The New Project

Long time, no see.  Busy, busy. 

Since I'm participating in NaNo now, I figured I would need a project. That's kind of important, right?  I was just going to do the fan fiction story, but I'm already a good 20,000 words into it.  That's 20,000 words I can't include in my word count.

Then I decided I might go ahead and actually finish the second draft of ATRS (yeah, yeah, I know; I took a three month hiatus from it), but it's so close to being done that it would be kind of pointless to spend all November doing it.  All I really need for that is a one week writing boot camp, and it'll be complete.  I know exactly what's going to happen, what needs to be written.  I am just L-A-Z-Y.  I'll do that in December, I think, when the dust has settled from NaNo.

I had two major ideas that I was deciding between.  One was the "sequel" (more appropriately, companion novel) to ATRS, which was going to be a real challenge, with two POVs and in present tense.  It would be good for me to experiment with different styles of writing.  This would have a darker tone, older YA or possibly adult.  At the same time, I opened up the three chapters I had finished of "Steam" and reread them.  They're--well, they're actually pretty good.  I liked them a lot.  I hated the fact that it was elemental fantasy (fire, water, blah blah), and it had a distinct, Tolkien-esque high fantasy feel.  Not my cup of tea right now, not at all.

I wanted to do something lighter and happier for NaNo.  Not something archaic and epic.  I wanted to do YA, not adult.  And I really wanted to do urban fantasy, or maybe steampunk if I was especially ambitious.  

Well, I decided.  Ever since coming up with "Steam" (in a very odd and vivid dream), I was mostly attached to the characters.  The plot was kind of quirky and had potential, but all I wanted to do was spend time with the people populating that world.  I spent days drawing up character charts to get to know them better.  I never do that.  And I thought, well, why not put them somewhere else and see what they do?  So the revamped plot is not an urban fantasy, sadly.  It's still set in a fantasy world, but it's much...tamer?  Fairytale-like, I think.  More Robin McKinley and less Lord of the Rings (not that I could ever measure up to anything Robin McKinley writes or J.R.R. Tolkien, for that matter).  The main character is a male fairy (because there aren't nearly enough of those in the world).  I'm a bit worried because I've never written a male MC before, but it will be a fun challenge.  Perhaps I will put up a blurb when I write one (I am oh so horrible at writing those; it's definitely a skill I need to work on if I ever want to attempt a query letter).  

Oh, it has fairies and witches and princesses, and everything I've ever wanted to put in an ideal novel.*  I'm so excited to begin.  Hopefully, by winter break, I'll have the drafts of two novels ready for intensive editing.  I shall take them with me to China where I will have no Internet, so--editing galore!

I know I have total ADD when it comes to projects, and I'm hoping NaNo will give me a chance to just WRITE without thinking about how good or bad it is.  I can always worry about that later, but sometimes, my Internal Editor sends me to a grinding halt.  It's a very annoying thing.  I need the chance to just be able to churn out the crap, so to speak.  After all, every diamond starts out as a piece of coal.  Er, I think.  I'm not that good at geology.

*The only thing it's missing is talking animals, so maybe I should just go all the way and add those too.