I've been pondering Jorge Luis Borges' concept of the crimson hexagon and wonder if I can somehow incorporate it into the story. I have a very peculiar feeling about the developing idea--sort of like suddenly finding myself in a ghost town that might or might not have something particularly terrifying lurking underneath.
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I pay little attention to books about writing. I might read one, and it might contain some useful information, but on the whole I feel pretty lukewarm about it. I'm naturally an analytical person (otherwise, I wouldn't be doing science for a day job!), but when it comes to writing, I totally do it by my gut.
Example: Chris Baty's book No Plot? No Problem! There are definitely some motivational passages in there and some helpful tips for newbies. But by the time that book came out, I've already been doing Nano for a couple of years. And to be honest, I'm not even sure if I would have found it helpful even if I was a newbie to Nano. Nano was never my motivation to write. I've been writing way before Baty came up with the idea.
Now this brings me to another bit of Nanowrimo related literature: NaNo for the New and the Insane by Lazette Gifford--an extremely prolific writer and poster of the Nano forums. I decided to sit down and actually read it yesterday. I think she has the right spirit of it, although I'd have to disagree with some of her methods (phase outlining, for instance, makes me cringe just thinking about it).
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There's this metaphor of marathon running to describe Nanowrimo. I don't remember whether this was written in Gifford's book or on the forums, but I was thinking that it wasn't quite accurate. The idea was that an amateur runner accepts advice from an expert runner, thus indicating that an amateur writer should accept advice from an expert writer. I'm not quite sure that's the same thing. Running is a physical, measurable sport--so that any advice would be fairly objective. Writing is both a craft and an art. If the advice is for mechanics--fine. But an expert writer can never dictate someone else's ideas or style.
I guess what I'm saying is that I find all the threads, started by people asking if "A" is okay or if "B" is not okay, annoying. Maybe it's just my own preferences talking here--I like being independent. In all aspects of my life, I just jump in and figure things out for myself. I intensely dislike people hovering over me. And I hate hovering over other people (this is probably why I don't particularly like teaching either). So for people who need lots of hand-holding--who want advice on every aspect of writing--they're almost incomprehensible to me. It's as if they want all their creativity sucked out of them.
