NaNoWriMo 2012 Progress Report, Day 14

This is the weirdest writing project I’ve every undertaken.  Not because of the subject matter, or even because the goal is to write a whopping 50,000 words in 30 days.  It’s weird because I haven’t settled on a lot of things you have to know in order to write a story, much less a novel.

Things like, what is the narrator’s perspective?  Third person omniscient?  Third person limited?  First person singular, first person multiple…   So far I’ve written 22,000 words and I’ve bounced around a lot in terms of narration.  I’ve got a lot of third person semi-limited, some omniscient, some first person, some journal entries, a letter, a bunch of first person told to another character in the story.  The latest chunk I wrote was completely first person and that was maybe the easiest and most comfortable 1,000 words I’ve written so far.  I haven’t found a unifying perspective or voice for the story yet.

So if I’m not going to end up with a drafted novel at the end of this, what will I end up with? (and why am I doing this?)  I’m not quite halfway done, but when I look at the pile of words I have right now, I see the beginnings of at least one novel.  Probably a few short stories in there too.  Also, having absolutely no expectation of, or concerns about, the quality of the end product is a wonderful freedom.  I can fail early, fail often, fail spectacularly.  And then I can start again the next day and try something different.  That’s what this project is for me, a giant literary lab bench where I can select a different approach each day and see how it goes for a thousand or two thousand words.  And yes, I would like it very much if you envisioned me in a lab coat with shop glasses.. must protect the eyes you know and some word combinations are combustible.

Today is Day 14.  Going with the average word count, I should be at 23338 at the end of the day.  My current word count stands at 22053.  I’ve got some writing to do… see ya later

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