Welcome to day number seven of this year's NaNoWriMo challenge where, by the end of today, I should be completely caught up to the target word count that I slipped behind on following an impromptu day off. I'm still not sure whether or not the novel I opted to work on will be anywhere near a draft worth sharing but I think I'm onto a structure that's interesting.

The basic structure isn't all that groundbreaking as I am simply using chapters that are each made up of their own short story of sorts but at the same time each piece fits together to create a much bigger picture. I know, by definition, this is pretty much how chapters are supposed to work but I think the gimmick that I am using to tie the chapters together steps away from traditional structure enough that it feels exciting and new, at least to me.

With the way that these chapters work, I can overwrite and ramble as much as I want without worrying how it fits in with my past or future story as long as I stick to each chapter's theme. I'm finding that this is an awesome technique for me while working with the deadline pressures of this challenge.

Here's an example of how it works, the samples I'm about to use are nowhere close to the actual story I'm working on but they should help to clear up my thoughts. So let's say the story starts with a guy walking down the street, we get a brief description during the basic start to a standard piece of narrative.

Then let's say he approaches a dog. This sends us into the characters head as he shares his history with dogs in what would be chapter two with chapter one being the introduction. This dog chapter can go on about his likes, his dislike, random fact, stories from the past as we build up to a transition.

Don't worry, these transitions don't jump back and forth between the ongoing introductory tale with these little vignettes like a flashback episode of Family Ties, no, we never get back to the introductory storyline until the very end to tie everything together.

Instead, let's say, at the end of the dog chapter our character explains that he was never able to look at bacon the same way again after witnessing his childhood pet eat an entire package of raw meat. This would then send us into a chapter about the character's connection to bacon.

Again, I'm over-simplifying this tale for the purposes of this example because though dogs and meats are fun, the sample I used above makes it sound like I'm piecing together a story using nothing but Wikipedia entries where each chapter is based on the keyword of the last sentence from the chapter before.

Now that I think about it, this Wikipedia explanation is kind of a good way to explain what I'm attempting to do only, at least in my head, the transitions are smooth enough to where the gimmick itself doesn't outshine what I'm attempting to write. I think/hope that this gimmick won't even be noticed until the reader is about halfway through or if the reader has read this post.

Either way, this approach allows me to just fill each chapter with the points that I want to get to in a very sloppy, overwritten first draft that is going to be a lot of work to rewrite. I'm fine with this though because it allows me to spew out words to easily meet my daily word count goals.

So, now that I've shared my master plan it's time to wrap things up so that I can switch tasks and get to work. As always, I'll check in tomorrow with another update on my progress. Until then, I hope you enjoy your day.

Sincerely,

The Wicker Breaker

P.S. If you are reading this and playing along with this year's NaNoWriMo feel free to add fubunker as your writing buddy and I will buddy you back.