Still going strong...

I'm still here, and alive. LOL. I have been busy writing my NaNoWriMo novel lately. I've discovered a nice surprise and a not so nice surprise.

First, the nice surprise is that I write much faster when I'm wearing headphones and blasting heavy metal into my brain. It blocks out all of the surrounding people, sounds and distractions. Why didn't I think of that all those months ago when I was writing A Midnight Infatuation?

Second, the not so nice surprise is that the letter "P" is trying to go out on my laptop keyboard. You have to press it harder than I normally do and therefore I end up with a whole lot of words missing their P's. I find that very annoying.

Other than that, I'm doing quite well. I should hit 20,000 words today in A Birth at Dawn, as long as nothing out of the ordinary happens during the rest of my day, of course. I even have dinner planned out so that I won't have to spend more than fifteen minutes throwing it together.

So why am I on here and not writing, you ask? Well, a girl needs a break from her vampires and werewolves every so many chapters (<--I had to backspace to add that p). You have to step back and make sure that your beloved characters are going in the direction that you want them to be going in. Sometimes they surprise us and, no matter how many outlines we create ahead of time, they end up going where THEY want to go.

I absolutely LOVE when my characters take over the writing. For those of you who have never experienced this, it is AMAZING. You finish a scene and then look back over it in awe. Like, did I REALLY write that? That came from me? WOW!

All books have a natural flow about them. Soft scenes mixed with hard scenes. Funny scenes toying with sad scenes. Intense scenes mingling with light-heartened scenes. All of these add to the overall feel of the story. Just like real life. You have your up days and your down days, your happy days and your sad days, your days filled with nothing but excitment and the days where you just know you will die from the boredom. Books are the same way.

I thoroughly enjoy writing the sex scenes in my books. They are fun and exciting and provocative. But, I enjoy writing the action scenes even more. The more intense and fast-paced they are the better. My fingers move just as quickly over the keyboard as the action flows in the story. It seems that the more intense the action, the faster I write and the faster the scenes flow through my brain.

But, a book can't be nothing but sex and excitement. You have to have some backstory; reasons for the action, love and decisions for the sex. Those parts are the hardest for me to write. I know what goes there and I know what I want to say, but I tend to write a lot slower during those moments. They aren't exciting. They are informative. I know all about my characters, but I have to let the readers know about them. If only every book came with the knowledge that I already have of my characters. Then I could just write sex and action all the time. LOL!!

Ok, that's enough of a break I suppose (<-- I had to go back and add one of those Ps too). I better get back to work, after getting my demanding toddler something to drink.

Best wishes to everyone who participating in this exciting endeavour.