YA Challenge: 1200 words written and a minor feminist freak out

I managed to get a lot of work on Morgana Tremaine done today. There were 1200 of writing, which is 200 over my daily goal, and I also figured out a lot of tangential world-building stuff, as well as a few outlines and basic ideas. I now know which order her cases need to go in, how they hitch together to build the overall story arc, how big her class size is-- yes, this is important-- and who's in it. Oh, and working out the magic system. Which I always have a love/hate relationship with. It's so hard, yet I find it really interesting.

I also invented an awesome, awesome name for a side character. Can he have his own novel please please please? I kid you not about this awesome name. Sigh.

On chapter fourteen in The Guide to Writing Fantasy and Science Fiction. It's still pretty awesome, though the writing, at least, makes it seem as if the writer thinks that fantasy is a boy's world. Which hasn't been true for at least thirty years. Also, every time there is an opportunity to have a "victim" character be referred to be a female pronoun, he does it. The feminist in me rages and shakes her fist; the optimist in me says quietly, "Maybe he didn't mean it that way...."; and the pessimist agrees with the feminist and adds, "And the fact that he might not have meant to do it is more frightening. Latent sexism is the worst."

Sigh. Too many classes in feminist theory. I'm starting to feel oppressed all the time. >_<

YA Challenge: Goodies and Events

I'm freshly back from my sister's baby shower, so I was super busy since I last posted getting ready for that. Yesterday-- Saturday-- I managed to edit 2000~ words. I did, however, learn that Word 2007 has the capability of performing the Flesch-Kincaid test for readability and grade level, which I ran on Morgana Tremaine. It puts the reading level at age 12, which is perfect, and at grade 4.5. Flesch-Kincaid apparently has some issues, but it's still rather comforting.

I also received today when I got my weekend mail The Guide to Writing Fantasy and Science Fiction.

It seems pretty good so far. I'm on chapter five, so not very far in. We'll see a bit later on. The cover really turned me off, but I read an excerpt and the table of contents and all seemed well, so here's hoping. The writer seems to be laboring under the unfortunate, inaccurate assumption that fantasy is still a man's world, so I kind of want to hit him, but he's at least trying to be PC. Trying and failing, but he is trying.

Hopefully, I'll be able to get some work done tonight!

YA Challenge: Day Numero Uno

It's day one of Dora Goss' YA challenge, which means that Morgana Tremaine and I need to get our butts in gear. Yesterday, I spent quite a bit of time reworking about half of the first case, but I need to finish up on that and continue on to work on the story. I've been doing the editing in Scrivener for Windows. I'm not sure why, but the block I've had about editing it vanishes if I do it in Scrivener-- maybe just because it looks so different from Word? Scrivener isn't all it's cracked up to be, though-- I accomplish the same thing as Scrivener through a mix of Word and OneNote. I could do it all in OneNote, which is basically the same as Scrivener, and sometimes I do, but I prefer Word. One of the things I do like about Scrivener-- the ability to turn smart quotes into straight quotes with a click of a button. Why smart quotes exist I'll never know. >_<

Okay, enough Scrivener babble! Time to get cracking! I'll be updating throughout the day, just as I do in my LJ when NaNoWriMo's going on. Below is my handy-dandy progress bar for mapping my daily progress. If you'll remember, my goal is 1000 words per day of writing or 3000 of editing. I've set bars for both, so you can see what's the what.

2061 / 1000 words written. 200% done!

2765 / 3000 words edited. 92% done!

YA Challenge

Normally, I post most writing news on my Livejournal. However, since I'm currently working on a Big Bang over on that, I decided that it would probably be better to pace myself and post this here.

Ever since Dora Goss, who I met at Alpha Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Workshop in 2009, posted her YA challenge, I had been toying with the idea. I'm currently working on a YA novel (alongside two other projects, gah), so it wouldn't exactly be out my way, and I would like to think that someone is paying attention to my YA aspirations, even if they aren't.

So, here goes: from June 1st to August 31st, I will be working on Morgana Tremaine, a fantastical detective story centering on twelve-year-old Goner Tremaine. Depending on how it all goes, I want to either write at least 1000 words per day or edit 3000 words per day-- I'm a quick editor, but I do it multiple times. My goal is to ideally get the novel-- novella, theoretically, at 30,000~ words-- finished and ready to send out by the end of the summer. My first step is editing what I have written currently to prepare myself for the work come June.

I plan to utilise progress bars. I love progress bars.

Someday

It is officially my final finals week at Ithaca College, and I am, obviously, trying to make time slow down by not doing any work. So, I managed to work on my 20-page paper today, but that French history final? No. No, I haven't. I've thought about it briefly, though. That's a start.

In the interest of keeping The End from coming, I wanted to put down some of the things that I will be enjoying if I ever get a job, which I am indeed trying to do:

Number 1: Pay my rent for the month of June.
Number 2: Be able to afford internet for the month of June.
Number 3: Get a new apartment, so that I don't end up on the street.
Number 4: Get a USB hub, preferably a Tardis one. I can't keep having to switch out my external hard drive, Marvin, and my web cam every single time I want to use one instead of the other.
Number 5: Awesome clothes, books, and music. And a new computer, since my desktop keeps blue-screening.

So, cheers. I'll check back in after finals, since I have some actual projects planned. I want to read a French novel, get started on my GRE studying, and do some more vidding. I've got my Youtube channel set up now so I'm good to go. I just need time to start my internet empire.

Ukulele: First Draft of The Hanging Tree

 

My first draft of "The Hanging Tree" from Mockingjay with ukulele. My voice is dying and the playing isn't up to par because of my spinny head, but first draft. I'm trying to figure out how to incorporate a pennywhistle somehow.... I think it would suit the song. Hmm. :)

How to Study

My last college semester ever officially starts on January 24th, but I've started the work already. The massive amount of reading required for 300 and 400 level courses in English and History means that work needs to start as soon as possible, which is what I've done. I'm about half-way through the second chapter in my first book for my "The Old Regime and French Revolution" class and have started some preliminary work on my major paper for my Feminist Science Fiction class, which is especially important since I'll be presenting it at a conference.

One thing for which I'm grateful to my Magic Realism class last semester-- it finally taught me how to properly study a book. The fact that I managed to get through three years of college without that knowledge is both daunting and discouraging, but now that I finally do know, I'm getting a lot more enjoyment out of the work.

You have to own the book. Underline (not with pen or with highlighter, or I slap you in jail for book rape), straight and neatly. Also, joking aside, highlighter and dark pen lines often distract from the actual text of the book and make it hard to read. Stick in post-its with thoughts, notes, alerts, et cetera. rather than writing in the margins of the book. Bring your own experiences in: it'll help you remember later on. If your book is badly written with convoluted sentence structure, like that first "Old Regime" book is, try to write a summary after each chapter to figure out what the main point is. Studying should be careful, painstaking work. I, personally, find that fun, but I've been told that I'm strange.

My three stories for the Dell Award are out now; I should hear back in early March one way or the other. Hopefully, I win, and then I can go to Florida! Whee! I've also been given a brief note on my story in at Dark Discoveries-- it's been a year and they're not done, but hey, it's gone up a level to the editor himself! Everything is sunny on the writing front so far this year. (Though who knows what February and March will bring.)