Half NaNo Update and Tag Questions!

Well, it looks like November wasn't full of writing posts after all!  (Wow, I can hear the non-writers cheering....  Ouch.)  I actually haven't gotten much writing done at all and unless I can pull off about 20k words by next Friday, I won't finish.  But, hey!  That's okay!  Half NaNo was a challenge I took upon myself, fully knowing that I might not accomplish it.

But... who says I can't try again in the month of December when, after five orchestra concerts (this weekend... fun and exhausting at the same time!) and the SAT (this Saturday right before the matinee concert and then the night one... that's no fun and exhausting), I'll have the whole month off?  WAHOO!!  I love homeschooling.

Anyway, I decided to do the tag questions that Amy posted for Half NaNo anyway.  : )  Because I love tags and I love answering questions about my novel.  (By the way, if you guys have any questions, I'd be more than happy to answer them!!)

~What's the name of your project? When did you first come up with the idea? And how long have you been working on it?  My novel is actually untitled as of now, but I do have some ideas....  : )  I came up with the idea a few years ago at my grandparents' house after watching the Winter Olympics and being absolutely fascinated with the ice dancing competitions.  The story started out with a girl whose sister died and had something to do with ice dancing, but that never got off the ground, so I thought about the idea, wrote a little, put it down, then re-wrote everything I'd done (a grand total of three pages!) for Camp NaNo.  So, yeah.  It's a work in progress and I know that when I finish writing it (aaaaaalmost there!), I'm far from done.  I have a lot of new ideas about things I need to change when I do the editing and that'll probably be on my Christmas break.  : )

~Sum up your novel in five words or less.  Love and relationships.

~Who is your favorite character?  Tell us about him or her.  Nikki, hands down.  She's my main character and the entire story is told from her perspective.  She's amazing - sensible and down to earth and completely awesome.

~Where does your novel take place?  What time period?  It takes place in modern day times.

~Do you have a theme song for your story?  What is it?  Ummm....  No.  At least, I don't think so.  Well, not yet.  : )

~What's been the hardest part to write so far?  A lot of it!  Most of it is about ice dancing, which I previously knew nothing about except for the fact that I liked it.  : P  So I had to research that a lot, which I did in the first week of Camp NaNo.

~Which chapter was your favorite so far?  Probably the one I just wrote.  I'll try to be as spoiler-free as possible and just say that it's really cool and involves a fair.  : )

~Can you share one of your favorite snippets?  (One you haven't shared on your blog already)  Ooh, one I haven't shared on my blog already....  Hummm....  Okay.  (Heehee....  Before I do, funny story.  I was writing in the car on the way back from our second Thanksgiving meal of the day [ugh] and had written a little but got a little smidgen of writer's block.  Then, everything just fell into place and I knew what I wanted to write!  I wrote about seven hundred words and was gearing up for the climax - literally, the climax of the entire story - and then... my laptop hibernated because it ran out of battery.  : P)  And, after much deliberation, I've chosen this snippet.  Excuse a lot of it - it's still unedited.

    Bennett and I went through the routine, with Bennett reminding Alec how to do each move and me telling Alec how told hold me so that he wouldn't drop me.

    When we finished, Bennett put me back down and we bowed while Alec and Natalie clapped for us.

    "That was so great, Bennett!" Natalie said, skating up to him.  "Think we can do that next year?"

    "Ha!"  Bennett shook his head and glared at Natalie.  "Not on your life.  Let's just work on the little, easy moves - forwards and backwards crossovers for a start, then a twizzle, and maybe after that - and if there aren't any mess-ups, we'll attempt a stationary lift."

    "You're no fun at all," Natalie protested, crossing her arms.  "Tell him it isn't fair!" she said to me in a whiny British accent.

    "It's so unfair..." I muttered, trying to do an impersonation of Edmund Sparkler, but failing utterly.

    "You guys are both officially weird," Bennett said, giving us a look.

~Are any aspects of your story drawn directly from your own life?  Give us an example.  Sort of!  I think it's good to experience a lot of the stuff you write so that you can write it so that you're showing from what you know and not telling like you're copying out of the encyclopedia, but since sometimes I can't really say what it's like to have an older brother (with or without amnesia!), ice dance, have a million cousins who all get together every year for Christmas, or *gulp* fly on an air plane (no joke!), I have to wing it.  : )  So I try to draw from my own life as much as possible.  (I did write that one narrative essay depicting the time I got shot at inside a cabin, though!!  But that's another story for another time....  And completely harmless, for all you who were wondering....  We used blanks.)

~Your main character gets dumped into a big city in the modern era (or if you're writing a contemporary work, he/she gets dumped in medieval London).  How does he/she respond?  "Whoa....  Look, it's Mr. Knightley!  Where's my handkerchief?  Or the nearest wall?!"  Heehee....

~Who's the funniest character in your story? Tell us why! Give examples! Support your argument.  : D  Natalie Fraser!!  She's hilarious.  She quotes all sorts of period dramas and Winnie the Pooh and makes life a lot brighter for everyone she comes in contact with.  She saves Nikki (an introvert) from having to answer questions from people at school by just being herself (an extrovert).  She asks Nikki the really hard questions that nobody else will ask and helps her find the answers.  She's the perfect secondary character.  : )  Here's an example of one of her lines that shows her personality in contrast to Nikki's and still manages to make me laugh.

    "You are so weird...."

    (Nikki argues, saying she's not weird because her brother is changing for the better and she likes it.)  I looked up at her [sitting on the countertop] again, raising my eyebrows.  "And you call me weird because of that?  You've got issues, Natalie."

    Natalie grinned.  "No, I'm really happy about everything you just said.  The reason I called you weird was because you just used that plate [to chop up chicken for a salad], then washed it and put it away.  Like, seconds after you used it.  You could have put it in the dishwasher, you know..."

~If you were forced to eliminate a character from your story--just wash them clean off the slate--who would it be?  Horror of horrors!!

"In nine hundred years of time and space I've never met anyone who wasn't important before."  - Ten, Doctor Who.

"I'd imagine the whole world was one big machine. Machines never come with any extra parts, you know. They always come with the exact amount they need. So I figured, if the entire world was one big machine, I couldn't be an extra part. I had to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too."  - Hugo Cabret, Hugo.

The same goes for novels.  Each and every one of my characters are in there for a reason and they have a specific role to play. 

~Do you plan on writing a sequel to your novel?  Shhh....  Yes.  But it's very hush-hush.  So don't tell anyone you heard it from me.

~Eowyn~