NaNoWriMo

I've signed up for my first ever National Novel Writing Month. 50,000 words in one month. I'd already been working on this novel for a year now, most written in Scrivener trial program for Windows. I'd not opened it for quite some time due to my change of life move from Chicago to the Blue Ridge Mountains in Georgia. When I opened it yesterday, November 1st, the start of NaNoWriMo, all of the 19th century writing was gone. Thankfully, I'd compiled all into a word doc, so I didn't really lose it, just had to find and reconstruct. That was how the first day went when I should've been writing 1666 words. 

Today was MY first day and I completed 2357, but the day isn't over. I have 975 words to make the complete 3332 for two days. That is how my evening will be spent, I'm sure. 

A friend reminded me about my blog & asked if I would update it with the novel info. I must say I'm a bit nervous on that when it's straight writing with no editing or research, so we'll see. But, for those of you who either don't remember or flat don't know, I'm posting the synopsis. I had posted a chapter excerpt last year, and I'll repost that tomorrow. Then, if I do post the progress, at least you'll have an idea of what it's talking about. 

And as always, I am open to constructive feedback. 

Peace out. 

dk

"In Search of Mama" is the story of Dottie Stroebe, a 1st generation German-American girl, with an illegitimate son, who falls in love with a carny man. Clayton is a one-legged Indian half-breed, fifteen years Dottie's senior. They marry, have another child and travel the circus circuit another four years before settling into a non-descript, life in Chicago. When Dottie passes in 2010, a strange elderly southern gentlewoman with the same last maiden name appears at the funeral, gives Dottie's daughter, Marie, a letter that is an invitation to visit her in NC, and saying she's known Marie's mother since she was little. Fifty-years old, with nothing holding her anywhere, Marie packs up and leaves Chicago shortly after. She finds Louise in a tidy log-cabin behind a dilapidated plantation. Even though Louise has extended the invitation, she is not happy to see Marie. As Marie tries to learn what role this mysterious woman played in the life of her mother, a family story unfolds that carries us from 19th century Appalachia to the plains of Oklahoma in the year it became territory, to 20th century railroad yards of Pennsylvania to Chicago from the 1940s to current. It tells of passion, racism and family secrets hushed through generations.