Soundless Screams

NaNo Mania

It seems fitting that I kick off this blog with a NaNo post. I'm 46,280 words into Pirouette, my NaNo novel. It's about a ballet dancer who gets turned into a vampire after finding out she can never dance again. It's a paranormal romance, and the bigger picture is more supernatural inclined.... it's not just vampires and slayers. There's a cult, and some evil people who claim to do good but are evil to the core.

It's been fun. :) My big novel project, Survivor, has been taking a loooong time to write. At 180k it is still not done. *rolls eyes* It is nearly done, course I've been saying that for months, but seriously....I'm in the home stretch. I have a few plot threads to tie up, and a few to actually write. And then, it's perculation and then the first edit pass. Anyhoo, it's a welcome change. The other book I've been working on is a dark fantasy called Blood Bound, which features vampires, slayers, shapeshifters, magical people. It's more of a fantasy than anything. The original book that spawned it is called The Sacrifice which was my NaNo Novel from 2003. I tried to do rewrites and found the plot, characters, and the world going in a completely different direction so I cut the Sacrifice plot thread out, and decided to rewrite it as it is, and make Blood Bound a different work altogether. This one took alot of worldbuilding and conlanging which I really enjoy. Both are very heavy, very dark works, and Pirouette, while dark as well, is just easier to write at the moment. My world is pretty much future Earth with minimal magic, and my vampires are slightly different but nothing too far off the mark.

I really like switching between projects. It gives me a much-needed breather from all of the intensity. I tend to write very intensely, both as I'm doing it and in the scenes. I pour myself into it, so much that I feel what my characters feel...... I think that's one way to make them more real.

I also have too many ideas. I was "discussing" this with a writer friend, who always seems to have an active writing queue going on. I have close to 40 novel ideas. *wide eyes* I get them from everywhere -- dreams, news stories, life in general (which actually spawned Pirouette but was at one time called Twice Dead and almost became chick lit), conversations, other books, etc. And I dutifully write them all down. My method is to have 2 main projects, a primary and a secondary. Once Pirouette is finished, Survivor will take the primary position and Blood Bound the secondary. Once I start editing something, I want to be doing first draft work, so I've thought about what comes next. I have a few screaming for my attention, and a possible sequel to Pirouette. It's just tough b/c there just isn't enough time to do everything I want to do. I even have a sci-fi novel that's been patiently waiting since last year November, when I didn't do NaNo b/c of class I took that is now useless. Boy, you better believe I am kicking myself on that one.

My friend says she never writes any of them down until they won't let up -- whatever keeps nagging at her is how she determines which ideas make it into the queue. I gotta say that nixes at least 2/3's of my list there. A few have been strong ideas, but most are passing ideas. I could toy with them in the future but not right now. I even tried my hand at short stories, but it didn't go very well. I have one draft in edits and another first draft that ground to a screeching halt b/c I just lost interest. With shorts, the emotional investment isn't high, so it's easy to discard. Novels, they require total dedication so I wanna see them through. Maybe some day.

I'm happy with my progress as of late. I've been writing every day, and an average of 2k a day during NaNo, usually during lunch at work. I find that I'm more productive and less frazzled and I can get the words versus when I used to write, after work. After work I'm either comatose, migraine-y, or just plain unmotivated. It's a struggle to even hit 1k, my previous quota. Now I hit the upper 1k's to 2k and that's awesome! At that rate, I could turn out a first draft every three months. And seeing how I want to get an agent next year, this is a good thing. ;)

Anyhoo, that's about it. Here's a short snippet:

I nodded, only half-hearing him. I opened my eyes, and a wave of vertigo assaulted my senses. Evidently, the fire hadn’t died down – it only made itself invisible. Nice to know. “Yeah, I got that. I’m dizzy again.”

Lucien pulled away from me and pulled me into the first room we came to. Once we were inside, he took both my hands. “You can do this, Alisia. I will be with you every step of the way.”

The scene that greeted me, however, ground everything to a halt. People laid in beds, immobile, some bald, some literally wasting away. Their feelings and thoughts poured over me like hot water, and my dizziness got worse. I wasn’t sure if I had it in me to do this. “I don’t know. Their feelings and thoughts are so damned strong.”

“You must learn to shield. Erect a solid, impenetrable wall inside of your mind, your self. And don’t let them come in.”

I smiled blandly. “Easier said than done.” But, it was better than nothing, so I complied, imagining a steel wall between them and me. For extra measure I added a semi-transparent bubble around the whole thing. Hey, sometimes more is better.

Immediately, I felt better – the vertigo disappeared, and I felt stronger, more capable. Neat trick.

“You’re doing beautifully,” Lucien said with a grin. “You did the right thing.”

I nodded, drawing in a deep breath. “Thank you, sensei.” I gave him a small mock-bow.

His brow furrowed at that. “Sensei?”

I giggled. “It means teacher in Japanese.”


Sorry, but that's all for now. ;)

posted by vamp_writer @ 4:54 PM