Update on NaNoWriMo 2010: My First Two Chapters

Hello everyone,

As I mentioned back in November, I gave NaNoWriMo a try for the first time in 2010. I didn’t hit 50,000 words in 30 days, but I had a lot of fun trying. I posted regular updates to my friend’s blog at the time, and now I’d like to bring some of what I produced to Faceintheblue.

By no stretch of the imagination is this a finished work. I tried to merge my love of historical fiction with my recent appreciation for Kurt Vonnegut’s style, and I ended up with something in dire need of revision. That’s not to say I’m not happy with what I produced.

My concept was a simple one: What if someone had lived for ten thousand years and knew he was about to die. What would he have to say? What if his death was facilitated by a physical incarnation of death, and the protagonist came to love the harbinger of the end before the end of his life’s story? What would that look like?

It was too ambitious a project for thirty days. Maybe I’ll continue it as an ongoing project. I am resolved that this will never be something I formally seek to publish. In the meantime, here are the first couple of chapters of my work. I plan to publish more in the near future.

Enjoy!

On E-Publishing

A friend of mine recently sent me a link to this blog, which makes a powerful contribution towards the ongoing argument that self-publishing –e-publishing– is not only the easy way to put my work in front of readers, but also the better way to do it. It’s a seductive siren song, but does that analogy extend to include to tempting me onto the rocks?

I’m going to be honest, I am slowly coming around to the idea that this might be a direction I have to explore. Not anytime soon, mind you, but that’s because of my stubbornness. It’s the way the world seems to be going, and even someone who writes historical fiction can only ignore the prevailing winds for so long before he thinks about adjusting his sails accordingly.