NaNo '06? WTF!?

Good lord, it's too early to be thinking about next year's National Novel Writing month, but that's exactly what I'm doing. What, exactly, is wrong with me?

The little joke I tossed out in my last column -- that writing about a guy who discovers on page one that he's dying, and promptly dies at the 50,000 word mark,r regardless of what else is happening -- is actually incredibly appealing to me. It will likely make for the worst, least satisfying, and ultimately anticlimactic climax I've ever written, but, most important, it'll be fun. Well, at least for me. And that's kind of the most important thing, to me.

I've even found a tasty little subplot to play with -- having the character purchase scratch and wins, obsessively. He'll drop $20.00 on them in the first chapter, thinking, hey, what does it matter if I burn my money on these stupid things, I'm dying anyway, and then will see how long he can go buying more with the winnings from his tickets. Which, thanks to the gods of literary fiction, will carry him through until the endof the book.

Again, a mostly meaningless idea, but something that would be fun to do, and give the character just one odd little tick that'll make him a little bit more fun to write, and hopefully a little bit more fun to read.

Although, really, instead of making plans for next year's NaNo, I really should focus on just getting this year's done. And then getting around to do the editing work on last year's novel, which is desperate need of some.

And please, don't even get me thinking about "The Amazingly True Adventures of Spiffy The Chicken" -- I have enough other projects on the go at the moment. Though, ironically, I'm sure that'll end up being the one that's actually completed first.