Through friends and these boards, I know that quite a few Tucsonans are doing sequels or continuing other NaNovels they've completed in the past. This is my sixth Nanowrimo, but the first time I'll be attempting to continue an existing story.
I first wrote The Circle of Many Faces in 2004. In terms of my Nanos I think it's been my best idea, but the original version was my worst Nano in terms of word quality. I have no idea how that happened, it may have been a combination of relative immaturity (then vs now) and the breakneck pack of Nano with only a few plot events planned. I began my rewrite in October of 2007, set it aside during most of Nano and picked it back up late November. (I finished my 50,000 words pretty quickly last year and eventually finished with that concept and decided to work on other things.) I've been working on it until now, and here I am and it's almost finished.
My writing quality does tend to drop during Nano. However, this is the first year where I've really stepped things up and written continuously throughout the year; previous years it was really in spurts, but this year I have written at least 10,000 words every month and most months made it to 20,000. I am concerned that during Nanowrimo I won't be able to put out satisfactory words and will have to rewrite everything--a process I normally enjoy, but I am hoping to get some draft-quality writing out this year, something I can edit and not completely redo... but I also know that thanks to this year, my speed-writing has improved.
The other thing is, I generally don't write by outline. I like to know what's around the next corner, but I tend to plan as I go. I still don't plan to outline this one, but I'll likely need more of a bullet list of events that will occur during the novel, or at least the first 50,000 words or so. (The first novel is probably going to end up around 170,000 words when all is said, done, and edited, so I don't think I'll be finishing this book in November)
To everyone else doing a sequel or continuation: How do you deal with balancing the writing with the unique pressures of Nano, and keeping things consistent with the previous draft? I'm definitely going into this not knowing quite what to expect.
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2003 - The Long Road | 2004 - The Circle of Many Faces | 2006 - Searching for Sunset | 2007 - Souls in the City | 2008 - The Murmuring Mirrors
51,056 / 50,000
oct. 6, 2008 - 15 11
Oddly I feel no pressure this year and perhaps it is because this past year has been a lot of pressure in other areas of my life. I look forward to this year as a retreat from the rest of my challenging life at the moment. A time where I can finally focus on just one thing.
I do have a begining of an outline as to not get lost in the midst of the story which happened to me that last time I completed the challenge I ended up trashing the first attempt after 11 days into the challenge and started over again and still managed to reach 50,000 words in the new story before deadline of the challenge. This time I want a map so that I can keep on track and not have so much rewrite. I want to approach this differantly this time and see what happens.
I am like you I have spent most of this year writing consistantly so that it has now become a practice I do nearly every day. I feel NaNo has helped me a great deal in so many ways I was pretty unruly in my writing and the challenges have helped me become more of a real honest to goodness writer. It certainly has built my personal confidence in knowing I can do this I can write a book and have proved it now a few times. There has been no question as to my writing ability but putting my nose to the grindstone was a real personal challenge, one that now I have over come thanks to NaNo.
I think with NaNo too, it is important to keep it simple and fun through out, I plan to participate in more write-ins and enjoy the experience more than I ever did before. I know I can produce up to 5000 words a day so I do not feel the pressure as much and I don't get on myselve anymore if I have a bad day of writing. I just put it aside and go do something else and come back the next day refreshed again. Old dog learning new tricks..lol. Before I took it way to serious and made myself miserable the last time wasn't as bad as the first time I enjoyed it more. This time I plan to honestly treat it as my own personal writing retreat....and enjoy the experience.
65,700 / 50,000
oct. 8, 2008 - 16 46
I'm working on what I'd like to call the third season of my fantasy story. I'm at a point where I'm trying to come up with a few storylines in advance so that I don't get stalled in the middle of the month! The part of the story I stopped at was just going to be a throwaway moment, but after some major planning, it has become the most important moment ever. I just hope it gives me enough fuel to propel me through the month!
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*Co-ML for Tucson, AZ*
You see these? You see these words? These are REVLON words!
52,969 / 50,000
oct. 9, 2008 - 10 55
balancing and pressures: Three hours on current novel; three hours on NaNo. or vice versa depending on inspiration. Last year's NaNo resulted in a novel that is being edited by my senior editor (romance). Knowing that it can be done motivates me to continue. Good luck to you.
7,628 / 50,000
oct. 9, 2008 - 17 16
Not exactly. My two unfinished (or barely-started) NaNos tend to haunt me sometimes. I couldn't figure out what to write about this year, but then an idea hit me. I think it would go well with an unfinished one, as my people have been standing in one spot for nearly two years now, waiting for the next line. I couldn't move on because I didn't have a clear idea of what they saw and its significance. So they've been staring at it for two years! But I think my idea will work. I'll just have to add that word count to the spread sheet as a subtraction from each day's total.
----------2007 -- Cafe & Chalk
2006 -- unnamed (IIRC) and unfinished
2005 -- unnamed (IIRC) and unfinished
2004 -- REACHED 50K ON THE FIRST TRY!!
55,289 / 50,000
oct. 14, 2008 - 07 55
This year I was originally planning to work on a sequel to last year's novel, but then another story came to me -- and right now I'm thinking I'll work on that. But after going through some files yesterday, I found two or three more other ideas for additional books involving the same characters as last year's novel, so now I'm reconsidering again. If I don't work on The Decanter next month, I'll go with one of two possible sequels.
Both of them are currently outlined as prequels. The one that requires the most work could pretty easily be revised to happen later, but the better developed one can't be. The pressure I'm feeling there is to get back and forth between last year's novel and either "prequel" to make sure there are a) no inconsistencies and b) appropriate references to past events in the first-written but later-happening story. So I'd have to be rewriting bits of last year's at the same time I'd be writing the prequel this year.
That in itself wouldn't be too big a deal -- but, and check this out, I'm "complaining" about potential good news -- an editor has asked to see a synopsis and the first three chapters of the one I drafted last year, and I need to get that material to her before the end of November. Soooo ... the pressure would be to guess (correctly) what references to the prequel story would suffice, and put them into the completed novel .... And I think that's too much pressure, so I'm probably going to go with an unrelated novel this year, and work on the prequel/sequel stuff later. It'll be "pressure" enough to try a new genre this year!
Ashleen (hoping to make more sense next month than I'm making now)
----------meet me at www.AshleenOGaea.com
12,919 / 50,000
oct. 19, 2008 - 08 26
I think mostly what stresses me out about writing a sequel (a third, even) is making sure everything stays continuous. Every time I write one of these, I get more, add more, and I'm thankful nothing has been published so that I can go back and fix the other ones.
Good notes would probably be in order, if I was organized like that.
----------http://www.ameliajune.net
2005--Triple X (winner)::2006--Waking Kiara (winner)::2007--Maya's Web (winner)::2008--Seducing Seshat
50,021 / 50,000
oct. 26, 2008 - 17 02
Last year's novel Kasumi is rather parallel to this one, although The Tragedy of Victory starts earlier and will likely end around the middle of Kasumi. I tend to think of TTOV as a sequel to Kasumi, but it isn't really.
Luckily my main character is different so changes can somewhat be ascribed to viewpoint. Funny thing though, my views of Kasumi's house changed drastically about 2 months ago so descriptions will need an updating.
The pressure part comes in for me in that this is the darker side of the over arching plot in Kasumi, and I don't write dark (or action) well. Oh and I'm now working full time (which ads up to about 5 hours per week more work and about an hour each day more travel time than last year), which makes me a little nervous about time.