January Brings Revision Weather

I haven't really given a full report on how National Novel Writing Month went for me way back ... gee, was that a whole month ago?

My NaNoWriMo novel, Fire On Mist Creek, topped out at 58,735 words on around November 26. I even managed to write a few hundred more words on a short story before the thirty day period was up, so all in all it went pretty darned well. Of course, as I've mentioned before, I started November 1st with a full (if messy) outline, character sketches, and other research all done.

But things happen, and I now face major rewrites. One scene is going to be replaced, a character is going to make more appearances and be more antagonistic, and another character just popped into existence in the next to last chapter and now has to be back-written into the story. I also need to add more description. One can't just spend a single month writing a story and be done with it. Well, most of us can't.

December got crazy, as December tends to do. there's still some craziness to come in January, but just the same, it'll be time to start the whole process again. Editing, polishing, submitting, promoting, tracking down agents, editors, and cheerleaders (also knows as reviewers, bloggers, and word of mouth ... mouthers), planning the new books and pushing the old ones, stuff ... things.

It's either that or go outside. In January--no contest.

This is both stuff and things.