I did it!

Hello peeps - through my tears, my rage, my deep deep sorrow at what is going on in the world - I finished my NaNoWriMo challenge. I wrote thirty thousand words on last years ms - Crooked Knife - bringing that up to 83 thousand words - a manuscript I can edit - though - I have to admit - it is not finished. I'm still unsure how to do the ending so I can't say that I have a finished shitty first draft - but it is in there somewhere! I'll put it away for a bit and then start carving away some, adding some and making it so. I also wrote about twenty thousand on my new project - Caribou Dreaming - which I'm hoping to morph into a graphic novel.

I know these challenges aren't for everyone but they work for me, so I'll keep doing them. I was happy this year, as I figured out a way to use that word count button to my benefit - even though I didn't have a new piece that I was focusing on.  Caribou Dreaming was a carrot to get me to finish Crooked Knife. Point is - it worked for me.

Because Crooked Knife is set on the reservation where I work - I could put all sorts of my feelings about Muskrat Falls and the terrible project that Newfoundland Hydro has going there - I could make it part of the mystery - and yep get out all my rage at what big industry is doing to our world. I could address indigenous issues and as my protagonist is a cop who is not indigenous but works on the reservation - I could feel fairly free to discuss her dilemma's and awakening to what is really going on. I could politicize myself without it being at all preachy - I hope - there is lots of humour and fun in the book and it is a mystery.

And that brings me to another point - I do want my writing to enlighten and inform people. That is why I write - it is why I live actually. I love reading and watching and enjoying art that is not political - but there has to be some human in there somewhere who wakes me up - or I'm not interested. I went to see The Once the other night. They are an amazing trio from Newfoundland and I can't describe their music but it is genuine - fun and full of love. The first song they did was one of Cohen's - Coming Back to You  - and I was positively awash with tears and in the front row. They did it acapella  - the words seemed to hang in space like jewels. The point is that their music helped heal my sore old heart and it amused me and inspired me and in one of their songs - The Nameless Murderess - I was positively elated at the innovative and wild sound they got.


What is art for? What is beauty and inspiration and innovation for? I really don't have an answer - I just know I need it. I hope with Crooked Knife that the readers will put it down and say something like 'Holy Hell - I had no idea that was going on in our world!'.

How about you all -what do you create for? And here is a digital finger painting of mine called 'Come Home'.

NaNo Update

Yes - I know it is only day three but I have to encourage myself with everything I can. I've written over seven thousand words and just about half on my old ms Crooked Knife and half on the new one Caribou Dreaming. When I get to 20 thousand on CK I'll stop that one and write the rest on the new novel. That'll give me 70 thousand on CK and that should be enough for a first draft. Yep - I tend to add as I revise though I chop a lot too! Not sure about this process - it is sort of weird but it works to keep me motivated so I think I'll keep on. I've tried revising before on NaNoWriMo and I just can't do it without a word count being part of it. And it isn't exactly a word count I need on CK - I really am short a whole novel. It is very fun to be back in the game of writing on the mystery. I haven't tried in ages - since probably January or February. For one thing - I was very focused on actually finishing Bright Angel which also began on a month long writing marathon - though I believe it was the Burrowers version BuNoWriMo. I finished all the bits - the last revision, the sell package - including the dreaded synopsis and did my homework on where to send it. I sent it out in June and I have heard back from two of the six that I sent to. One publisher said that they liked it very much but didn't quite fit their lineup and the other asked for a full manuscript and I haven't heard back since. That's a good thing, no? They are arguing it at least. So four more to hear from but I feel like I've got a finished and polished package so that is good.

Crooked Knife is a mystery set in the community where I live. Actually it is here and across the bridge in Sheshatshiu - the Innu reserve here in Labrador. It is very political and maybe way too close to the truth but I'll get it down the way I feel it now and then deal with that in the revisions. It was easy to start because I had so many opinions on the way things are here - and I know this location will be exotic to most folks as it is a northern community with not only First Nation's folks but Inuit and an established base of what is called hereabouts 'Settlers'. Now, after the last month's embroilment in a very big environmental activism fight I think I know exactly how to write this. So yay! My new novel is a YA also set here. It isn't a mystery - or at least not yet - as a devoted PANTSER I never really know. But I'm three and a half thousand words in and it is mostly a teenage angsty sort of story - again with the exoticism of this place and the hook that this teenager is having an identity crisis that also involves three different races.

Here is a photo of Sheshatshiu from the bridge.

How is YOUR November going?

Who me?

Wow! Here we go again. Another meeting of the insecure writer's support group!Group I'm glad I posted at least once in between first Wednesdays. And yep, I still struggle with insecurity about writing and just about anything else. I will tell you what I'm good at though - I'm good at faking it.  Right now I need to fake it because that is the only way I can sustain myself until I get the internal weather I'm hoping for. For I am the sky not the weather. I know I'm okay with all my wounds and scars. My basic goodness is intact like the sun, but it is being clouded by doubt and pain right now.  So I put on positivity like a rain coat and get out there. 

I'm happy to be doing NaNoWriMo again this year -it really helps. Because I need the word count thing I am using it to count 20 thousand words on last years novel, which will give me a proper, if messy, first draft. The other 30 thousand will be on a new YA called Caribou Dreaming . 

How are you all doing?

doing the NaNoWriMo

What is a NaNoWriMo - it is National Novel Writing Month. (note: it should be International though it would ruin the feel of the acronym in your mouth)  It happens every November - the challenge is to write 50 thousand words in 30 days. That isn't exactly a novel but it is a fair chunk of one. Yep. Think I last did one of these (the BuNoWriMo - a smaller friendly group called the Burrowers who sets a challenge to write a novel in June) in 2011. It was the start of what is now Bright Angel. I did 50 thousand words then and kept going into July and August and now I'm still at it. I'm actually darn close to this last brush through. I'm not going to pick a date as life keeps throwing me curve balls when I do, but soon.

So why start another? Hmmm...

1. When I do finish Bright Angel it will be gone for a month or two with my mentor. Instead of biting my nails I'd rather get another project on the go.
2. I've been moderately successful with the challenge. I have one mystery that I think has some good bones but I need to go in and untangle a lot of it. But Bright Angel was easy peasy from the beginning and maybe now I get how to really go at these challenges.
3. I like a challenge and I'm the teeniest bit bored right now. The NaNo is a big challenge. It is hard to make sure to write 1,667 words a day - especially when I'm busy at work - but I want to. I'm ready for it.
4. Weirdly - just knowing I'm going to do this has kicked my butt to get this last revision done. Truly.
5. And finally - who knows? I follow my inner demon.

I love Friday evenings don't you? And my work is sooooo...not Monday to Friday that I don't know why I do. Tonight I'm going to get my thousand or so in - and get on to Willa's hat. The kids will muff around - here or there - there will be no sense of urgency. Step-dot and I plan to go to the market early and stay for a minimum amount of time. We're stocking up on writing snacks and coming back with the intention of catching up on our nanowrimo word count. For me that's about 5 thousand words maybe more and I'm not sure where S-d is. I want to write in between raking and pulling the fence around the garden down - my Sweet Patootie has told me he will build a REAL fence next year. Yay! So later dear readers. Hope you see my totals go up and up!

NaNoWriMo

I did 3 thousand words today. I'm still behind - I'm at 13,018 and I should be at 16,670 or something like that but hey I can catch up. I'm having a ball - being madly inventive and really just charging away. I've developed some good solid characters that I'm having fun with and yes - a dog made it into the book - his name is Fergus and he's a very particular dog in a very ordinary way. I've also discovered some ways that my protagonist uses her mind and her memories of what her mentor Detective D'Entremont has told her about investigating murder. I like them and I think my readers will too. More importantly perhaps, I like the sheer inventiveness of this part. Without imagination where would the world be now? And why isn't it used more freely in all aspects of life. Imagine a world without it! Nothing that we hold dear would be present - no one could have created anything including social reform or the bagpipes. (Ok perhaps everyone doesn't love the bagpipes but for sheer inventiveness they can't be beat)

Now, I'm going to go and get to work on another hat I'm doing for my dear dear Willa who turns 15 this Thursday. I was there when she was born - the first non medical person to hold her and she was my very first birth experience that didn't include me as the mother! So later my dear readers. Hmmmm....a picture I think. But not sure of what...we'll see. I think they'll have to be from my Annapolis Royal album so I can keep in the space of my novel. One from the garden and one from Fort Anne - both important places in the book.

writing update

This is a collage of the Betty Island trip

Earth Bound is coming along - did my thousand today. My step-daughter is doing NaNoMo or what ever it is. She's a bit behind but we have scooped her out of the house of illness and she is downstairs on my laptop working away. So for those of you who don't know - NaNoMo is a program wherein folks sign up to write a novel in a month. They have to do 50 thou. words I think. Very big - originated in Canada! Bursting with pride - and hockey and basketball and Chaos!


Later my dearios...