| Cheeky 2,000 words this evening? We shall see. |
NaNoWriMo 2018 • Page 2
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RawShark 2,202 posts
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sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years agoRawShark wrote:
And post it so that wemay read and give feedback, it is what makes this thread such a good place to write each year.
Cheeky 2,000 words this evening? We shall see. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years agoFogHeart wrote:
And to start at least the feedback part, thanks to FogHeart who sent a chapter out of limbo:
@sunjumper Oh, alright, you can have it early.
https://fogheartnanowrimo.blogspot.co.uk/
Phoebe
The first paragraph describing the dolphins is good and to the point, however I think it would benefit from the somewhat more indirect style you have been using before. You are telling us outright that their behaviour is not only threatening but also out of the ordinary, you might want to rather show what effect that has on the observer through whose eyes we are seeing the scene or by working it into the description of the animals. You have been very good at building tension just by your use of words, this part would profit greatly from your skill.
e.g.:
“‘Everyone OK, Meredith?’
‘They’re not paying us any attention, Matt. They’re just off on their own. To be honest I’ll be happy if they stay that way.’“ This is a perfect example. Shown through the eyes of the characters it becomes clear that these dolphins are a source of danger. And by keeping the comments low key it builds up tension. I like that a lot.
“They’ve been interested in Phoebe ever since they saw it.” ‘it’? Most ships are generally called she or he by their crews. Is this on purpose?
“This depth is colloquially known as the ‘Twilight Zone’, due to to quality of the ambient light. Water acts as a weak red filter, such that the deeper you go, the bluer everything appears. After forty metres nothing shows up as red unless some other light source is trained upon it. Tropical fish and corals that would be dazzling orange or yellow or red at the surface become dowdy greenish or brown. At four hundred metres the only light remaining from the surface is an eerie indigo. I was losing sight of the dolphins, so I turned on the floodlights.” This is a great paragraph. I mentioned this in the last thread; this is a great mixture of facts and exposition which do a great deal to reinforce the atmosphere. It works well as the person telling the story is a scientist, thus you get a glimpse into the characters psychology at the same time you describe in a few short lines how everything becomes darker and even the colours shift towards the sinister. Mixed with the information that the evil dolphins are diving to deep you keep building on the feeling of foreboding that is so present through everything you have written so far.
The descent is great. The descriptions after the midnight zone are all spot on and my what a cliff hanger to end the chapter to.
I’m sorry not to have read it earlier not only is it really well written but also would have been perfect as a story leading to Halloween.
Great stuff, I am looking forward to more and I do recommend everyone else to read the story too. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years agoI took last years fragment and edited it. Cleaned it up and added a bit of polish. This part does not count towards my word count this year but it is the basis of the story.
Editing it also helped me get remembering and getting back into the story.
Enjoy. -
Carbon_Altered 890 posts
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Registered 15 years ago@sunjumper
Ah-ha, the mysterious little cafe is back. Within two lines I remembered it, two more and I was avidly reading it again! Love the seasons at war in the first part, but the council clerks and bankers made me feel really uneasy (in a good way)
Absolutely zero idea where you are going with it, but got a Neil Gaiman vibe at the moment. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years ago@Carbon_Altered
Many thanks for the feedback.
Gettng back into the story is incredibly hard. I spent almost two and half hours for measly 1300ish words and as it is the grand tradition I hate most of it and I feel like I lost the feeling of the original story.
I wanted to write more before I publish the next bit, but then I remembered that this is the month of writing and not the month of worrying.
So here is the beginning of the new
chapter. I have some strong reservations about how this is going but then pushing it out into the wild will give me some feedback that will either make me calm down or give me some pointers of how to proceed. -
Do we have a list of participants for this year? I am continuing my 2016 and 2017 efforts with a view to developing more cohesive storylines (or just actually manage to complete a shitty first draft!). At present both stories are rather fragmented. I'm also tinkering with a very old story but won't focus heavily on it.
I have a couple of ideas for short stories. A man is offered the chance to become a whale, and a third personality develops in alien race where it is normal for individuals to have one body inhabited on a cyclical basis by two different brains/personalities. -
Carbon_Altered 890 posts
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Registered 15 years agoI'll be back after the weekend with more feedback. KEEP GOING!! -
BearFishPie 837 posts
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Registered 10 years agoWith the limited time I have I’ve opted to dust off the halfway-complete Second YA book I abandoned in 2014 in a vain attempt to get the first draft complete. I’ve got way less of a structure sorted out for this compared with book 1 at the same point, so this could easily end up an in salvageable wreck. That said, I’ll be much happier to have given it a proper go and got the half-finished project out of my thoughts, in the worst case situation.
I’m way behind already, about 1500 words down - but I was never likely to hit the formal target -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years agoI will put a list of the people who said they would be writing in the first post tomorrow.
It would also be great for the people writing to put their work into the thread. I can't believe that I'm the only one writing at the moment.
I managed around 1.9k today. And I am a bit happier with the output today.
I will post tomorrow as I want to add a bit more to what I wrote before publishing it. I'm not quite happy with the rush job I posted on Thursday and I am now trying a different strategy now.
I’m slowly getting back into the writing groove. I still wish I had the discipline to write more during the rest of the year. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years agoSo I went through the thread and now have a list of all people that are officially participating.
I will add this to the first post.
NaNoWriMo 2018 Dramatis Personae (in order of appearance)
Sunjumper
Your-Mother
Wuntyphyve
Rice_sandwichi
BearFishPie
Raw_Shark
MetalDog
FogHeart
Supporting cast (may write something this month)
The12thMonkey
MIA
Fontgeeksogood (is he really dead though or will he return with some last minute prose)
Carbon_Altered
Which begs the question where are you all?
Do not write in darkness, share with us, it feels a bit lonely being the only one posting stuff here. -
@sunjumper
I've written almost nothing so far (500 to 1000 words) as I've been trying to impose some kind of order on my story. I downloaded the Scrivenver beta for Windows and things are sitting a little better structure wise now that I've been able to chop it up into loose chapters. I noticed that I have multiple different versions of files on google docs and two computers so I need to get some version control going or it will be chaos. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years ago@rice_sandwich
Controlling the chaos is good and Scrivener is pretty neat for organizing your material. And 1000 words are so much better than no words at all.
I'm looking forward to reading your new stuff. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years agoAnd another update. Slowly I'm getting back into the groove and the story has started to stabilise. I think one or two chapters more and I’m back on track. The word count is also slowly increasing as it is becoming easier with each passing day to actually write instead or staring at the blinking cursor mocking me.
Are the rest of you still alive? -
The12thMonkey 598 posts
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Registered 17 years ago@sunjumper
I've been away for the start of November, but I'll read up and edit in thoughts / comments soon. -
BearFishPie 837 posts
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Registered 10 years agoBarring a complete failure to write anything on day 1, I’ve been scraping about 1k a day. It’s a fragmentary mess though, and I’m fast approaching the point I’ve mapped the story up to. -
Carbon_Altered 890 posts
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Registered 15 years ago@sunjumper
Chapter 2 only suffers because it came after a great start and it is a foundation for future plot. I liked Edmund pushing the buttons of the science bloke. Right now this story could be a nice tale of small town entrepreneurship, or the generator will accidentally open a portal to an alien dimension and they'll be fighting mind bending demons. You've got me intrigued!! -
Carbon_Altered 890 posts
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Registered 15 years ago@sunjumper
Update 3 (so end of chapter 2 and start of 3)
Hmmmmm, a very helpful old lady and mention of a mysterious blocked off basement. MIND BENDING HELL ALIENS CONFIRMED.
I can feel you getting into your stride. Something is pulling Jenny and those around her to this mill, but what is it? -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years ago@BearFishPie
Are you going to share your work with us?
@Carbon_Altered
Thank you very much for you kind words and your feedback, it means a lot to me.
Right now the story is a bit of train wreck, going back to it after a year was much harder as expected, as I lost my feeling for the original style. I was flailing around a lot at first, but I have come to accept that this is now its own thing and now I am just following the story as it moves forward. IT is not what I had intended at first anymore, but I am enjoying the ride and there is a lot for me to learn from the experience. That you seem to enjoy this mess makes all the better..gif)
Edited by sunjumper at 22:43:50 05-11-2018 -
BearFishPie 837 posts
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Registered 10 years ago@sunjumper I can do. What’s the best way to put something up? I don’t want to mess the thread by posting a whacking great chapter in here, but don’t have a functional blog to tie the text to either at the moment. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years ago@BearFishPie
Prettxy much all of us just got a blog and post our stuff over there. It's pretty easy to set up and publishing new chapters isn't more complicated than copy, paste and pressing a button. -
BearFishPie 837 posts
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Registered 10 years ago@sunjumper I have a dormant Wordpress so will try to reanimate it. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years agoDespite a good start, this was like pulling teeth again.
But chapter 4 is done.
Again it went a bit wild and not in the direction I wanted it to go. But after over 2500 words I finally reached the point that I want to get to. One I imagined could be reached in one or two neat paragraphs. Well... this is the NaNoWriMo way in the end. The story leads I follow. -
The12thMonkey 598 posts
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Registered 17 years ago@sunjumper
Ok, I've read up now.
I do want to know what could be lurking in the mill and why people seem very easily persuaded into working on the project. I feel like you're setting up the mill as a character itself.
My main observation would be that it felt like the characters weren't listening to each other some of the time. For instance, Edmund says "You must be Linda", and Linda replied "Hi, I'm Linda". I also didn't get the feeling of Barbara being old from the way she spoke.
That said, I really liked the party scene at the end of chapter 4, and it had some very cool descriptions in there. Looking forward to more!
I terms of my own contribution, none of the ideas I was toying with have developed, but I am in the midst of redrafting the opening of the story I shared in 2016 NaNo, so I'll be able to put some of that up soon. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years ago@The12thMonkey
Thank you for your feedback, what you are saying helps me alot, especially as I can compare it to the feedback of others.
Some things are working as intended, others not so much and then there are bits were I simply messed up.
What worked: the mill; that one is intentional and that is the feeling I am trying to evoke.
What fails: Barbara, she describes herself as someone who has decades of training of being young. But that remark alone is not sufficient to carry that idea. That needs more work in revision.
And were I was simply not paying enough attention: the Lind bit. That’s just me being an idiot.
I'm glad to hear that you will be joining us soon. I think I vaguely remember your story from 2016 but won't go back and check, so that I can read your new work with fresh eyes. Wild and not in the direction I wanted it to go. But after over 2500 words I finally reached the point that I want to get to. One I imagined could be reached in one or two neat paragraphs. Well... this is the NaNoWriMo way in the end. The story leads I follow. -
BearFishPie 837 posts
Seen 3 weeks ago
Registered 10 years agoRight so, I’ve attempted to resurrect my shonky Wordpress page. I’ve stuck Chapter 1 of the current book onto the following page (sorry, no idea how to embed links via mobile):
http://tomsheenwrites.wordpress.com/ya-book-two
Edit: evidently web links just plain work by themselves. Hooray, I’ve learned something!
Edited by BearFishPie at 18:50:12 07-11-2018 -
Carbon_Altered 890 posts
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Registered 15 years ago@sunjumper
I thought chapter 4 flowed really well, no teeth to be pulled. You're back in the stride of neat weird play, "the taste of existential futility that had taken over his mouth" being one example among many. Echo the other feedback about interesting how people are being drawn to the mill. I laughed at the end of the chapter, just knowing the lump on the sofa would be a chef and you didn't let me down. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
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Registered 20 years ago@BearFishPie
Today was a busy day, I hardly got any writing done, but I will have a look at your stuff tomorrow. i'm looking forward to it.
@Carbon_Altered
Thank you for oyur kind and instructive feedback. I am very glad to hear that the chapter that was such a pain to write doesn't show it. And I'm glad you liked the cook.
There should have been an update today as for the moment I know pretty well where the story is moving towards. But I hope that I can get that done tomorrow. I'm still hoping for one of those magic 'flow' days.
Oberrvation of the week everything that has happened from chapter 2 onwards was ignored in the original draft, last year chapter two would have started with the generator installed and running for the first time. But this time I thought that I am in no hurry and I could as well show how everyone came together in the first place. -
sunjumper 3,548 posts
Seen 2 weeks ago
Registered 20 years agoBearFishPie wrote:
Let's have a look then.
Right so, I’ve attempted to resurrect my shonky Wordpress page. I’ve stuck Chapter 1 of the current book onto the following page (sorry, no idea how to embed links via mobile):
http://tomsheenwrites.wordpress.com/ya-book-two
Edit: evidently web links just plain work by themselves. Hooray, I’ve learned something!
Chapter 1
You set up the atmosphere nicely. I can feel the weather and imagine the light in London as the story unfolds and I’m quickly drawn into the personal world of Andy. While I think he is a bit on the egotistical side, he seems very human.
“Andy stooped to pick up a lump of gravel. He turned it over in his palm, then hurled it with a yell out into the Thames. It made a pathetic little splash. He wished he could follow it to the sediment below.” This is just a great description.
And suddenly the teem romance takes a turn for the supernatural. But as this seems to be ‘book 2’ that makes sense.
Fog man? I like that.
There are some bits where you could tighten the style a bit during revision, like for example: “He stood rigid, as a cold knife of shock ran through him.” which is a pretty good description but would flow better as: “He stood rigid as a feeling of shock ran him through like a cold knife.” But these are considerations for the revision phase. I like how you quickly build a feeling of danger and urgency and how you manage to present a situation with just a few short effective sentences.
The way the power works become clearer. Andy’s use is not what I would call clever but it makes perfect sense given his age and the situation. I’m also intrigued by the danger that is connected to the use of it. Just as I was wondering how often he could use the power you answered the question.
And I like the resolution of the chapter.
Nice work. I know what the story is about more or less. I know the main character and what kind of person he is and have now a feel for the world. -
@sunjumper thanks very much for the feedback - greatly appreciated! My plan was for it to be enough of a refresh of the core mechanics of Andy’s ability and hint to the prior book’s occurrences without stopping the story dead on the first page. Unfortunately Chapter 2 is a car wreck in text form, and I’ll have to effectively rewrite it from scratch 
.gif)
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