I can not believe that I am actually sitting here looking at two 70-count stacks of paper, one in a binder clip and the other in a rubberband, trying to get a feel for which one looks right.

I need a life.

For what it is worth, the rubberband looks like less work to read.

Totally rubber band. Unless otherwise specified, rubber band is the industry standard.

edited for laptop hiccoughs

No drabble topic this week?

sneaking in before the drabble topic...

So I got my NaNoWriMo reminder the other day. Has anyone done this particular event before? (I know Deb can write a book in a month, but I don't pretend to be half that good.) I'm sort of dumbstruck by the fact that it's almost November, and as such have not done any planning like I was... planning. I'm not sure that I can still do it, if I have no idea what I want to write.

Ooopsie. I'm about to run out the door to get my hair cut, but I'll post a topic when I get back. Promise!

I know Deb can write a book in a month

Not usually; just the Kinkaids.

I generally run between four and six months, which I think is reasonable enough.

I keep meaning to do NaNoWriMo, but I'm never at a beginning point for a story then--right now I'm polishing Anna and Jack's story, and what with an actual person who might buy it having shown at least a glimmer of interest, I'm not about to set it aside on Nov. 1! However, I'm making one of my 2006 goals to finish the Lucy and James re-do I'm starting Jan. 1 in time to NaNoWriMo my Waterloo story.

I'm just boggled by the thought of 50,000 words. 50,000?!? I can't even think of what kind of story idea could encompass that many words. Of course, that's probably only 200 manuscript pages or somesuch, which isn't that much, but for someone who's only done a smidgen of actual writing? Seems like Everest.

Yep, it's roughly 200 manuscript pages. It's too long to be a novella, but it's a short novel. To me, it's maybe half a novel. Jack and Anna's story is currently sitting on 108,000 words by computer count, and about 120K by the page count estimate method. I try hard to keep to around 100K because that's about the longest you can easily sell in romance these days, but one of my ambitions is to be famous and popular enough to stretch out a bit, because my natural length as a writer is around 125-150K. I just like long stories. Doorstop fantasy trilogies or 20-book series featuring the same characters make me happy (always assuming they're well-written and I care about the characters). And one of my gripes with the current state of the romance genre is that the strict length requirements make stories feel rushed, often, IMO, leaving out the emotional/intellectual growth of the relationship, making it hard for me to believe they'll really live happily together for 50-60 years.