Reading: King Rat by China Mieville
Music: Bothy Band
TV/Movie: Venture Bros.
Link o' the Day: ThePulp.Net: Doc Savage
Total Wordcount for current Novel-in-a-Month: 3,990

An interesting observation as I try the NaNoWriMo challenge. I'm noticing a startling lack of consistency. Case in point, I have several scenes which indicate that the action takes place in late autumn or early winter, yet one establishing scene in which a character is awoken by streetworkers jackhammering a sidewalk--not work typically done in the cooler months. It bothered me for a bit when I realized what was happening, but then I decided that this was all stuff that could be easily fixed in the next draft. The workmen could become garbage men, and because the scene takes place outside of a graduate student housing complex, it could be one of those huge metal dumpsters that make a lot of noise when being emptied.

This is only one example. A Major Event is supposed to happen at 9am, and five characters are working their way to that event in the opening chapter, yet I'm finding that it's difficult to keep all the time consistent with reality. Not impossible, but it's slipping enough here and there where I have to make a conscious effort to establish the timeframe. Still, I'm not going to worry about it too much. I just know that when this draft is complete, if I still wish to work with it, I'm going to have to buy a lot of red pens to mark it up.

In regards to "trying to get it right the first time," I've been trying to adopt the way of thinking as expressed below. This taken from the NaNoWriMo workshop book:

"Abandon the stultifying notion of brilliance and aim instead for the low mark of completion. It'll take the pressure off of you, which will allow your writing to become looser and more ambitious, paradoxically raising the quality of your book. It's Barber's law: Aiming low is the best way to succeed."

It goes against how I typically approach my writing. Granted, I don't insist upon perfect the first time around, but I do dwell on the details quite a bit more.

It's going to be an interesting and, at times I'm sure, a frustrating month.

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Today's link goes to ThePulp.Net: Doc Savage site, a great place on the web for folks interested in learning about the classic Doc Savage pulp series. I used to read some of the collected stories when I was a kid, and would sometimes revisit them now and then in the 90s. I've not thought of dear old Doc Savage in a while until the Venture Bros. show on Adult Swim came along.
Classic storytelling. Not exactly great literature, but still quite a bit of fun.

Enjoy!