NaNoWriMo and beyond!

As another fabulous NaNoWriMo comes to a close, I thought I'd look back on a month of hectic wordage.
I shall start in somewhat smug fashion and declare myself a winner!
Yay, me!

It's been a fun November, helped by the fact that I really enjoyed the story I was writing - a lighthearted fantasy novel called Heroes Wanted that should, hopefully, be ready for publication in spring of next year.
There was some sadness as well, with the passing of Anne McCaffrey.  As a callow youth I spent a great deal of time reading her Dragonriders of Pern series - she created a fantastic world in which it was a joy to spend time, one that was a huge influence on me and a driving force in cementing my love of words and literature.  Now that NaNoWriMo is over, I find myself with an urge to go back and revisit Pern.  It has been too long...

Back to NaNo:
I did fall quite a long way back for awhile.  This was entirely my friend Karen's fault - she came to visit for a weekend.  There was boozing, there was gaming, there were excellent fish and chips in Lytham, Lancashire.  What there wasn't, was writing.

Luckily, I had booked the last full week of November off from work, to dedicate myself to catching up.  I eventually finished on the last day of my holiday, Sunday the 27th.  It wasn't all writing: I played some Skyrim (awesome) and the Star Wars: The Old Republic beta (less awesome - more on that in another post).  But that week was, for the most part, a whirlwind of words.  Felt good, felt damned good!
So I treated myself to a Sonos Zoneplayer from Amazon - I love this thing!  Beautifully simple to set up and use, amazing sound.
Anyway, the first draft of the novel is pretty much done.  It needs much work, some fleshing out in places, scenes need tweaking and the dialogue needs a going over but, overall, I'm quite pleased with it.
So pleased in fact, that I've decided to give you, yes YOU!, a free eBook!  A copy of my debut novel, Crystal Eyes, no less!
Take yourself over to http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/99280, stick it in your basket and, when you reach the checkout, enter the code CM23Y to get it for nowt!  That's free, gratis and for nothing!
Once bought, it can be downloaded in formats suitable for any eReader - Kindle, iPad, Nook and so on.

Enjoy...I hope.

NOTE: The voucher code will expire on Saturday the 3rd of December.  After that, you gots to pay!

I have seen the face of the enemy...

And it's name is Skyrim.
I bought it so my friend, who was coming for a visit, could have a game of it.  In the end she never tried it, but I have now and I can feel it sucking me in.
Such a vast space, so many places to go and things to do - it reminds me of the first time I played Warcraft, that feeling of having a world to explore with no limits (other than getting killed by big monsters).
The problem is that I'm trying to do NaNoWriMo.  I have fifty thousand words to write.  I'm currently on 19,200, about a day and a half behind schedule.  I do not need to be pulled into a vast virtual world with monsters to kill and phat loot to gather up!

DAMN YOU, SKYRIM!
And don't even get me started on Uncharted 3. 

(In case you're not aware, Skyrim and Uncharted are new video games.  They're both great, though, and you should totally get them.  Unless you're trying to write)

NaNo update!

2 days in to NaNoWriMo now and it's going fairly well (I think).
I've not done the full word count for today yet - a mere 2800 words compared to the 3200 odd that it ought to be.  But I can make that up, might even do a smidgeon more before bed tonight.

Anyone who wants to be a writing buddy, my name on NaNoWriMo is RagnoDonna -
http://www.nanowrimo.org/en/participants/ragnodonna 

Update: I've now hit 3100 words but am having trouble focussing on the screen.  That may mean it's bedtime.

It begins...

The clock ticks down, hearts race, eyes stare at a blinking cursor on a virgin page, and across the world thousands upon thousands of fingers hover, poised like hawks over waiting keyboards.
It's NaNoWriMo time!
It's amazing to think about all the people across the world doing this, all the love and hate, the joy and pain, the laughter and tears, being transformed into (almost) uncountable words.
I'm proud and humbled to be a part of this wonderful thing. My only sadness is that I'll never be able to read everything that is written.

My apologies for the purple prose!
Anyway, good luck, fellow NaNoWriMoers, may your fingers fly fast and true!

Nanowrimo

Time to gird your loins, flex those fingers, and call forth your powers of literary creation - National Novel Writing Month (aka Nanowrimo) begins in just a couple of days.
People around the world (so I guess it should be international, but whatever) will doing battle with empty pages and blinking cursors. 30 days, 50,000 words, no prisoners!
Join us, cry havoc and let slip the word processors of war!