Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Draft 1: Complete

I just finished the first draft of my novel. Woooo wooooo!

I began writing on Sept. 23 and only took a few weeks off in November to work on my thesis--so I'd guess about 2.5 months to write the draft (which is likely poorly written at this point). I know that I rushed the ending a bit (because I wanted to be done with it, I think), but that will be rectified in the editing process. It's 413 pages or 141,054 words (twenty three chapters and a short epilogue).

I'm struggling with what to call it. I'm creating a list of possibilities now, but maybe I shouldn't worry too much about it since it might change in the future? Who knows. When I first started this project back in high school (ohhhh so long ago--I'm so old) it was called "A Fallen Gift" and while that title still suits the story in some ways, it's changed so greatly since those first eight drafts that I think the title needs to be just as new.

I just wrote down "The Falling" which may be good. But would I call the sequel "The Rising"? Boo, both are boring and not very original. I don't know. I just feel like it needs a working title.

Here's a very brief summary of the story:

"Evelyn has returned to Falls, New Hampshire, in search of Lucas, a friend who she was forced to abandon with no warning when she was just a child. During her search she finds herself drawn to mysterious Cameron and discovers that he is not what he seems to be. When painful secrets about her life and her past come to light she, and her relationships with Lucas and Cameron, will be changed forever."

[Note: I'm slightly worried that "Falls" is too close to "Forks" (Twilight's setting) as a name of a town. Opinions?]

I bet I can get the summary a bit tighter, which I'll need to in order to pitch it in a query letter to agents (the step following editing). I guess I'll go with "The Falling" for now (gag)... I don't know why I feel like I need a title on it before I print out the first draft. Eccentric writer behavior I guess? :)

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Hello World!

So, I was playing around with my blog, changing a few settings and whatnot and I found something totally cool: statistics for who looks at my blog.

Hello to the 102 page viewers in the United States!
Hello to the 18 page viewers in the United Kingdom (which I like to think of as my home away from home although I've never been)!
Hello to the 10 page viewers in Latvia!
Hello to the 9 page viewers in Canada!
Hello to the 4 in Germany!
Hello to the 4 in Denmakr!
Hello to the 3 in New Zealand!
Hello to the 2 in Belgium!
Hello to the 2 in France!
Hello to the 2 in South Korea!

Now, I'm well aware that perhaps there is really only one person in each of the above places and maybe they've been doing all the looking, but I'm going to pretend that these are all individual page views. Hello world! We need to diversify a bit more :) Yippie for blog stats.

Saturday, December 11, 2010

Facebook

I've been toying around with the idea of creating a facebook page for myself? What are people's thoughts on this? :)

Really Finished!

I finished school Wednesday night! I now have my MFA in Writing degree from the University of New Hampshire. I can't believe it's over and that 2.5 years have passed. It's crazy that it's been that long, but it's over and done now. That means I can finish up the new novel that I started a few months ago and get to editing that (and publishing) and I can focus on writing new things.

I've also made a decision: When I take down "A Starter Boyfriend" from FictionPress (likely when I finish up my new novel and send it out), I will re-post "Hostile Kisses" because I've had a handful of people request it. It will still be a while (maybe summer or early fall) before that happens, but at least it will give a few people something to look forward to. :)