So today I passed my all-time record (for as long as I’ve kept records) at Nano, completing 60,900 words at Nanowrimo. The key I think is not just taking this week off, not just keeping going, but daydreaming about my characters—then, whenever I get inspired, writing that scene. Almost all of the huge spurts you see below came out of that:
Today, it was pretty easy to write. I got about 500 words finishing up a few loose ends. Then I wrote a longer scene with Cinnamon and her fae mentor the Huntswoman, and almost a day’s worth of writing popped out of my keyboard. Then I decided to write another scene, one from ROOT USER (the third book in the trilogy, of the large manuscript I’m working on) and got 2000 words in about 30 minutes (!), all from choosing to write this:
But no matter how I tries to ignore it … I can’t ignore what they says next.
“And if they lose a hunt,” the jerkboy says, “guess what? They eat the loser—”
“You take that back!” I shouts, poppin’ to my feet. I hops over the nearest table and barrels down on the boy, who’s hoppin’ to his feet as well, his buddies standin’ to come to his aid, actin’ like I’m neither a girl he should play nice with nor a monster who could rip his throat out. “You take that back this instant!”
“What?” the boy says, eyes gleaming at me. “The part where they eat the loser—”
“We are not cannibals!” I screeches, snarlin,’ my whiskers comin’ in, my fur comin’ out.
“I bet she’s eaten her share,” one of the other boys says. “Like, weregazelles and shit—”
“The herbivores are our friends! We runs together! Nobody eats nobody on my hunt!”
“Your hunt,” he says. Everyone’s circled around us now, the boy standin’ out front. He’s big, so, I guesses, he guesses he can take me in a fight. Good fuckin’ luck. He grins with a nasty smile. “Like anyone would follow you—”
“I had twelve followin’ me on my last hunt,” I says. “Thirteen, actually—”
“I thought you could count,” he says. “What, you lose one? Eat one?”
I snarls and steps forward, and he leans back, fists up. I raises mine.
Then I turns away. “Not worth it,” I mutters, lookin’ at the huge crowd around us. He swings and clocks me behind the ear, and I kinda shrugs and shakes him off. “Not worth it at all,” I mutters, boltin’ through the crowd, walkin’ fast towards the exit. “At all—”
“Where are you going, Miss Frost,” says the proctor.
“The deans’s office,” I says. “I just picked a fight.”
“Wait just a minute,” he says, hand reachin’ for me, but I shrugs him off.
“Get off me, or I go to the safety cage,” I says, snarlin. “And call for my Mom.”
“Yeah, call your mother,” says the jerkboy, who followed me.
“Christopher, I see your mouth is open,” the proctor says coolly. “Close it.”
And the scene which follows, in which Cinnamon goes to see the Dean of the Claremont Academy, who’s more cool than even I anticipated — I mean, drill sergeant in a former life? Really? Makes sense. And helped me crack 60,000 words:
But the point is, never give up on Nano. It will continue to reward you, all the way to the end.
-the Centaur
