Day Four.

7208.

Doing pretty well. I’ve been consistently ahead, since I managed to start day 1 with over 2k–I’m still about five, six hundred ahead even though it’s only 11:40 pm today, since I got a headstart from being over 1000 ahead yesterday. (Egad.) I’m pretty excited, although a lot of the prose is awkward so far and the planning a little hackneyed. I can edit later. Two days, and wordcount bribery ahoy!

DAY TWO

AND SIX HUNDRED WORDS AHEAD~

4034!!!!!!!

It’s not very interesting, aside from the prologue, but it’ll pick up in a chapter or two. My mantra is “I can always edit later.”

HAHAHAHA

It’s an hour-fifteen into NaNo and I’m already at 1215 for wordcount. Boo-yah.

Hahahahaha.

Yes, it’s one o’clock in the morning!

Granted, this is all probably because this chapter was based heavily on the prototype story that I wrote in March, but I’m hoping this is a good sign.

WINNERRRRRRR!!

50,003 at last validation.

WOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!

The Home Stretch…

49,350 words. 650 left to go.

No excuses, now. Unless I either die or suffer injuries in the next 24 hours which make it impossible for me to type, I’m going to finish.

This is a really cool feeling.

Day Twenty-Seven Report

Coming in at 46,545, over 1.5k over where I need to be! Yesterday I managed a lot of words, ending up at over 1.7k+, which is pretty darn amazing for me. Currently I’m looking at having to write just over 1.1k every other day until Thursday.

So NaNoWriMo’s drawing to a close. This is it. This is: THE END. I’m hoping to have the team get their acceptance letter before the end of November, which may happen. I also finally figured out what Maureen does, and it’s pretty cool, although I’m going to have to go back and change a few things. (Note to self–people able to see magic of other family members; accounts for Maureen not being seen as unusual by own family.)

I think things are falling into place.

You know, I never thought I’d get this far. Before I started I told myself, “I’m fine if I make it to 30k. 20k, even.” And now I’m less than 4k away from the big 50.

I’m proud of myself. If I can do this, surely I can do anything! (Now all I have to do is figure out how to finish this monstrosity.)

Days Twenty-Five (late) Twenty-Six (early) Report

So, currently JNW gives my wordcount at 43,678 while the NaNo validator gives me 43,940. I have no idea why, but that’s really awesome.

So we’re almost almost almost to the cool part of the book, where they start training for the tournament and then go to the tournament and pwn everyone. And I’ve just realized that this is going to be a really, really, really long book if I don’t cut some stuff out.

Hm. Well, I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. Right now, my job is just to write and get that word count to 50k.

On the bright side, today we get another shot of Megalomaniac, Haruhi Suzumiya-channeling Anabelle. Like I’ve said, she’s sort of a cross between Suou Tamaki, Suzumiya Haruhi, and Regina George, which, as you might guess, makes for a very interesting character.

Twenty-Two, Twenty-Three and Twenty-Four

40k! 40k! 40k!

This is altogether too exciting.

Current word count: 40,804.

Anyway, over the last three days I’ve forgotten to post because of one thing or another. I’ve been writing a bit less because I can slow down my pace a little bit, but am still making over 1000 words over where I should be nearly every day, just in case there’s a day where I really have too much to do in the next week.

So, news in the novel:
-They have finished the bake sale.
-Inge and Anabelle are still on shaky terms.
-Anabelle is prepping Coraline to write the essay, and figuring out who she wants on her team.

I’m still trying to figure out why Maureen is on the team. She has no magical talent… so what’s her special skill that would be of immense use in a magical showdown? Ability to neutralize magic would be too deus ex machina, and it would also take the character in the wrong direction–I want her to have nothing magical about her. Hm. I’ll have to think fast. Or, alternatively, draw the novel out long enough that I don’t have to figure it out until after I hit 50k and can write at my leisure.

Day Twenty-One Report

36,047. Hooray! So I guess the yak-totem-thing is going to get me to 50k, huh?

Today is Official Angst Day. For some reason started going off on a bit about how Anabelle suddenly remembers that she ought to keep her distance, instead of getting too buddy-buddy with these people as they are only temporary friends. Riiiiiiiiiiight. Of course. (This is what I get for watching the end of Ouran during breaks from writing. Should never combine anime and writing.)

I don’t usually do angst, and I’m not sure I can really call this angst. This is about as angsty as my stories ever get. Well, with the exception of Lovepowerd (another story), which is pretty much an angst circus. More like “self-contemplation and reevaluation”. I’m big on that.

In other news, I found myself writing the margin note: “What’s the name of my country again?” Yes, this shows exactly how much attention I pay to worldbuilding. Brilliant, Ling, brilliant.

Days Seventeen and Eighteen Reports

Forgot to update yesterday — hit wordcount, albeit late at night, with 28864 at the end of the day. Didn’t quite get 1667 for the day, but I was far enough ahead from the day before that I was 500 ahead at the beginning of today anyway. So far today I’ve written 1042 words, and have a total of 29,906 words total. I’m going to make 30k!

In the past two days, Anabelle has suddenly developed a group of friends among the first-year girls after her befriending of Inge. My favorite line from this is: “At first it was sort of creepy, but eventually she began to remember that this was what her life was supposed to be like.” Yes, aha. There are still girls that are skeptical of her attitude, though. I randomly created a character I named Lindy after Captain Hallaoun from Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha of all things who is one of these skeptics, just as a bit character, but over the last chapter she’s turned into something of a bigger player than I anticipated. She and Anabelle have made a magically-reinforced bet that she can’t get Professor Sharpe to help them within a week.

It’s really interesting, writing off the outline. I’ve had trouble with it before, so I outlined about sixteen chapters of material, which have been condensed into about eleven in the actual writing. But now I’m off the part that I’ve outlined, so I’m essentially making stuff up as I go. And I think it helps that I’ve got momentum, but it’s actually going along. Huh. I don’t even think I need wordcount bribery any more.

Scenes that I’m really excited to write in the future:

• When the team goes to the tournament and Maureen meets her twin sister, who’s on the Coronet Academy team
• Anabelle having a bake sale to raise money for the entrance fee
• Anabelle giving Madeline (Maureen’s twin) a severe talking-to
• Coraline and Inge revealing that they had a bet running on whether Anabelle would manage to pull off getting the team into the tournament