After reading such blogs as Miss Snark and the query section on the Nanowrimo forums, I'm overhauling my query letter so that it can go find me an agent. Not much else to say about it, but as it's taking up the majority of my evening, I thought I'd mention it.
I've also removed about ten thousand words from the novel I wrote in November. Yes, it's a lot, but a whole lot more are going to come out before I'm finished with it. (Also, I'd like to apologize if any of the people I emailed my first draft to are reading this blog: parts of the novel are painful, aren't they. It's very wordy. It's very "tell-y".)
But I'm having a good time, and I can't wait to go back through my story to smooth it out -- to make it actually GOOD. All in good time.
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Mind's Eye by Håkan Nesser
Now that I've stopped writing for a little while, I've got to read a few books. So I went to my library, and ended up borrowing Mind's Eye by Hakan Nesser, who is, apparently, pretty popular in Sweden. I thought, Good! I like European things, and the description of the story sounded interesting.
The mystery starts out really promising. Guy wakes up and doesn't know what happened (quite like what I just wrote -- one reason I chose this book), and discovers his wife is dead. Guy goes to prison, but he didn't do it -- and gets murdered himself (don't worry, this is all in the blurb, so I'm not giving anything important away).
That's all good. Interesting. Okay, now what?
The investigators investigate. They talk to people. Halfway though, they're talking to people. At the 3/4 point, they're talking to people. At the end, they're talking to people.
I don't know. If you read on Amazon, it got really good reviews, but I didn't feel it. It was sort of like the middle sagged all the way to the end, and all the questioning became really repetitive. Very much a plot-driven story, since the characters didn't really have lives of their own (not as much as I like -- i.e. they didn't really do any extra-curricular activities that weren't mentioned as a side-note).
Nothing strikingly "wrong" with the story or the writing style, just not my cup of tea.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Grand total: 120k words; just under 450 pages
Whew!
Well, that's done. I finished the novel last night after pouring 6,400 words into it yesterday. That's a lot! But after all that, all the hard work, pushing through the boring parts ... I think the ending tied together really nicely. I don't think I've left any loose ends, but I'm sure my test readers will tell me if I did.
Editing is going to be an adventure, though. Not only have I never written 450 pages of anything before, I've never had to make 450 pages look presentable before! I guess I'll tell you all about it when I get there. For now, I'm leaving it alone to marinate in all its awesomeness.
And it's weird what music I got hooked on while composing this little (*cough*) tale. Lady Gaga and Falco. Why? Maybe I went a little nuts toward the end of the novel ... but after a while, I was like, "I've really gotta listen to Bad Romance again!!" So yeah. Some crazy pop music lead to my crazy word count. And now I've gotta come down off it somehow.
Well, that's done. I finished the novel last night after pouring 6,400 words into it yesterday. That's a lot! But after all that, all the hard work, pushing through the boring parts ... I think the ending tied together really nicely. I don't think I've left any loose ends, but I'm sure my test readers will tell me if I did.
Editing is going to be an adventure, though. Not only have I never written 450 pages of anything before, I've never had to make 450 pages look presentable before! I guess I'll tell you all about it when I get there. For now, I'm leaving it alone to marinate in all its awesomeness.
And it's weird what music I got hooked on while composing this little (*cough*) tale. Lady Gaga and Falco. Why? Maybe I went a little nuts toward the end of the novel ... but after a while, I was like, "I've really gotta listen to Bad Romance again!!" So yeah. Some crazy pop music lead to my crazy word count. And now I've gotta come down off it somehow.
Friday, December 4, 2009
Still going
115,302 words. 412 pages.
That's the grand total at the moment. Yep, I'm still working on the novel, and I'm actually ready for it to be done. Once I've gone back over the thing with a heaping dose of editing, it's going to be a fantastic story -- and depending on how many test readers I get for my first draft, I'll be able to see how well it goes over with my "fans".
I'm even starting to think about other stories to write. All of them these days have some sort of mystery to them -- just can't figure out how to end a literary novel. Maybe I should read some more of them? I don't know. They're so beautiful, but with me, they ramble. Just like I'm doing now.
That's the grand total at the moment. Yep, I'm still working on the novel, and I'm actually ready for it to be done. Once I've gone back over the thing with a heaping dose of editing, it's going to be a fantastic story -- and depending on how many test readers I get for my first draft, I'll be able to see how well it goes over with my "fans".
I'm even starting to think about other stories to write. All of them these days have some sort of mystery to them -- just can't figure out how to end a literary novel. Maybe I should read some more of them? I don't know. They're so beautiful, but with me, they ramble. Just like I'm doing now.