No plot? Nasty problem!

Actually I do have a plot so now I don't have a problem. I've finally decided on something to write about for this year's NaNo challenge. It's a fairly character-driven and altogether involved story. I had a few doubts about whether I really wanted to write something that I'd written on previous years - as much as I like the other ideas I have, they're stagnant at the moment for me. I love them to pieces but I've worked on them so much for so long it's nicer to have a breath of fresh air - a totally new setting and plot, to the two I've worked on for the past two years including NaNo Novembers.

Saying that though, the plot and setting isn't exactly fresh. It's based loosely on something I've written out a plot for before. But the reworked setting doesn't quite fit with the plot anymore, so it's still new and exciting. It also draws inspiration from science fiction like V for Vendetta, Blade Runner, Fallout and Watchmen in terms of theme and setting, and 'feel'. It's not got anything futuristic about it but instead it's sort of Alternate Universe, so that'll be interesting.

I worked on it with Nat, because I decided that I needed someone to bounce ideas off. And she'd the same idea, really, because Nat herself had been stuck for ideas or not really wanted to resurrect something already planned. Recycling old characters is something I don't mind doing and we're working off basically the same plots and setting just from different angles and viewpoints of said characters. I think it's going to be an interesting venture; the same story told from a slew of different perspectives, with all characters having a part to play in the 'grand scheme of things' and some events in their timelines tying in with other events for other characters.

Unfortunately my description probably makes it sound really complicated, and I'd love to post some kind of a summary about it, but right now there's not a definite one. I'm going to settle on one when I update my NaNo profile itself but for the moment I can't, as the site is being re-worked over the weekend and if I made any profile changes until Monday they would all be lost tomorrow.

I'll see how proper planning works out for reaching my word goal of 50k this year. I usually do some thinking during October but I feel properly prepared this time around and I'm hoping it will make a difference to my word production rate. 22 days to go!

Good Morning Starshine!

This being the first post in my new blog, I should probably set about telling the world what it's purpose is. Ink Blots is solely for everything writing related that I create or want to blog about; whether I'm ranting that I'm having writer's block, or a particular word just won't come to me, even if I've had the most brilliant idea, perhaps I have some extract I'm proud of to share with everybody. Whatever it is, it goes here. I realised that I don't really use my regular blog very much; and when I do I write, sometimes, quite a bit about writing itself. I admit that I haven't focussed much on my writing for the past two years - exams, study and exams have been the downfall of this particular past-time. I began to fear, mid-college year around April/May time, that my creative writing would or already HAD stagnated due to the way I've been moulding my writing to essay form, for whatever subject it's on. I was proud of my writing style; I always had been, it always effortlessly sounded like I'd written it when I read it back to myself. I don't want to lose that, and for that reason I started blogging again.

Well, with NaNoWriMo 2011 just around the corner (23 days, 21 hours!) I've decided that no matter how tired, grumpy, lose-the-will-to-live I get, I'm going to write my 50k of words this year. Every year, I fall down around the 12k mark. It's usually because I have a roaring good start, writing at least 4k in the first day because I'm so full of gusto. Then I'll write another 1.5k the next day. So I've hit almost 6k in the first three days. Then I think, I can afford to take a break. I'm ahead of where I should be! I fall behind for a few days, make up for it by storming ahead adding another 7k to my total and then... fizzle out. There is a certain point at which you lose interest in a novel you're drivelling out 1.6k words for every day. I know the idea is to get it written, but I always always can't help myself from thinking I'm murdering my plot, my characters, and doing them a disservice by writing utter shit. So clearly I need a change of mindset; NaNo is so that you get something written, no matter how under-developed your characters are, no matter how twisty and loopholed your plot is. It's about writing the words, even if they read back like something a ten-year old would write.