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Archive for The Murder School

Finished!

NaNoWriMo ends today, but I finished my own draft yesterday afternoon, with time to spare. The total draft clocked in at 77,722 as counted by the NaNoWriMo word goblins, but Microsoft Word counts it as 78,707*. That’s about 10,000 more words than the original draft for After the Service, a NaNoWriMo product from 2006. My estimate for this book was 80K, so I’m fairly pleased with where it ended up. There’s lots of room for cutting if need be, once I rewrite it–and heaven knows it needs plenty of rewriting. This draft is puts the “rough” in “rough draft.” But hey, that’s what NaNoWriMo is for.

And now, I get to forget it entirely. December is devoted to rewriting David Kelter’s previous mystery, All That Death–I’ll be blogging bits and pieces of that process, as well. I will come back to this draft once that whole process is entirely finished, and AtD is published, hopefully sometime this spring.

“This draft,” by the way, has a new name–I’ve ditched The Murder School, and am currently calling it Degrees of Murder. Get it? Because, you see, he graduates.

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Halfway: 42,127

After fifteen days of writing, I’m 84% of the way to the goal of 50,000. But as gratifying as that is, 50K has never been my real goal here–my goal is to write a novel. As mentioned before, my previous David Kelter books have been about 70K and 75K respectively (though the latter is only a draft). I have been expecting this to be a bit longer, and so far it looks like that will be the case. My general estimate has been 80K.

That means that not only am I halfway through the month, but I’m probably also halfway through the novel itself, which is pretty good timing. And not only that, but I’m just about exactly halfway through those handwritten notes, too.

The best news of all, though, is that I think I’m over the wall I hit this past week. After four straight days of sub-1000 writing, I cranked out 4,736 yesterday.

(NOTE: Somehow, this post got lost somewhere in the ether last weekend. I think there was more to it when I first wrote it, but here’s what seems to have survived.

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10,407

Two pretty good days have put me 20% of the way to the NaNoWriMo goal. Now comes the hard part, when I have to juggle work with my writing, but that’s why I built up the cushion that I did this weekend.

Depending on how things go, I’d like to be well beyond 50K by the time November 30 rolls around. The last two David Kelter books have both been around 70-75K, and this one may well end up longer than that. But I have plans for next month–namely, revising the second David Kelter book, All That Death, to have it ready for publication in the Spring. So, if I could finish the entirety of The Murder School during November, that would be ideal.

But doing the writing has reminded me of something very important–writing is hard work. Sometimes it comes easily, and those are great days. But usually, it’s hard work. When you haven’t sat down and written 10K words in a weekend for a while, you sometimes forget that little fact.

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7,519

Whew! So far, I’m hitting all my goals, but only just.

Last night, I managed to scrape together outlines of my last few scenes. They aren’t great, but I’m expecting that, as I write, they will coalesce by the time I finish. Besides, I expect that by the time I get there, I’ll be well past 50K, and thus out from under the gun of November, so that I’ll be able to take my time.

However, I could not take my time today. I had set the goal for myself of hitting 7,500 words, without realizing how scanty the outlines for my first few scenes really were. My next few scenes are actually outlined fairly thoroughly, so it will be less work to put them together. Today, though, I took 17 handwritten lines of notes and turned them into 7,519 words. Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

I also had to name some characters, which I put more effort into this time around than I have in the past. I’ll introduce those names in a later post. For the moment, I’ll leave you with the Lines Of The Day. I may not do this every day, but whenever I write something that strikes me as moderately worthwhile I’ll share it with you.

“Mr. Kelter, I realize this may be an unusual request, but hear me out. When Jenny first decided to come out here to visit Seattle Pacific, I did some research on the school. Part of that research was reading several editions of the Falcon, where I read some of articles about the unfortunate events of this past January—and your part in them. And I also read the article you wrote in regards to your investigation of the death that occurred in your church. If you don’t mind my saying so, those were both rather impressive accomplishments.”

David, as it happened, didn’t mind.

And with that, I’m going to bed. Tommorow, I’ll write something more sensible, like 1,667 words. Or so.

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By any other name

This post on Open Wardrobes got me thinking about names in the run up to this new book (working title: The Murder School). Names are one of the weak points of After the Service I will freely admit to. I usually slap a name on my characters at about the same time I think them up, which leaves me with some rather dull character cognomens. My main character’s name is “David,” his roommate is “John,” his editor is “Jane,” his pastor is “Rick,” and his police detective is named “Anderson.” (Anderson might take offense to being called David’s police detective, but that’s what he gets for being a supporting character.)

Jim’s poetic ruminations on the importance of naming, combined with my own innate laziness, have actually combined to force me to take a bit more care in the naming of my supporting cast in The Murder School (hereby called “TMS“).

As I’ve been outlining, I’ve been neglecting to give any of my new characters names, with the exception of the victim. Instead, I’ve been referring to them by initials or abbreviations. My hope is that, eventually, I will come up with stellar, creative, descriptive names that illuminate the nature of these characters without being overly heavy-handed or–even more important, with a mystery–giving anything away!

I don’t know when I will actually give names to these folks, so I may end up posting excerpts with these nicknames still intact. So, without further ado, I present to you the new characters to be found in TMS:

  • JL: Jenny Lee: This is the one character I’ve named–the victim. She’s a Christian music star and alumna of Seattle Pacific University. She was supposed to give the commencement address for David’s graduation, but she’s found dead in her hotel room a couple days before. I like this name, because it’s the kind of short name a pop star should have, but it’s actually her real name.
  • AG: Alumni Guy. SPU director of alumni relations, or something like it. He contacts David on behalf of the school, asking him to investigate JL’s death–and hopefully to prove that it had nothing to do with SPU, which is getting tired of the tag “The Murder School.” (Get it?)
  • Mgr: Jenny Lee’s Manager. He also contacts David, having read up on his earlier exploits while doing advance work for his client. He, too, wants independent eyes and ears on the investigation.
  • Rep: Reporter. A reporter and SPU alum David knows vaguely from way back. He’s still trying to hit the big time, and also asks David to investigate, hoping to get some cheap labor that will give him a major scoop.
  • PA: JL’s Personal Assistant. A young, cute, freckled Tennessean with an accent David finds adorable. She’s devastated by her boss’ death, and by being stranded alone in a strange city. Or is she?
  • KB: JL’s keyboardist. A hip young musician, who, while he was feeling creatively stifled in his current position, is worried about the loss of his steady gig, and mourning the loss of his friend. Or is he?
  • JLM: JL’s Mother. A Korean immigrant who has lived nearly her whole life in the States. I imagine she has a Korean name, but that she hasn’t used it in years, and goes by a more American-sounding one. Not very close to her daughter, but angry and distraught by her sudden and mysterious death. Or is she?
  • HSBF: JL’s High School Boyfriend. A former jock, who the years have treated a bit less well than he may have hoped, he nonetheless could be said to have some rugged charm, if you overlook the small paunch and receding hairline. But while he still thinks his former girl is smokin’, he hasn’t seen her in years. Or has he?
  • VA: JL’s Violin Adviser. First violin for the Seattle Symphony, and one of JL’s music professor at SPU. A young prodigy grown into a less-young hotshot, he maintains more familiarity with his female students than David thinks appropriate. But he also hasn’t seen her for quite some time. Or has he?
  • AP: JL’s Accountability Partner. A friend from Tennessee, she knows more about JL than any other person, and loved her anyway. Or did she?
  • DKM: David Kelter’s Mother. Or is she? Yes, actually, she is. This isn’t the first time she’s appeared–she’s in the first scene of the forthcoming All That Death, but never got a name. The time has come. She’s kind of a flighty sort, but sharp in her own way–usually having to do with baseball statistics. Hates that David keeps finding himself involved in these murders.
  • DKF: David Kelter’s Father. The owner of a fairly successful printing business in the town of Mount Vernon an hour north of Seattle. Covertly fascinated by, and even a little envious of, his son’s escapades.

If you have any suggestions for these names, I’m all ears. At the moment, I’m considering taking names directly from the Washington State voter rolls, for some verisimilitude. But this time, I’m determined to make sure the names fit the characters well–and that will mean I’ll have to actually start writing the book, and get to know them.

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