Humor will not be tolerated!! -Portia

I'm… exactly as far as I was when I finished the first day. Oops? And I don't see that changing soon. Hmmm… maybe this was a bad year to start. But at least I got the scary part of starting started… so maybe next year will be better?

So ... I haven't written in a few days, either. Something about having appointments, classes, and meetings from 6:30am to 10pm several days this week has put me in survival mode instead of creative mode.

I've more than doubled what I had before November started. Woo-hoo!

(of course, the math says it means I've only written 15K this month, but I've decided to not care)

Is anyone on track with their word count? Just curious. Most I've heard about NaNo this year are people who aren't gonna make the 50k.

I suppose you mean aside from me, as I shouted about hitting 50,000 in this very thread on the eighth. : )

bobtheenchantedone wrote:I suppose you mean aside from me, as I shouted about hitting 50,000 in this very thread on the eighth. : )

I somehow missed the last half of page 1, turns out. Sorry about that! Congrats!! That's fantastic! And really fast. 8 days? Yipes!

And Dead Cat, I approve of the new icon. mmhmm. [nods]

Thanks! We found that I can type 3000 words in an hour, and that I have too much free time on my hands.

bobtheenchantedone wrote: and that I have too much free time on my hands.

And whose fault is that, bob? Hmmm?

Well mine of course.

Well, November has ended and I surprised myself by writing nearly 27k (the story is now about 41k).
And I think it needs serious revision if this question is any indication (I have about a couple dozen named characters and 16 of them have had at least one viewpoint section).

Dead Cat wrote:Well, November has ended and I surprised myself by writing nearly 27k (the story is now about 41k).
And I think it needs serious revision if this question is any indication (I have about a couple dozen named characters and 16 of them have had at least one viewpoint section).

Yes, revision might be a good idea. Just speaking for myself, I would find reading that ever so tiresome. But, continuing to speak for myself, I prefer J and YA fic in general, so if you're goin' for the epic, I don't usually like them much anyway.

Yeah, I have no idea what it is. It could end up as YA, epic, sci-fi, fantasy--anything but nonfiction. As for myself, I've been leaning toward it being a sci-fi with elements that could be seen as magical. As for an audience, I'll have to classify it as me--and considering I'm a fan of all of the above...

All books need revision. But I'd hesitate before saying throw out your gut feelings for your book off of one writer's opinion on multi-viewpoint novels in general.

If you've not read it yet, I'd highly recommend Scott Card's "How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy" as a good springboard for some rules of thumb (and the motivations for them or their lacking).

Good books that come to mind with multiple viewpoint characters being vital to the story's flow include the Lord of the Rings, the A Wrinkle in Time quartet, Les Misérables, The Sound and the Fury, and basically every Sanderson book published. (Granted those tend to be longer novels, but they are what come to my mind.) Many others do come to mind, but I'm not sure how vital the dual perspective is. (CS Lewis, Jim Butcher, Robert Heinlein, RA Salvatore, Peirs Anthony, Luis L'amour, the list goes on.) As with many elements of writing, readers don't tend to notice unless done jarringly wrong or absolutely stunningly well, thus perhaps leading to Inconveniently Willful's distaste.

Also, the genre may play a significant role in what an audience will accept. Thinking of The Eye of the World, Robert Jordan's first novel, I can think of a good dozen 'main'/vital characters just off the top of my head and at least 4 of them have viewpoints in that one novel, and if I'm recalling right, 3 or 4 more may have their own chapter. (Do we see through Tam's eyes in book 1? man, I'm going to have to re-read it now...) Fantasy fans are more likely used to it, and are much more willing to go along.

Tao wrote:If you've not read it yet, I'd highly recommend Scott Card's "How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy" as a good springboard for some rules of thumb (and the motivations for them or their lacking).

In addition, I recommend listening to Writing Excuses. I can pick out some specific epic / viewpoint episodes, if you like.

I'm already a big fan of Writing Excuses (and I've seen a Katya in the comments, is that you?) and I think I read that Orson Scott Card book about a year ago, but I've forgotten a lot if what it says. I'm just your token writer wannabe who still needs to write a million words before I get good at it. I'm just glad that I've made a definite improvement since my first book that I wrote in second grade (I still don't know what I was thinking when "everything turned lilac" for zero reason at all).

Hey. Nothing that anyone writes in second grade makes sense. Trust me, I know.

Dead Cat wrote:I'm already a big fan of Writing Excuses (and I've seen a Katya in the comments, is that you?)

It is! Do you want to see something incredibly geeky I made for them?

bobtheenchantedone wrote:Hey. Nothing that anyone writes in second grade makes sense. Trust me, I know.

One of my students wrote a story last week about a pumpkin that got married...

Katya wrote:

Dead Cat wrote:I'm already a big fan of Writing Excuses (and I've seen a Katya in the comments, is that you?)

It is! Do you want to see something incredibly geeky I made for them?

Incredibly geeky is practically synonymous with "awesome," so yes!

Dead Cat wrote:

Katya wrote:

Dead Cat wrote:I'm already a big fan of Writing Excuses (and I've seen a Katya in the comments, is that you?)

It is! Do you want to see something incredibly geeky I made for them?

Incredibly geeky is practically synonymous with "awesome," so yes!

http://katya0133.livejournal.com/940.html