Monday, January 26, 2009

In Which I Set a Horrible Example

So the WIP I posted the beginning of in the last post is coming along swimmingly. I'm about 11k words in, and I even have a plot (!!) and an inkling of an ending. Oh, and I have a working title--The Support Group. Not as interesting as any of the suggestions (and thank you so much for them) but it has the convenient quality of actually relating to the book (not your fault, helpful commenters; you had no idea what the book was about.)

So you'll notice I've written over 10,000 words in less than a week. A lot of writers would balk at this. Typically, though, I actually write even faster than this.

The advice you'll see a lot advocates the BIC method--BIC meaning Butt In Chair (though I like how it makes me think of BIC pens, too). Basically, this means you sit down and you write a little bit every day.

I don't do this. I'll go weeks or months without writing. And when I actually do write, it's constant, in obsessive, unstoppable bursts. 3K on weekends before I'm allowed out of bed. 2K after school. At least 2K during the school day, which my Calculus teacher just loves, of course. Move move move.

Because if I don't finish it quickly, I get bored. And I don't finish.

BIC, ADD-style.

--

So here's my query letter for The Support Group. Granted, I won't be sending this query letter--and I haven't even shown it to my fabulous fabulous agent yet--but I do so love writing them.


Former prodigy Dustin, eighteen and peaked, looked forward to living alone on the last of his picture book royalties. Instead, his brother’s night terrors escalate to a breakdown, and Dustin’s stuck sharing the house with—and playing nursemaid to—fifteen-year-old Jeremy. It’s not as if there are parents to do it; Dad took care of Jer for awhile, but disappeared in shame after Dustin came out. Late Mom’s around only in Jeremy’s nightmares.

Carting Jeremy around to doctors, however, offers a very significant plus—meeting Caleb, a psych nurse who promises Dustin a lot of things, among them a solution to Jeremy’s nightmares. Dustin hasn’t had a clue what to do besides stress over the kid and offer him tea and anti-anxiety meds, so Caleb’s invitation to Jeremy to join his support group seems like a dream come true, and Jeremy flourishes. Dustin’s drive to help his brother—and to remain close to Caleb—makes it a snap to follow the nurse’s directions for Jeremy’s care...and to answer Caleb’s probing questions.

But as Dustin’s relationship with Caleb develops, so does his sense that this group’s using Jeremy for something far more sinister than support, especially when Jeremy’s improvement subsides to a wracking sense of guilt he won’t explain to Dustin. The truth is, Caleb’s on a search for information. And delicate, not-so-innocent Jeremy seems the perfect place to look.

THE SUPPORT GROUP is a 45,000 word YA novel.

4 comments:

Sophie W. said...

huh. I don't BIC either, and i don't even write in spurts. I just write whenever I want to. It's worked out pretty well so far.

deltay said...

Hmm... now that I think about it, BIC doesn't really work well for me either. If the muse comes, then basically it's write-write-write until the the novel wears off completely. Otherwise I end up staying away from a period of time just to re-energize...

Anyway, that's AMAZING that you're about to be published later this year! Another teen author ;) And Brown in the fall? Whoa, you've definitely got a lot going for you now; an Ivy and a book?! Sweet. :) I'll definitely have to check out Break when it comes out - what's it about?

Race said...

Uh! Don't upset the calculus teachers.
And if you take a biology class don't upset those instructors either... they know things about you that are just scary.

hannah moskowitz said...

My biology teacher loved me :D

deltay--thanks! You've given me an idea for another post...