Nanowrimo 2007

The National Novel Writing Month looms ever closer as the end of October rapidly approaches. The project began some eight or nine years ago when a small group of writers in the Bay Area, led by Chris Baty, started the site where anyone can write a novel of at least 50,000 words in the month of November. Let me do the math for you - approximately 1700 words per day for the entire month.

The objective is to turn off the internal editor and let the words flow until a minimum of 50,000 words is reached. At the end of the month the partipant has the what I think of as the equivalent of Michelangelo's 17 ton block of granite from which he liberated, David, one the finest pieces of sculpture ever created. From your first draft, written in November, the sky is the limit, as they say, as to what you do with that piece.

I have completed four novels in the past five years at Nano. Two of them have been published and are available for purchase: Sofie, the Queen of Oakland, and The Marker.

Two others are sitting on my hardrive waiting for the grueling re-writing and editing process that I so expertly shy away from. This process for the two book published has taken about three years, for the two books.

Now I'm faced with another Nano and, as in the past, an idea came to me this morning from out of the blue while on the treadmill. It involves a weaving of stories from my family (write what you know), but with major doses of fiction, setting changes, and times and name changing.

My greatgrandfather received a head injury and was institutionalized. He would sneak home and be with my greatgrandmother long enough to produce my grandfather. Eventually news from the institution was he was killed in a train accident. No one questioned the death and many years later he was discovered, still alive, tending the gardens at the institution.

My mother was a Rosie the Riveter during WWII. She took a troop train to Oakland when her husband-to-be sent for her and when she arrived they were married.

My father was a welder-pipefitter in the Oakland Shipyards during WWII.

Both were born and raised in the '30's and '40's in Oklahoma. Neither were college educated.

Somewhere there's a story that when completed would not mirror these events; but would include them. A love story entailing loss and tragedy and hard work and continual struggles to keep going; and in the end a treasure for all the world. Or something like that.