SoCNoC 2011 - a different route

This June started out busy. Over the first few days, I wasn't sure if I should even attempt SoCNoC (The Southern Cross Novel Challenge - write a 50,000 word novel in the month of June).

By the time the 23rd rolled around and the month was mostly gone, I decided that I couldn't possibly write a novel. I was writing lots of other things though, and just for fun, I went onto the CARM forums, where I've been spending a lot of time lately debating God, Religion, evolution, creationism and various minutia in and around the absurdity that is modern religion and went through all of my posts (they provide a link for this, which made it very easy) and cut and pasted everything I wrote (didn't count quoting other people) into a document and tallied up my word count. The number was big...really big, something like 35,000 words. When I took my Theist versus Atheist posts and Casual Atheism posts from facebook, my count was over 40,000 words of discussion, argument, logic and mis-speak.

Just to be sure, I checked on the Kiwiwriters forums, to make sure that making SoCNoC non-fiction and mostly random wasn't "against the rules", and sure enough, the other executive were ok with me doing what I was doing.

Over lunch today at work, I collected from June 23rd to today and re-tallied the total. I hit 52,466 words in June. That's well past the required 50k words.

It is the most incoherent "novel" I've ever written, but if I wanted to, it could turn into a book about atheism and religion.

Two things occur to me:
1. I'm writing a novel's worth of posts every month (most likely), since I didn't, in any way, plan to hit 50,000 words and
2. I really need a life!

My Magna Carta

Chris Baty, in his novel writing instruction book, "No Plot? No Problem!" discusses creating a “Magna Carta” of novel writing. A list that can act as a guide during Nanowrimo. While we are outside of Nanowrimo at the moment, I realize that I have never made a Magna Carta for myself.

To start, I went through a list of my favourite novels and looked for themes and commonalities. My shortened list looks like this:

• A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
• Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay
• The Saratine Mosaic by Guy Gavriel Kay
• I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
• The Elric Saga by Michael Moorcock
• Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
• Dune by Frank Herbert
• Neverness by David Zindell
• Perfume by Patrick Süskind
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• Quarantine by Greg Egan
• On My Way to Paradise by Dave Wolverton
• Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
• Hyperion by Dan Simmons

And I pull out the following:

• This is largely science-fiction/fantasy list
• There is a theme of children/students and learning
• 3^rd person omniscient narration
• Good endings (believable and non-obvious) or large reveals, sometimes, the entire novel is written around the ending
• The writing style is sophisticated without being flowery or over the top
• There is a show, don't tell focus as well as implying without saying things directly
• It feels like the author has through about every detail and developed a complete history/backstory, which gives the novel depth. The author doesn't need to go into all the details however.
• The characters are multi-faceted, three dimensional and have clear and sometimes conflicting motivations. They typically learn something about their place in the universe or make the hero's journey (“Hero with a Thousand Faces” by Joseph Campbell)
• Most are one-off novels without sequels or series OR can be read in isolation
• Many have no clear heroes of villains, but merely people on opposite sides

This sounds like a list that anyone would have with any good novel. In a way, all I really want is good story, good writing skills, good characters etc...

I realize that in a way, a list like this could potentially lock me in a box. However, I always keep in mind that some of my favorite novels can break any of the rules at any time and still succeed. It's "whatever works" in my ways and I have to keep that in mind. Still, a reminder of what I like while I'm writing is a good idea and I have it here.