Monday, January 9, 2012

Revise, revise, revise. Repeat.

Happy 2012, world! Sorry for the long gap between posts, but I'm revising again. In fact, last November I pulled all the fulls I had out with agents just for this revision. I hoped to have it done by 2011 year's end, but that didn't happen. Sick kids, winter break, house guests and whatnot derailed the original schedule, but I'm definitely back on track now. Won't be posting much here until I'm done (two weeks, tops!) but here are some random things I'm currently researching for the ms.
Library stacks in a monastery in Tibet. Indian libraries in the 12th century would have been similar.

Marwari horses: An indigenous breed of war horses from Rajasthan. Notice the inward turning ear tips--they're a peculiarity of the breed.
Chabutras:Huge bird feeders found in public places in Gujarat. Would have existed in the 12th century too.

Cool, huh? :) Now back to that revision ...

Friday, November 18, 2011

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Writing unleashed - NaNoWriMo Week 2

Yogi in the woods.
Sadly, my last post proved to be a tad optimistic. I thought I was prepared for NaNoWriMo. Ha! I had no idea what was coming at me.

Here's what: The night before Halloween my son spiked a high fever. Instead of trick-or-treating he was laid up on the couch, too sick even to hand out candy. The fever didn't go down for the next few days, and then a chest x-ray finally confirmed pneumonia.

To make things worse, the Halloween noreaster dumped a foot of snow on us and knocked out cable TV, the sole solace of our sad little invalid.

And finally, the Scrivener for Windows release I was looking forward to was pushed back from Oct 31st to Nov 7th. Dang!

Between the doctor's office, the pharmacist, the making and ministering of various comfort foods, a week's worth of seventh grade schoolwork to make up at home, the other kid's schedule etc., absolutely nothing got done. Even the poor dog had to make do with hurried on-leash trots around the neighborhood. End result as far as NaNo: 800 words instead of 9000.

However, the week of misery is now at an end. Both kids are back in school. I've installed my brand new copy of Scrivener. My fellow NaNo'er Heather and I have booked a sunny study room at our town library, and managed to pound out our daily word counts. Heather even joined Yogi and me for our morning walks around Lake Waban, where Yogi romped, unleashed, in carpets of crunchy fall leaves. And the snow? That's gone too.

Hope you didn't hit any slumps in your NaNo wordcount!

Saturday, October 29, 2011

NaNoWriMo 2011

Two days to NaNoWriMo 2011!

This year I'm totally prepared. I'm buying Scrivener for Windows on Monday (They're finally launching it, according to David from Lit and Latte), and my friend Heather and I are meeting at the library every weekday from ten to one to write together.

I haven't managed to get to 50K in my previous two attempts, though I did get a lot of writing done. Maybe third time's a charm ...

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Happy Diwali!

Call it procrastination, but I spent way too much time putting together the Diwali card last night. It beats cooking, cleaning, shopping, calling up people, wrapping gifts, and all the other things I have to do for Diwali. Speaking of which, I better get back to it!
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Sunday, October 23, 2011

Scrivener for Windows

I stumbled upon the beta version of Scrivener for Windows while flailing around trying to outline the NaNo ms. I've always wanted Scrivener but, alas, don't own a mac. Everyone in the house has a macbook, except me, even the kids. So unfair. Though it's true that I'm quite fond of my battered (what IS this thing??) um, Gateway laptop, and have passed up an upgrade a time or two. Can't think of anything I envy on the mac anyway, except Scrivener. So Yay and Yippie for a windows version at long last! I love the corkboard concept already. It's perfect. And it saves me from pasting long rolls of paper on my walls like so:The only problem is that the beta runs out on November 7th. I'm not clear what exactly happens next. We're supposed to provide feedback on the beta, I think, and maybe (please, please, pleeease, Literature and Latte) they'll have a new version available for trial or sale by then!

If you want to try Scrivener for Windows get it here: http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivenerforwindows/

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Outlining for NaNoWriMo

Why is Yogi on my outline chart? Because he's cute!
I'm Nano-ing the shiny new idea this year! And for a change, I'm pretty sure about what is going to happen, and how it's going to happen, and who it's going to happen to. So, I've decided to OUTLINE before November. Having been a pantser forever, this is all new to me, but I think it'll work this time. No way of knowing until I give it a shot, so here goes.

I may even switch laptops to download Scrivener ... :)