Camping with Duffy Barkley

 I have mentioned many times how much I love the nanowrimo challenge of writing at least 50,000 words in a novel in the month of November.  It is a busy month and the challenge of reaching the word count means I don't get to edit, but rather to be as wild and uncontrolled and say anything and everything that flows through my mind.  Later comes the drudgery of editing, but each of my three novels began as a wild and uncontrolled first draft.  I write in a state near sleep, the brain freed to dream and create by the exhaustion and this allows me to see why Stephen King was on to something when he said that his pre-writing routine needs to be nearly the same as his pre-bed routine.  In fact, at times I sit at the typewriter and can not think of one word but then crawl into bed and my brain begins scrolling through scenes so quickly I never retain all of them long enough to get it written down, before, dreamlike, they evaporate.  So June and August have sessions of Nanowrimo, known as CampNaNoWriMo, when you do the same challenge, but with less forum interaction and less holiday and school activities to demand my time, you would think I'd be more successful. Not really.  Last summer I only wrote 8,000 words, but this summer I am determined to get there again.

 On June 30, I published my Double Time On the Oregon Trail and that is the finished book of one I started a long, long time ago.  1999.  In the End of this August it will be in a Goodreads book giveaway so that five people can win a paperback version between August 27 and Sept. 4, and free for five days on kindle from August 31 to Sept. 4 as well.

So I have been neglecting my friend Duffy Barkley, the young boy who is my favorite protagonist whose adventures in Uhrlin took me through bullying, school shootings, and Guatemala.  This CampNaNoWriMo, I am locking myself to the computer, even though the Olympics may be going in the background, and re-entering Duffy's adventures.  Wish me luck in keeping him alive so I can share the next journey to Uhrlin with you.