In Which I Have a Field Day With Tropes

Roughly 2,500 words into "The Monster of Dewsberry Drink" and I'm finding some weird similarities with "Troll Wife".

Troll Wife is a story where a young female troll discovers that part of her job description as “tooth fairy” is stopping a deadly monster before it kills more children.

The Monster of Dewsberry Drink is about a boy that discovers a monster in the local lake, and is determined to save him before the lake is destroyed by a local developer.

At first glance, they don't seem to have that much in common. Female non-human lead vs male human lead, for example.

But on closer examination:
They're both Urban Fantasies.
They're both set in Southern California.
They both have weird issues with names. (Troll Wife hasn't earned a name yet. In MoDD, "Sape" goes by that nickname and would die of shame if anyone learned his real name. Plus, he names the monster, Monster.)
They're both about Outsiders trying to find a way to fit in.
A hand print appears in both stories, as a significant "you're not alone" moment.

People reading these are going to start thinking I have issues. (Ok, Bill and Kim already know I have issues.)

In Which I Display Writerly Angst

I'm 76 words into "Monster" this morning, and I suddenly realize I am the worst writer in existence.

Ok, probably not the worst writer in existence, but ranking in with that group. Show don't tell, show don't tell! I thought this would be easier in third person, but I am wrong.
I know, just write the crappy first draft and fix it in editing right? But wouldn't it make sense to do it right the first time, instead of having to do it two (three, seven, ten) times?

In Which I Write Backwords

I started The Monster of Dewsberry Drink last weekend. Given my work and family life, I'm really more a weekend novelist, so I expect to get some more words down this weekend.

This is the first book that I ever started by writing a query letter first. In it's own way, it's a hook and outline to help me remember what I'm writing about and not get distracted by every shiny idea that passes my way. So, here is the query letter for The Monster of Dewsberry Drink. (No, I will not be using this as my query letter when I send it to agents :)

"Sape" is starting 7th grade with a normal set of problems. His best friend is drifting from him, getting heavily involved in sports. His parents are almost ready to flip the house they've been working on for the past year, which means moving again. His brother's girlfriend thinks she's a Witch (eye roll), and his brother is… his brother. Oh, and it looks like he's going to lose this year's Science Fair to Katherine. Again.

All of that pales when he finds a real live, actual-for-true monster living in the local reservoir. Sure, it won't solve all his problems, but he's bound to win the Science Fair at least. Unfortunately for Sape, a local developer doesn't want anyone to know about the monster. When a mysterious man tries to drown Sape in the reservoir and the monster saves his life, things go back to super complicated.

Now he's got to enlist the help of his (former?) best friend, his arch-nemesis, and even (gulp) his big brother to save the Monster of Dewsberry Drink.

In Which I Discuss How Weight Loss is Like Writing (and NSV)

So, a few weeks ago I joined Weight Watchers at work. I've been steadily losing weight, but it's not really visible yet. What's interesting to me is how Weight Watchers as a group talks about motivation. "A setback is a set up for a come back" and NSV (Non Scale Victories).

Non Scale Victories are things that are related to your weight loss (dropping a size in clothes. or being able to do something that you couldn't do before you started losing weight). I think, as writers, we should celebrate NSVs of our own. Non Sale Victories. Some groups have agent rejection contests. Whoever racks up the most rejections in a given time period wins. It's a way to take the sting out of the rejection. Word Wars are another NSV, where people sit down for a given time period and write as much as they can, and share those totals with friends that are doing the same thing.

Those are good, but not really my style. I think I'm just going to celebrate things like getting some words down, or creating a new plot point, or researching an agent. Things that I can do, things I can control, and things that remind me why I'm doing this.

Today, I started my new WiP, The Monster of Dewsberry Drink. I wrote two scenes (about 500 words) and I'm about to go back into it and write another scene. I should hit 1,000 words before I go to bed tonight. I created 15 plot points. (Those were the easy ones. The harder, better ones will come later.) Mostly, I'm just glad to be writing again. I love that feeling.

NaNo post

Ok, I've decided to write/explore The Monster of Dewsberry Drink as my NaNoWriMo project. I'm not sure I'll win NaNo this year. I just don't have enough writing time in my schedule to be able to do almost 2,000 words a day. But I'm going to try!

(And yes, Scrivener is every bit as cool as I thought it was, even in the Windows Beta version that doesn't do everything yet.)

My husband has offered to buy me a copy of Scrivener for my birthday, so trying to win doesn't have that extra pressure on me :)