Saturday, October 18, 2008
Writing Exercise
I came up with a word count writing exercise for myself the other day. I've picked an idea I had for an original fairy tale and each day I write an increasing number of words on the story. So the first one I wrote 100 words, then 200, then 300, and today 400. Tomorrow I'll write 500 words and then the next day I'll write however many I need to get to 1667 words. It's going pretty well. I like the story (The Tale of the Prince and the Schoolteacher) but I'm just now getting to the plot and I have two segments left to write. Granted, the one tomorrow will be longer but I've still got a lot to fit in. Oh well. We'll just see how it turns out, I guess.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Oops...
Heh heh heh...I nearly forgot about this blog. I suppose that's what I get for starting a new one just for NaNoWriMo. Anyways, here are the story summaries. They're in alphabetical order, which is hopefully the order I'll write them in. Some are longer than others.
12 Dancing Princesses
A king, up to his ears in cobbler bills, proclaims a contest. Whoever can solve the mystery of how his daughters wear out their shoes every night will win the hand of the princess of his choice and become king. An old soldier comes to try his luck and, with the help of a magic cloak, solves the mystery.
Bearskin
A poor soldier makes an unfortunate deal with a strange gentleman and must wander for seven years dressed in a bearskin.
Beauty and the Beast
After her father gets in trouble trying to fulfill a promise, a young woman agrees to go and live with a beast in a magical castle in the woods.
Bluebeard/Fitcher’s Bird
A wicked wizard captures pretty girls for unknown reasons. When her sister is kidnapped, a brave young maiden disguises herself and finds a way to stop the wizard once and for all.
Cinderella
A gentleman’s daughter is forced into servitude by her wicked stepmother. With the help of her godmother and some friends, the girl goes to a royal ball and finds true love.
The Firebird
A young prince yearns to prove himself to his father. He sets out to catch the mysterious Firebird that has been stealing his father’s golden apples. Along the way he meets a talking wolf and learns that the Firebird is the servant of a princess who is trapped by a deathless sorcerer. The prince and the wolf (who is a man under a spell) go to save the princess. In the end, the sorcerer is defeated, the prince marries the princess, and the wolf and the firebird transform back into their human forms and marry as well.
The Fisherman and His Wife
A fisherman catches a magic fish. The fish offers him a wish to let him go. The man refuses the wish but lets the fish go anyways. His ambitious wife makes him go back though and they go through a series of increasingly greedy wishes before the fish decides to teach the wife a lesson in humility and unselfishness.
Frog Prince
A young princess makes a promise to a frog after he rescues her favorite toy.
Golden Goose
A boy who everyone thinks is stupid learns that a kind heart can lead to great rewards.
Goose Girl
A princess is forced to take a job as a goose girl after her servant betrays her and steals her magic and her talking horse. As she tends the geese, however, the girl discovers new powers and uses them to regain her rightful place.
Hansel and Gretel
A brother and sister are left for dead in the forest by their wicked stepmother. The boy is clever and leaves a trail to lead them home. The next time they aren’t so lucky—and then both of them will have to be clever.
Jack and the Beanstalk
Jack is a boy with a lot of ambition and wild ideas. All he wants to do is go on an adventure, like his dad. Unfortunately, living on a farm with his mom doesn’t provide a lot of opportunities for adventures. When his mother throws Jack’s latest acquisition—a bunch of magic beans—out the window, a beanstalk grows overnight and Jack gets the adventure he’s dreamed of.
Kate Crackernuts
Two girls love each other like sisters, but the mother of the plainer girl curses the prettier one. The two girls run away to try to break the spell. They end up at a castle where two princes live. The handsomer prince is trying to break a spell that has been cast on his brother, forcing him to go into the world of the faeries every night. The handsome prince and the plain sister agree to do each other favors. She will watch over his brother and break that spell if he will watch over her sister and break her spell. And so the plain prince and the plain sister marry and the handsome prince and the handsome sister marry, and they all live happily ever after.
Katie Woodencloak/ Cap o’Rushes/Donkeyskin/Catskin
A princess runs away from home to avoid an unwanted marriage. She takes a job as a scullery maid in a palace. The prince treats her cruelly but when she attends a ball in disguise, he is enchanted by her beauty. In the end, the princess teaches the prince a lesson and marries someone much nicer than him.
King Thrushbeard
A young king tries and fails to win the hand of a beautiful but haughty princess. His pride injured, the king proceeds to teach the princess a lesson in humility.
Little Mermaid
A mermaid rescues a human prince from drowning and falls in love with him. She sacrifices everything to be with him, but once on land she finds out that sacrifice isn’t enough. She will have to fight to get what she wants.
Little Red Riding Hood
A girl disobeys her mom’s instructions on the way to Grandma’s house and learns that Mom gives instructions for a very good reason!
The Nightingale
A lonely emperor finds comfort in the song of a little nightingale. However, he fails to realize that his friend is not happy in a cage; she has to be free to sing. When a new, mechanical bird arrives, the emperor frees the nightingale, who flies away. Then the emperor falls ill. It is up to a clever servant girl to find the nightingale and save the emperor.
Princess and the Pea
One rainy night a girl shows up at the royal palace. She is mistaken for a princess and finds herself swept into a contest for the prince’s hand. During this contest, she will have to face her greatest fear: heights.
Puss in Boots
A miller’s son is angry that he is left with only the cat after his father dies. The cat convinces him, however, that there are advantages to every situation and then contrives to get his master everything he’s ever dreamed of.
Rapunzel
A foolish man and his wife steal from a witch, who takes their firstborn daughter as payment. She trains the girl as her apprentice and then traps her in a tower in the middle of the forest. One day a prince finds the tower and the girl. They fall in love and come up with a plan to get the girl out of the tower. When the witch finds out, however, she separates them. Years later, they are reunited and begin a new life together.
Rumpelstiltskin
A miller’s daughter finds herself in a terrible predicament when her father tells a lie to a greedy king. Luckily, there’s someone to help her. When all the gold is spun and the king is ready to make her his bride, will this guardian come back and save her one more time?
The Six Swans
Eliza and her six brothers live happily at home with their father, a widowed king. At least, they do until Dad decides to remarry. Their stepmother turns the six boys into six swans and casts them out of the palace. Eliza runs away before she can curse her too. She spends six years wandering the countryside searching for her brothers. A strange old woman helps her find them and tells her how to change them back. Enchanted shirts changed them into swans, so enchanted shirts will change them back. But during the time she is making the shirts, Eliza cannot utter a single word. This wouldn’t be nearly so hard if a handsome prince didn’t come along and take her back to the palace with him, and if the stepmother didn’t show up again and try to ruin things!
Sleeping Beauty
A princess is placed under a terrible curse by a wicked fairy. Her fairy godparents manage to change the curse a bit and then take her away to keep her safe. The princess grows up completely unaware of her true identity and she falls in love with a peasant boy. When she finds out about the curse—and about a betrothal that goes with it—she runs away, just as the curse kicks in. Then it’s a contest between her true love and her betrothed to save her and defeat the wicked fairy.
Snow Queen
Kay and Gerta are best friends. When Kay is kidnapped by the Snow Queen, Gerta leaves home to search for him. Along the way she meets a pair of crows, a robber girl, a kind old woman, and a proud reindeer. Will Gerta reach Kay in time, or will he be trapped in the Snow Queen’s kingdom forever?
Snow White
When her wicked stepmother tries to kill her, Princess Snow White runs away into the woods. She finds refuge with seven brothers, who let her stay with them as long as she works as their housekeeper. Things go fine for a while, but then the stepmother comes back into the picture.
Swan Maiden (Swan Lake)
A princess is placed under a spell by a wicked sorcerer who wants to marry her and take over her kingdom. She spends her days as a swan and her nights as a human, and she is trapped by the lake at his castle. When a prince finds out her secret, he promises to help her. What neither of them realizes is that it will take both of them to break the spell.
Thumbelina
A little girl no bigger than a human thumb is kidnapped by an evil toad who wants her to marry her son. Thumbelina escapes only to be kidnapped by a beetle. She gets away from him too and finds shelter with a field mouse for the winter. The mouse tries to get her engaged to a mole. Thumbelina makes one more escape and this time she ends up in the land of the flower fairies, where she finds her true love and lives happily ever after.
Toads and Diamonds
Two sisters, one good and one bad, both meet an old woman. One is kind to her, the other cruel. In accordance with the faerie code, the old woman (a faerie in disguise) rewards and punishes them.
True Bride/East o ’the Sun, West o’ the Moon/Lady and the Lion
An orphan is captured by a wicked troll who sets her three impossible tasks. A giant black dog comes to help her and frees her from the troll’s clutches. She lives in the castle he built for the troll (as the last test) and eventually meets a prince. However, he has a wicked stepmother and a horrible troll for a betrothed. When they come to claim him, the girl calls on the black dog again to help her reclaim her true love.
12 Dancing Princesses
A king, up to his ears in cobbler bills, proclaims a contest. Whoever can solve the mystery of how his daughters wear out their shoes every night will win the hand of the princess of his choice and become king. An old soldier comes to try his luck and, with the help of a magic cloak, solves the mystery.
Bearskin
A poor soldier makes an unfortunate deal with a strange gentleman and must wander for seven years dressed in a bearskin.
Beauty and the Beast
After her father gets in trouble trying to fulfill a promise, a young woman agrees to go and live with a beast in a magical castle in the woods.
Bluebeard/Fitcher’s Bird
A wicked wizard captures pretty girls for unknown reasons. When her sister is kidnapped, a brave young maiden disguises herself and finds a way to stop the wizard once and for all.
Cinderella
A gentleman’s daughter is forced into servitude by her wicked stepmother. With the help of her godmother and some friends, the girl goes to a royal ball and finds true love.
The Firebird
A young prince yearns to prove himself to his father. He sets out to catch the mysterious Firebird that has been stealing his father’s golden apples. Along the way he meets a talking wolf and learns that the Firebird is the servant of a princess who is trapped by a deathless sorcerer. The prince and the wolf (who is a man under a spell) go to save the princess. In the end, the sorcerer is defeated, the prince marries the princess, and the wolf and the firebird transform back into their human forms and marry as well.
The Fisherman and His Wife
A fisherman catches a magic fish. The fish offers him a wish to let him go. The man refuses the wish but lets the fish go anyways. His ambitious wife makes him go back though and they go through a series of increasingly greedy wishes before the fish decides to teach the wife a lesson in humility and unselfishness.
Frog Prince
A young princess makes a promise to a frog after he rescues her favorite toy.
Golden Goose
A boy who everyone thinks is stupid learns that a kind heart can lead to great rewards.
Goose Girl
A princess is forced to take a job as a goose girl after her servant betrays her and steals her magic and her talking horse. As she tends the geese, however, the girl discovers new powers and uses them to regain her rightful place.
Hansel and Gretel
A brother and sister are left for dead in the forest by their wicked stepmother. The boy is clever and leaves a trail to lead them home. The next time they aren’t so lucky—and then both of them will have to be clever.
Jack and the Beanstalk
Jack is a boy with a lot of ambition and wild ideas. All he wants to do is go on an adventure, like his dad. Unfortunately, living on a farm with his mom doesn’t provide a lot of opportunities for adventures. When his mother throws Jack’s latest acquisition—a bunch of magic beans—out the window, a beanstalk grows overnight and Jack gets the adventure he’s dreamed of.
Kate Crackernuts
Two girls love each other like sisters, but the mother of the plainer girl curses the prettier one. The two girls run away to try to break the spell. They end up at a castle where two princes live. The handsomer prince is trying to break a spell that has been cast on his brother, forcing him to go into the world of the faeries every night. The handsome prince and the plain sister agree to do each other favors. She will watch over his brother and break that spell if he will watch over her sister and break her spell. And so the plain prince and the plain sister marry and the handsome prince and the handsome sister marry, and they all live happily ever after.
Katie Woodencloak/ Cap o’Rushes/Donkeyskin/Catskin
A princess runs away from home to avoid an unwanted marriage. She takes a job as a scullery maid in a palace. The prince treats her cruelly but when she attends a ball in disguise, he is enchanted by her beauty. In the end, the princess teaches the prince a lesson and marries someone much nicer than him.
King Thrushbeard
A young king tries and fails to win the hand of a beautiful but haughty princess. His pride injured, the king proceeds to teach the princess a lesson in humility.
Little Mermaid
A mermaid rescues a human prince from drowning and falls in love with him. She sacrifices everything to be with him, but once on land she finds out that sacrifice isn’t enough. She will have to fight to get what she wants.
Little Red Riding Hood
A girl disobeys her mom’s instructions on the way to Grandma’s house and learns that Mom gives instructions for a very good reason!
The Nightingale
A lonely emperor finds comfort in the song of a little nightingale. However, he fails to realize that his friend is not happy in a cage; she has to be free to sing. When a new, mechanical bird arrives, the emperor frees the nightingale, who flies away. Then the emperor falls ill. It is up to a clever servant girl to find the nightingale and save the emperor.
Princess and the Pea
One rainy night a girl shows up at the royal palace. She is mistaken for a princess and finds herself swept into a contest for the prince’s hand. During this contest, she will have to face her greatest fear: heights.
Puss in Boots
A miller’s son is angry that he is left with only the cat after his father dies. The cat convinces him, however, that there are advantages to every situation and then contrives to get his master everything he’s ever dreamed of.
Rapunzel
A foolish man and his wife steal from a witch, who takes their firstborn daughter as payment. She trains the girl as her apprentice and then traps her in a tower in the middle of the forest. One day a prince finds the tower and the girl. They fall in love and come up with a plan to get the girl out of the tower. When the witch finds out, however, she separates them. Years later, they are reunited and begin a new life together.
Rumpelstiltskin
A miller’s daughter finds herself in a terrible predicament when her father tells a lie to a greedy king. Luckily, there’s someone to help her. When all the gold is spun and the king is ready to make her his bride, will this guardian come back and save her one more time?
The Six Swans
Eliza and her six brothers live happily at home with their father, a widowed king. At least, they do until Dad decides to remarry. Their stepmother turns the six boys into six swans and casts them out of the palace. Eliza runs away before she can curse her too. She spends six years wandering the countryside searching for her brothers. A strange old woman helps her find them and tells her how to change them back. Enchanted shirts changed them into swans, so enchanted shirts will change them back. But during the time she is making the shirts, Eliza cannot utter a single word. This wouldn’t be nearly so hard if a handsome prince didn’t come along and take her back to the palace with him, and if the stepmother didn’t show up again and try to ruin things!
Sleeping Beauty
A princess is placed under a terrible curse by a wicked fairy. Her fairy godparents manage to change the curse a bit and then take her away to keep her safe. The princess grows up completely unaware of her true identity and she falls in love with a peasant boy. When she finds out about the curse—and about a betrothal that goes with it—she runs away, just as the curse kicks in. Then it’s a contest between her true love and her betrothed to save her and defeat the wicked fairy.
Snow Queen
Kay and Gerta are best friends. When Kay is kidnapped by the Snow Queen, Gerta leaves home to search for him. Along the way she meets a pair of crows, a robber girl, a kind old woman, and a proud reindeer. Will Gerta reach Kay in time, or will he be trapped in the Snow Queen’s kingdom forever?
Snow White
When her wicked stepmother tries to kill her, Princess Snow White runs away into the woods. She finds refuge with seven brothers, who let her stay with them as long as she works as their housekeeper. Things go fine for a while, but then the stepmother comes back into the picture.
Swan Maiden (Swan Lake)
A princess is placed under a spell by a wicked sorcerer who wants to marry her and take over her kingdom. She spends her days as a swan and her nights as a human, and she is trapped by the lake at his castle. When a prince finds out her secret, he promises to help her. What neither of them realizes is that it will take both of them to break the spell.
Thumbelina
A little girl no bigger than a human thumb is kidnapped by an evil toad who wants her to marry her son. Thumbelina escapes only to be kidnapped by a beetle. She gets away from him too and finds shelter with a field mouse for the winter. The mouse tries to get her engaged to a mole. Thumbelina makes one more escape and this time she ends up in the land of the flower fairies, where she finds her true love and lives happily ever after.
Toads and Diamonds
Two sisters, one good and one bad, both meet an old woman. One is kind to her, the other cruel. In accordance with the faerie code, the old woman (a faerie in disguise) rewards and punishes them.
True Bride/East o ’the Sun, West o’ the Moon/Lady and the Lion
An orphan is captured by a wicked troll who sets her three impossible tasks. A giant black dog comes to help her and frees her from the troll’s clutches. She lives in the castle he built for the troll (as the last test) and eventually meets a prince. However, he has a wicked stepmother and a horrible troll for a betrothed. When they come to claim him, the girl calls on the black dog again to help her reclaim her true love.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
National Novel Writing Month 2008--Prep Time
Okay, so I'm trying my hand at NaNoWriMo again this year, even though last year I decided it was too hard to write a novel and be in college at the same time. This year, though, I think I might possibly have a chance. Why is that, you ask? Because this year I am not technically writing a real novel. I am retelling 30 fairy tales in 30 days.
Yes, you read that right. 30 fairy tale retellings in 30 days. Each fairy tale will be at least 1667 words long. That adds up to 50,000 words, which is how many I'll need to officially "finish" NaNoWriMo. I don't think this is cheating at NaNoWriMo. No one ever said I couldn't write 30 short stories in a month, right? And most of my stories have the potential to be connected. I mean, if nothing else there can only be so many fairies in this magical land (and I think they'll all take place in the same faraway country), right? Of course right.
I'm using the Scrivener software to help with planning and writing for NaNoWriMo this year. Scrivener is wonderful. I won't go into all the details here but basically it lets you keep all your stuff for a particular project--all your chapters, all your reference material and pictures and soundbytes and character profiles and junk--in one file. You can export the novel to Word or to a .pdf and have it all formatted to print off and send out for publishing. I really, really love it. It's so much easier than keeping everything in folders on my computer, so that I have to search through everything to find the picture I want for a character.
Anyways, I'm hoping that having this blog will keep me accountable for writing every day. I'll put up my planning stuff here too (which is mostly just summaries of each fairy tale and then the original versions; I'll probably only put up the summaries) so that in case of an emergency (God forbid) I'll have it all here too.
This is my first year writing on the computer for NaNoWriMo. Other years I've been writing longhand in composition books. It worked in high school because I could take a composition book to class but I couldn't take a computer. Now I'm in college I have a laptop and I can bring it to class. Not that I'll write in class. I definitely won't. But I go to every class early anyways so I can write before class.
I really hope I can finish this year. I will be so proud of myself if I finish this year. I've only finished one other year and that year the novel was complete and utter crap. Which is to be expected, I know, when you write a novel in 30 days, but it was disappointing. This year will hopefully be more managable because I just have to concentrate on one story a day and there's no continuity stuff. Later I can edit the stories and see if I can't find some common thread to weave through them.
Well, that's all for now. More tomorrow probably. I just wanted to get this set up today.
Yes, you read that right. 30 fairy tale retellings in 30 days. Each fairy tale will be at least 1667 words long. That adds up to 50,000 words, which is how many I'll need to officially "finish" NaNoWriMo. I don't think this is cheating at NaNoWriMo. No one ever said I couldn't write 30 short stories in a month, right? And most of my stories have the potential to be connected. I mean, if nothing else there can only be so many fairies in this magical land (and I think they'll all take place in the same faraway country), right? Of course right.
I'm using the Scrivener software to help with planning and writing for NaNoWriMo this year. Scrivener is wonderful. I won't go into all the details here but basically it lets you keep all your stuff for a particular project--all your chapters, all your reference material and pictures and soundbytes and character profiles and junk--in one file. You can export the novel to Word or to a .pdf and have it all formatted to print off and send out for publishing. I really, really love it. It's so much easier than keeping everything in folders on my computer, so that I have to search through everything to find the picture I want for a character.
Anyways, I'm hoping that having this blog will keep me accountable for writing every day. I'll put up my planning stuff here too (which is mostly just summaries of each fairy tale and then the original versions; I'll probably only put up the summaries) so that in case of an emergency (God forbid) I'll have it all here too.
This is my first year writing on the computer for NaNoWriMo. Other years I've been writing longhand in composition books. It worked in high school because I could take a composition book to class but I couldn't take a computer. Now I'm in college I have a laptop and I can bring it to class. Not that I'll write in class. I definitely won't. But I go to every class early anyways so I can write before class.
I really hope I can finish this year. I will be so proud of myself if I finish this year. I've only finished one other year and that year the novel was complete and utter crap. Which is to be expected, I know, when you write a novel in 30 days, but it was disappointing. This year will hopefully be more managable because I just have to concentrate on one story a day and there's no continuity stuff. Later I can edit the stories and see if I can't find some common thread to weave through them.
Well, that's all for now. More tomorrow probably. I just wanted to get this set up today.
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