A NaNo Update

22,053 Words!

        I'm right about where I need to be on the suggested word count, but not where I'd like to be.  Actually I'd rather be at 50,000 words right now so I could just be ladling on the gravy.  If I keep my pace, or kick it up like I'd like to, I will complete the 30 day goal of 50,000 words fairly easy--well, perhaps not easy, but it should be doable.

        Since I began my novel, Time Light, something has taken place which pleases me.  I really like this story.  At first, it was okay--just so-so for NaNo.  Now it's my baby and I'm starting to fall in love with it.  As I get to know my characters better, I grow fonder of them and am excited to see where they end up.  The story is filling out and I'm excited by it.  I can very easily see this as turning into a series of three or more novels, as I can see many more stories branching off from this one.

        On a previous post I presented a possible blurb for the novel.  Here it is again:

                                         Time Light

John Proffitt is losing it. First he lost his job, then his house, and now his marriage is in jeopardy. Could he be losing his mind too? Increasingly obsessed with the suspicious activities in the abandoned building across the street from his apartment, he tries to unravel the mysteries of the sounds and lights that come from the building and the men he sees leaving each night. Are they visitors from another planet or something else? In his investigations he uncovers not only the identities of the strangers, but also the secrets within himself.

            Here is more of a synopsis of the story:

          

The story starts in April of 1965 in the city of Chicago.  John Proffitt is awakened in the middle of the night by a deep noise accompanied by a steady vibration.  He investigates to find a brilliant beam of light emanating from an abandoned building across the street from the apartment where he and his wife are living.  A short while later he sees people leaving the building he thought to be abandoned.  He grows increasingly troubled as he begins to witness this same event on a nightly basis.  He sets out to figure out what is going on.

           As he starts examining this mystery he comes to the realization that he has no memories of anything in his past.  He has not been working for over a year.  His wife, Della, has been the one bringing home the paychecks and they are barely getting by on the money she makes.  She is becoming fed up with the situation and divorce seems on the horizon

            John discovers that he had been the head of a technological company when his memory loss came about.  After he has to stop working, he and Della lose their house and are forced to move.   Eventually, with the help of Della, his psychiatrist, and an associate from his company John begins piecing together his past.

           However, the peculiar events that he sees happening at night threaten his return to mental health.  He must prove that what he is seeing is real and find out why these events are occurring.  His investigations begin uncovering odd and disparate connections that he must make sense of in order to unravel the mysteries of the street of empty buildings where they live, the management company that owns these buildings, and the questionable operations of the company where he had worked.

           Having come to a realization that the abandoned building is being used as a port of entry for alien invaders he struggles to find people whom he can trust and who will believe his story.  He risks his life to get the evidence he needs to convince the authorities so they can stop the invasion.   But is it all really as it seems?

           In Time Light John Proffitt is confronted by the racial conflict of the mid-sixties river town of Cairo, Illinois; issues of love and trust in marriage; and secrecy and deception in the corporate world.   Seeming to be living on the brink of insanity, he comes to the realization that escape is sometimes the best and only solution.

        So there you go--here is my current synopsis without giving away too much.   This NaNo novel is truly seat of your pants writing.  I've been starting to formulate future plot details in my head, but I'm not outlining.  I'm just writing as I go.  I did write my closing paragraph and I will probably write the closing scene soon.  The rest of the story is being written just as though I were reading it from the beginning.  We'll see how that goes.   At least I'm having a good time.

         On Monday I will be reviewing Alex J. Cavanaugh's CassaStar.   I hope you will check that out to see what I have to say.

          If you're doing NaNo how's it going so far?  Whether or not you are doing Nano, do you have any comments or suggestions about either the blurb or the synopsis?   I'd thought about reworking that blurb, but I'm too busy writing the real stuff.  But I'm still open to suggestions.   Thanks!




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