Playtime is almost over ~ Writing Plans for the New Year

photo from erincondren.com

I'm not much for resolutions but I set all kinds of goals for myself from fitness to budgeting and all other things in between.  With the end of December and my self-imposed break approaching quicker than I anticipated, I've been thinking about my upcoming writing goals.

One of the last courses I'm taking this month is called Scrivener for Beats on Udemy.com by Sean Platt, a writer whom I've mentioned in a previous post. Beats are Sean's version of outlining stories, with pictures of actors that could portray the characters in a movie. He also includes pictures of locations that the story could possibly take place.

I attempted this a few years ago when I first encountered Scrivener but I lost all of my pictures and notes when my PC started acting crazy.  I was forced to practically wipe my whole system clean, which made me cry like a new born baby for about 2 days (Don't judge me).

The notes I made were nowhere near as detailed as the ones in Sean's video. I can't wait to get started working on my failed NaNoWriMo 2014 project again. It's a good story, I guess it wasn't time for me to write it then. Once I apply Sean's tips, I'll be in a much better place than I am now.

Have you set any goals or resolutions for 2015? Tell me about them.

As always, happy writing.
I'll Holler!!!

NaNoWriMo 2014 ~ Day 4

I love NaNoWriMo with all my heart, to the moon and back as they say. But, it's driving me crazy all ready.  It's my fault though, cause I wasn't as prepared as I should have been.

Note to self and other writers--

If you are writing a series, be sure to re-read the previous book or books in the series so you won't make stupid mistakes.

Man, I was bringing folks back from the dead, calling folks by the wrong name and not remembering if  the character had 6 siblings or 9. 

Another good idea to do is have what I'm going to call a post outline. I have an outline that gives me a route that I could go in while I'm writing but I need an outline that documents where I really did take the story.  Basically a chapter summary. 

This may seem like common sense and I would have said that myself before I saw all of the ooops moments I had.  

Whew! End rant...

My total word count is 6050.  I was hoping to be at 8000 but crap happens.  If (or when) I'm too lazy to let you guys know my status, there is a little box to the left that will show you my total word count. Now sometimes the NaNoWriMo site "be in his feelings" but as soon as I'm able, I do update the total.

I hope that you are doing well with your novel. Happy NaNo-ing! 

I'll holler...

Day 14 Feeling More Confident

Good thing I'm not writing with a typewriter. As much as I mess up, I wouldn't have any ribbon or paper.

I took JanFlora's advice and wrote a little on Write or Die. It did help quite a bit. Write or Die helped me to keep in mind that it didn't matter that whatever I was writing wasn't perfect, I just had to write something.

Victoria Mixon's advice was to spend a whole day outlining the rest of my novel, which is what I did yesterday. I added a few paragraphs to my total word count, but I was mostly trying to get all of my scenes and chapters in order, thanks to Scrivener for Windows.

Since I know exactly what I want to happen for the remainder of the book, today I was able to push out 2,338 words. I'm still about 6,400 words behind, but I feel confident that I'm going to catch up and win this thing.

Thanks for all of the great advice and support.

Happy NaNo-ing!