I am just over 40k for NaNoWriMo. I should be able to get to 45k by the end of the week and 50k at some point over the weekend, which is kind of excellent.

Not so excellent, depending on how you look at it, is the fact that I am pretty sure I am not even halfway through the novel. It seems to want to be a lot more complicated than I had anticipated, and characters I’d thought were secondary are insisting on quite a bit more attention than I had intended giving them. And there are several plot loops that are making their presence known that I having figured out yet.

It seems to be pretty sure of itself at this point, so I am just going to follow it along and see where it wants to go. After five (sheesh!) years of NaNoing I am pretty familiar with how I write and what works and what doesn’t, so while I won’t say that it’s easier I think it’s less frustrating. I don’t know who is drawing the doors in back alleys in New Orleans, and that’s ok. I’m not sure who Eleanor’s grandfather was, exactly, and that’s ok. I am curious to see where it goes more than I am nervous about not knowing. It will figure itself out, and mostly I just need to stay out of its way.

It has ended up being something of a Persephone story, and a bit of a Wonderland story with a great many Alices. Only one Persephone, though.

Categories: writing