Unless you spend it the way that I did--writing a novel. And by writing a novel, I mean writing a novel. In three days. Start to Finish. Yup, that's what I did this Labor Day Weekend.
So, right about now most of you are probably thinking I'm nuts (and right about now so am I since I'm still a bit delirious) but, although they were 3 of the hardest days of my life, they were also 3 of the most rewarding. So, even though I'm kinda tired of writing right now, I've decided I need to get this down for posterities sake. And also to explain it to all of my awesome Facebook friends who, though they were not shy about expressing their theories that I am insane, they also cheered me on, which is totally awesome.
First, a little background. This may come to a shock to you, people who read one of my four blogs, but I like to write. I started my first "novel" at age 10. I got about 100 pages in and it disappeared. Not sure what happened to it and I know it wasn't very good, but I was 10. I finished a 200 pageish novel at 15. I never published it but I still think it would probably be a pretty good young adult novel so I may still do that someday. Right after Cold Mountain came out in theaters 10ish years ago, I was so disappointed I decided I needed to write a better historical fiction/romance about my very favorite topic, the US Civil War. It's currently on my laptop, unfinished at 250 pages--but I will be finishing it before Oct. 1st because I've already announced it's upcoming release to the 17 people who follow my Facebook author page and the 90 people who follow that Twitter feed. I know, I don't want to disappoint the few dozen fans who may actually be awaiting it's arrival, lol.
But the true testimony to my writing happened this summer. I have also always been interested in the middle ages--princess and princes, that sort of thing (I was a history major in college after all) and so after a pretty vivid dream that had a good story line, I decided I needed to write a novel based on that dream. Even though I still hadn't finished the book that had been sitting there for a decade--the one I promised I would finish before I wrote anything else, and thus the reason I have written no books in the last ten years--I had the energy to write this book and, if I've learned nothing else, it's that a writer must write exactly what they have energy to write and nothing else ( think about that a bit, writing teachers.) So, over the course of about 3 weeks in July, I wrote a novel. My sweet friend who will remain nameless was so kind as to read it as I went and keep me going. By the time I was done, I realized that I've been wasting a lot of my life not doing what I really wish I were doing because of lots of stupid excuses that essentially mean nothing. I am a writer--I am a lot of things--and I need to write.
There was just one nagging problem. I am a Christian. I go to church regularly. I am a reserved, conservative. I hardly eve swear. But when you're writing a novel, sometimes you have to write things that you're not particularly comfortable writing--and you have to be okay with the fact that your mom or your aunt or your boss or you student's mother might read them. However, I wasn't quite ready to face all of that, considering it is a romance novel (although it' really more historical fiction or literary but it certainly fits the romance genre, too) and I am an elementary school teacher, I decided to publish under a pen name.
The only problem with that is, that makes it really hard to advertise and to brag to your friends!
Well, a lot of my friends have found out and that's okay, they're still my friends. And now one of my aunts knows, too, and I still think that's okay.
Anyway, I digress. While I was looking for ways to publicize the novel I wrote this summer, I stumbled upon the International 3 Day Novel Contest, which is exactly what it sound like. 3 days to write a novel. Apparently crazy people have been doing this for decades. There's a $50 entrance fee and it's totally the honor system. You can start at 12:01 AM in your own time zone on the Saturday morning of Labor Day weekend and you have until 11:59 PM Monday. To write a novel!
Well, I just had to do it! And I did! And here's how that process went for me.
Originally, I intended to come home from work Friday and go to sleep until 12:00. But that didn't happen. My husband had a "thing" to do and I had errands to run and tutus to make and it was just not happening. So, no nap. But I was determined that I could sleep Monday night (who needs sleep?) and at 12:01, I hit the ground running.
Before the contest begins, the only thing you're allowed to do is make an outline. Well, I'd been playing with the idea for a trilogy (yes, 3 books!) about vampire hunters for about a year now. I know, it's getting a little overdone. But, once again this was dream inspired. And I guess I kinda wanted to give Stephanie Meyer a run for her money. (Something tells me she has a little more money than I do.)
So, armed with some open research tabs on my laptop, a sort-of outline and several bottles of water, I went off to the most secluded corner of our house and started writing.
I literally wrote all night that first night. I thought it would be wise to write while my children were asleep so they couldn't burst in and interrupt me. I didn't stop writing until 1:00 PM on Saturday. Then, with about 20,000 words on the page, I took a two hour nap. This contest isn't necessarily about length, but I knew that the story I was trying to tell was long and complicated and it would take time. My sweet husband kept me fed and hydrated and my children only came in a few times to ask my why I had abandoned them.
At 3:00, I started writing again. I wrote all afternoon and evening until about 2:00 AM when I started to fall asleep at the computer. As much as I wanted to keep writing, I couldn't. I was starting to hallucinate a little bit--seeing weird shapes out of the corners of my eyes, etc.--and everything was funny. So, I took another nap, this time not a very long one, and I woke up ready to go again.
I didn't go to sleep again until about 3:00 AM Monday morning. A total of three cat naps in 3 days, about 7 hours of sleep. I only ate when my husband brought me food. I didn't watch television, play with my daughters, pet the dog--anything. (I did go to the bathroom but I am not ashamed to say I did not shower) I just wrote.
I finished the first draft Monday at 2:00 PM. But I wasn't finished. I had a 78,000 word document (that's 289 pages double-spaced) and I had no idea if it even made any sense. And, while I wasn't necessarily writing to win (although who doesn't want to win?) I didn't want to submit a pile of poo either. So, I needed to read it and edit it and make sure none of my character's names or genders changed through the course of the novel. So, that took a really long time, too. I was finally done editing and submitted my novel to the fine people at the contest around 9:00PM.
I learned A LOT from this experience. First of all, I learned that I am a fast writer. I was keeping up with other participants on social media and my word counts were smoking theres. Not that mine was better, but it was longer. Secondly, I learned that I don't give up easily. There were times when I started to think I HAD to go to sleep but I pushed through and kept going. I learned I have amazing friends. I asked for people to leave words of encouragement on my Facebook page and so many friends said such awesome things, it was wonderful. I had one friend "stay up" with me via the phone a great deal of Sunday night when I was really starting to lose it. I got some invaluable writing advice from my older brother, who is an award winning novelist. Even if I did end up writing a pile of poo, it would all have been worth it just for that.
But I don't think that's what I wrote. I strive to write the kind of books I would like to read and I really like what I ended up writing. In fact, I do plan to write the other two volumes in the trilogy.
And here's what my book is about! It's called The Clandestine Ternion Book 1: Transformation. Now, you already know its' about vampire hunters but it's also about the other two groups (or Passels) in the Ternion (which means trilogy oddly enough), Vampires, of course, and Guardians. It opens with a group of friend deciding to attend an Eidolon Festival (something I think I invented for the sake of the book) which ends up being a party for Vampires and the like. One of the friends disappears and our heroine, Cadence, tries to find her. Cadence ends up killing a Vampire, making the other Vampires very angry and she wouldn't make it out alive if it wasn't for the Guardians--the group whose purpose is to protect Hunters from Vampires. Cadence learns that she is a Hunter and that she carries a gene that, if activated, will allow her to develop her "super powers" and become a full-fledged Hunter. She decides to activate the Hunter genes and goes of to train with a group of Hunters and Guardians. Meanwhile, her ex-boyfriend at home is pining for her, she's developed a crush on the leader of the Guardians, and she's trying to follow the rules of the organization she's joined but realizing she has a hard time controlling her instincts and listening to the leader. Also, the girlfriend of the Vampire Cadence killed in chapter 1 is organizing against her. (There are some other scenes I am skimming over that aren't as important.) The story climaxes when Cadence and the team go to Paris to try and defeat the girlfriend of the Vampire she killed in chapter one. To find out if she is successful or not, whether she ends up with her ex-boyfriend, the Guardian Leader, someone else or no one, you're gonna have to wait cause I'm not allowed to do anything with the manuscript until the winner is announced in January. That being said, I would love to know if this plot sounds remotely interesting to any of you or if you fell asleep three sentences in to it.
Now, if you have read this far, I thank you and applaud you because this post is becoming a novel. And here's the deal. My brother told me something so very true this weekend and I have taken it to heart. He said (and I paraphrase) sometimes as Christians we have to write things we don't really care to write because the story has to be believable to the author. We have to stay true to our characters and what typical people do (or say) in real-life situations. He said, the second it doesn't seem real to the reader, he or she stops reading and then you've lost them. I get that now. Do I want to think about my sweet aunt reading my book and realizing, at the age of 37 with two children I'm not a virgin anymore, well, no of course not. And she probably doesn't want to think about it either. But people do that and it's hard to tell a love story without it. And I'm not talking 50 Shade of Gray. I've had some friends read those particular pages and tell me they are very tasteful. So, that's why I've decided to share the link with you, my beloved blog readers, and let you decide for yourself whether or not you can read a love scene that I wrote and not be too embarrassed to ever look me in the eye again. The only way I'll ever know who read it is if you tell me (or if you leave me a GLOWING review on Kindle, which would make me want to bake you cookies or name my next heroin/hero after you.) So, here you go. My published book is called Deck of Cards by ID Johnson and you can find it here. It's only $2.99 and even if you never read it, if you go download it and leave me an awesome comment, you are much appreciated. And if you read it and you love it then that's amazing. And if you read it and you hate it, well then, I don't need to know about it.
Okay--longest blog post every. Cheers to those of you who made it to the end and good night!
PS: My brother has written several novels but you can purchase his award winning novel The Devil's Choir by Chris Morrow here. Read it, you'll love it.
