This is my first [INter]NAtional NOvel WRIting MOnth, aka. InNoWriMo, and for the traditionalists in the USA: NaNoWriMo.

The aim is to get back in to the habit of writing and making it a daily exercise; not editing, not plotting, and certainly not worrying whether my prose cuts it. I have been working on a large piece of fiction for a couple of years and have fallen in to the “pit” and cannot climb out of the latest chapter, constantly re-editing, cutting characters, adding and removing B and C plot lines etc.

This has to stop, and a month of strictly enforced vomit writing seemed the obvious remedy.

I spent October plotting and found Kristen Lamb‘s eight part series on Plot Structure to be a most valuable resource. I read her posts and applied some of the techniques to my basic idea for a story and started day one with a twenty-five chapter outline, a passable Log Line, and the scenes for the first seven chapters planned out.

I’m not sure I would have made it through the first week without that preparation “in the bag”.

So here I am at the end of day 14 with 20,229 words and eight chapters completed. based on the official NaNoWriMo schedule of 1667 words per day I am a little behind, but based on my own schedule, that takes in to account a new other commitments such as my youngest son graduating year 12 at school, I am pretty much where I want to be.

I have made mistakes but, so far, have resisted looking backwards and trying to fix them.

I have left stubs; where research is needed, such as where I don’t know the particular military ranks in the Spanish Army of the fifteenth Century e.g.

“Off you get [rank],” a disheveled officer said to me.

…and this helps to quieten the pedantic editor and perfectionist lurking inside me. Now…End Blog, and back to the vomit draft.