It’s July 1st, and while I have a second novel in the works, I decided to take a quick time out to work on a new story for this month’s writing challenge. Camp NaNoWriMo is a mid-year competition (against no one but myself) with a 50,000-word goal. That means I have to write at least 1,667 words daily or play catch up on days I don’t write.
Check back for updates, word counts, and story info.
July 1 - Okay, let’s do this. Got a new story brewing and 50,000 words ahead of me. Will this story make it that far? Who knows. Got a few scenes in my head, got my two main characters ready to get spicy, and a thin plot. These updates will be brief (honestly I should count them toward my daily word count, but I think that’s kinda cheating). Goal is to write, not self-edit, and hopefully, by the end of July, have some sort of short story or novel. So, basic plot - story opens with our hero following his mark. He’s only called in when sh** might go down, and he’s in some sort of trouble with the boss. The heroine knows she’s being followed, tries to give the mercenary the slip, but he catches up with her. Little does he know, she actually gets the drop on him. Hero mentions the name of someone she knows (the person that sent for her), but the two are interrupted by actual mercenaries. WORD COUNT: 2,205
July 2 - After a full day of running around, I finally sat down around 6 pm to write. I have a nasty habit, even when I know I shouldn’t during NaNoWriMo…I must edit. While rereading the work I did the day before, I often find ways to enhance what I had written. Sometimes this means cutting out some stuff, but I try to keep it to a minimum, like a word or two here and there. However, today I ended up adding more than I deleted. So yay me! Now that the two main characters have evaded some bad guys, they’re getting to know one another — but barely. Both are hesitant to share too much info about themselves. All we learn is that he has a nickname, and she knows the guy that sent him to get her. I attempted a lot of witty banter in this next scene, because they’re basically hiding out in an apartment until it’s safe for them to travel. WORD COUNT: 3,359
July 3 - There’s a song that goes “mama said there’d be days like this” by the Shirelles and today was one of those days. No actual writing got done — between finishing a book I was reading (City of Ashes) and starting a new one (Once Upon a Time in Hollywood), catching up on laundry, running a few errands, and watching a terrific movie (The Tomorrow War, see above pic), it’s now too late in the day for me to get anything of substance on the page. I did, however, do some outlining this morning while I was making breakfast. And I am counting every one of those 186 words. The beginning of my story has our two characters getting to know one another while on the run together. I think one of the best movies out there that portrays a similar situation is (another movie I watched today) called The Electric Horseman. Although very little happens to them once they’re on the run, the chemistry between Redford and Fonda is palpable even though they come from two different worlds. My characters come from a similar world, but one of them has been hiding out from that world, while the other wants to leave it. Outlining is something I wish I did more of, but when competing in NaNoWriMo I’ve found that just writing by the seat of my pants offers me some freedoms. Still, it’s a good exercise for when I get stuck, and boy, am I about to get stuck. I literally typed “hilarity ensues” just to jump to the next scene with the hope to fill in the gaps later. Tomorrow, I hope those gaps come easily. WORD COUNT: 3,545
July 4 - This is always one of my favorite holidays. As I am known to tell people, a holiday where there’s no stress about gift giving is right up my alley. And it’s all about food. Speaking of which, there’s a funny moment in the story where our heroine insists on returning to her apartment for a few things she wanted and as it turns out it’s food out of her fridge. This girl has priorities! But our hero is none too pleased with this. He’s working really hard not to ask her too many questions, but when she drops a bomb on him (they must make a pit stop before she is delivered to the man who hired the hero), our hero is faced with a tough decision. I’ve made a choice to not reveal too much info while telling this story. At this point, we know names, we know the hero is some kind of mercenary and that the heroine has been in hiding for quite some time. Oh, and I worked on creating some fireworks between my hero and heroine…get it, LOL. The heroine gives the hero the slip. WORD COUNT: 6,465
July 5 - Am I the only one with a fascination for abandoned locations? I’m talking malls, schools, hospitals, and in today’s research for my Camp NaNoWriMo work-in-progress, factories. I think my obsession has something to do with the video games I like to play - Silent Hill, Resident Evil, pretty much anything zombie or apocalypse-related. In today’s scene, our heroine has tried to give our hero the slip but is confronted by some not-so-nice men. Our hero is able to rescue her, but she also plays a part in dispensing with the bad guys. Although our hero is miffed by her action, he can’t refuse helping her retrieve something that will allow her the chance to finally live a normal life — something he’s been contemplating since his last job went south. This evidence that she’s been hiding is buried in the lot of an abandoned factory, hence the picture above that helped me write some of the scenery. But the bad guys are not done with our hero and heroine just yet, and when the hero comes head-to-head with them, he gets hurt. Incidentally, while I would call myself a writer of romantic suspence, I’ve never written this much suspense in any of my stories. I’m currently writing quick chapters that contain quite a bit of action and cliff hangers to the next scene. It’s exciting and is helping me push forward. WORD COUNT: 8,556
July 6 - Today I’m celebrating my hubby’s birthday. While he’s out seeing his mom, who shares a birthday with him, I’m getting some writing done. In today’s scene, our hero has been hurt — bad. And he has to trust the heroine to help him. Let me tell you, if anyone ever pulled my search history, today would send up some red flags, LOL. Gunshot graze, treating and dressing a wound, and cheap motels were all in the search bar today. This scene took up a lot of the words for today because I had to get our hero and heroine on the road, to a drugstore for supplies, and to a middle-of-nowhere rest stop so she could treat his wound. There may also be a “oh hey look he’s shirtless and is that a six pack” moment or two that got written today. But I digress. WORD COUNT: 10,099
July 7 - I’m obsessed with pirates. Maybe it’s an influence from my dad being in the Navy, or my love of the water, but give me a good pirate movie or TV show, and I’m in heaven. We recently finished the series called Black Sails (I was in love with Charles Vane, go ahead, google him, I’ll wait…) and I miss it. I miss it so much, I jumped at the opportunity to rewatch the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, and tonight we popped in the second movie in the series. This is also why I didn’t get a lot of writing done today. Our heroine is patching up our hero in the current scene, but I had to stop when he woke up the next morning. Will have to make up for the word count tomorrow. WORD COUNT: 10,425
July 8 - One of my favorite parts of writing is research. My story’s hero is called The Wolf in his line of work…not to be confused with Winston Wolfe in Pulp Fiction (btw, I love Tarantino’s movies if you haven’t figured it out yet). The Wolf is obviously his nickname/codename and I figured I better find him a wolf tattoo (see above), so I did some googling. I will share what these characters look like, but in the meantime, here’s where we are — we learn the heroine spent the last few years working in a free clinic where she’s picked up a few skills. She stitches the hero’s wound but she’s also plied him with cheap tequila to numb the pain. The next morning when the hero wakes up, he’s not only sore and hungover, he’s not wearing his pants. Oh boy! He’s also feeling pretty worse for wear and as much as he wants them to hit the road, he realizes — after the heroine tells him repeatedly— that he might need to rest. They’ve been in a cheap motel room for the last fourteen hours, and when the heroine goes to pay for an additional night, she finds the person behind the front desk is dead. And they’re on the run again. Now, I don’t want to give away too much of the story, but let’s just say this is a theme that runs throughout the story while they get to know one another. I do foresee them getting to their destination eventually, but that’s when a whole different set of problems will arise. Writing daily can be a challenge. I have gone months without writing because while I know I need to make the time for it, I always find excuses. It’s akin to joining a gym to get in shape and never getting on a treadmill. You have to do the work, or you won’t see the results. The great thing about NaNoWoriMo is the obligation you feel to stay on track. In essence, you only need to write about 1,667 words in a day. It may seem like a lot, but it’s not. This whole entry is about 350 words, it doesn’t seem like much when you look at it. 1,600+ words doesn’t cover a lot of ground in a story but if I’m really into the scene, I can usually surpass that goal. In the meantime, I’m pretty happy that I’m keeping up with (if not ahead of) my word count goals for the day. WORD COUNT: 12,749
July 9 - This is where I get stuck. I know where my characters end up, I just don’t know how to get them there. I have two hours to figure it out and add a little over 1500 words. Pray for me. Was back at it after dinner. Characters are on the open road, being chased down by, you guess it, more bad guys. I hit a proverbial speed bump on what happens next so I decided to jump ahead and get them to their next checkpoint. They end up on the doorsteps of a family member. But here’s the challenge…we just came back from dinner, we’re stuffed, and I could sleep. I’m only 360 words short of today’s goal, but I’ll take the win. WORD COUNT: 14,157
July 10 - Ten days down! It would be so easy for me to procrastinate — it is the weekend, after all and I have things to do— but the weekend is also when I get most of my writing done. So, you’re asking, what’s with the burger? I know, looks delish. In a way, it’s the key to understanding our heroine. Now that they’ve taken refuge with the hero’s uncle, it’s time for them to lay their cards out on the table. This should get interesting since they both want very similar things. My search engine is filled with research now on what evidence our heroine could have that would send her into hiding for the last several years. I’m thinking it involves a crime boss and someone on the inside of the organization she had worked for. The same organization the hero works for now. Open to ideas…WORD COUNT: 16,187
July 11 - Time to reveal how I see our hero. If you’re a fan of Better Call Saul, you might recognize the actor who plays Nacho Varga. He’s ultimately a bad guy in the show, but you end up sympathizing with his character’s struggles. And oh my, is he easy on the eyes. To say that I’ve done my research on him would be an understatement and while we’re anxious for the last season of BCS to air, we have to wait a whole year (argh). So, a little bit about the hero. He works for an underground government agency, he’s around thirty, and he’s hit a wall with his life. He’s good at what he does, and he doesn’t know what else he would do if he left the organization, but he thinks he wants out. The last decade, after he was recruited out of the Marines, he lost touch with his family. He’s leveraging his uncle in the current scene I’m working on, staying in the apartment over his uncle’s bar with the heroine. The heroine understands the hero’s struggle having worked for the same agency. And although she’s been in hiding, she wonders if going back to the agency will just be a different type of captivity. My characters have a lot of inner turmoil going on which will feed into their attraction. As much as I want to “get them together,” they’ve only been around each other for a little over 24 hours. Probably too soon for them to have real feelings for each other or act on it…but they will eventually. Okay, maybe they have “a moment” in the current scene. But it’s quickly extinguished (*fans face). WORD COUNT: 17,789
July 12 - If there’s one thing I’m not short on, it’s reference books. I’ve had The Writer’s Complete Crime Reference Book for almost 20 years and hope to find it handy. Books like this really help me with ideas and my current WIP (work-in-progress) is getting to the point where I need to make some decisions. Why has my heroine been in hiding for so long? What does she possess that could bring down a crime/drug lord? Why has she waited so long to come forth and what could happen when she does? I’ve been doing a lot of research on cartel activity and I found an interesting story on an event that occurred in Allende, Mexico. The town was destroyed by a cartel, triggered by the DEA who had talked a cartel operative into to handing over trackable cellphone identification numbers for two of the cartel’s kingpins. When the men learned they’d been betrayed, they set out to exact vengeance against the snitches, their families, and anyone remotely connected to them. That was a decade ago. About a year ago, NatGeo set out to do a documentary about what had happened. Victims spoke of the ordeal, bearing great personal risk to tell their stories. That had me thinking. What if the heroine has info on something similar that happened? What if in her investigation she found out someone in her own agency was dirty? What if it was someone she had been close to? It got my wheels turning, and there’s still a lot I need to work through, but for now, I’m focused on hitting word goals. WORD COUNT: 18,990
July 13 - Time to introduce another character to the story. The hero and heroine have a plan, but of course, something has to get in their way. Enter this guy. He works with our hero, but also worked with our heroine in the past, and they may have had a relationship. Still working through the details. Anyhoo, this character catches up with them while they are on the run and the heroine needs to make a decision. Stay with the hero, who she doesn’t know but is starting to have feelings for…or go with someone she does know but doesn't think she can trust. I’ll tell you, some days trying to find the words to tell a story is like trying to wring blood from a stone. I sat in front of my screen for almost four hours and was only 524 words short of my goal. A lot of the scenes I wrote are unfinished but I started a few. Meanwhile, I’ve created a Pinterest board for the novel so I can start capturing images. WORD COUNT: 20,445
July 14 - Five years ago, I boarded a plane to the Romance Writers of America summer conference in San Diego. There I attended sessions with some of my favorite authors speaking about their craft, scored a lot of free swag and books, and spent time lounging by the pool with my hubby. The real reason I went to this event was to find out if my novel, which hadn’t even been published yet, let alone finished, had won anything in the Daphne du Maurier awards. I ended up getting second place, which was an amazing and humbling experience. It catapulted me forward to finish the novel and I finally published it earlier this year. It just goes to show you, if you stick with it, and keep writing, you can accomplish something. The memory of winning back then and the outcome of having the poster above delivered to my door today comes at a good time because I really don’t feel like writing today (other than this blog). But I’m going to work on getting my second wind after dinner, and back to the keyboard I’ll go. I’m considered posting a scene tomorrow, so stay tuned. WORD COUNT: 21,628
July 15 - Officially at the halfway point of Camp NaNoWriMo 2021. I should be at 24,195 words, I’m currently at 22,296. Just a bit under 2K short of the goal for the middle of the month. While I’ve gotten to the middle part of my story, this is often where I get stuck. I did a lot of brainstorming in the car today—where I do my best thinking—about where the rest of this story will go. I still have a lot of holes to fill in, but there are some scenes in my head that should help with that. Yesterday, I promised to share what I have written but I share it with a caveat…this is a ROUGH draft. Please enjoy this SAMPLE CHAPTER of The Wolf & I. Now, I’m off to write. WORD COUNT: 22,296
July 16 - Time to introduce another character in The Wolf & I - the heroine, Jessie. Believe it or not, this came from a hairstyles Pinterest board. I think she’s super adorable. I love finding images for my characters. Sometimes I know exactly who they look like—like Max, the hero, who I posted above—and sometimes I have an idea in mind but get further inspired while searching through images. I’m at the point in the story where my characters are really starting to care about each other, even though they’ve only been together a few days. They both have similar wants and needs, and Jessie does something for Max that is not only kind, but changes his life. WORD COUNT: 22,983
July 17 - I’m what they call a “pantser” — someone who likes to fly (write) by the seat of their pants. I’ve tried to change this behavior and become more of what they call a “plotter” because there comes a point when you kinda run out of steam or have backed yourself in a corner with your writing — you get stuck, as they say. Over the years, I’ve studied story structure and as you can imagine, there are so many books, blogs, and templates out there, it’s hard to narrow down what works best for your writing style and genre. Even if you’re not a writer, it’s interesting to understand just how screenwriters and authors plot out your favorite movies and books. Your can see how the dots connect and sometime interconnect. What happened in the first scene may come full circle in the last scene, or there may be a series of choices made by the hero that results in them getting exactly what they wanted in the first place, or failing miserably. If you are a writer, having “what happens next” laid out for you can be a great safety net for when you get stuck. About a year ago, while I was writing Tame My Racing Heart, I came across Derek Murphy from Creative Indie, who has tons of content on his site to help writers. One of my favorite tools is his one-page plot outline. It hits all of the points in the story that matter. He has an informative video on it along with free books on Amazon to get you thinking. Anyway, this morning, armed with coffee, I set out to take the 23K words I’ve written so far, and place them on the outline. While doing that, I’ve added more detail to several scenes. Tomorrow, I’ll tackle some later scenes in the story to get my word count up, but today, this has been my focus. WORD COUNT: 23,316
July 18 - It finally happened today. I had a eureka moment! I figured out the motivation behind my heroine’s quest. It took some brainstorming—which I like to do by hand on a large piece of paper. I was able to connect the dots and tah-dah. I had a lot of words to make up for today. I started with being 5,700 words behind goal. I tend to write slow, this I know about myself, and I blame my inability to keep from editing as I go. In fact, the reason I’m so behind has a lot to do with me rereading what I’ve written so far and enhancing it. But I filled in a huge hole with information that will make the next parts that I’ve written even better. WORD COUNT: 26,151
July 19 - I’ve already been putting some thought into my book’s cover image…it’s not going to be what’s shown above, but I decided to take a second and make a faux cover in the meantime. Definitely going to tie in Max’s chest tattoo (did I mention he was one?), and overall the cover will probably adhere to the typical bodice-ripper rules. If you have never heard that phrase before, google “Fabio romance book covers” and you’ll get the gist. The image above was made in Canva, a program I use quite a bit at work to make employee announcements. I discovered it when I was creating ads for my novel that came out this year and now I swear I see commercials for it everywhere. I love playing with the program, because I’m so not a designer, but I can pretend to be one using it. As the month gets closer to its end, I’m about 4,500 words behind schedule. So off I go. Final count? Got an additional 1500 words in today. WORD COUNT: 27,699
July 20 - 10 days to go, 22,301 words to write but I have two hours ahead of me to get some work done. Added 1,455 steamy words (yeah, I’m at that point in the story). WORD COUNT: 29,154
July 21 - Sometimes, you can’t force the words no matter how hard you try. Today was one of those days. 177 is a measly number to throw up on the board but it’s 177 more words than I had yesterday. Plus, I have these delusions of grandeur that I’ll catch up over the weekend. *crosses fingers. WORD COUNT: 29,331
July 22 - The quote above sits in a frame on my desk, and is possibly one of my favorites. However, instead of adding any words this evening, I worked on the outline. I’ve gotten to the middle of my story (and maybe a bit quickly) and I’m at a loss as to how to get them to where they need to be to move toward the end. Time for a little creative brainstorming. I have a three-day weekend ahead of me where my goal is to write roughly 12-15K words. Pray for me, LOL. WORD COUNT: 29,331
July 23 - I spent the day doing precisely what one shouldn’t do when trying to reach a word count goal. I did some editing. In my defense, I spent last night working on the outline, and there were a few tweaks I needed to make for the goal, motivation, and conflict of both characters to become more accurate. While I’m happy with where things are at, I have not made any strides in adding more scenes. If anything, I have about 100 fewer words than I did yesterday. But, the weekend ahead is clear, and by then, I’ll be able to focus on the new scenes I came up with yesterday. In the meantime, part of storytelling, for me at least, is putting a soundtrack together that supports the mood. I did this for Tame My Racing Heart, and I’ve done it again for The Wolf & I. Here’s a list of songs, in no particular order:
Robert Bradley's Blackwater Surprise - “Baby”
Queens of the Stone Age - “The Way You Used To Do”
The Afghan Whigs - “Demon in Profile”
Juliet Simms - “100 Little Deaths”
The Rolling Stones - “Undercover Of The Night”
Forest Blakk - “If You Love Her”
WORD COUNT: Let’s not today, LOL.
July 24 - Best laid plans. I had intended to add to my word count these last two days but as they say, sh!t happens. I ended up editing, not writing, and while I may have reduced my total word count in the process by 364 words, I did get through editing the first half of the book. And I figured out the remainder of the story by working on the outline. Now the hard part. Add 21,033 words over the next six days - that’s 3,506 word a day for those of you keeping score. I hope to tackle the remainder of Act Two tomorrow and get a jump on Act Three, where the characters will be in even more danger than they are now, a secret will be revealed, and there will be some mixed communication that will cause these characters to break up, so to speak. Even if I don’t hit 50,000 by midnight on July 30th, I will have the lion’s share of a book written in a month. If only I had this determination and stamina year-round. WORD COUNT: 28,967
July 25 - Even on the days when I’ve felt less than inspired, when I’ve been too tired after a long day, or I’ve found myself stuck with no idea how to get characters from point A to B, I’ve sat down every day this month to write. Even if it’s been simply to churn out this blog, I’ve gotten into a habit. I know missing one day will turn into two, then a week, then months (which is how long it’s truly been since I’ve done anything substantial). Once I complete this novel (it’ll probably be 75-80K words in the end), I plan on going back to the book I had planned on working on next. Sometimes it’s just easier to work with a blank page than it is to plow through 400 pages of something you wrote that you know needs a massive overhaul. Anyway, the goal for today was to write as much as I can so I can hit the 50k mark by Friday night at midnight. I chipped away another 4,729 words! WORD COUNT: 33,696
July 26 - For most of us writers, we have a routine. Coffee in, power up, write. Or the sun is down, everyone’s been fed, write. Some write at home, in an office with a closed door, or they sit in their favorite chair. Some go to a coffee house or the library. I’m not one to write outside in public. I find outside the house can be too distracting — Oh, what’s that person doing? Should I get a refill on my latte? Is anyone looking at me? For most of my life, I’ve written at home, at a desk in my bedroom or home office. This month, I changed things up a bit and have been writing at the kitchen island. And while this is barely outside the norm of my usual setting, I’ve been fairly productive. Well, today threw a monkey wrench in my plans. As I sit in a hospital room with my dad, who may need a possible hip replacement, I’ve been trying to do some writing while he sleeps. I won’t get in the 3,000 words I’d hoped to bang out, but I did my best. Today’s scene involved the characters trying to gather evidence on the cartel only to be attacked and forced to run again. A secret is finally revealed about the heroine and the hero struggles with how he feels about her. WORD COUNT: 35,201
July 27 - Heading into the final few days and as life throws me a few curve balls, I’m highly doubtful I’ll hit my 50,000 gal. However, I’m gonna come pretty damn close. And, I have the majority of the story written with the unwritten scenes on deck. I’ll definitely keep writing into August because I’m anxious to get these two characters their happy ever after. In case I haven’t already mentioned it, the hero works for a government agency and in a recent scene, he’s discovered the secret our heroine has been hiding. In her defense, she was getting closer to the hero and knew the truth would ruin whatever is going on between them. Despite finding out about the secret, the hero battles with his anger over it and his feelings for the heroine. Things are about to get even more complicated! WORD COUNT: 36,302
July 28 - Due to unforeseen circumstances, aka a wicked migraine, I didn’t write today. WORD COUNT: 36,302
July 29 - So tonight when I got home, the internet went down. It was like the freakin’ stone ages around here. I almost suggested watching a DVD! But once things were back up and running, I did bang out the rest of the scene I started two days ago. Tomorrow is the last day for Camp NaNoWriMo, and although I’m never going to hit the 50K word goal, I’m going to stick with this habit of writing daily and finishing this story. WORD COUNT: 36,602
July 30 - So, I thought it was the last day to write for Camp NaNoWriMo, but it looks like they are counting the 31st, so YAY ME! I’m 12,572 short of goal, so if I buckle down tomorrow, I can get probably bang out half of that. WORD COUNT: 37,428
July 31 - Ending the day around 5,000 words short of the goal. But as I’ve said, I’m good with that. I imagine this will be a bit longer than 50,000 words when all is said and done, but I made quite the dent this month. Not to leave you with a cliff-hanger but our hero and heroine are in love, they just won’t admit it to themselves or each other right now. They have one more big battle to fight before they see they can’t live without one another. Then it’s happily ever after. If you’ve been following along all month, thank you. If this is the first time, you’re setting eyes on this month-long blog, know that every day was an opportunity for me as I created a writing habit of consistently getting my butt in the chair. I cannot wait to finish The Wolf & I, but before I go, here’s a link to the The Wolf & I by Oh Land. One of my favorite songs. Until next time, XO. WORD COUNT: 45,000