More explicitly...

[trinityofone]

...for those who were wondering about this, I finished my novel! (Requisite "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!") I spent all of yesterday afternoon printing it out (seriously! It took five hours! I hate our crappy printer!) and last night and this morning re-reading it for the first time. And I'm pleased to report: I don't hate it! Hurrah!

I'm going to show it to my mom once I've fixed the most glaring typos, and then I think I'll feel okay letting other people read it. But until then:

Things I learned whilst re-reading that publishing sensation-to-be, The Chambers of the Sea

-If you use the phrase "with an expression of intent concentration on her face" three times within 100 pages, people will notice.

-Girls in fake beards are hot. My current reading of War and Peace confirms this. I wrote my "girls in fake beards" scene long before I read his, but I'm glad Tolstoy and I are in agreement on this point.

-Extended jokes in Dutch are funny. Even if you don't speak Dutch.

-Sure, footnoted e-mails sound fun in concept, but have you tried formatting them lately?

-I write lyrics that would shame David Brent.

-All my characters sound kinda like me. Which means they all sound kinda like characters on Buffy.

-Voyeurism! Yay!

-If you put down the last page of your novel and think, with an impossibly wide grin on your face, "This ending is gonna make people cry!", you might want to look into revising your moral code.

And for those of you who like stats (IOW, me):

Total number of words: 118,454
Total number of pages (my computer): 443
Total number of pages (brother's computer): 424
Date started: December ? (7th, maybe?)
Date completed: June 22

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed in seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
T.S. Eliot, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"

A man dreams of leaving
But he always stays behind
U2, "Lemon"

Comments

[whiskeypants.livejournal.com]

omg i love the dutch. i cracked up over the dutch. it made me very happy.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Yay! I'm so glad! There was always a chance that that could be one of those things that amuses me and only me. ;-)

[whiskeypants.livejournal.com]

no, i literally had my phone in my hand to call you, i liked it so much. but it was too early in the morning for you.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Speaking of phone calls, I'd love to talk to you soon--about other things, too. Are you going to be around tomorrow? I have a lot of annoying family things I have to do (tonight: movie about penguins produced by parents' friend; tomorrow: uncle's birthday party) but I can try to sneak away and give you a ring.

[nenar.livejournal.com]

Yay! Congratulations on finishing it! Now, what's your next step(s)?

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Now I have to do a first edit, then show it to my mom and hope she doesn't hate it, then either make changes based on her suggestions or send it to other people to read, or both. Then, depending on what people (and, let's face it, especially my mom) think, I suppose I'll try to publish it. I'm not really sure how to go about this, but my parents' friend Jay is an author, so maybe I'll ask him.

I forgot how cute your kitty is! Aww...

[darcydodo]

If you use the phrase "with an expression of intent concentration on her face" three times within 100 pages, people will notice.

Kind of like how in The Fall of Hyperion (which I know you haven't yet read, and I'll try very hard to remember to bring it with me when I come down to LA), every time they use a nursing pack (a futuristic bottle sort of thing) for the entirety of the book, it refers to it as being "one of the very last nursing packs" or something like that. There are only so many last few whatevers. It drove me up the wall.

Trying again... (LJ hates me)

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Yeah, things like that make me batty. Even in Neverwhere, my favorite book ever, I got annoyed after about the third time Door's eyes were described as being "like shifting opals" or whatever it was.

And I'm sure I do something worse, something that I didn't even spot.

Re: Trying again... (LJ hates me)

[darcydodo]

Yes, I wondered what ^E'x{ meant, which is what got e-mailed to me as the first comment. ;)

[sonofzeal.livejournal.com]

Congrats! That's an incredible achievement.

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I hope it really is... (I am having the doubt now.)

[mhotaru.livejournal.com]

Congratulations!! You are amazing!! (coming from someone currently in Ireland who has yet to write a single page of anything... T_T ) I wanna read! I wanna read! ^__^

Seriously though, great job. I'm so happy for ya!

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Aww, thanks! (And don't worry about not writing in Ireland--if I were over there now, I'd be so starry-eyed, I'd barely be able to move, let alone write.)

My mom's going to start reading it today. If she doesn't hate it, I'll send it to other people--thanks for offering! I'd love your opinion!

[snowmanscraps.livejournal.com]

Wow! That's amazing, Anna! Congratulations =). You must be very happy and rightfully so =). I'd love to read it if you have the time to send it my way, but regardless yeay! and whee! to you =).

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much! I feeling kinda of *eek* about it now, but once my mom's finished reading it, I am going to send it to other people. I'd love to have you take a look at it. =)

[ilgattopardo.livejournal.com]

Total number of words: 118,454
Total number of pages (my computer): 443
Total number of pages (brother's computer): 424
Date started: December ? (7th, maybe?)
Date completed: June 22

Well, that is an accomplishment (for some perspective, take my dissertation: approx 2/3 the length [which, er, isn't everything, right?], started December ?, um, 2002 [officially], date completed: um...). Many congratulations!

But, like any self-respecting unemployed washed-up failed author, I can't help carping. Did you perhaps mean "voyeurism"? Good thing I wasn't your TA for French :-)

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but there's no guarantee that any of my pages make any sense, or say anything important.

(I'm having a doubty day.)

Did you perhaps mean "voyeurism"?

Yup. That's what I get for 1) not spell-checking, and 2) not reading over my own stupid post. D'oh!

Novel

[willmcpherson.livejournal.com]

Congratulations, Anna! I'd be happy to be one of your readers if you'd like to e-mail me a copy.

P.S. This, by the way, is the only thing I've written onto livejournal since I first got on the blasted thing.

Re: Novel

[trinityofone.livejournal.com]

Thanks! And good to hear from you! I'm having second thoughts about the brick of paper I produced, but if I ever decide I like it again, I'd love to have you read it. I always enjoyed your comments in class.

As for LJ...give it another chance! I find it helps if you take the time to make your journal all shiny and get pretty icons and stuff...then you can't help wanting to write in it! Although that may be just me; I have a weakness for the shininess.

Seriously, though: you can write anything and people will read it. That's a weird-cool kind of power. ;-)