Winning My 8th NaNoWriMo (But still only have 5 books)

Success!  I am delighted to say that I have finished the first draft of the Third Book of the Tales of Uhrlin.  Duffy Barkley doesn't get to be the star of the show as much in this book, but I had so much fun when it finally started coming together.

trying to remain organized

 When I tried to finish this book in November of 2012, I had written the two earlier Duffy Barkley books. They were different though. In spite of being started in a NaNoWriMo push, they really had been developing over several years of playing with my sons and their friends. This third book was the first attempt when my boys were men, and I had lost the companionship of the children who inspired it. Having seen them graduate from High School, I was proud of them, but uninspired to keep developing this fantasy world without being able to bounce ideas of them and have them say, "What if, this happens?"  Plus those first two books are complicated.  There are two worlds, a timeline that moves back and forth through time, characters and more characters and as the years passed, my brain struggled to hold on to the little details that help with continuity.  I know there are programs to help writers build complicated worlds and keep track of the various threads, but what worked, finally for me, was keeping a word document with my notes, a draft post from this blog with every story line color coded so I could see who had been neglected too long, and an open office file to write the actual book.  So I tried to write this in 2012, and in summer and again. There was always something jangling in my brain, tangling the threads and making me have questions I didn't know the answer to, but this time, it was like all that time had been brewing the ingredients, and aging them and when I sat down this month, my fingers raced to get where they already knew they were going.  I have to edit, re-write, and edit again, so I'm not sure when the final product will be available. But I already love this book.  Finally.

Today is the Middle Of NaNoWriMo, or 25,000 Words

Just My Books and I

Candles from my Dad and Grandma to guide my way

 Writing has changed from when I first began thinking seriously that I could write a book. Well, no, I'd been thinking I could do it since I was a toddler, but getting started, Now That was a different matter.

     I began with a blank notebook and a stack of note cards and a trip to the library to dig into the multi-volumed encyclopedia set of course. This was how I had begun writing all those required papers back in Jr. High, and High School, and at College.

    Now I sit at my computer or tap on my hand ha
eld device and when I need to answer a question I don't have to drive to the library, or even walk across the room to get a stack of notecards, and when I need to know how to describe Mr. Vesuvius in detail, I can read other people's descriptions, or see their paintings, pictures and video.

     When I started my Nano Novel I was already knowing it would be a conversation between two boys, one living in the days leading up to the 79 AD eruption of Mt. Vesuvius at Pompeii, and one living in the months before the 1980 eruption of Mr. St. Helens. But I am a Nano "Pantster" meaning I don't outline ahead of time, but take my characters and a faint idea and we jump off the Nov. 1st cliff and fly by the seat of our pants toward the goal.

     So I have spent some time writing, alternating with time on Google earth seeing street view and satellite views of the volcanoes. I have watched you-tube video of kids snowshoeing on Mt St Helens and of a determined old man who died because he wouldn't be evacuated since he was a Mile and a huge forest say from the volcano and his mountain wouldn't hurt him.

     Then I have taken every day at work, and grabbed a scratch piece of paper and on every break and lunch time, written or sketched in my novel. So some editing happens there, when I type from a pencilled written piece first, but editing is not supposed to slow down the passionate rush of story this month.  Oh, and neither is blogging.  Oooooopsy daisy.

My sons loved the same picture book I did
Look Out for Pirates
So I made them a poster with their faces

My life has been filled with books, and it started with these, the kids picture books that were always abundant in our house even when we were low on money for almost everything else. On the wall is the quilt from my crib that my grandmother made for me.

You may have tangible wealth untold;
Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold.
Richer than I you can never be
I had a Mother who read to me.
  --Strickland GillianOr 

Reading and Writing are Woven Through My Life

When I try to recall the various times and places and people who were important to me, I find that they are often linked in my mind to the books we shared, or the ones that I was reading while I was there.  Even times when I was completely tunes in to the "real world" were often more real in my mind, thanks to being able to compare and contrast them to the stories of other times and places.

My first memories are of sitting on my Mom or Grandma's lap and begging for "Chicken Little" again and again, or reaching out to poke the newspaper while balanced on one of Dad's knees at the breakfast table.

Reading to my guys began when they were born and a dozen years later they still love a good story

 I remember first Grade with books written in the strange phonics of ITA, where my Clifford, The Big Red Dog had Book spelled bwk and school was skwl.
I did not have social skills for dealing with people my own age.  Until I started school, I was surrounded with great grandparents and Great aunts and uncles and could easily talk to people in their 80's and 90's - but 5 or 6!!! No.

So reading became my refuge, hiding behind a book allowed me to escape eye contact and gave me experience and "friends" and practice at the things kids did and thought until I could finally leave Nancy Drew or Trixie Belden on the shelf and talk to flesh and blood friends too.

Hooked my son on Star Wars Novels and his first poem was about Star Wars

This freckle faced "Me" loved books

May be why glasses became essential in 4th grade and by this 10th grade shot no-one could imagine me without them

Even when I came out from behind the book, I used books as a way to connect to people.  I wrote my own stories and gained in confidence as people asked to see what I was writing and actually asked for more.  ARound 8th and 9th grade I discovered the other readers in my school, and we shared our passion for the best books by adding our name to the library waiting list.  I remember some of the most popular books were scary. I was thinking that Hunger Games was too twisted for Jr. High kids until I remembered that, that is when we were devouring, Flowers In the Attic, Carrie, Jaws, and The Exorcist.  Of course we also loved less scary books and The Outsiders and The  Once and Future King were big too.

I think I loved this dress due to Laura Ingalls

Freshman year of college, I really began writing poetry and met my husband.  He loved reading too, and we share a literature book from that year with several favorites, including, "A Rose For Miss Emily" and "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"  We wrote a lot that year but looking at my poems I see that they are less poetry and more a journal of the hormonal teenager who has found her "soul mate."

and my husband loved Dr. Doolittle so the animals also came thanks to books

We ended up having a house full of books, two sons, and at one time, a dozen parrots, 2 cats and 2 greyhounds.  The craziness often drove us to taking long road trips, where, instead of reading, we would listen to books on tape, and that is how I shared the first 4 Harry Potter books with boys who were too young to read them themselves.  Later the books were devoured by the boys on their own, but I miss those family drives with the story shared between us.

Going to See Writer, Timothy Zahn was a family Treat

Finally I got brave enough to publish my own fantasy novels, and they have slowly been making their way into the wider world, but not even the thrill of holding my first printed book can equal the feeling of having my family hanging on as I read aloud from 280 typewritten pages, and they were just as involved as when I was reading, "a real book" to them.

Thrilled to hold my first book in proof

Still Thrilled with two novels in print

 Still, I wondered, what leads from reading other peoples stories to needing to create my own?  My first "job" was helping my Grandpa, tan rabbit hides and mount them on fiberglass forms, with glass eyes and deer antlers.  I sold those, "Jack-a-lopes" to the tourists along with richly detailed stories of the life and habits of the critters.  I think that is when I became hooked on having an audience and knowing that my words had the power to make someone wait for the next one, or pull out their money, or laugh, just laugh.

Posing my Anne Geddes Sunflower baby in my Yard

Judy, my first and most faithful best friend

Oh Give Me a Home

Every game I made up for my dolls and my 2 younger brothers, every story I acted out to my classroom or told to my sons, drew me deeper into the part of me that finds reality best felt against the backdrop of creative storytelling.  I can feel pain and sorrow when a friend dies, but survive it a little easier because I've experienced it in a slightly more removed manner first, when reading Old Yeller and Where the Red Fern Grows.

Back to My Oregon Trail Novel

 Back on August 3rd, I wrote a post about getting into Pottermore as a Beta Tester and about the other activities of the summer, including the challenge to write a novel in a month on CampNaNoWriMo.  I posted the prologue to the book I am working on, tentatively titled, Double Time On the Oregon Trail.  I am aiming the book at the middle grades and it is a time travel story almost, the two 15 year old girls, traveling the Oregon Train 150 years apart, do not actually time travel, but they do both own the same lap desk, and sometimes when they open it, what they find is what the other girl had in it at that location, a journal and other items.

The girls are traveling similar routes. Kenyon is in a Dodge Caravan with her Dad and younger sister, while her pregnant mother sells their house and flies out later to meet them.

Della is in a wagon caravan with her pregnant mother, her dad and a younger brother.  A lot of other people start in the caravan, but several twists of fate leave their numbers less as time passes.

Writing this has been fun and is not as far from completion as when August began, but it didn't finish in the month of camp.  I make no excuses, but do admit that I like reading the research a little more than necessary. 

 

 It is very different from the two novels I have published about Duffy Barkley, which are purely based on fantasy and my own life experiences and so flow, uninterrupted by fact checking except for trying to maintain consistency from one book to the next as far as spelling and place names.

On Aug. 3rd I gave you the prologue about why the lap desk was special.  Today I will share what I wrote for Chapter 1

Chapter One – Kenyon

     “Dear Diary,

     OK, that sounds a bit stupid but how else am I supposed to start off with one of these things.  I’m not going to start naming you like Ann Frank did.  You’re no “Kitty” but I can see the appeal in believing that these words will be written to someone, anyone at all.  No one in my real life seems to be hearing a thing that I have to say.  OK!  That does sound like whining but nobody cares what I want or how I feel.  They are the grown-ups and they get to make all the decisions and I’m supposed to just smile and kiss all my friends good-by without one small word of resentment.”

     The pen dug in so sharply as it underlined the two words that the paper was sliced cleanly right through.

     Fifteen year old Kenyon glanced up from her refuge in the very back seat of the Dodge Caravan.  She was the farthest she could get from her Father in the driver’s seat and still be in the van.  In her lap she cradled a simple box of dark, weathered wood.  Resting on the sloping surface of the box was a blank book with rich, creamy pages.  Snoring gently beside her was a smaller version of herself, a five year old girl with matching, tanned skin and dark brown hair.  Kenyon returned to the words she was writing on the first page of the blank book.

     “I’m not usually such a grouch, but my whole, entire life is being destroyed and I am not only expected to let it happen, I actually have to pitch in and help it happen!  I am supposed to be starting my sophomore year with my friends, not that I’m super popularity girl or anything but I do have friends and they all go to the same school, My School, and it’s going to be a great year except I won’t be there.  I’m here!  I’m driving across the whole, boring country with my dictator Dad and my bratty sister and I have to be responsible for the brat so that Dad can relax after driving all day.  He could at least have let me get my learner’s permit so I could be driving too, but no, he wants to wait for me to have lessons when we don’t have a trailer to pull.  He tells me to grow-up all the time but tries to keep me his little girl at the same time. 

     “Speaking of little girls, what I have to do is babysit her through the evenings at different motel swimming pools and keep her entertained for long, hot, boring days in this old van.  She’s such a baby!  The trouble is that soon she won’t even be the baby of the family!  If Mom wasn’t pregnant she would be driving out with me and ‘lissa instead of staying home to finalize the sale of our house.  Dad could do that, but this way will be easier on her, so Dad and I find the new house in Oregon, and move things in and do all the hard work, then Mom just walks out our old door, flies to Oregon in like, half a day, and walks into the house we’ve gotten ready for her.”

     Kenyon turned the page in the book and twisted her pen between her fingers as she thought about the unfairness of her life.  It was a beautiful pen, expensive because of the squishy soft grip and the polished malachite casing.  The pen and lap desk had been a gift from Grandpa Walt.  She loved the aged wooden desk and the cool gleaming green stone of the pen like the aged brown of his skin and the gleaming green water of the river where he took her to skip stones, watch snapping turtles and gather honeysuckle.  The thought of him made her eyes burn with unshed tears and her throat feel tight.  She probably could guess he’d be at a Pirates game about now – something she might never do again!  She slid off the lid of the desk and idly sifted through contents she already knew by heart; thick creamy paper, rich with the perfume of the dried honeysuckle tucked between the stiff sheets and starting to absorb the scent of cedar from the box, envelopes, a small spiral notebook with black pages, a supply of pale gel pens, a calling card, a small mirror, pens and pencils, a pirate pennant, and a pink Swiss army knife.  There was also postage stamps and a Kennywood address book, the picture of raging rapids on the cover made her smile wistfully.  The entire box was made without a nail anywhere, smoothly joined by an expert craftsman.  Grandpa said it was probably old, maybe even a hundred years or more.  She slid the lid back into place and resumed writing.

     “Grandpa Walt would say I’m pouting.  I guess I am, but missing him is one of the things I’m pouting about.  I know he loves me and I love him so much.  He says he’ll call and talk to me every weekend and fly out to spend a week in Oregon at Christmas, but then he’ll go home to Pittsburgh and I’ll still be missing him!”

     The hot weight of her kid sister sleeping against her became unbearable, “Lissa, Get off me!  You’re sweaty.”

     “Lissa, I mean it – Move.  Wake up brat.”

     “Ung!  Kenny, stop shoving me.  Hey, read your book to me.”

     “No, Go back to sleep, just not on me.”

     “Read to me.”  The demand in her younger sister’s voice took a second to register in Kenyon’s mind.  She turned to see the small girl gazing at her with a sleepy pout.  “Read what you’re writing Kenny.”

     Kenyon snapped hr journal shut.  “No, ouch!  You made me drop my pen.  Now I have to unbuckle my seatbelt and you’re laying on the buckle.  Shove over.”

     “Read or I’ll tell Dad.  You’re supposed to entertain me.”

     Kenyon snatched up her pen and hastily stuffed it back in the lap desk and slid the desk beneath her seat.  “No way, Melissa.  Don’t pull my hair.”

     “I didn’t mean to pull your hair.  I was just sitting up.  You told me to move.  You don’t even love me.  You’d love to be an only child!  Let me see!”

     “Ouch, KENYON!”

   From the front seat, Dad called, “Kenyon, stop picking on your little sister.”

     “Don’t touch my journal, ever!  Wait.  Are you sure you aren’t still sleepy?  We’ll get there faster if you sleep.”

     “Get where?”

     “Dad’s looking for a market so we can get oil for the car and cold drinks for us.”

     “You sleep Kenyon.  Then I’ll get there faster.  NO, Don’t sleep read your journal and we’ll still get there faster.  Did you write about me and how we’ll swim every night?”

      She knew that Melissa would become even more determined if she was flatly refused.  “Really, it’s just boring old stuff I was writing while I was waiting for you to wake up.  I can’t wait to find out if Templeton breaks the egg.  I want to read more about Charlotte.  I’m having a hard time waiting but I didn’t want to peek ahead while you were sleeping.”

    “I’d kill you!  You can’t ever read Charlotte’s Web if I’m asleep!”

     Kenyon forced her eyes to look wide and innocent as she shrugged apologetically,  “I just wrote.”

     “Well, that yucky, boring stuff is OK when I’m asleep but never read ahead without me.  I’m ready now.”  Melissa turned imploring eyes upon her big sister and the journal was forgotten.

Often I just write for myself, because there is a part of me that is most myself when spinning stories, but this time especially I am curios about feedback and your comments would make me smile, even if you hate it, just to know someone cares enough to respond.

Thanks for taking the time to look.


Dixie

Goodreads giveaway

Caesar, a green wing macaw

 I have not written here this last couple of weeks as I planned.  There has been a death in the family, as I write about at my other blog, Echo's Voice.

Yet I wanted to share  that I am giving away 5 sets of my Duffy Barkley Novels through Goodreads.com and I wanted you to have a chance to enter before the contest ends on August 27th

http://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/13266-duffy-barkley-seek-well-tales-of-uhrlin-book-2

 So I am posting the link and some of my pictures and calling that good enough this time.  The pictures are from my home area or from a trip to Guatemala that is featured in the second book, Duffy Barkley: Seek Well

Blind man's bluff in Guatemala

My brother and I in Guatemala

Smith River, CA

Jed Smith State Park

My son's puppy was wore out playing at the river

Patrick's Creek

Cold enough to take your breath, warm enough to stay in for hours

Ever Green

Sunset from my Porch

Enjoy the end of summer, and I'll be back soon.