Saturday 31 December 2011

NaNoFiMo 2011

These are all the pretty certificates I made for NaNoFiMo 2011. Like them? These ones are for everyone:





...and these ones are just for the winners:






Just for the record, I'm one of the winners. 80,097/80,000 words and 'the end' written on two drafts.

Wednesday 30 November 2011

Invitation to the Ink-Slingers' Ball

Ink-Slingers all come out tonight
Ink-Slingers now come one come all
The Ink-Slinger's moon is shining bright
Ink-Slingers come to the Ink-Slingers' Ball

Friday 7 October 2011

By the seat of my pants...

[rant]

NaNo is kind of annoying me at the moment. Every time I go there, everyone seems to be saying "YOU MUST PLAN" and "PANTSERS ARE MORONS". Of course it's impossible to write 50k in a month without spending eleven months of the year planning it, right? What kind of crazy person would try to write 50k in a month without planning the whole thing down to the positioning of the toadstool MMC accidentally crushes at the end of chapter 17?

Yeah, you can imagine how die-hard pantser Siana Blackwood feels about that...

So of course I keep trying to present the other point of view, the idea that you can write 50k (or even a fair bit more) in a month without having a plan. Only then I get irritated and start second-guessing myself...

I mean, I write the first draft in a full-screen text editor. Then I paste it into a word processor for spell-checking, read it a few times and then start making a list of what really should have happened. The list is just on a piece of paper or sometimes in a text file. I don't see the point of all the fancy writing software because I just never use all those features. If I'm happy with this basic list of software (just a text editor and a word processor), does this mean I'm not a 'real writer'? Ye Gods, I've never even written a single word while sitting in a coffee shop...

But then, so far thais year I've written:

  1. No Light in the Dark - 95k

  2. Dispersion - 120k

  3. Blade's Edge - 65k

  4. Night Without Stars - 75k

  5. Hope - 85k

  6. Dark Star - 100k

  7. Broken Mirror - 66k

  8. Crystals and Moonlight - 60k

... and started How to Nuke Your Enemies (currently 24k)

Eight completed first drafts, none of them written with expensive software, in a cafe or with months of planning in advance. I stand by my pants and by my 'write it anyway' philosophy.

[/rant]

To tell the truth, that's not stuff I expected to be able to say during my 12th month of wrimo-ing. The same people and the same advice were on NaNo last year and I consciously decided to disregard it and believe Chris Baty (No plot? No problem!). I haven't made the expected progression from pantsing a bad story to becoming a planner, though. I guess it's because I really do like the stories I've written. I still can't imagine editing Dispersion or Night Without Stars, because every time I start reading them the characters take over my head and I'm just living through the events along with them. Some tiny part of me knows they're the wrong events, but I really do love them anyway :).

Okay, I feel better now. Maybe I'll go and write something.

By the seat of my pants.

Thursday 21 July 2011

Random Blather

Okay, so I should update my blog more often. I should make that new theme I've been thinking about making. I should do a whole bunch of different things. However, I have done a whole bunch of stuff this year. so I think I should be excused. Still, I will try to mend my ways.

So far this year:

JanNoWriMo: No Light in the Dark (95k)

FebNoWriMo/MarNoWriMo: Dispersion (122k)

April Fools/MayNoWriMo: Night Without Stars (76k)

April Fools/MayNoWriMo: Hope (86k)

WriDaNoJu: Dark Star (100k)

JulNoWriMo: Broken Mirror (41k and counting...)

FebNoWriMo was a loss by 2k and MayNoWriMo was only barely a win, but other than that the year has been going pretty well and I've written 664k of my planned 1 million words. I feel good about that.

Anyway, blog updates will soon be forthcoming, more writing will be done and... and there probably isn't really an 'and'. Oh, Leroy said he's going to start posting as well. I'll let him introduce himself, though...

Wednesday 27 April 2011

The shape of books to come...

Since I hardly ever post here (too busy procrastinating on the writing forums), I thought I should share something that came my way. It's about paper books versus e-books and it made me start thinking that as a writer, it really wouldn't be quite the same just being e-published...

Books without batteries

This is definitely an issue I'm going to spend some time over in the course of YeoWDam't. Expect more posts! I'm also inviting my readers to contribute links of their own, hopefully from both sides of the issue.

Monday 21 March 2011

Siana sucks at posting...

I officially promise that I'm going to do better...

Over the next few weeks (possibly a month or so) I'm going to completely redesign this blog and actually start using it. New topics that you can expect to read about include:

  • My works in progress

  • My current activities. Mostly, this means comments on whatever WriMo I'm participating in at the time.

  • Writing techniques. This is YeoWDam't and if I can't learn a lot about writing throughout the year there really isn't a lot of point doing it.

  • Writing resources. This includes lists of websites that give better advice than me, software reviews and all stuff like that.

  • Humour. Being me, this is going to involve stuff like interviews with characters, joke writing advice and possibly the odd non-serious short story...

Watch this space for more information about the redesign and new content.