And so it begins . . . again.

So here it is, nearly midnight at the end of another day. Only this day marks the day I was born, some 35 years ago. I'm tempted to just stay up and play the End-Of-Daylight-Savings card, but my body doesn't give a rip about daylight savings. It KNOWS what time it is. And my kids' bodies know too. They'll be up at six, thinking it's seven. So I'll keep this fairly brief.

I heard someone say once that one day I just wouldn't care so much about birthdays, that I wouldn't want to get any older or have any desire for the hubbub and confetti and showers of affection that once accompanied the annual celebration of my emergence from the womb. And I remember thinking something to the effect of: "that person is smoking crack. And not just any crack. The really, really good crack." But, naturally, that person was right. Don't remember who that person was. If I do, I'll track them down and punch them in the face.

By the way, the point of all this is: I'm writing a novel.

In just a few short minutes, it will officially be November 1st, 2009. Which means I'm about to be the busiest recluse you'd ever want to not meet. November 1st marks the start of National Novel Writing Month (aka NaNoWriMo). NaNoWriMo is a pretty spectacular event that occurs each November. The idea is simple. Thousands of aspiring novelists like myself hunch over their keyboards, bug-eyed and salivating, typing furiously in pursuit of one common goal: to complete a 50,000 word (or longer) novel in just 30 days. It's not a contest. There are no winners or losers. It exists simply to motivate new writers who have always wanted to finish a novel but have never had any clue how to do so.

As some of you may recall, this won't be my first time. Last November was my first foray into the psychotic, caffeine-soaked world of NaNoWriMo. I started out with a very vague idea which had some promise. It was to be a novel (working title: Weight) about a high-school wrestler coming of age in rural Nebraska. I kind of liked the idea, and I thought it was perfect for NaNoWriMo. It was a new enough concept, which meant that I had no idea where it was headed, so I didn't care about writing non-stop, with no time to edit. I figured if it sucked, I'd chuck it. No big deal. So I wrote furiously every day, for hours on end. In the process, I briefly alienated my beautiful, supportive wife and forgot the names of my two children. I became surly and scraggly and twitchy. My back pulled a Quasimoto and my hands shriveled into twin writer's claws. OK, so it wasn't quite that bad. In fact, it was quite a jolly good time. Mostly. Long story short, when November 30 rolled around, I had done it. I had crossed the threshold of 50,000 words.

But my book sucked. Well, it didn't suck per se. Actually, there were some really nice passages in there, some places where the writing really sang and resonated with me, and for a while there the book seemed as though it could become something that readers like myself might actually want to read. But the novel ultimately lacked focus and direction. It meandered all over the place. Plus it was becoming far too big and clunky and autobiographical, which meant that I had violated one of my own unwritten rules: to keep myself out of the dang thing as much as possible. But writing feverishly with no time for revision will do that to you.

Soon after NaNoWriMo ended, I discovered that a couple of months later a contest for aspiring writers was taking place: The Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. This contest has only been around for a couple of years, and its purpose is to award some aspiring novelist out there with a $26,000 publishing contract and the opportunity to become the published author he or she has always dreamed of becoming. Basically, it's American Idol for books. I thought: here's my chance. I can take this big, unwieldy, embarrassingly personal book and craft it into something that will surely go in there and kick all the other little unpublished novels' skinny little tails. But I was so drained from NaNoWriMo that I decided to treat myself to a week off. Just a week to relax, work like a normal person, remember the names of my children. Then I would crack my knuckles, hunch my back and dive in for two and a half months of solid writing and revision. So I took a week off. Then I took another week off. And another. And at the start of every new week I just couldn't bring myself to face the monster again. (Note: In case you believe otherwise, let me assure you: names of novels matter. I had decided to call my book Weight, and that's exactly what it had become.) It was now late December and the submissions for the contest would have to be in during the first week of February. And I still had a ton of work to do.

Fast-forward to mid-January. I'm tired, burnt-out, and frustrated, and my novel is now longer, more autobiographical, and even more unwieldy than before. So I found myself literally on the verge of total breakdown. And that's when the tide suddenly turned. I remember it vividly. I was standing in line at the library, and there, staring me straight in the face, was the book that had won the same contest the previous year. It was a gritty, hard-boiled, Dennis Lehane-esque mystery entitled Fresh Kills. And I thought: I can do that. All I need is a plot. Something fun that I can bang out in two weeks. A short novel that moves. Fast-paced, interesting, good dialogue, and a story. So I prayed. I literally cried out to God for an idea. And two hours later, I had one. It was a Hitchockian thriller called The Inheritance, about a man who goes to his aging mobster father's mansion to kill him. It had all the elements I had been looking for. And my wife liked it. So I sat up until the wee hours typing out a quick outline. The next day, I started writing. And I loved it. The story moved, the dialogue was sharp and interesting, the characters mysterious and complex. There was even some heart to the thing. Thirteen days later, it was finished. I had actually finished a novel. Finally. I submitted it to the contest and made it through the first two rounds, then got the axe. Truth be told, I wasn't that surprised or even disappointed. I liked the book, but I had to face the facts. It wasn't wholly original, and I had written it in less than two weeks. What the experience did for me was confirm, at least for myself, that I was in fact a writer. And a pretty good one at that. In other words, I proved I could do it. Next year I would be back and I'd be back like gangbusters.

It's now 12:10 am. Next year has arrived.

So the plan is this. I'm going to start writing my new book tomorrow morning, and I want to take you along with me. This blog is going to exist, hopefully, to let you in on the writing process, and to give me a place to vent about it all. Honestly, I probably won't be writing too much here since I'll be consumed with writing the book, but I'll do my best. Plus, I plan to post excerpts, maybe even whole chapters of the book here as I go, so you can see how the novel takes shape in its rawest, unrevised state. And no, it's not either of my two previous ideas from last year. It's an idea I've carried around like a fragile little dove in my heart for the past eight years or so. It came to me in a dream, actually, and when I woke up from the dream I knew I had a fully formed book idea, one that could really become something. I won't give much of anything away yet, but I will say that a couple of real-life events have taken place (Elizabeth Smart and Jaycee Dugard, to be specific) in the years since that dream, which echo the central event of the novel. This makes me nervous, as I don't want to come off as a hack who's simply ripping off headlines. But I can't fight the sense that I just HAVE to write this book.

It is now 12:21 am. Or really 11:21 pm. Either way, I'm wasted. Tomorrow morning approacheth much too swiftly. Here's hoping you'll join me as I temporarily go completely mad. Cheers.