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I've been working hard on some nice cover art for the first edition of Sole Survivors, and I thought it'd be cool to put them up. I haven't yet decided what I want to do exactly as far as the cover goes, but I really like the last one on the list.

There's a new section, Art and Miscellaneous for these such things so that I don't have to keep posting them on this part of the site. I'll post any updates that happen in there in this blog.

I haven't done any actual editing yet, but I do plan on getting busy with it after I finish writing my final essays. I've got a lot due Monday and Tuesday, and I don't want to screw those up.

The closer I get to the ending, the less I want to write it. It's not that the ending is going to suck or anything, nor that I don't want to write it, but I'm afraid of finishing this story. This is a common problem with me when I write. I spend days upon days, sometimes months (and even a full year on one) writing novels, and after all that hard work, they need to eventually come to a satisfying close.

But here's the bigger problem with "Sole Survivors": It's not part of a series. See, I've been writing a book series called "The IUF Chronicles" that pretty much goes on forever and will end whenever I get bored with it. When I finish writing the draft of one novel, I get started on the next. I can't do that this time because I have no intentions of writing a sequel.

The good news is that I had an incredible dream last night that inspired another story. The main character in my dream was me, but I'll be changing that. What happened was I was walking through a park when someone called out my name. I looked around and saw nobody I knew, so I figured that someone else in the park shared my name. Then I heard it again, this time much, much closer to me. I looked in the direction of the voice and saw just a tree. But something in it came down, and it freaked me out. It was this ugly pod with all these holes and spider webs all over it, and it slowly turned around. It was speaking to me. When it had my attention, it just said "keep your back against the wall." I looked around and saw some buildings, and it was at this point that I realized I was near a river. There were a bunch of people leaning against this big building, all staring out at the river.

I ran to the wall and put my back against it, and the other people asked if I had heard the pod speak. Suddenly, these ghost-like people started swarming all over the water, but nobody on the beach besides us against the wall seemed to notice anything. The ghosts started doing something to the water, like making these huge splashes in and out of it, and soon giant chunks of rocks and water came crashing toward us. I shouted "keep your backs against the wall!" to keep the people against the wall, but as the giant rocks came at us, some of them bolted, and were crushed by them. The water pushed us hard against the wall, and rocks started smashing some of the people next to me, but when it was all over, a few people and I were still alive, and the riverbank was completely devoid of all the people who were just there.

I have no idea what this story would be about exactly, but there was more to it than just that. I guess it would be about these creepy looking tree pods that talk to people and get them to do things. There was another part of the dream when I was going into a theater with my family, and a tree pod came down and told me that I had to do something illegal, but not so bad that I couldn't get away with it without apologizing. Knowing that the pod had saved my life once before, I went into the theater, found an old lady, and punched her in the shoulder, and immediately began apologizing. She was confused, but forgave me.

I tried looking up the tree pods on Google, hoping I might find whatever it was that I saw in the first place that might have inspired the pods in my dream, but there wasn't really anything close to it. I'll try drawing it, but my artistic skills are rather poor, but hopefully I can give some idea as to what they look like.

This is the same post I made on the main site.

At 10:33 PM on November 21, 2005, I wrote the 50,000th word of my NaNoWriMo novel "Sole Survivors". I wanted the word to be epic, but it ended up being "the".

There's still a bit of story left to write, but I have officially won in the eyes of the NaNoWriMo community. Here is the sentence it's in, since it doesn't give away anything in the story:

"Why would he think you needed the money?"

So I have done it, and proved to myself that I could do it. Looking back, it didn't seem so hard, but as I think about it, it really was. Balancing this with school work and the knowledge during the first half that I still had more than 20,000 words to write was no easy task. My brain was drained on some days, and I was both physically and mentally exhausted throughout week two. But the task is done, and I can relax.

Please don't let this discourage you if you've fallen behind on your word count. There are still nine days left, so don't give up. Besides, my goal still isn't yet complete. The story has not been written completely yet, and there's still the editing phase afterward. Hitting the 50,000 word mark was one of many goals I made for this month.

Thanks to everyone who supported and encouraged me, and screw the rest of you who thought the idea was stupid.

I am now one hundred percent certain that I will reach 50,000 words by the end of November because I have less than 4,000 to write. With my parents gone for the night, I've had all this quiet time to just write and write and write. There's still plenty of story to write, but it's coming together pretty quickly.

So the goal now isn't just to reach 50k words, but to actually finish the first draft of the novel. I could end up at around 60,000 or more if I push myself and draw out the plot a bit more.

Unfortunately, because one of my characters forced me to do it, I had to kill off one of my favorite characters this night. I was planning on letting him live, but my female lead convinced me that he had to die. No matter how much I argued with her, she wouldn't let it go. And now, because she wanted it that way, a character has died. I made sure to make it a very emotional scene.

I'm actually pretty mad at her now because she did that to me. I already had a nice ending planned for her, so she totally took advantage of that and forced me to let her kill him. This isn't the first time a character has taken on a mind of his or her own, but it is the first time that I've actually been mad because of it. But looking back on it, she really did have a point, and it wouldn't have made much sense if I let the guy live.

The strangest thing about NaNoWriMo (beside the fact that I'm being controlled by nonexistant people) is that I keep adding to my word count in everything else I write by adding extra adjectives or sentences that aren't that necessary. All of the posts in the past few weeks have been padded with extra words that I normally wouldn't bother adding. It's incredible how you can be so attached to something that it starts spreading into the rest of your daily life.

I've also become so involved with the story that I can't watch a movie or read a book without wondering what it has to do with my plot. Today I was watching The Good Son and was worried that the kids in the movie hadn't been previously mentioned in my novel. I had to stop reading Jennifer Government because the intricate plot in that novel is hard to follow while writing mine.

I love NaNoWriMo. There were a lot of downs, but mostly ups. I've got an almost finished plot that might not have existed had I never discovered NaNoWriMo. I've created some incredible characters, all with unique personalities and backgrounds. The story has been a lot more serious than I expected, but it works. There's still a bit of comedy, and the story is always just a little off in terms of sanity. Some of it is just plain over-the-top, but if readers have half as much fun reading it as I do writing it, then I know that they will love it. It was a big risk, abandoning the science fiction realm and trying out action/drama, but I am so glad that I took the challenge.

I'm planning a reflection essay thingy that I will write and post on this site for all to read, so keep your eyes opened for that. It's just going to be babbling on about how I got started, how I did it, and what I experienced, as well as why everyone should give it a try. I'm also planning a whole new section of the main web site for some articles I've written over the past years on storytelling. I need to work out some of the issues I've been having with nucleus before I can get that section up, but once I get it fixed, it should go up pretty quickly. All of the articles are already written, they just need to be updated and posted.

My 40,000th word only had two letters. It's a preposition and it's used in a very important sentence in the story, so I can't post that sentence here.

Less than ten thousand words remain, and I've still got 11 days to go. The thought that I might have a complete first draft for my novel is exhilerating. I've been listening to some absolutely incredible music by Sigur Ros that I never heard before. I wish I had found it earlier on, but the more I think about it, the more I realize that it's good that I only discovered it now because it's perfect for the ending.

You can actually download the songs (legally, it's on their website) by going here:
http://sigur-ros.co.uk/media/index.php

I recommend all of the songs on the site, but the best ones are the following: (right-click and save as)

síðasti bærinn - This sounds like something you'd hear in a movie toward the end, when there's no dialogue, but it's very emotional. It's all violin, so if you like violin, DOWNLOAD IT. Click here

von - This is just fricken' epic. It starts off with a violin, and then this guy's voice comes in (he sounds like a woman, but it's good), and it gets really strong toward the middle. Click here

hrafnagaldur óðins [odin's raven magic] - chapter 3 - The title is really long, and so is the song itself. It starts off with a wooden xylophone, and then some strings come in, and it starts sounding like the end of a movie. It would work best with a somewhat happy ending, like after a big twist. It's better for more drawn-out plots and settings, but would also work for anything else. I really like it. Click here.

I have added the band's website to the Links page of this site, since their music has been so helpful to my writing.

I will start updating this site after December 15, maybe earlier. I will add all the links that have been helpful in the writing process, as well as a completed character profiles page. This site will then be used to post news about the status of the "Sole Survivors" project.

EDIT: I have now used the "f"-word 51 times so far, the most I have ever used in a novel, seeing as the only other novel with the word used it just once.