Hesitant, Hopeful

I've been trying to decide whether I should avoid this topic, but I've decided a little bit of information couldn't hurt. So, I thought I'd share a few things about my new novel project. Just a few things, mind. Nothing fancy, not too much information, just a few basic things.

The first would have to be that you won't see a title, mock cover, or general synopsis for this particular project. None of that stuff with be available until after I get the first draft done and am onto the editing phase. This is, by far, not my usual mode of operation. I have a "Novel" page on this blog because I normally write synopsis blurbs and make mock covers for my projects. But you know, while chatting on Facebook with a friend it came to my attention that I've never actually finished a project when I do too much extra stuff for it.

Case in point: Love's Daughter and Remembering Tomorrow are two pretty prime examples of this particular thing. Both have titles, mock covers, and blurbs, both are on the back burner. Even my Dark Hearts project, which I still hope to start--and, of course, finish--at some point, has failed to launch because I spent too much time doing extraneous work for a book that fails to exist at all (this reminds me of you, Jodi, writing about making a website for a book that doesn't even exist, ha!).

But I will share a few things. You can find the counter-dealy-ma-jigger on the sidebar over yonder. I'll regularly update my progress, if you're interested. Mostly it's for me. I like to see that thing moving, to see how many words I've written, and what percentage of goal word count that represents. Of course, 75,000 words is a guess, not a hard and fast rule about how many words I'll have. I could have 100,000 for all I know... but I doubt it.

I'm writing, as the widget says, a "Gothic Romance" novel. I really want to reject romance as a genre, but doing that has gotten me nowhere. So, I'm embracing it. Not just that but historical romance. The work is set in London during the Regency Era, my favorite era and genre to read. Since coming back from CA, I've read almost 20 regency romance novels. I'm pretty obsessed. So since I love them, I figure I'll try my hand at them, even though historical voice has never before been my strong suit. This one, though, is coming out really well, I think.

I can also tell you that I'm really, really happy with what I've got so far. I've never been more happy with a project... like, ever. Except maybe my thesis, but this isn't that. This is fiction and I've never felt better about a fictional work I've written than I do this one.

I can also tell you that no matter how much you think you know about an era, you're wrong. I'm a huge regency fan, but when it comes to small details, I've had to do some pretty huge research. For instance, do you happen to know how fast a carriage travels? Or, how mail was sent and delivered in the early 19th century? Or what about what sort of paper people used for letter writing? Oh, or what sort of pens people used to do said writing--quill or metal nib? Or any number of other factoids responsible for authenticity? No, me either. At least, I didn't. Thank the heavens for Google and the ability to bookmark--and export said bookmarks across computers. Else, I'd be in trouble.

All in all, I'm proud of what I've got so far. I've got a pretty good plot-skeleton, I've been carrying around a little notebook to take notes when ideas strike me (because I can't ever remember that stuff), and tonight I made myself sit down and work even though I wasn't feeling wonderful. Now that I have, even though I only managed to write about 1,350 words tonight, I feel really good about it. And about what I got out, which I think manages to introduce a significant part of the plot.

And now, it's six-fifteen in the morning and I'm tired. I've been sleeping like crap so I think I'm going to curl up and wait for Matt to come home--he gets off work at seven o'clock. Good...er... night... or would that be morning? (~.^)

PS. Editing is beyond me at this point, so I hope what I've said makes sense.