Wrap-UP

This was meant to be a post for the end of the Clarion Write-a-Thon. Ha. BUT. I've been writing like crazy.

First, my soft underbelly: I post fanfiction related to James Roberts' Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye comic series (NO SHUT UP IT's ART OF THE HIGHEST CALIBER) at Transfans.co.uk under the name bumblemusprime. Get the comic series, then read my sticky fan tribute!

I swore off fanfic in 1994. See, after reading Mossflower to pieces, I wrote my own Redwall novel, and, with no Internet to guide me, sent it to Brian Jacques. He sent back a note saying "Your story is well written, but you need to think of your own ideas and characters!"

I vowed to heed him; sorry, Brian Jacques, but the MTMTE series is that good. Vow broken.

PS: Brian I not-so-humbly submit that my novel, at the age of fourteen, was fourteen badgers' worth better than The Bellmaker. You phoned it in on that one.

Ahem.

I reached my Write-a-Thon goal earlier this week. I completed a short novel at 51,000 words, which is pretty good for me, considering my typical novel runs around 150,000 words. Life goal achieved: be brief!

I cooked on this novel. On high heat. Broil, lots of salt. Extended food metaphor here.

When I cook my prose quickly, I don't cut and rewrite. A crucial character needs a whole new plot and arc, but I just wanted to get through to the end and so I limped him along as a passive whiny brat.

I learn from writing badly, in theory. Well, I learn but it's hard to say what at this point... which also comes from writing quickly, because one ends in a stunned daze, a few pounds overweight, sucking chocolate and coffee like a babe at the teat. Usually I can see the cracks and the poor judgment and the curdled milk in the cake at the end of a hot, hard session (METAPHORICAL, you pervs)(the cake is a lie, too).

I'm not sure that I improve by writing fast. I produce, though! Afterward I'm a bit too dazed to really find the good heart of a piece. Herein lies a great critique of NaNoWriMo: that in its heart, each NaNo is a bucket of diarrhea. Whaddya think, dear readers who are writers? When you charge ahead, heedlessly vomiting words, saving any self-analysis for revision, do you learn? Or do you, yes you, right there in the corner, excise and revise?

There is a comment section--use it! The ghost of Brian Jacques is watching.