Category: Writing Happenings

What happened to the Frenzy?

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I’ve been writing less and less and it’s not for lack of material, it’s for lack of time. I owe my readers an explanation of what happened to my Script Frenzy competition. In summary, I didn’t finish the race. The sad part about it is that I had only 18 pages to go when I stopped writing.

 Why did I stop writing it? Honestly, I liked the story, but the script format was a big struggle for me and I diverted my energy into other writing projects and other life events and simply gave up. I still want to write this particular story. I have to decide if to finish it on my own terms and place it in my e-reads for your reading pleasure or to turn it into a novel during my Nanowrimo competition this coming November. Your input regarding this will be greatly appreciated.

 In terms of projects, I’m working on editing “The Road Home”, and in the middle of writing a new novel whose title I have not decided yet.

 Thanks for your support.

Naty

Ten days to go

On By Naty MatosIn Writing Happenings2 Comments

It seems so closed and so far at the same time. April has flown away. I can’t believe that during nanowrimo, I had written over 150 pages by this time of the month and I have not been able to make it to the dreaded 100 this time. There’s so much of the story left to write and only ten days left. So the real question is , will I’ll be able to finish this script in the next ten days and hopefully with more than a hundred pages. Let the writing continue.

Crossed midpoint

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The script has crossed the mid point in terms of pages and in terms of the story; we are slightly ahead of schedule, but not much advantage to spare. The irony of this story is that who I created as a supporting character is taking center stage and I’m not sure I want to squeeze her into the back again. I’m actually enjoying the things that are occurring and how they are developing. I may just have to change the title at the end. 60/ 100, we are almost there!

Painful writing

On By Naty MatosIn Writing Happenings3 Comments

Someone brought to my attention today that I had stopped my script frenzy updates. I guess it’s because I’m having so many difficulties with this script, it’s hard for me to describe the already painful experience after using what is left of my brain in actually describing what these characters are supposed to be doing.  As my readers know this is my first script.

I truly believe that God is teaching me something through this experience; get out of your comfort zone. I’m a novelist. I can write a short stories and essays. I’ve even done a poem or two and even received recognition for some of them in earlier years. Why is this so hard? I don’t know if it’s the structure of it, or the unfamiliarity. I have to admit that I struggle adapting  to new things, so I guess this writing experience is a reflection not only of where my life is, but also where God is taking me. Now, I am almost 95% sure that God doesn’t want me to be a script writer, that’s not what I’m saying. He’s calling me to move out of my comfort zone and take risks and experience new things. It does sound great in theory, who doesn’t like something new.  Nobody tells you that just like a beautiful vase that needs first to be molded and placed in the fire to get to that final product; those new things that we’re embracing have a struggle of their own.

This weekend I was about to throw in the towel. I have already written in my mind the blog posting announcing my withdrawal from the competition, then an e-mail came through. It was from one of our frenzy sponsors advising us of what they call, “the moment”, and how to get over it. The email busted every excuse I had come up to get out of the race…once again, I was busted! So I sat in front of my computer and wrote another six pages. Even with my kicking and screaming. Amazingly I’m ahead of schedule.

The story…, it’s not quite what I had envision. It has taken a life of its own, but even then I’m enjoying it again.  So here’s where we are… Page 44/100 of my script on Day 12.

Progress in quality not quantity

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Part of the challenge of not knowing what you’re doing is that you may have done tons of work and it could be done wrong. Last night after writing, I decided to look into our frenzy resources page and realized that there was specific software that helps you format scripts. I subscribed to one of them and had to reformat all that I had written. So today instead of progressing in my story, the time allotted went to reformatting the story. Thank God I’m ahead of schedule and that I found http://www.scripped.com

Day 5 Script Frenzy 26/100

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More than expected; since I am ahead of schedule, I figured I would do just a page, but the inspiration hit and was able to do much more. I don’t have a structure of where I’m going with this story, but I do know that it’s taking a life of its own. I’ve been able to enter some not necessary comedy, but some sarcasm to the story, through the sister of the bride. She’s the voice of reason. This one is definitely going to be more than a 100 pages, so now my goal is not so much the page count, but to actually finish the story.

Day 4 Script Frenzy 22/100

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It was a productive writing day I’ve been thinking all day on how to make this funny. I placed some physical humor. There is nothing better than a couple accidentally knocking themselves over in their honeymoon to make some great memories. Thinks are getting hairy for my main character. She’s starting to discover that her husband and she have different expectations and goals. They just made it home from the honeymoon. We’ll see what will happen next.

Day 3 Script Frenzy 14/100

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Even though I didn’t sit to write until about two hours ago, I’ve been thinking about my script all day. My brain felt fried and unmotivated. I was in the middle of a wedding scene yesterday and I couldn’t find the witty to the story. It’s supposed to be a comedy after all. I was too tired to be sarcastic and I have no experience writing comedy. So I’m a blind woman trying to describe color, a newbie to comedy, a newbie to scripts. After shopping for some home improvements, I came home and watched “The Wedding Planner”. Jennifer Lopez is not one of my favorites actress. I do like Matthew McConaughey , but if you need some inspiration on wedding scenes, you can’t go wrong with this movie. I tried to watch Made of Honor as well, but the version I found was in Chinese and my language abilities are limited in that area. After the movie, I took a nap and when I woke up, my muse was back and I was able to make it to fourteen pages. There’s hope…!

Day 1 Script Frenzy Day 6/100

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First day of the frenzy; not really sure of what I’m doing, but here we go. I plan to get some type of format at the library this weekend, because I’m writing, but I’m not even sure that what I’m doing is right. For those who don’t know what I’m doing, this is a competition of writing a script with a minimum of 100 pages starting April1rst and submitting the script no later than April 30th.

Today’s countdown 6/100   94 to go!