NaNoWriMo Update — Week 3 — And The Struggle Begins
My writing slump is a funk…
The third week of NaNoWriMo has been an interesting journey.
In my NaNo experience in the past, I have always started having problems starting in the third week. The day that I’m attempting to publish this should start as an indication (It’s Tuesday at the moment). I couldn’t even be bothered to do it yesterday. LOL
BUT, here I am! And that’s an accomplishment that I’ll celebrate as a win.
Honestly, I haven’t recorded my NaNo words in three days. I could blame my daughter for spending time with her friend, which would be legitimate. I do miss her. I could also blame my son for making me laugh so hard that I snorted like a pig, and he made me forget to record my numbers. That, too, is legitimate. But I won’t blame them. The truth is that I’m just in my NaNo slump or funk. I normally don’t write this much, so that’s the real truth of the matter.
Regardless, I’m not going to give up, so here goes with the update!
The Projects
The Ghost Pepper Dragon Saga
I’ve started writing the story of The Ghost Pepper Dragon Saga, which started as a Twitter thread way back in 2019, which I touted as “the misadventures of a villager whose life is full of -I just can’t- moments.”
My MC remains entirely unaware of the origins and secrets of the village she has been raised in. So, I’ve been having a lot of fun with foreshadowing and storytelling within the storytelling. My MC, Kelar, attends her first coming-of-age bonfire, and the creepy and hilarious stories that ensue are entertaining and disturbing, but it’s made even better with her taboo love interest sitting beside her and sharing in the fear and laughter. What could be better? I’m having to remind myself to slow down and let the story just be a story, instead of telling it all and letting things slip. Writing is hard!
Pylons
It’s a SciFi story about colony ships that are sent to worlds and expected to survive with no way back and no communication (not that the colonists are told that during orientation!).
I ran into an issue with this story, getting ahead of myself and writing in the first meeting between my MC, Lily, and the alien named Detri. It was way too soon for that to happen because we need to learn more about Lily and who she is as a person, what kind of world she lives in, and why the colonists are so desperate to get back into space. I haven’t decided if there needs to be something deadly and pressing on the planet to make them want this so badly or if it’s just a mission born of the desire to be a spacefaring race, instead of degenerating back into a cultivation-based society that is solely planet-bound and trapped.
Hmmm… it’s something to put some serious consideration into as I continue to work on this story.
Mages and Games
The story, here, has been filling out slowly. The great evil has reared its ugly head and already cost some lives before the community was even aware of its existence. It is even an ancient evil (hello, tropes!) that only one has ever survived. We hear from that one, and he cautions the magic community to be vigilant and cautious as they investigate and attempt to counter the degenerates who would dare to awaken the great evil.
We also get to delve deeper into the MC, Soren, as she has a panic attack while visualizing her mother being slowly destroyed by this great evil. She is also in shock since she knew one who died while discovering that the great evil had awakened, and we share in her sadness. But! She has her family and her betrothed with her, along with her dragon familiar, to comfort and help her in this time of need.
Writer’s Way Prompts
There will only be one Writer’s Way prompt this week due to Thanksgiving. It was decided that the club would only meet for three days this week and then reconvene next Monday. For Wednesday, the prompt is:
Wednesday’s Prompt — Your piece has to be an all-dialog story that is meant to enlighten, encourage, and entertain with a minimum of 2 characters.
I want to participate in the prompt, but my mind is on my stories, and I struggle with dialogue, as is. It is my bane and weakness! *queue dramatic death* I might try before tomorrow, for it’s due tomorrow, but we’ll see if I accomplish that. The NaNo funk is real.
So far, as of right now, I have written 37,796 words in twenty-two days, which is more than I’ve done in quite a while. NaNo is working!
My NaNo Funk
Another thing that has been distracting me from NaNoWriMo is how Bradan Writes Stories and Sieran Lane have peer-pressured me into joining Tapas, a fiction writing app. Not that I’m complaining. Not at all. But now, I have tasked myself with adding my story, Naylin — Dragons of Light to this app. And the work involved seems staggering. It also has me wondering if uploading my stories there might be more productive than posting to Medium since this site tends to suppress fiction in favor of non-fiction articles. I get it, I do, but it means that fiction writers and their hard work are left to rot in dark corners, and a plague on that, I say! We need to be discovered so we can make people laugh, cry, and think.
Hmmm… it’s something to consider.
What I’m planning to do about my missed word count days is add up what I’ve done and then divide it into the three days. I don’t really care if it’ll be the same number, or not. I’m not here to impress anyone, not even myself. *chuckles*
What’s important is to keep going, even if word count suffers because of the funk. And that’s what I’m going to do!
Onward!
So, this is what I’ve been up to for NaNoWriMo and how things are going in my little slice of the world. I hope things are going well for all of you!
Thank you for your time! Writing is an experience. Reading is, too. Consider commenting and connecting with me. I’d love to interact!
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