Today is my last day of sabbatical before jumping into Nanowrimo. On this last day of my journey to find my inspiration again, I want to give you some insight on what can actually be gained from taking some much needed time off:

-when you aren't supposed to be writing three pages a day, you find yourself wanting to write three pages a day.
-there are other books out there besides vampire novels and books about infertility and depression.
-Bejeweled blitz on Facebook is addictive. So are Pieces of Flair and The Mood Weather Report.
-AOL radio has an all Nickelback channel which is very cool.
-dreaming turns into moments when your characters are talking to you again.
-suddenly, I have three more novels to add to the series I'm currently writing. I cultivated the plot lines for the last three novels while watching Heroes Season 3, Prince Caspian, and Dune.
-I'm also thinking about writing a fantasy series about five or six years from now.
-I've had great conversations with friends and family about my writing and found fantastic inspiration and encouragement in those conversations.
-friends who have been very understanding about my devotion to my work and the little bits of time I get to spend out with them. This break has been wonderful for them, but as of this past week, they are all telling me to go back to work. Except Karrie, who wants to play more DDR.

Ultimately, even though I haven't always enjoyed the time off from my work, I'm finding myself refreshed and ready to get back to business as usual. I'm excited to see Forbidden released in the middle of November and I'm pumped up for my Nano novel this year. There comes a time when we all need to recharge our batteries. I'm glad I took the time off to recharge mine.

It's hard to rewrite something that you've already finished. Especially when you've written it so long ago that you can't honestly remember what it was you had written before.

I finished Legacy in April. It had been hard to write, bogged down with historic fact, with a plot that twisted so much I could hardly keep it straight. My villain wasn't bad enough, my hero was not heroic enough, and the human girl stuck in the middle of the story had too much information for the time period. Did I mention that Ulrich makes his first appearance in the story line in this novel? It's a lot to take in.

I hated every single page of Legacy's first draft. Well, not every single page, but at least the majority of them. So the ability to rewrite the story is a wonderful opportunity for me. I can remake the plot so it actually makes sense and rewrite my villain so he's the horrible bad guy I see in my head. I can make my hero an actual heroic figure. So many things to fix, so little time to do it.

As it stands right now, I won't get to Legacy again until December 1st because of Nanowrimo. I'm currently sitting on page 27 of the draft. It has to be completed and edited by May 21st, 2010 because that's when it's being published. Which means that I have about six months after Nano is over to finish it up. I've never been under that kind of a crunch before. Prophecy was done in January of this year and published in June. Forbidden was finished in July and will be published in about two weeks. That's how I've liked it to be done. But Legacy has thrown a wrench in my works.

We'll have to see if I make my deadline or if it blows up in my face.

There isn't much time left. I have exactly six days left on my sabbatical, then I jump headfirst into the craziest month of my existence. I have figured out that if I want to hit my 53000 words this year, I have to write 2500 words a day five days a week. If I stretch that out to six days a week, that count goes to 2120 words a day. If I write every single day of the week for the entire month of November, I would have to write 1767 words a day. It's not as intimidating as it sounds.

53000 words is roughly 102 single spaced pages in Arial 11 point font. I wrote 129 pages in just over two weeks last year in October before jumping into Nano. So this shouldn't be horrible. I might even be able to have a social life while participating in Nano this year.

The whole point of Nanowrimo is to prove to yourself that yes, you can do this. There's no excuse to keep putting off the chance to write that book you've been dreaming about. It's tons of fun and I'm excited to be a part of it again this year. The prize is just too cool.

So I'm going to enjoy my last six days of sabbatical (I might even cut it short and work on Legacy before the Nano craziness begins) and make plans for November that are far enough away that I can plan my writing around them. Then I'm going to wait for my proof copy of Forbidden to arrive so I can again hold the work my mind in the palm of my hand.

Here it is! The new cover is finally available. The proof is on the way, so very soon I'll be holding this book in my hands. I just couldn't wait to share the new cover with everyone since it was approved by createspace.

I have also found out what the prize is going to be for winning Nanowrimo this year. It is the same as last year, but getting a free proof copy of your novel is a big deal. I'm excited to participate in Nano again this year for that prize alone.

See you next week!