Buoy, am I tired!

How I spent my Labor Day Weekend: I wrote a novel!

Okay technically perhaps...a novella.

It was part of the 3-Day Novel Contest . I usually do not admit publicly when I've entered a competition since later when the winners are announced I too frequently have to say, "well, it was a good try."

But I feel completely different about this competition. I want to shout it from the rooftops of the world: "I WROTE A NOVEL IN THREE DAYS!!!"

Whether it's a great American novel (or Canadian, since the contest is out of Vancouver, BC) or it's a work of rubbish, I completed it. Finished at seven minutes before midnight. Sent it in the next morning.

Whew.

And those of you who have followed my summer's bat stories will be happy to hear that I used that as my jumping off point. Write what you know, after all. Before I dove in at 4:00 Saturday morning, all I had thought up were three possible openings, and I decided that the antagonist would be someone from a terrorist organization.

I was thrilled with where the story went and how much my summer's research into bats and rabies ended up helping me pen my 101-page story.

That's all I'll say on the subject for now. I'll know the results of the contest in January; maybe I'll post them here.

Some up coming dates to consider:

Saturday, October 14, 2006, I will be presenting an "Art of Re-Writing Workshop" as part of the 3-day New Hampshire Film Expo in Portsmouth where we'll channel our inner hero & villain in a character study workshop from 4 to 6 p.m. Earlier that day join me as I sit in on a Creative Writing Warm-up Workshop led by screenwriter & filmmaker Bill Bourdon, 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Check it out!

Saturday, November 18, 2006, from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m., I will be one of three judges for the Rochester (NH) Short Film Festival along with Mark Constance, a DGA Assistant Director, and Matthew Newton, of the NH Film Office. There's still time to enter your film of fifteen minutes or less.

Hope to see you soon. Thanks for stopping by!

(Photo above by, you guessed it: my hubby. At Cliff Island, Casco Bay, Maine. Buoy Sculpture Artist Unknown, but please feel free to identify yourself here!)