Annnnd...Go! (NaNoWriMo Kick-off)

Writing Song of the Day: "Na Na Na (Na Na Na Na Na...)" by My Chemical Romance- check it out under our "Rock With Us" tab.

Yes, Pam and I are delving into the scary world of NaNoWriMo this year- and we are most definitely going to finish this time. We've been reading blogs, looking into our local NaNo events, and we even set a reward for ourselves when we make it to 50,000 words by November 30th.

Feast your eyes on this...

Looks good, right? We know :)

Anyway, we wanted to do a kick-off blog post about NaNoWriMo for all other participants (and others who just enjoy stalking our lives) interested in our method for completion, and what we are working on.

First, let's discuss our novel ideas. After visiting Nathan Bransford's blog and reading up on all of his advice for NaNo, Pam and I did a lot of soul searching about what exactly we wanted to write. We both kind of pride ourselves on realistic fiction, so we decided to do the exact opposite of this and go head first into the world of-dun, dun, dun... SUPERNATURAL/PARANORMAL YA!!!

Pam's WIP:

Tara has to say goodbye to her life in California when her family decides to move to the Pork Capitol of America, Newfield, Virginia. Her older sister, Michaela, has been terribly sick since she was a baby, and her parents have found a specialist who can treat her. But Michaela also feels as if she’s been to Newfield before…and many of the locals sure seem to recognize her. Tara’s used to her sister being a little “off,” but now she’s wandering off in the middle of the night, screaming before people die, and developing a strong fear of iron.

Tara shares these discoveries with her new friends, “twins” Malik and Justine, and they lead Tara to believe that Michaela could only be one thing…a changeling. Or the child of a fairy that was swapped with Tara’s real sister.

Which means Michaela isn’t human. Which means Tara’s “real” sister could still be out there. Which means Tara and the Twins have to get to the bottom of everything before some not-so-friendly locals put an end to Michaela, whatever the hell she is. This is me paying homage to Lost Boys…only with fairies.

Become her writing buddy at: pharris81

Quita's WIP:

Avery Grey's always wished that he could have a life other than the one he was granted. At 16 years old, awkwardly clever Avery is still constantly moving from foster home to foster home. Every family that’s taken him in just tends to give up. As soon as Avery has resigned to living the rest of his teen life in his urban group home for boys (including creepy follower Gustav) , an elderly couple from a small suburban North Carolina town set their sights on Avery.

Just like that, Avery’s wish comes true and when the seemingly normal couple takes Avery home, he embarks on his last chance. He wants to be on his best behavior…after all, he doesn't have that much longer until he’s free to be on his own. At first, things almost seem too easy. Avery makes new friends that are much better behaved than his group home co-habitants. Amongst them is Tierra, the school’s most exotic beauty that every boy has tried to woo and Avery, out of everyone, has caught her attention. This makes Avery a few enemies, especially mean spirited Lincoln who loves playing with fire and has severe allergies to iron and salt. Lincoln and his followers will go to great lengths to get rid of Avery before he gets too close to Tierra and finds out more than he should know.

Avery soon finds that some wishes are better left un-granted.

Become my writing buddy at: mhockaday

So, now that we have the ideas- when the hizell are we gonna find time to write? Not only are we full time educators, but Pam is starting to teach part-time classes online and I am taking graduate history courses online (did we mention that we are also working on our MFA?). It seems like we want to torture ourselves, but really we just want to finish another manuscript- and this is the perfect opportunity. Okay, enough blabbering- you want to know how we plan on being superwomen, don'tcha?

Here's the plan:

• Write 7-8 pages a day- at lunch time, while students take tests, while students complain about life, while teachers attempt to whine about students, while we are supposed to be listening to our moms on the phone...you get the point


• Double up on the weekends if we missed our page count during the week

• Complete blog posts for the week on Sunday


• Get work for MFA done during the weekdays (sometimes at work, sorry children- after November you will have our undivided attention again)


• Finish all MFA assignments on Friday


• Cook meals that will last at least two nights


• Take minimal bathroom breaks

• Limit stalking time of Hollywood actors and random musicians (We luv you Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Pattinson but...Must. Finish. Novel!)


• Limit TV time (not sure if this will ACTUALLY happen- but we shall see)


• Finally, attempt to not check Twitter and e-mail every five minutes

***BTW- We LOVE our students and we love our jobs. We plan to be fully attentive to our day jobs and the kids. Just jokes!***

Got any other tips for us? What about you all--how are you going to complete your novel? And don't forget to "buddy" us at NaNoWriMo-we luvs the buddies.