Plots!

[laceblade]

[Poll #1286084]


EVERY YEAR, I get the same itch to write around October. It's because the first time I tried NanoWrimo, I started a story called "Ghost Hunters," centering on high school kids at a boarding school in the middle of nowhere going ghost hunting. The writing quality was pretty poor, but it's ghost-hunting and yay!fun. Currently, Ghost Hunters is a bit over 30,000 words, but it has never been edited. Those who are very brave could look at it here, where I kept a blog of updates the last couple of years.

Should I rewrite Ghost Hunters and work to actually complete it? Or should I start something new? Steph is suggesting that I do articles centering on a theme. One of my LJ friends is making an effort to blog every day, which sounds cool too (I would be more serious in my blogging, going for essays and whatever).

ANYWAY, this is the first year that I'm not in school during the month of November, and I'm wondering if I should try it again? Everyone and their mom is doing NanoWrimo, it seems, and it would be nice to rewrite all of the sucky parts. Also, I could not post things in a public blog as soon as I write them, and save myself some embarassment.

What say you, Internet?! Is this a worthy endeavor? Are you betting I'll only last 3 days like I do every year?

Maybe everyone who's doing it could make our own support community on LiveJournal? That way we won't spam everyone else in our personal journals?

Comments

[suibhne-geilt.livejournal.com]

My second year of NaNo was continuing the story I'd started my first time out. Ditto with my third & fourth years.

For years 5 & 6, I finally learned how to write a story in only 50,000 words, instead of getting to 50k and realizing I was only halfway through the plot.

[mystickeeper.livejournal.com]

But is it so bad for a novel to take more than 50,000 words? Maybe I've just read too many Victorian novels, ;)

[suibhne-geilt.livejournal.com]

Not at all. It's just that the goal for NaNo is 50k in 30 days, and I know that my devoted audience didn't like the 11 month gap between the two halves.

100,000 words comes out to about 300 pages of a normal trade paperback-sized book, so it's definitely not overly long by modern standards.

[were-duck.livejournal.com]

If Ghost Hunters still excites you, I think you should do it! I would suggest starting the writing over, though, and mining the original draft for characters and ideas and plots that you think still work.

I FULLY SUPPORT using a community!! I don't want to be spammy.

[mystickeeper.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I will definitely rewrite all of it, if I go to it, except there are a few scenes that I think work okay. Of course, even those will probably be needing at least a little reworking, too.

I know I get annoyed by people's constant progress updates, kind of like constant exercise updates or whatever else. Maybe we could do a community, and then if we feel the need to do personal updates, can do so once a week or something.

Normally, I don't care about being spammy because people don't HAVE to friend me on LJ, but I understand that NanoWrimo lends itself to being self-absorbed, etc.

[raanve]

I'm planning on participating, but I have, like, zero plot ideas and that makes me a sad panda.

If you started a community, I'd join. :D But I'm probably going to spam LJ/Twitter about it anyway so - yay!

[jume.livejournal.com]

I'm going to start fresh and SO SHOULD YOU!

[antarcticlust.livejournal.com]

You can work on and edit Ghost Hunters any time. The point of NaNoWriMo is to get you to word dump so you can get ideas out there without feeling pressure to have it be "perfect." So I say just sit down and see where things take you!