a change in plans

Daylight Savings went into effect this week and now it's entirely too bright in my bedroom in the morning. I'm sure it was this bright over the summer but that's something you get used to as the sun gradually comes up earlier and earlier every day. In the last few weeks we were waking up to dim light that has been replaced with what feels like a glowing neon rectangle. I really need to invest in some blackout curtains but I waffle on that idea because they're kind of expensive and we live in an apartment where installing such things would probably be against our contract or something. I saw another apartment that had taped construction paper to their kid's window, presumably so they can take naps during the day. Necessity is truly the mother of invention.

I know I said I wouldn't be posting this week but due to a sudden dental emergency, my friend was unable to fly out to stay with us this week. We're working on rescheduling but the week goes on regardless.

This has freed up some time for writing, which, honestly, I haven't done very much of this week. Yesterday I got a bit sidetracked making a "cover" for my novel along with actually creating the look of the marks that are so central to the story. [The official NaNoWriMo website claims that authors with "covers" are 60% more likely to reach their word count. This may have backfired a little as I spent all of last night working on this and didn't get any writing done.] There aren't that many simple character languages out there so I've Frankenstein-ed a few together. I'm not sure if I'll ever actually use the marks as illustrations in the book but it's good for me to have a reference for descriptive purposes.

Marked is my working title. 

It gets pretty annoying to constantly refer to a story as "the novel."

The original drawing is actually flipped horizontally. 

I had to change it because Mona's Malmark is on her left wrist. 

*face-palm* 

Despite my slow start to NaNoWriMo my notebook is getting heavier, a tactile indication of progress that might be my favorite thing about writing stories long-hand. The difference in weight between a blank notebook and one that's been filled is much greater than I'd think a little ink would account for. I think the stories themselves make them heavier.

I follow Neil Gaiman on tumblr and he's been getting a lot of questions about NaNoWriMo but this has been my favorite response so far.

Writing the "boring bits" is something I this most writers have a hard time with and I'm right there with them. The pacing of a story is so important and writing a "slower" scene freaks me out sometimes because I worry that it's boring and bland and this is the point where people will put the book down and never finish it because it's awful. I've seen a lot of opinions that books should never have these "boring bits" in them, that your exposition should always be action packed and engaging. I get that we should avoid writing essays in our novels but I love that Neil points out that you don't have to add explosions to scenes like these. It's about finding the meaning in a scene and bringing it out through dialogue or someone a character does. It doesn't have to be big, it just needs to mean something. Most authors lose around a third of the text from a first draft in revisions. You cut the things that don't mean anything, that aren't important, and you're left with fewer, but more powerful words. If we try to create that kind of power even in a first draft, imagine how much better a concentrated final draft would be. Power in stories comes in action scenes, dramatic moments, but also in little conversations, small acts. So we write those "boring" scenes and we make them mean something.