11,496 words! Still behind, but having fun. [WIP]

Feeling a little thin, plotwise, today. So tonight I decided to have a drink or two, put on SiriusXM Octane, and go for descriptive lushness.

And now, WIP for you:

Progress Again: 9,494 Words and Counting [WIP]

November continues to be a month of multifarious obligations and unexpected tasks. Nevertheless, I persevere. I'm way behind on word count, but I will continue to forge onward. The point of it is to keep going!

And now, today's Work In Progress:

Back in the Saddle After Much Hard Riding [WIP]

7,176 words total, as of this evening. Dragging tail, energywise, after several days of heavy output, but we keep going, because we must! Onward!

And now, your Work In Progress excerpt:

Word count is at 6,032: behind, but catching up [WIP]

Have had several crazy days in a row, and wound up not getting anything written last night due to complete brain fatigue failure, but tonight I slammed 2500 words down, and will continue doing that or better until I'm back at pace.

By the end of tomorrow night the NaNoWriMo benchmark is 10,000 words, and I've got another full day working with Amy in her henna booth scheduled tomorrow, so it'll be tight, but it's the end of Daylight Saving Time, so I'll have another hour's stamina to burn. I'd love to get 4,000 words written tomorrow evening. Wish me luck!

And now, some WIP from this evening's efforts:

Another 849 words tonight; some WIP to tide you over, though

I'm a fair bit shy of my daily goals lately, but it's been that sort of week. Tonight was gym night, and as a result I'm the kind of tired that makes it hard even to type well. :-)

Still, any progress is better than no progress, and I have this coming weekend to make up word count, in the gaps between the event I'm helping Amy cover with her henna business. I also resolved an issue with my remote-desktop software on my home PC, so it will be much easier to write over my lunch hours from now on.

And now, to bed. But first, some work-in-progress:

A bit shy today (2,685 total), but I blame my full schedule. [Long WIP, too]

Had a Dia de los Muertos celebration to attend today, and wound up unable to get anything NaNo done over lunch.

Still, I think tonight's 800+ words were worth the trouble, and highly informed by the "Day of the Dead" mood of the evening. A lengthy sample of it follows, after this section break.

NaNoWriMo Day One in the Can! (Also: WIP)

1,744 words, better than the minimum-per-day of 1,677. Not a punishing pace, but a good start. They say that the first casualty of war is the battle plan, and that's certainly the way it's working out for me. The way I wanted the story to start is not exactly the way it's going, but that's okay!

I'm making great use of a Mur Lafferty tip this year: the placeholder. It's amazing how much leeway and momentum one can preserve by simply writing [scene where this other bit happens I don't want to think about right now] and keeping going. Great stuff.

Okay, work-in-progress excerpt:

NaNoWriMo Countdown is Ticking!

I've been outlining and brainstorming all evening for the writing marathon (or chain of sprints... whichever) that is NaNoWriMo. I'm quite pleased with my story concept and character sketches so far (great artist steal...), and to boot, I'll be blogging here about my progress and thoughts as close to every day as I can.

This novel, tentatively titled Vitium Renata, will mark both my first novel-length foray into fantasy, as well as my first attempt at working up a fully-fledged magic system.

What it will not be, though, is an exploration of something I discovered at this past weekend's Magic City Writers group meeting, which is that I may have a real gift for writing horror, or at least the ability to derive a lot of fun and pleasure from the process. I will definitely be trying my hand at some horror stuff after NaNoWriMo has ended. Just in time for Christmas!

After the break, a little rough horror scene I did at the prompting of Kathryn, who was driving the 10-minute writing exercises that day. Be warned: it's gross!