The Strange Adventures of Rangergirl
September 15
Ta da.
I'm done.
I wrote 5200 words today... and finished the first draft of The Strange Adventures of Rangergirl. I am so very, very pleased with how it turned out. I'm sure I'll start to hate the book -- or at least focus on its failings -- during the revision process, but right now, I love it, I think it's the best thing I've ever done (I suspect I'll continue to think that, actually). Mmm. Happiness.
And now I get to write some stories for a change! In fact, tomorrow I commence a short-story dare with Sean Klein and Heather and anyone else who wants to join in. A month of writing stories, then I'll revise my novel and start that whole arduous finding-an-agent-or-publisher thing...
So, for some chronology:
I got up decently early today and wrote 1500 words, getting up to the big final showdown scene (come on, it's a Western, sort of, except for the bits that are contemporary fantasy, or comic-book, or magic realism; I had to have a showdown, though I flatter myself that it's an unusual one). I hung out with Heather for a bit, and we went to Berkeley. Heather bought a copy of New Genre (featuring a fine story by Barth Anderson; I wish I had even half his talent, I really do) and The Kappa Child, both of which I'm interested in reading. Then we went to the café for brunch. I wrote longhand while Heather did stuff on her laptop. Our friend Teddy joined us for a while, and we had a nice conversation about Borges, consensual reality, intersections of fiction with truth, etc.; very pleasant, very interesting. Then more writing, until I finished, at 5 p.m.
Mmm. I got up and danced around the coffee shop when I finished. Shortly after, the post-novel depression hit; this is what I've been working on, more or less, for 2 years now. And I'm done. For a month, anyway, when I'll start revising. But still... I've told their whole story. I don't live with the characters anymore.
I'll miss them.
We went to see Possession, which was pretty good. Then home, where I counted my total words. The book's 123,000 words, and that probably won't change much; there are scenes to add, and scenes to cut, and I suspect they'll even out, more or less. I typed the title (it's my one superstition; I don't put the title above a piece until the first draft is finished, otherwise I jinx myself, it's hubris, and I never finish the thing). Then I wrote the dedication -- to Heather, which was a surprise for her, I think -- and then Heather typed "The End", my other little finishing-a-novel ritual. I like to have someone I love write "The End" on a book when it's done. I think I stole the ritual from something I read a long time ago, actually, but if so, it was so early in my childhood that the specifics are lost. Mmm. So nice. So good to have finished this, finally.
Heather went out and got the last disc of season 3 of The Sopranos, and we watched that, and snuggled on the couch... and here I am, telling you about my day.
Last night was fun, too. Heather and I stayed up late, going through our juvenilia, reading old poems and bits of stories, marveling at how far we've come, marveling even more at the occasional flashes of competence and skill we saw in those early works. We've both wanted to do this forever, this writing thing; and we're doing it. We're incredibly lucky.
Tune in next week for news from the realm of short story...
Words written since February 1, 2002: 164,700
Words written since last entry: 5,200
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