November is with us again, the month in which hundreds of
thousands of people each year turn their backs to orange-coloured October and
sink all their free mental capacity into the writing of a fifty thousand word
story. I’m talking about National Novel Writing Month, of course: a cocoon-like
period of time out of which one emerges bleary-eyed and startled to find that
Christmas has somehow arrived. I started
in 2006 and I’ve only missed the finish line once since then. Actually, last
year I was ten thousand words short by 30 November, but I did at least go on to
finish that title and ‘AFK, Again’ – my fifth novel set in Second Life® – hit
my virtual bookstore in March of this year. That’s a plug, by the way. You can
buy it.
Sunday 3 November 2013
Saturday 2 November 2013
NaNoWriMo 2013 kicks off
And we're off...
Having said previously to quite a number of people that I wouldn't write a sequel to AFK, last year I wrote a sequel to AFK. I enjoyed doing this way more than I expected and so this year I'm going to write during NaNoWriMo a third novel in the series. It's pure indulgence on my part, but then what is writing if indulgence doesn't figure anywhere?
Here is the opening section.
Having said previously to quite a number of people that I wouldn't write a sequel to AFK, last year I wrote a sequel to AFK. I enjoyed doing this way more than I expected and so this year I'm going to write during NaNoWriMo a third novel in the series. It's pure indulgence on my part, but then what is writing if indulgence doesn't figure anywhere?
Here is the opening section.
“Got
you,” said Inch Sideways, as she left.
In a way, you could say that it was Inch
who turned me into a murderer in the first place. I mean, it’s not like I’d
even contemplated killing anyone before I met her, aside from the occasional (and
entirely understandable) desire to slaughter in cold blood the odd politician
here and there. And it’s hardly the case
that, having done the deed once, I would go on to murder again. I like to think
that I’m no more likely to kill a second person than anyone I pass on the
street is likely to kill their first.