happy new year!

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Written on Thursday, January 01, 2009 by haleigh

I love New Year's. It's a clean, fresh start. I feel like I have a fresh start writing too. My first MS behind me, and I'm ready to start again, with everything I've learned. Hopefully I won't make all the same mistakes this time around (like ending up with so many plot holes I have to rewrite 60% of the darn thing).

So in the vein of fresh starts, I have been researching, researching, researching. To admit to my geekiness, I love this stage. I love scrounging for little known facts and being able to throw out at a party, "You know, the per barrel cost of Brazilian deep-sea oil from the Tupi field is $33."

So in my plotting, I got all excited yesterday about an idea - campaign financing! The plot all comes back to scandalous campaign donations. So I googled "campaign finance" and in about five minutes, I realized this is not, in fact, the direction I want to go. Yikes! Could I have picked a more convoluted subject?

So, I'm still trying to figure out what the big final conspiracy is. I'd like to get the suspense side of the book plotted before I start writing. The relationships/emotional side I try to just let happen. But it's much easier to write when you know who the bad guy is and what they want!

But for this particular story, I have one topic to research which is turning out to be really fun. My heroine is a pilot. I'm pretty sure this says a lot about her -- her attention to detail, her independence, her love for routine.

But the cool part - she crashes her plane (on purpose). So I have to figure out how exactly one goes about crashing a plane and surviving it. So my first thought: taking flying lessons! Uh, a bit out of my price range. Second idea: flight simulator!

So with my little flight simulator computer game, I am learning to fly -- and crash -- a plane. I've so far learned to take off, make turns, and climb and descend. Next, I need to figure out how to land the sucker. Then, I'll crash it :)

So my goals for the new year are, in no particular order:
-- learn how to crash a plane
-- write another MS
-- query for an agent

And today starts Marn and I's mini-nano! I'm at 3,211 right now, and my goal is 28,211 by January 31st. Anybody else in?

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3 Comments

  1. Marnee Bailey |

    Girl, I'm with you. :) I'm at 8900 ish but I totally slacked off today. (Too much wine/champagne/liquor last night)

    I still have a wee bit o time tonight though....

    Go us!!

     
  2. Jessica Nelson |

    No way! You guys nano away. LOL
    Sounds like tons of fun research. :-) Let us know what you come up with. I'm wondering why she's going to crash on purpose...

     
  3. haleigh |

    And mini JanNaNo is off to a start....a thousand words today! Go us!

    Jessie - you're sure you don't want to join the fun? lol. She has her reasons for crashing her plane, but they're so convoluted that it's hard to explain. Basically, she's been "hijacked" of sorts by the hero, who's been hired to find her father. Kate, not wanting her father to be found, crashes the plane to stop the hero from finding her father. (he becomes more heroic as the book goes on, I promise :)

     

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