Tags
cliff-hanger, Harmon's Plot Embryo, must read, NaNo Prep, NaNoWriMo, Novel drafting, Planning, plot points, story outlining
I’m doing it again. Trying to write a complete project in a month. But this go around, my word-count goal is so much smaller than my last four attempts at a measly 20k.
Yes, I just put measly before 20k, but on average I aim for 40-50k in a NaNoWriMo session, and I’ve only hit that goal twice.
Finally, I’m getting to work with my LOVING RED characters again. This one will be a prequel, outlining both Kaia’s background with Dev—the bear and ex—and the circus incident with the Scarlet Queen, whose just appeared in Ria’s world. I am so excited to continue this story thread. If you don’t know anything about the LOVING RED gang, their storyline jumpstarted with Facebook roleplaying…which is why many of my characters have their own profile pages.
Anyways, I don’t so much want to talk about their story (but I’ve done that here, here, and here if you want to know more). Instead, I wanted to set y’all up for the NaNoWriMo advice and exercises I’m going to be throwing at you over the next few months.
Now is the time for planning…even though I may have outlined this story at the end of last year, it’s nice to review and remind myself what the hell I’ll be doing.
Originally, I used Harmon’s Plot Embryo to develop my ideas and create more symmetry in my stories. I tend to lean toward the cliff-hanger and don’t want to be a one-trick pony. My notes on that below, and an excellent YouTube post I took these notes from.
From this process, I teased out the major plot points and decided on an alternating point of view. Like in LOVING RED, I will use first person for Dev—as he is the character I created and played in roleplaying, and third person for Kaia, who was played by a close friend.
That let me create my current outline, which I’ll sneak peek right here.
For the rest of this month, I will be reading this over, working through details as best as I can, and will probably start the opening scene(s) before July hits. Yes, I know that’s cheating, but I’m doing this to get my first draft down, not to win anything. Besides, I play by my own rules!
And that’s it for now. I’m set up, finishing another story, hopefully giving myself a week break in between, and jumping in to this novelette.
Are you using the summer to complete some writing goals? Do you participate in NaNoWriMo? Let me know what you’re working on, what your goals are, how you plan to meet them, and if you want to hear about keeping on track, catching up, and adapting to real life as you craft.
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