934 – Washington Irving – Rip Van Winkle (A Posthumous Writing of Diedrich Knickerbocker)
Words: 7053 – H G Wells – The Door in the Wall
Words: 7120 – Henry Van Dyke – The First Christmas Tree
Words: 7176 – Jack London – To Build a Fire
Words: 7178 – Mark Twain – Was it Heaven? Or Hell?
Words: 7181 – Edgar Allan Poe – A Descent Into the Maelstrom
Words: 7226 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Fall of the House of Usher
Words: 7396 – Edgar Allan Poe – The Purloined Letter
Words: 7419 – Thomas Bailey Aldrich – Marjorie Daw
Words: 7446 – Richard Harding Davis – The Consul
Words: 7805 – Jack London – A Piece of Steak
Words: 7876 – Guy de Maupassant – Miss Harriet
Words: 8080 – Mark Twain – The Private History of a Campaign That Failed
Words: 8426 – Richard Connell – The Most Dangerous Game
Words: 8881 – Carl Stephenson – Leiningen versus the Ants
Words: 8970 – Willa Cather – Paul’s Case
Words: 9601 – Thomas Nelson Page – The Burial of the Guns
Words: 10669 – Edith Wharton – Souls Belated
Words: 11870 – Edith Wharton – Afterward
Words: 12261 – Nathaniel Hawthorne – Rappaccini’s Daughter
Words: 33015 – H G Wells – The Time Machine

Posted on 2012-01-22 by Hawthorn Fire 4

Friday Night Lights

While I’m working through my CD ripping project, I’ve been knitting and doing some marathon Netflix watching. I can’t remember what prompted me to start watching Friday Night Lights, but I’ve been working my way through the first several seasons – and it’s GOOD. The writing is amazing. I wish I’d been watching this all along. The problem is that after watching the show continuously, I’ve started talking with a Texas twang. It’s a little embarrassing.

Posted on 2012-01-02 by Hawthorn Fire

NaNoWriMo 2011: Validated.

I’m validated at 50163 words.

Technically I’m “done” writing my National Novel Writing Month project. Except that I still need to write chapters 12-15 and chapters 2 and 5. But 50163 words makes it “finished” for the purposes of the contest. I’m a winner. I’ve written more than Slaughterhouse Five and The Great Gatsby. Not “better than” just “more than.” 🙂

Nano 2011 Winner

So here’s the general plan for the rest of this – I’m going to edit/write through December, but put together an outline for another story in that time, too. Then take January to write that story, and edit/rewrite more of this one in February. I hope to keep a daily word count every day, and I’ll track it the way I tracked the word count for this, so I can keep up a daily routine and not get off track.

Posted on 2011-11-30 by Hawthorn Fire 1

NaNoWriMo 2011: Still chugging along.

I’m at 43,506 words. That’s 6,494 words away from “winning.” And I have 4 days. I think it’s a safe bet that I’ll get there, especially since I have all day tomorrow to work on it. I didn’t write at all on Thanksgiving Day, but I wrote in the car both to and from Iowa (not easy at all; it’s very distracting to try to write with cars whoosing by and the bumps in the pavement) and on Friday while everyone went out shopping.

Interesting to try to explain to family members what I was doing. My family is not always supportive of creative endeavors unless they’re attached to work or school requirements, so… yeah. I basically explained it as “I’m in a contest to write a novel in a month, and I’m close to winning, so…” because if you’re trying to win a contest, that’s okay. If you just writing a novel for the sake of writing – a bit on the loony tunes side.

And of course, everyone wanted to know what it was about, and yeah… haven’t even shared that with Stephanie, yet. Too afraid it sucks ass. Actually, I know it sucks ass, at least right now. Hopefully it will not suck ass in the future when I get a chance to re-write it and remove the suck from it, replacing it with less-than-suck, or possibly even with pretty-damn-good if I can figure out where to get that. Chances are you will never get to see this novel. I’m sorry about that. I make no guarantees. I’ll do my best, I promise.

Posted on 2011-11-26 by Hawthorn Fire

Men are bad at sex (writing)

The Literary Review’s “Bad Sex in Fiction” award is dominated year after year by men. (heh. See what I just did there?) I do find the thought that men can’t write sex well very funny. And there are some prominent male authors on the list, too, which is odd, because what’s so interesting about their books if the sex is stupid?

I’m also a bit alarmed that there is a “Bad Sex in Fiction” award in the first place. No editing until December, self. Do not panic.

Posted on 2011-11-24 by Hawthorn Fire 2

NaNoWriMo 2011- Road Trip setup

Writing in car, now with inverter to ensure iPad stays charged. Also, monkey plays critical role in keeping iPad from falling over. Trial and error involved in this set-up.

Posted on 2011-11-23 by Hawthorn Fire

NaNoWriMo 2011 – Still on target

My word count is now 35,521 words. Not quite beating out Ole Yeller on the “famous books word count list.” I’m under par by 1,153 words, but I should have time to get caught up (and hopefully ahead) tomorrow on the road to Iowa for the family Thanksgiving. Stephanie is driving, and I’m planning on writing in the car on a lap desk that I’ve used to write in bed several times. It should work fine. If not, I’ll come up with a new plan. I have 14,479 words left to write, and 9 days left to write them. If I keep averaging as many words as I have, I’ll pass the finish line on time. I’ll have the basics of the plot built, with lots of back story and character development to return and add in during December and January. The whole thing should be well above 50,000 words when I finish.

Posted on 2011-11-22 by Hawthorn Fire

Word Count for Famous Novels (organized)

[Also published on my blog commonplacebook.com]

Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words. Based on this list compiled by Nicole Humphrey Cook. (Thanks Nicole, and sorry for stealing; I wanted to see the list in order.) For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference. Also, here’s another list I may swipe and add in here.

Harry Potter Books
Philosopher’s Stone – 77,325
Chamber of Secrets – 84,799
Prisoner of Azkaban – 106,821
Goblet of Fire – 190,858
Order of the Phoenix – 257,154
Half Blood Prince – 169,441
Deathly Hallows – 198,227

Lord of the Rings
The Hobbit – 95,022
The Lord of the Rings – 455,125
The Two Towers – 143,436
The Return of the King – 134,462

Other Famous Books
22,416 – The Mouse and the Motorcycle – Beverly Cleary
30,644 – Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl
35,968 – Old Yeller – Fred Gipson
36,363 – Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe – C.S. Lewis
42,715 – The Tequila Worm – Canales, Viola
46,118 – Fahrenheit 451 – Ray Bradbury
47,094 – The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
47,180 – The Red Badge of Courage – Stephen Crane
48,523 – The Outsiders – S.E. Hinton
49,459 – Slaughterhouse-Five – Kurt Vonnegut
50,000 =========== NaNoWriMo Winners
54,243 – The Hours – Cunningham, Michael
56,695 – As I Lay Dying – William Faulkner
56,787 – A Separate Peace – John Knowles
58,428 – The Wind in the Willows – Kenneth Grahame
59,635 – Black Beauty – Anna Sewell
59,900 – Lord of the Flies – William Golding
60,082 – The Dew Breaker – Danticat, Edwidge
61,922 – All Quiet on the Western Front – Erich Remarque
63,422 – Mrs. Dalloway – Virginia Woolf
63,604 – The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne
63,766 – Brave New World – Aldous Huxley
64,768 – The Martian Chronicles – Ray Bradbury
66,556 – The Color Purple – Alice Walker
66,950 – Treasure Island – Robert Louis Stevenson
67,203 – The Fault in Our Stars – John Green
67,606 – Ironweed – Kennedy, William
67,707 – The Sun Also Rises – Ernest Hemingway
68,410 – Drinking Coffee Elsewhere – Packer, ZZ
69,066 – The Adventures of Tom Sawyer – Mark Twain
70,957 – Woman Warrior – Maxine Hong Kingston
72,071 – White Fang – Jack London
73,404 – The Catcher in the Rye – J.D. Salinger
77,325 – Philosopher’s Stone – JK Rowling
78,462 – The Picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde
80,398 – The Secret Garden – Frances Hodgson Burnett
82,143 – The Dark Is Rising – Cooper, Susan
82,370 – The English Patient – Michael Ondaatje
82,762 – Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl – Anne Frank
83,774 – Cry, the Beloved Country – Alan Paton
84,799 – Chamber of Secrets – JK Rowling
84,845 – Gilead – Robinson, Marilynne
85,199 – The Unbearable Lightness of Being – Milan Kundera
87,846 – Pere Goriot – Honore de Balzac
87,978 – Persuasion – Jane Austen
88,942 – Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell
89,297 – Waiting – Jin, Ha
91,419 – Joy Luck Club – Amy Tan
92,400 – Song of Solomon – Toni Morrison
95,022 – The Hobbit – J. R. R. Tolkien
97,364 – Anne of Green Gables – Lucy Maud Montgomery
~~99,121 – To Kill A Mockingbird – Harper Lee~~
99,277 – All the Pretty Horses – Cormac McCarthy
99,560 – Welcome to the Monkey House – Kurt Vonnegut
100,388 – To Kill A Mockingbird – Harper Lee (count confirmed)
100,609 – Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card
103,090 – A Distant Shore – Phillips, Caryl
106,821 – Prisoner of Azkaban – JK Rowling
107,349 – Gullivers Travels – Jonathan Swift
107,945 – Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte
109,571 – The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
112,737 – McTeague – Frank Norris
112,815 – The Golden Compass – Philip Pullman
114,634 – Walden – Henry David Thoreau
114,779 – The Tenth Circle – Jodi Picoult
119,394 – Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
119,529 – My Sisters Keeper – Jodi Picoult
123,378 – Atonement – Ian McEwan
127,776 – Life on the Mississippi – Mark Twain
128,886 – The Yearling – Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
130,460 – War Trash – Jin, Ha
134,462 – The Return of the King – J. R. R. Tolkien
134,710 – Schindler’s List – Thomas Keneally
135,420 – A Tale of Two Cities – Charles Dickens
138,087 – Moll Flanders – Daniel Defoe
138,098 – Snow Falling on Cedars – Guterson, David
138,138 – 20000 Leagues Under the Sea – Jules Verne
143,436 – The Two Towers – J. R. R. Tolkien
144,523 – One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
145,092 – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn – Betty Smith
145,265 – Cold Sassy Tree – Olive Ann Burns
145,469 – Last of the Mohicans – James Fenimore Cooper
155,887 – Emma – Jane Austen
155,960 – Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
156,154 – Watership Down – Richard Adams
157,665 – Alias Grace – Margaret Atwood
159,276 – The Kitchen God’s Wife – Amy Tan
161,511 – Cold Mountain – Charles Frazier
166,622 – Uncle Tom’s Cabin – Harriet Beecher Stowe
169,389 – White Teeth – Zadie Smith
169,441 – Half Blood Prince – JK Rowling
169,481 – The Grapes of Wrath – John Steinback
174,269 – Catch-22 – Joseph Heller
177,227 – The Fellowship of the Ring – J. R. R. Tolkien
177,679 – The Poisonwood Bible – Kingsolver, Barbara
183,349 – Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
183,833 – Little Women (Books 1&2) – Louisa May Alcott
183,858 – Jane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë
186,418 – Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden
190,858 – Goblet of Fire – JK Rowling
196,774 – The Corrections – Franzen, Jonathan
197,517 – Stones from the River – Hegi, Ursula
198,227 – Deathly Hallows – JK Rowling
198,901 – A House for Mr. Biswas – V.S. Naipaul
206,052 – Moby Dick – Herman Melville
208,773 – Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
211,591 – Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
216,020 – The Amazing Adventures of Kavelier and Clay – Chabon, Michael
225,395 – East of Eden – John Steinbeck
236,061 – A Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving
257,154 – Order of the Phoenix – JK Rowling
260,742 – Cloudsplitter – Banks, Russell
311,596 – The Fountainhead – Ayn Rand
316,059 – Middlemarch – George Eliot
349,736 – Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
364,153 – The Brothers Karamazov – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
365,712 – Lonesome Dove – McMurtry, Larry
418,053 – Gone with the Wind – Margaret Mitchell
455,125 – The Lord of the Rings – J. R. R. Tolkien
561,996 – Atlas Shrugged – Ayn Rand
587,287 – War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy
591,554 – A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth

Posted on 2011-11-22 by Hawthorn Fire 4

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