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008: First Quarter Report

Seven days into the process and I still have all my hair. I've only launched my cat across the room once so far; he gets the hint pretty quickly when I growl at him from the computer. I had hoped for a jump start by setting aside a large chunk of time at the beginning. It took two days of rather random letter arrangement on the page before the cleverness kicked in.

To hit the magic number, I should be doing 1667 words a day. A little math tells me that after seven days I should have 11669 words. Word count a few minutes ago gave me 10925. It's not a terrible number, but it certainly isn't the barn-burner I had been hoping for. I'm happy the gap isn't larger. I'll be giddy if I'm only off by this margin come November 28th.

I'd be ecstatic if I actually thought this book was going to be finished in 50,000 words.

I can't see the end yet. I know the last two chapters, but how I'm going to get there is still murky. The one thing that NaNoWriMo doesn't allow for is the luxury of figuring things out. You've got to get your groove on early and keep it there. Having the plot actually hang together is a bonus. The point of this mad dash isn't necessary to get the most exquisite words on the page, but rather to get something down. You can edit and fix later. You can argue about the curtains and the furniture once you've got the house built.

Of course, the house has to be built on a solid foundation. I'm trying not to fixate on that detail.

In the meantime, I've got holes to fill. Gaps in my research continue to haunt me. I want to spend a few days in the woods up past Snoqualmie Falls and actually wander around where I've placed the town of Fall Creek. My map of Washington state says the Tolt Reservoir is closed to public access, which has done little to assuage my desire to climb that dam and stand on the top where Georges Maratre meets Mr. X again. I know nothing about radio and my lack of knowledge is putting cramps in my fingers. I need a crime scene report from an auto accident to get the terminology down. I need to know how to operate a police scanner as well as the bigger radios they keep in their stations. I don't know enough about hypnotic suggestion.

I need to know a lot of things. But there isn't time for all that; I've got to keep writing.

A draft of the book's opening has been posted in the Library over at markteppo.com. First four chapters and the prologue. A half hour of entertainment if you are so inclined.

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Posted by Teppo at November 8, 2002 09:02 AM

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