NaNoWriMo 2014

So as some of you may know, I have committed to giving NaNoWriMo my best shot this year. NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month, which is November, and has been going on annually since 1999.Co-founder and author Chris Baty started this movement with 20 friends in 1999 as an effort to motivate each other to write the stories they always said they were going to. It has continued to grow over the past 15 years and is now an international event with local chapters hosting kick off parties, write-ins, and post NaNo parties.

NaNo is a very intense undertaking and will take some serious discipline if I am going to get through it. The idea is that you write each day to have a 50,000 first draft at the end of the month. This works out to 1,667 words a day which anyone who has written a term paper with a word count requirement knows is not easy. The idea is to write everyday and pay no attention to the details of critiquing. It may be terrible, you may cut half of it afterwards but the goal is to get words on paper and your ideas flowing.

What I find most interesting about NaNo is that the founders and participants alike are treating writing as a social activity. I always approached writing as a small room, introspection but NaNo writers argue that just being in the room with other people who are pursuing the same task you are in motivation. Hearing the keystrokes from someone will keep you focused and even turn on a bit of your competitive juices making you not want to fall behind.

The months after NaNo are where you edit, re-write and complete the overall arc of the story but that pressure is completely ignored for the fast paced writing style of the month. The founders encourage the writers to give themselves permission to suck which is incredibly freeing. They argue that the words on paper, quantity over quality approach actually brings out the best in writers because they allow themselves to write freely. There will be massive edits to do and the 50,000 words will inevitably go off on tangents but you can’t fix something that isn’t written.

For me, I anticipate the hardest part of Nano will be time management. As with any new obligations people first line of resistance is to say they don’t have time but the old adage still stands, you can make time. I make time for all sorts of things I don’t want to do so why not make time for something I love doing and that makes me a better person? Writing is my expression and my outlet for a pent of swirl of intellect, inspiration, emotion, and anxiety that needs to be released. When I write I can think better and be better. I can always find more time for that.

So being a week out from the official kick-off of NaNoWriMo 2014 I am going to commit to a story idea, pre-plot just enough to give me an arc that I build on, and read as much as possible because come November 1 the fingers will be to the keys for at least 1,667 words a day….hopefully!  

If anyone is interested in trying NaNo check out their website is nanowrimo.org. Hey, no one is judging you and there is penalty for not finishing. If nothing else you’ll get some good stress relief for the days you follow through.

If you are participating I’d love a writing buddy, or six! Check out my twitter @taylor3672 and link up, or if you’re local maybe I’ll see you at a write-in.

Good luck to all participating and who knows, maybe your NaNo story could be the next big breakthrough on the NYT bestseller list.

Until The Very End

I have been on quite a long hiatus from reading as I have been putting all my efforts into writing my own stories. I am at the point with my manuscript now that it has been sent out for critique readers which mean I can take some much needed time away from it.

With the draft aside I sat in front of my over flowing ‘To Be Read’ shelf and went back and forth for twenty minutes trying to decide what I would like to read. I looked and looked and it was only when I turned around to leave my office that I saw just the right book….Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

No, this was obviously not on my shelf of books waiting to be read, in fact I’ve read this one at least seven times but it pulled me back in.

For those of you around my age (25) you understand that the name Harry Potter means so much more than a boy with a lightning scar. Harry Potter for us is one of our most loyal friends, our inspiration, and is the glue that holds so many years of adolescence together and allows them to make sense. It is metaphorically and physically a part of me…I got an HP tattoo is London last year.

I grew up with a fire that was ready to consume me every year waiting for the release of the next book. I was at the stores at midnight waiting in line with hundreds of other Potter Heads. I stayed up all night no matter what the next day was bringing unable to tear my eyes away from Harry, Ron, and Hermione’s adventures. I was at midnight screenings for the movies (sufficient, but as always subpar to the book) as they hit theaters.

 Credit moviedevil.com

There has never been a time that the opening sequence theme song didn’t give me chills or pulling the dust jacket off one of the books to re-read didn’t make my eyes go wide with excitement. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets starts to take us into the darker side of the wizarding world, setting us up for the depth of darkness that is to come. We meet Dobby, learn about Hagrid, confirm our dislike for the Malfoy’s, fear the beast that is in the Chamber, and shared in the triumph with Harry, Ron, and Hermione as they show us that courage, loyalty, and wit can create a winning combination.

Spending my evening wrapped up in the magical world is a comfort I long to feel all the time. I hate the put the bookmark in place because I know I will have to return to the muggle world awaiting me where things are often much less enchanting.

I am so thankful to JK Rowling for giving me something that continues to bring me such joy. Her talent and ability to make children feel like they have three best friends, no matter what the circumstances, can only be described as magical. She truly is a hero of mine and because of her childlike imagination I am a better adult.

To know that seven books, eight movies, multiple companion pieces and an international community of people with the same fervor are all out there to welcome me home is encouragement beyond measure. The Harry Potter Generation will only continue to grow as more and more kids will come of age being told bed time stories of magical wizards, daring adventure, and the power of friendship.

“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”- Albus Dumbledore

Welcome Back!

Hi all!

 

It has been some time since I dusted off this old blog but just like everyone else life has gotten the best of my timing.

 

However, I do have some exciting updates about my goings on.

 

1. I have started tackling a new list of must read books that will ‘Make You More Interesting’. So far it has been exciting reads but I have many more to go. I will give more details on the list and what I’m reading along with it soon.
2. My closest friends and I have been conducting a book club fairly continuously for the last year or so. As a reader I find it so gratifying to sit around a table with people I respect to discuss how we felt about the same book. This is why literature is so important and why I’ve centered some of my most cherished memories around books.
3. MOST exciting of all, for me at least, is that I’ve completed 2^nd round drafts of a full manuscript for a book I have been writing. It is classified as New Adult genre and as it stands it is around 80,000 words. This has been a very long, very difficult task but so rewarding. I am currently sending it out for critique readers to complete my final edits and call it done. It will go into a file that I am building to hopefully, in the near future, send to a literary agent to try my luck at being published. For now the accomplishment of just finishing a book is incredibly rewarding.
4. I am also gearing up for NaNoWriMo: National Novel Writing Month. This yearly event takes place in November and all participants have the goal of completing a 50,000 word draft in one month. It will be extremely challenging but very fun, I am looking forward to it. I have a solid idea that I think will be just the right style for this adventure.

 

As a writer/blogger I understand that there are certain expectations of maintaining a blog and in the last months I have not done my part. I thought about starting a whole new blog but my archived entries are valuable to me and I enjoy seeing them.

 

So, in using all the tools I have to my advantage I am going to revamp the blog, share about my writing process, and offer helpful hints/notes/topics I come across along the way. I will still write about what I’m reading but I will also be talking about what I’m writing, my path towards committing myself to becoming a better writer and engaging with the literary community.

As an aspiring writer, or whatever I am, I realize that the community is the most integral part to be a success. I consider myself a success if my words get read, and I have a lot of words to share.

 

So, I thank all of you who have come back to this blog and I welcome all of the newcomers. I would like to interact more, take questions, suggestions, and make this a conversation.

 

I look forward to where this will take me, I hope you do to.

Spirituality meets skepticism.

On the recommendation of a very good friend I read The alchemist by Paulo Coelho several years ago and it has remained one of the most inspirational, thought provoking books I've ever read. It surprises me now to think that it took me years to read anything else by Coelho but I finally did with Aleph and I almost wished I hadn't.

There is something to be said for building up expectations, which is why I generally tend to expect less; that way it lessens the blow and if it turns out to be better than expected then it is a nice surprise. With Aleph I was bringing in all the emotion and high hopes from The Alchemist and that was a big mistake.

Aleph, although classified as fiction is more biographical in nature and tells the story of Coelho's train journey across Russia for a book signing. I hate to drag this book entirely through the mud because there are some absolute gems of thought and wisdom that only writers seem to be able to portray. Several times through out reading this book I had to take a moment to let some of the words truly sink in. But for the majority of the story I was not engaged. There is a young woman who appears to me as a type of stalker but is said to be a reincarnation of someone Coelho has known previously. Their interactions seem strange to me and I didn't find myself liking either of them as people. The entire story changed my perspective of Coelho and his work. He is obviously a very spiritual man and has an affinity for philosophical thought but he claims to have re visited several of his past lives, being able to almost time travel among them through the 'aleph' which he describes as a moment of complete spiritual awakening and transcendence.

I like to think of myself as an open minded individual who doesn't shut out others beliefs because who am I to say I know anything is a certainty? But multiple times I felt myself rolling my eyes and being put off by the expressed spirituality's of this story. The thought provoking nature of his writing is interesting but I found myself on the side of severe skepticism so much so that I had to force myself to finish this book.

It's hard for me to decide how to rate this one seeing as I had such a personal aversion to it. I think Coelho's work is phenomenal in his other writings and has much more validity to them so I would suggest starting elsewhere from Aleph. The Alchemist will always be very high on my literary list and I would strongly suggest introducing yourself by that avenue. Aleph is a tough stretch for me because it isn't intended to be fantasy but real experiences. I personally was not a fan, who's to say how others will feel, but I stick to my previous sentiments of enjoying his work from a different avenue.

Shanties all around!

I had been knees deep in work projects and paperwork so I decided I need a good old fashioned 'beach read' to give me a little escape. I needed a book that was all fluff, purely for entertainment purposes and that wouldn't make me think too much while I was reading it. Luckily for me there is an author who is as obsessed with the show Downton Abbey as I am and she wrote the perfect book for the occasion called 'While we were watching Downton Abbey.'

For those you who don't know (I feel sorry for you) Downton Abbey is a PBS show that starts out in 1914 England at the Grantham Estate. It is a magnificent old English estate that has butlers,  footmen, maids and all the wonderful pomp and circumstance that one associates with early 1900's upper class British life. Lord and Lady Grantham, along with their three daughters and houseful of servants provide a most gloriously intellectual soap opera that I am not ashamed to admit to watching.

 
The book by Wendy Wax tells the story of a ritzy Atlanta apartment building that has an English concierge who decides to screen the seasons of Downton Abbey once a week as a way to develop the social community in the building. Claire, a recent empty nester and full time writer, Brooke, divorced mother of two young girls whose life is in a state of frantic transition, and Samantha, the woman who lives on the entire top full of the building, married to a most desirable man who comes from old Atlanta money whom by others has been deemed 'rich bitch', all attend these weekly screenings.

Through out the course of two seasons of shows, the three women learn that your circumstances in life do not separate us as much as we think and they form a unexpected but very strong bond. Where one woman lacks, the other two step in until they all comes to terms with changes in their lives. Through the stories of these three women we are reminded that life is more complicated than the show that we put on in front of each other. Sometimes the production is more stressful than the truth of things.
 
This story is, like I said, complete fluff and predictable but that doesn't mean it wasn't enjoyable. There are just enough Downton references to keep a junky like me satisfied but not too many that someone not familiar with the show will feel excluded. Potential spoiler alerts however. If you are the kind of person who reads solely for light hearted entertainment and tend to enjoy things like Sex in the city, Gilmore Girls, or even the Golden Girls, then you will enjoy this read.

My Old Friends

Loved this! Had to share.