Destined for Each Other? Nanowrimo 2011

I'm back, and I bring my Nanowrimo novel with me! Yes, I've decided I'm going to do Nanowrimo again this year, and hopefully keep up my two-year winning streak. I'm a little bit late in posting this, as I've been frantically finishing my coursework this past week, but now that uni's over I can focus more on writing.

So, here it is: my novel and a short excerpt. I had a horrible time writing the synopsis. For some strange reason I had a very clear idea of the way the plot was supposed to go, but the minute I tried to put it down on paper, I couldn't do it. I thought the idea behind me novel was so simple, but apparently I was wrong.

Anyway, this is an idea I got in November or December last year, after reading Lauren Kate's Fallen. I think what originally frustrated me was the love-plot that the novel focused on. In essence, a girl dies and is reborn over and over, and an angel who's in love with her keeps seeking her out to make her magically remember that they're soulmates.

This got me thinking about the whole 'destined for each other' thing. I've always been rather unconvinced by the 'soulmates' idea that seems to be so popular in fiction and film, and lately it's started to really actively annoy me.

It struck me as pretty unfair that you should be born over and over again and yet get no choice as to who you're forced to fall in love with. If all that ties you to one person is the memory of a romance in a past life, is it not rather tyrannical to insist that you have to love them in the next life too?

And For Your Challenge THIS Month...

Nothing to do in April, as the cold winds begin to roll in and you feel it’s almost socially acceptable for you to wrap yourself in a massive doonah and disappear for months on end, until forced once more out of your little cocoon by the hot weather?

Yeah. That’s how I felt mid-March this year. So I thought I’d try something different. I decided to try out Script Frenzy. What is Script Frenzy, you may ask? Well, it’s to screenwriting what Nanowrimo is to novel-writing. Essentially it challenges you to write a 100-page script – TV, film, stage – in the month of April. Sounds like fun, right? I thought so, while I was pondering how I was going to celebrate the long winter nights that were fast approaching. And so I decided to take a leap into previously uncharted writing territory. Essentially, this was my thought process...

It's Tough on Those Offspring...

Every once in a while there'll be a slump in the television shows on. You know what it's like; every time you switch on the television there's some stupid reality show about cops training dogs to sniff people's luggage at airports, or aspiring chefs trying to impress a panel of fat, overpaid foodies with their ridiculously sculpted creations not nourishing enough to keep even a small child from starvation. (Don't get me wrong. Masterchef is a lot better than many of the television shows out there, and at least it's creative and constructive, but ten minutes of it makes me want to go to sleep. Although I suppose it's better than making me want to stuff my face...) Naturally, you find yourself going back to more old-fashioned forms of entertainment; for me, that's often reading book after book inbetween schoolwork. Making a serious dent in your To-Read list is great, but there are times when television is indispensable as a way of just unwinding.

That's where Offspring comes in. Last night, here in Australia, a new drama series aired on Channel 10 which I think has a lot of potential. After a myriad of fairly average grunge-city cop shows and the gritty Underbelly, it's a relief to finally see a more down-to-earth drama series produced in Australia....

Mr Feathercott's Business, Chapter One

Had one wandered up a remote London road one gloomy Tuesday in 1957 one might have observed Mr Feathercott making his way home, his impeccably trimmed whiskers drooping in the chill evening air.
On the other hand one might not have; for Mr Feathercott was a singularly unremarkable character, with his wilting whiskers and his crushed bowler hat. Mr Feathercott, alas, was the last of a race of rather ordinary Victorian gentlemen, now nearing his seventieth year, and with no notable achievements in his long life to single him out for fame and fortune. Born to a dying race, Mr Feathercott had lived much of his life in obscurity. He had once brushed the hand of celebrity with his overly large nose when he had, after the unfortunate drowning of his elder brother (unfortunate insofar as it brought his heretofore ignorant brother into some sort of renown) come to a moderate inheritance. Moderate it was indeed, for ‘moderate’ was a word which could be applied to Mr Feathercott from the tip of his frayed bowler to the toes of his unpolished brown shoes.

Mr Feathercott's Business

Had one wandered up a remote London road one gloomy Tuesday in 1957 one might have observed Mr Feathercott making his way home, his impeccably trimmed whiskers drooping in the chill evening air.
On the other hand one might not have; for Mr Feathercott was a singularly unremarkable character, with his wilting whiskers and his crushed bowler hat. Mr Feathercott, alas, was the last of a race of rather ordinary Victorian gentlemen, now nearing his seventieth year, and with no notable achievements in his long life to single him out for fame and fortune.

Mr Feathercott's Business chronicles the lives of the Feathercott family - Mr Feathercott, his wife Esther, and his three daughters - over the course of the '50s and '60s.

Life in the Feathercott household follows a well-defined and inescapable order. Mr Feathercott, the aging academic, spends his life pondering Mr Dickens and snoozing in his favourite chair by the fire. His dissatisfied wife Esther, twenty years his junior, has long ago faded into the throes of middle age yet she cannot forget the encounter with a handsome ginger-whiskered man more than two decades ago.
But times are changing, and Mr Feathercott's carefully ordered world is being systematically eroded piece by piece. His daughter Maud, newly wed to the charming and devastatingly handsome Peter, cannot wait to escape to Chicago with her husband. Elizabeth, the eldest daughter, is busy raising a family and caring for her own husband, but she finds herself unconsciously drifting towards music stands and record stores when the soulful tunes of the King of Rock 'n' Roll are heard. And as for Gladys, the Feathercott's youngest daughter - well, nobody speaks of her, save in a lowered voice as if afraid that the gossip will spread on telepathic thought waves.
Useless, archaic and mildly irritating, Mr Feathercott's world will be turned upside down. And it all begins with an encounter in a deserted pantry...

Chapter One

Project 365: Soul Catchers, Chapter One

When one considers soul’s mates, one thinks of three words; destiny, love, and impossibility.

Destiny operated on a tight schedule in the kingdom of Stillvalley. While in other universes Destiny might be known for her fickleness, in Stillvalley she was as sharp as a needle and just as likely to prick you till you bled. She ran an efficient operation and never failed to reward heavy tippers. It was her duty to ensure that each and every being in Stillvalley, from the lowliest flea to the mightiest beast, had a soul’s mate. And she had never missed one single solitary creature.

Well. Not yet, anyway.

Project 365

It's the time of year to make New Year's Resolutions, so here's mine; I'm going to complete the 365 Days Challenge by this time next year.

Run by the amazing Scribbler's Abode, Project 365 challenges you to do something creative - photography, art, or writing - each day, every day, for an entire year. So I've decided to apply it to my writing, and I'll be posting snippets, short stories and excerpts as I go. The 365 logo shows that this piece is a part of the challenge, but for all my WIPs I'll still have a little icon to show which story it belongs to. The main story I'll be focusing on this year is Mr Feathercott's Business, and I'll post up the summary for that very soon.

Last night I wrote a short story which I hope to post up soon; it was really just to get into the mood, but I'll say this now; I'm really excited about this challenge. It's something to keep me motivated and focused, and I sincerely hope it will help my writing too.

And So It Begins...

INEVITABLY, when starting up a blog or anything of the kind, I end up writing a lot of rubbish that generally begins with "Well Now" and "I can't believe".

But this time I've vowed it's going to be different.