Picowrimo - Day 1

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

At twenty past midnight local time!

Greetings all. You know what to do. You know where to do it. Go! :)

Comments

[azdak.livejournal.com]

Right, well it looks like I'm first, thanks to being in a time zone an hour ahead of the Brits and the Irish, so here we go.

I have realised, looking back over past Picos, that the ones I most enjoyed and which were most productive, were the ambitious ones when I set myself a goal of being really disciplined about writing, rather than the ones where I was gentle on myself and set a low word count. So this year I shall aim for a 1,000 words a day on The Never-Ending Story Music II (with the caveat that the word count is whatever I've got up on my screen at the end of the session - so rewriting absolutely counts, as do any new words interpolated during edits).

I don't plan to focus too much on quality at this stage. I think I've been working on this for as long as ideealisme has on White Feathers and her progress on that puts me to shame. I want to get a first draft in place, dammit, and if that means leaving in the rough edges while the plot works itself out, so be it.

In case anyone's new to the comm, Music II is original fic about the consequences of an art theft in Vienna in 1938 immediately after the Anschluss with Germany, but the parts I'm working on at the moment are set during the war, where one of the thieves has become a film star and spy for the Allies, and another is working as an "art advisor" to Ernst Kaltenbrunner, the head of the Austrian SS (a third has fled to England and is making black propaganda - radio broadcasts in German aimed at undermining German morale - and the fourth has managed to escape the gas wagons at Maly Trostinec and has gone underground).

Having said all that, I'm not actually going to start writing anything till Monday, as I'm off for a long weekend in the countryside near Salzburg, minus dogs, kids and work, and my goals for that period are to eat lots, sleep lots, read lots and go for walks whenever the weather allows. See you all on the 5th! And happy Picoing!

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

I remember Music II. The extracts seemed very taut and compelling. Good luck with completing it and have a nice holiday.

[justice-turtle.livejournal.com]

Yay, Music II! I'm really intrigued by that story. It's so big and complicated, and full of research, and definitely going somewhere. (I always bog down in research, so I admire writers who can do it well. ;D)

[forodwaith.livejournal.com]

I remember this novel, and always enjoyed your excerpts - I'm looking forward to seeing more next week. Have a nice holiday!

[saki101.livejournal.com]

I always enjoy your writing, so look forward to reading what this month brings forth! Have a great weekend!

[stevie-carroll.livejournal.com]

Good luck. I'll be very glad to see more Music II.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

I think that must have been one of the years I wasn't around. But it sounds a fascinating topic/setting.

[jenn-calaelen.livejournal.com]

1000 words a day is an impressive goal! :)

That sounds like a very interesting story!

Hope you have a nice holiday and come back full of writing energy!

[six-old-cars.livejournal.com]

What they all said :)

Enjoy your long weekend, and I shall look forward to your excerpts.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Oh good, I look forward to more of Music II. I was also enjoying the one about the girl brought up as a boy.

[kerravonsen]

Thanks to picowrimo, I didn't pike out on working on my cof_remix story today, though I was tempted to. I wrote something. Which is definitely better than nothing.

My goals for picowrimo this November (I was going to say "this year" but then I remembered we had a mid-year Pico! Which is all to the good.):

* to finish my cof_remix story, which is due on the 10th.
* at the minimum, write something every day, even if it's just one sentence.

I haven't decided what to do after the 10th. I have too many WIPs to choose from. In both good and bad news, after reading the excellent "Wired For Story" I've realized why three of my WIPs have stalled, which is good, but it also means I have to re-think and re-outline them in order to solve that problem, which is daunting. The problem with all three is that I didn't have an Issue for the protagonist to deal with, or I did have an Issue and it's already been dealt with before the rest of the plot resolved. Hence the need to re-think.

However, before I get caught up in that, I MUST work on my cof_remix story, and I don't want to get distracted from that; which is why I haven't decided what to do after the 10th. Yet.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

Good luck!

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

Well, the sad truth is, I don't feel like returning to some unfinished stuff at all. Which is why I'm so thankful to pico; it's always pico time when I gather the strength to fight the inner demon of laziness and unlust again.

In any case, I gave "Arthur's Quest" a moderate kick in the backside and came up with about half a page for Chapter 15 - which is woefully little for me, but at least I've moved the chapter from the dead point, even if only a little.

Excerpt:

“That, indeed, has been your destiny from the day on when you were born,” said the Dame Brisen slowly. ‘A destiny so burdensome and dangerous that your father backed away from it on the day he was asked to choose. That way why he warned you many times never to use your magic ring: for once you chose to wield your magic, your destiny was bound to catch up with you.”

“So be it,” answered Gilli simply. “I am a sorcerer. I’ve always been one. I was born as one. I can as well act as one.”

“But it will be dangerous,” warned him the enchantress. “The evil forged by your grandsire in very strong. You may have the strength to fight it; you may not have the strength to survive such a fight, though.”

“I know,” said Gilli, but it is my destiny. And it is better to die in a battle against evil, fulfilling my destiny, than waste my life away as the stable boy of a princess, no matter how lovely that princess is.”

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

I must say I quite disagree with Gilli, :) but I like how you present his dilemma.

Of course eventually the conflict between his vocation and the princess is going to intensify, I suspect, and he won't answer as confidently.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

Well so far today I've only deleted stuff. This is very positive for me as this bloated THING needs to lose some weight, but white space doesn't show up so well on a pico comment and yesterday's work was a bit plotty, so...here's one of the scenes near the end of the partial. Eva has managed through the most defiant plot-hole-fixing in history to land a place at an exclusive finishing school, but her friend Sybil notes that there are gaps in her education:

Inverts


"Mind you, we all know why Mr Duncan isn't married."

Eva contemplated the image of the round-faced Mr Duncan with some puzzlement.

"Well he is no Adonis, but I don't see why not. Plainer men than he have married perfectly happily."

"He's not the marrying kind, Eva."

"Not the...?"

"Oh for goodness sake," Sybil hissed, "he's an invert."

Eva shook her head, still nonplussed. "You mean he likes standing on his head?"

"Eva, Eva, Eva," Sybil said, putting an arm around her shoulders, "we need to talk."

She ushered Eva into an alcove for a moment.

Five minutes later, as they came out, Eva said, "All right, I think I understand. So an invert is a man falling in love with a man, or a woman with a woman -"

"Keep your voice down! Yes. That's it. Though it's very rare for women. Usually it's men - and please don't say it aloud about Mr Duncan, or he could go to prison. Eva, what were you told about life? We all find out somehow. My mother wasn't much use, I grant you. But I had a wonderful nanny. Told me and Bo everything."

"Bo?"

"George. My brother. Though I've never called him that and he never calls me Sybil. To him I'm Pinkie."

"I see." Eva said. [...]

"Oh, and Sybil?"

"Yes, Evie, what now?"

"You said that women knew nothing when they got married. But the men. How do they learn what to do?"

"Oh Eva, you really are like a child. Ladies of the night, of course. How else?"

[saki101.livejournal.com]

Congratulations on the plot-hole fixing!

My attention was captured immediately by this conversation. This finishing school may actually impart some information.

[paranoidangel]

My pico goals are going to be a changeable thing, as November looks like being a busy month. But I've hardly written anything for ages, so writing anything at all is partly my goal.

Also, as Yuletide is earlier this year, I intend to write some Treats. I started one last weekend and despite having opened it this week, didn't do anything on it. But with pico starting I managed to edit it this evening. It's looking better, but still needs some more editing. My goal is to get it finished by the end of the weekend.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

Good luck! And totally with you re the changeable goals!

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

Not starting writing till I've got my Yuletide assignment -- hopefully by the weekend.

[saki101.livejournal.com]

Good luck! Looking forward to hearing from you next week!

[saki101.livejournal.com]

I have committed to more than one exchange. Yes, unwise. So my goal is to fill at least one during pico and make significant progress on at least one more. We will see. There may be gnashing of teeth later.

I am still on a Sherlock phase. I have an outline of the story almost done. Despite it not all being captured in written words yet, I have started fleshing out some of the scenes. This may also be unwise. There will be much revising. In this section, Sherlock has found a wrapped package hidden in John's room and is trying to puzzle out its significance. He has already offered one hypothesis which John refuted.

***

John switched on the kettle, got out a carton of eggs. Sherlock was still buttoning his cuffs as he walked into the kitchen.

“Tea?” John asked.

“Afghanistan isn’t known for that kind of cloth,” Sherlock stated.

“No,” John replied, as he held an egg up to the light. “But it’s on the Silk Road.”

“I haven’t done anything to the eggs,” Sherlock said. “Someone there, then,” Sherlock suggested. “Serving with you.”

John lowered the egg. The sun hot on the back of his hand. John squinted from beneath it to survey the make-shift souk at the edge of the base, brilliant with silks, alive with a Babel hum.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

I love the way they go from eggs to war service without missing a beat.

I did have to re-read the line of dialogue where he does that though.

That last sentence is really evocative and beautifully written.

[stevie-carroll.livejournal.com]

I got some editing done today on the later chapters of Searching for Julia, and hopefully I'll manage to go over the final two tomorrow so as to give myself a clear run at writing a synopsis this weekend. Have a non-spoilery paragraph from today's edits:

Lifting the papers out as a block, she took them over to the big desk in case she needed to spread them out. The first sheet was a letter to Lionel from an acquaintance who obviously considered himself a history buff, or whatever the Victorian equivalent might have been. He wrote that the evidence regarding Lionel's ancestor – which one, Linda wondered – was unproven at best, but pointed to Charles de Peverel having been acquainted at the very least with Sir John Hawkwood. Certainly de Peverel might have fought at Crécy. There was no reason to suppose that he hadn't conveyed the message that allowed the Black Prince a degree of success at Carcasonne, even though the English forces had never overthrown the citadel itself. Equally however, there was no evidence that he had ever been a part of that campaign. The whole story was a charming family legend, and if Lionel thought there was scope for a painting, or a series of paintings, depicting his ancestor then the enclosed might be of interest.

[saki101.livejournal.com]

I enjoy the crossover between the writing, the interpretation of the writing and the visual art it seems to have inspired.

[akane42me.livejournal.com]

Greetings to my Plucky Pico Pals!

The Story: Resolution.
The Goal: 200 words per day.
Background: This is a MFU fic, a gift for Elmey, started a very long time ago. After working on it during the summer Pico, I've been hunting and pecking away at it on and off at an astonishingly slow pace. Slow, even for me:) Working my way through a ***cough cough*** lengthy bout of writer's constipation.

Today I worked on a scene I have labelled in the draft as 'Follow and Swallow'. Solo is about to be captured after meeting a contact at a cafe. I will probably have to tinker with the choreography as I work the whole thing out, but here's some of it:

***
A half-block ahead of Solo, a black sedan rounded the corner and pulled over, its engine idling. A second black sedan sped from behind, skidding past him to jump the curb, blocking his path. The rear doors of the car burst open and two stocky men in black coats leaped out. Solo twisted around to find the two men from the café trotting up, their hands digging into the deep side pockets of their winter coats, going for their guns.

Solo transferred the schnecken to his left hand and thrust his right hand into the opening of his coat. He scrabbled around in his inside jacket pocket and snagged the object his contact had passed him: a capsule no larger than a Contac time-release cold pill. He pressed the capsule into the cinnamon roll and took a hasty bite. The capsule was made of titanium, virtually indestructible. It’s going to be time-released, all right, he thought, and swallowed.

[saki101.livejournal.com]

Yay, for this story!

This scene is delightfully visual. I hope escape or rescue is not too long in arriving.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

Oh yikes. "This digestive system will self-destruct in 60 seconds"

Poor Napoleon! He'd better find the thingy that it will stop him self-destructing, and toute suite. Interesting set-up.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

That was in reply to akane42me, obviously.

[jenn-calaelen.livejournal.com]

Not much writing today, due to zombieishness. I found the file for a treat I was writing for last Yuletide, reread it, and started editing. Story around 900 words atm, but no where near finished. I intend to work on it properly tomorrow, but that depends on whether Yuletide assignments come soon (and whether I am assigned this fandom ;) )

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

Sleep well tonight and good luck!

[six-old-cars.livejournal.com]

My declared plan was to write 12000 words of the YA novel I was doing in June/July. That's 400 words per day, and the text stood at 23730 words at the start of the month.

So what was the first thing I did? Start off on something entirely unconnected, of course :) In the middle of last week I had a sudden urge to write a spin-off of a spin-off of the "Traveller" novel I did a few years back. It's the story of a minor character's part in that first spin-off story. It may work, or it may not. Somewhat to my surprise, I find that I actually clocked up 390 words of that side-project (henceforth known as "Eleanor") today.

Meanwhile I did manage 90 words of "Catherine" at lunch time, but not having counted up the other until just now, I sat down after dinner to try to reach my target for the day. It was hard at first - the story has reached a point where my outline plan is non-existent - but once I'd got a scene going it flowed fairly well, resulting in a further 700 words. Gosh!


Today's snippet, where Catherine has returned from a trip in which she's discovered some important things, and got home late:


She turned to her dad again. "I'm sorry I was late home without telling you, but I didn't know we were doing this today."
"That's okay, sweetie," he said. "Two men from the fleet called round and told us where you were. They told us all about the Commodore's Cadets and how much you learn there. It sounds like you have a lot of fun."
Catherine nodded wildly. She almost missed her dad's brief frown before he picked up his empty cup as if to drink.
"Is there more tea?" her dad asked.
"I'll make a fresh pot," her mum said, stood up and headed for the kitchen.
Dad leaned close to Catherine. "The fleet men asked a lot about you, and about your friends."
Catherine tried not to gulp. "I hope you told the truth," she said, voice cracking as her throat suddenly felt dry.
"I didn't lie." Dad tapped a finger on the table and pursed his lips. "I... may have left out some details." He took a deep breath. "I didn't mention Anna."



(Actually I wanted to quote the bit that follows but the background would need a lot of explaining)

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

It sounds like you're off to a very productive start! It sounds like Catherine's got herself into a very sticky situation.

[forodwaith.livejournal.com]

I decided my project for picowrimo this year (other than my Yuletide story) would be a drabble (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drabble) a day, since I was recently reminded of how much I used to enjoy writing in that format.

First one of the month is now posted in my journal:
http://forodwaith.livejournal.com/212337.html

Oh, and I'm taking requests (http://forodwaith.livejournal.com/211450.html) if you'd like your own personalized drabble.

[espresso-addict.livejournal.com]

I'm envious of your ability to drabble to order so beautifully.

[sid]

I'll be working on a Big Bang that I foolishly signed up for. *g* I've already nearly reached the minimum word count of 10k, and the rough draft is due today (the 2nd), but there's still a lot of work to be done, including several scenes that only exist in brief placeholder note form. 1,368 words added to it Thursday!

[stevie-carroll.livejournal.com]

Good luck with it, and congratulations on yesterday's productivity.

[jest (from livejournal.com)]

My attainable goal this year is to write one new sentence everyday on the Man from U.N.C.L.E. wip that's been on my harddrive for three years now (my unattainable goal is to finish the thing). I actually did write a sentence yesterday, but I couldn't get online to post. Will hopefully get some serious writing done this evening which will put me properly on course.

Yay Picowrimo!

[saki101.livejournal.com]

I so identify with the situation you describe. Good luck!

[julesjones]

I've just joined the comm, thanks to seeing a fortuitous post about it a few hours after I'd jotted down some notes for a story I want to do as a "you have permission for it to suck" when I've stuck on my current WIP. :-) I can't do NaNoWriMo because I have severe RSI and my hands will drop off if I try to write 50 kwords in a month, but I do want to try to keep up 300 words per day for more than a few days at a time. I started well with 316 last night, and am about to start tonight's effort.

[ideealisme.livejournal.com]

Hi Jules! Welcome on board :)